Exploring the Text: What's with the wedding garment?
In this parable, there is a man at the wedding feast who does not have an appropriate wedding garment. When the king finds him and confronts him, the man has nothing to say for himself and the king has him ejected from the wedding. At first glance, this seems a little harsh. Why is the man punished so harshly just because he doesn't have the right clothes on? What if he couldn't afford them? What if he didn't have time to go home and change after work? These are a couple of questions we might rightly ask about this man in the parable. There are a couple of things that we might be missing, however.
Jesus is telling this story in front of the scribes and Pharisees. It is part of a confrontation Jesus is having with them after entering Jerusalem. This is the third parable he tells that directly relates to them. When we take this parable out of context, we may miss what he is saying to them. The second thing that we miss is a cultural issue. The king sent his servants out to find people to come to the wedding feast. They were not the first ones to be invited, but the A-list guests dishonored the king by rejecting his invitation, so he sent his servants to invite anyone they could find. These are all brought directly to the party. When they got to the party, they would have been provided with a wedding garment by the kings servants at the door. That was the custom of the time. This man who does not have a wedding garment either came in another way, or he rejected the garment the king provided and insisted on wearing his own. Either way, he was trying to be part of the wedding on his own terms, not on the king's.
This is the point Jesus was making with the scribes and Pharisees, and ultimately with us. To enter the kingdom of God, we must do it on his terms, not on ours. We must be clothed in his righteousness, not our own. There is great freedom in this because our relationship with God, our being part of his kingdom, depends on him and on the grace, forgiveness, mercy, and righteousness he provides for us, not on the righteousness we can manufacture on our own. After all, he provides the wedding garment, all we have to do is accept it.
David Dalton
In this parable, there is a man at the wedding feast who does not have an appropriate wedding garment. When the king finds him and confronts him, the man has nothing to say for himself and the king has him ejected from the wedding. At first glance, this seems a little harsh. Why is the man punished so harshly just because he doesn't have the right clothes on? What if he couldn't afford them? What if he didn't have time to go home and change after work? These are a couple of questions we might rightly ask about this man in the parable. There are a couple of things that we might be missing, however.
Jesus is telling this story in front of the scribes and Pharisees. It is part of a confrontation Jesus is having with them after entering Jerusalem. This is the third parable he tells that directly relates to them. When we take this parable out of context, we may miss what he is saying to them. The second thing that we miss is a cultural issue. The king sent his servants out to find people to come to the wedding feast. They were not the first ones to be invited, but the A-list guests dishonored the king by rejecting his invitation, so he sent his servants to invite anyone they could find. These are all brought directly to the party. When they got to the party, they would have been provided with a wedding garment by the kings servants at the door. That was the custom of the time. This man who does not have a wedding garment either came in another way, or he rejected the garment the king provided and insisted on wearing his own. Either way, he was trying to be part of the wedding on his own terms, not on the king's.
This is the point Jesus was making with the scribes and Pharisees, and ultimately with us. To enter the kingdom of God, we must do it on his terms, not on ours. We must be clothed in his righteousness, not our own. There is great freedom in this because our relationship with God, our being part of his kingdom, depends on him and on the grace, forgiveness, mercy, and righteousness he provides for us, not on the righteousness we can manufacture on our own. After all, he provides the wedding garment, all we have to do is accept it.
David Dalton