Isaiah is my favorite prophet. If I haven’t told you this yet, you should be aware that throughout the course of our ministry together, you will probably hear a lot of sermons on Isaiah, because I love the book of Isaiah.
So a little background before we begin. The book of Isaiah is actually three books written at three different periods in Israel’s history that were sort of cobbled together to become one book. The beginning is from the prophet Isaiah himself before the fall of Israel to the Babylonians, the later sections were probably composed by people in the Isaiahic school during and after the exile. This was totally acceptable practice; the ancient near east had very different ideas about plagiarism and authorship than we do. After a religious leader died it was considered totally appropriate for that person’s followers to continue to write and prophesy in their name. Sort of like how a ghostwriter would function now, except way more commonplace and expected. This is especially important in Isaiah because from this practice we get this beautiful prose narrative of the history of Israel, from the corruption of the heights of power, through the downfall and exile, and into the freedom of the restored Jerusalem. It is a book that, more than any other, tells how God stays with God’s people throughout all darkness and leads them into freedom.
Isaiah can mostly be read chronologically, with the beginning the warnings before the fall, the middle the period of exile, and the end the restoration of Jerusalem. But because centuries of editors have played with the text, throughout each of the sections are these snapshots of the promised reign of glory, moments of hope amidst the chaos. Our first reading for this morning is one of those moments.
This beautiful pronouncement of hope, of how the Lord is a refuge to the poor, a shelter in the storm, a doer of wondrous things. Of how the Lord will set a feast of rich foods and well-aged wines, and how death will be swallowed up forever. All of this comes in the middle of a pronouncement of judgment upon the earth. If you read chapter 24 you’ll notice that this reading stands out as in sharp contrast with the doom and gloom that surround it. Things will be dark, the book of Isaiah says. Things will be dark and hard and scary. Israel will fall. Violence will reign. But don’t be afraid. Don’t be afraid when you look around and God seems very far away. Don’t be afraid when the world seems out of control and all you see is darkness. Don’t be afraid, because God has done wondrous things. Don’t be afraid because God is preparing a feast. The day we have waited for will come, and on the mountain of the Lord we will rejoice in this promise. So, the book of Israel proclaims, “let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.”
The beautiful feast imagery in Isaiah, “of rich foods [and] well-aged wines, of rich foods filled with marrow, [and] well-aged wines strained clear,” a feast at which God “will wipe away the tears from all faces [and] swallow up death forever” seems to both compliment and challenge to our gospel this morning, this very strange parable Jesus told the chief priests and elders. So to see what these two readings might be having to tell us, let’s first take a look at some of the absurdities in this parable story.
Jesus said, “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a banquet for his son.” Now that seems to line up alright. The kingdom of heaven as a banquet feast, “a feast of rich foods,” of foods fit for a king. But here’s where the parable gets strange. The king sets the feast, but no one will come. Here’s the thing, when the king invites you to a banquet, you clear your schedule. You don’t not go the king’s banquet, you just don’t. But these guests, they don’t go. So the king again sends messengers to tell the guests, look, everything’s ready, the food’s set, come to the party. But still the guests won’t come. So the king burns down his own city. Ransacks it, destroys it, leaves it in a heap of smoldering ash. I’ve read enough fantasy novels to know that storybook kings sometimes do weird things, but burn their own city to the ground? Seems like some pretty poor decision-making.
So then, now that the city is destroyed, the king sort of nonchalantly sends the messengers back out to find anyone who survived the rampage to invite them to the party. Two things strike me about verses eight and nine here. First the callousness of the king in verse eight, “The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy.” Such an offhand remark to explain the destruction of a city. And second, the surprising openness of verse nine, “Go, therefore into the main streets, and invite everyone you find to the wedding banquet.” In sudden sharp contrast, now the feast is open to all. Suddenly we see a banquet that sounds like the elaborate feast described in Isaiah. The oxen are slaughtered, the dinner is prepared, and everyone, good and bad, is invited. The doors are flung wide, the party is at hand, come and taste the feast prepared. Which is some pretty great news. The kingdom of heaven is open to everyone. All are welcome at the banquet feast of the Lord.
And as a preacher, it would be so nice if Jesus stopped talking here. But he didn’t. The story takes one last weird turn for us. Because then we discover that the king came into the party and discovered one of his guests was not wearing the proper clothing. Which, considering all of the guests were just picked up out of the rubble of a destroyed city and brought with no prior information to the wedding, seems not all that unlikely. It actually seems pretty amazing that only one guy was not properly outfitted for a wedding, that the banquet wasn’t entirely made up of people in sooty, smoke-stained street clothes. Then the king has the man bound hand and foot and thrown into the outer darkness, “where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth,” a phrase that Matthew’s Gospel is uniquely focused on. For, says the end of the parable, “many are called, but few are chosen.”
This parable has a hard edge and takes a dark turn. Read like we often read parables, with God playing the role of the king, it’s hard to quite know what to do with it. I think part of what’s going on here is strife within Matthew’s own community. The struggle between Jesus and the religious leaders over authority is the same struggle between the religious leaders and the followers of Jesus that the people of Matthew’s community saw lived out day after day as they tried to make sense of the world after Jesus death and resurrection, after the Temple had fallen. Stories such as this one reminded them that Jesus too had struggled with close-minded religious leaders, and that Jesus had harsh words for such people.
And there is wisdom and guidance in that. But we read this parable from a different place than Matthew’s community. We read it not as an oppressed minority reeling from the destruction of the temple. We read it as Jesus disciples hear it, as a radical promise that God invites everyone to the banquet, good and bad, because God is a God of radical welcome and expansive love. So, because we read it from a different place, I want to wonder with you for a bit about what this parable might mean for us from the point of view of different characters. How might it change how we understand the banquet feast?
What if the king is not God, but the religious leaders? What if the feast is set, the banquet is thrown, but because of the king’s exclusivity, he still ends up dining alone. Yes he threw open the doors to everyone, but still there were hidden restrictions, laws and codes in place for who was welcome. Eventually, such barriers will end in the same place, a banquet set for an empty room. How does this parable then challenge us to question our own hospitality? What barriers might we still have up in truly believing that the feast is set for all?
Or what if the failure of the man dressed incorrectly was not his inability to wear the proper clothing, but his hesitation to enter fully into the joy of the feast. After all, if everyone else was dressed in wedding robes, clearly the possibility was out there that he too could have become properly attired. What if his problem was a failure to party? And so, by standing arms crossed at the edge of the party, afraid to truly let his guard down and have a good time, lest he look the fool, he missed out on the celebration entirely? How might this parable challenge us to consider our own joy? Is our faith fun? Something we engage because it brings a smile to our faces and a dance to our steps? Or to we approach a life of faith more as a life of obligation? We’re here to check the box off of “good person,” to fill the slot of our resume, but in doing so we forget that in the end this is a banquet, and we are called to dance. How might we be being challenged to bring more joy, more laughter, more downright silliness into this world?
This parable asks hard questions of us. It ends in a place with no clear answers and frightening challenges. But here’s the good news, sisters and brothers, even in the midst of our questions, in the midst of our shortcomings, and failures to welcome, still the feast is set. So come to this table with your questions. Come feeling unwelcoming or unwelcome. Come overfull or underdressed. Come filled with joy or cautious in fear. Come to a foretaste of the rich foods, of the well-aged wines strained clear. Come with your questions unanswered, knowing that such questions and wondering can only bring us closer to the heart of God, who promises in the midst of all our fears and doubts, to rest God’s holy hand upon this mountain. Amen.
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