The Parable of the Wedding Banquet
By: Yap Tat Yeen
Tags: Righteousness, Parable, Weddings, Darkness, Clothes

This parable told by Jesus is recorded in the book of Matthew, chapter 22 verses 2 to 14:

(2)“The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son. (3)He sent his servants to those who had been invited to the banquet to tell them to come, but they refused to come. (4)“Then he sent some more servants and said, ‘Tell those who have been invited that I have prepared my dinner: My oxen and fattened cattle have been butchered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding banquet.’ (5)“But they paid no attention and went off — one to his field, another to his business. (6)The rest seized his servants, mistreated them and killed them. (7)The king was enraged. He sent his army and destroyed those murderers and burned their city.

(8)“Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding banquet is ready, but those I invited did not deserve to come. (9)So go to the street corners and invite to the banquet anyone you find.’ (10)So the servants went out into the streets and gathered all the people they could find, the bad as well as the good, and the wedding hall was filled with guests. (11)“But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing wedding clothes. (12)He asked, ‘How did you get in here without wedding clothes, friend?’ The man was speechless. (13)“Then the king told the attendants, ‘Tie him hand and foot, and throw him outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ (14)“For many are invited, but few are chosen.”

The main character in this parable is the king. This king has a beloved son, who is mentioned only one time in the entire story. Although the background occasion of the parable is the wedding banquet of the prince, the protagonist in it is the king.

The king organises a wedding banquet for his son. He spares no expense to make it a grand celebration. He has an invite list, and has sent the invitation to these invited guests. No one may come who is not invited. What an honour and privilege it must be to be invited by the king to his son’s wedding banquet.

But the invitees did not want to come! Not just some, but all of them, refused to come. They have all received the invitation, and none did an RSVP. Despite this insult, the king sends his servants to tell the invited guests to please come when the wedding banquet was at hand. The servants return to inform the king that the guests refused to come.

The king loves his son too much to have no guests turn up at the wedding banquet. So he sends more servants to the invited guests — they go knocking on the doors of the invitees, beseeching them to please come. The king is so desirous that they come, that he even teaches his servants what to say — the servants are to tell them of the wonderful feast the king has prepared in his son’s honour, and in the guests’ honour. All is ready, only guests are awaited.

One would think the invitees will oblige to show up for the banquet. After all, the king is the highest authority in the land, and they ought to render unto him some respect. But they don’t. They pay no attention to the king’s servants, and ostensibly turn to tend to other matters (seemingly of greater importance than the king’s invitation) even as the king’s servants are still talking to them.

The king’s servants persevere in the assignment to ask the invitees to please come to the banquet. This costs them their lives. The story tells us that the invitees seize the servants, mistreat them and kill them. This is a clear show of defiance against the king, and not merely that, it is an act of aggression against the king and his kingdom.

What does the king do? When news returns to him that his servants have been tortured and killed by the people he is inviting to his son’s wedding banquet, he is super angry. The king sends his army to destroy the murderers and burn their city. When the king decides to act by use of force, it is a fearsome thing for those who would face the brunt of it.

This punishment ought not to have been a surprise to anyone who dares to defy the king and to kill his messengers. Perhaps the people had thought that there was not going to be any adverse consequences to them to disregard the king and his servants, and to do as they pleased and as they were capable of to the servants. Perhaps the king had all along been gracious to them, and they took this to be sign of the king’s weakness. Perhaps they felt that a strong king would simply command instead of ‘invite’.

With the rebels wiped out, the king tells his servants that those he had invited did not deserve to come. The king is not going to cancel or delay his beloved son’s wedding banquet. He does not want the banquet to be without guests, and so he tells his servants to go out to the street corners and invite anyone they can find — the king’s invitation to his son’s wedding banquet is now open to everyone!

And so, the servants go out to bring in anyone they can find, without finding fault with anyone — the ‘good’ and ‘bad’ alike are invited. If you and I were there, we would be invited!

With this, the wedding hall is filled with guests. It must be quite a surreal experience, to suddenly find themselves in such an august celebration. Here they are, even if they might think themselves unworthy of the king’s invitation. (There really was no need for them to be too concerned, for those whom the king originally invited were not worthy anyway!) Anyway, the choicest food they might ever taste is here at the banquet, and what a privilege it is to be able to partake of it.

The king arrives to meet the guests. He notices that there is a man there who is not in ‘wedding clothes’. Curious, the king speaks to him and asks how he got in without having on wedding clothes. The king’s question seems to have been asked in a friendly tone, for he addressed the man as ‘friend’. When the king asks a question, an answer is expected. But the man speaks nothing.

We are not told in the story who this man is. Is he the only one in the entire banquet who did not don ‘wedding clothes’? As the guests had been invited in from the streets and were not likely to have had much time to prepare themselves before the appointed time, the guests likely were supplied wedding clothes to wear to attend the banquet. This could be why everyone is, and is expected to be, wearing wedding clothes.

The king is surprised at this man who does not have on wedding clothes. And so he asks him about it. The man could have said he was not given wedding clothes to wear. The man could have said he wasn’t aware that there was a dress code. The man could have said the wedding clothes did not fit him but he still desired to join in the celebration of the prince’s wedding. The man could have been apologetic. But the story says he does not say a word — he is speechless.

He is probably aware of the dress code — after all, every other guest has on wedding clothes. He was probably given wedding clothes to wear but chose not to wear them. He probably isn’t all that interested in the celebration itself. He might have been one of the original invitees who had thumbed his nose at the invitation and had gone off to attend to his field or his business (he had not murdered the king’s servants, and hence he was not killed by the king). Whatever the case is, he does not reply the king.

The king then orders his attendants to bind the man hand and foot and throw him out. He is not invited out — he is shackled and manhandled. Unlike the wedding hall where celebration happens, the place where the man is cast is ‘darkness’ and is filled with weeping and gnashing of teeth. The description of this place is cryptic, but it is most certainly a place of regret.

The king then says, “For many are invited, but few are chosen.”

This is the point of the parable. Jesus tells the story as an illustration of the kingdom of heaven. The kingdom of heaven is like this. The king in the story represents God. He invites people to a celebration dear to his heart. The people invited need to decide whether to accept or to decline the invitation. Choosing to decline is most certainly the wrong response. There are people who might prefer to not receive an invitation, to be passed over by the king, or God.

Those who have chosen to attend the wedding are to put on wedding clothes. These clothes are supplied by the king. The wedding clothes represent the righteousness of Jesus Christ. The Bible says: This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood — to be received by faith. (Romans 3:22–25). Only guests clothed with the righteousness of Christ are welcome at the banquet.

Where do you find yourself in the story?

Are you among those who might not have been invited? Would you like to be invited? Note that the second round of invitation by the king had gone out to folk at street corners, and people who turn up at the banquet hall need not have their names on a guest list. Having heard the good news of the king’s invitation to all, you can just turn up.

Are you among those who turned their back on the invitation, and who went off in other directions? You could still come to the banquet — the king has not rescinded the invitation or his grace.

Are you attending the banquet without having put on wedding clothes? You may be in the company of a church or a fellowship of Christians, but have not put on the righteousness of Christ which is received by faith. If this describes you, the best decision you can make now is to believe in Jesus Christ as your Saviour and Lord, and you can be assured that you are welcome here in God’s kingdom.

Many are invited but few are chosen. We would want to make sure we are invited to the kingdom of heaven, and then to make sure that we are indeed chosen to be there. By accepting the invitation conveyed by God’s messengers, and by making the conscious decision to believe in Jesus Christ, we can be absolutely sure that we are accepted in the kingdom of heaven.