Matthew 22: 1-14

Matthew 22: 1-14

This is a parable that is similar to the ones in Matthew 21, Mat 21:28-32, Mat 21: 33-46  The wedding feast is offering the Kingdom of Heaven for those that believe in Jesus as their savior

Mat 22:1 Jesus spoke to them again in parables, saying, Mat 22:2 "The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son. Mat 22:3 "And he sent out his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding feast, and they were unwilling to come.

The slaves are the pastors and Missionaries or even you and I if we are spreading the word of God. When it refers to those that “paid no attention” he is referring to the unsaved, it could even be the three peats, you know the people that come to church on Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter. They really have not bought into Christianity but it looks good to others.

Mat 22:4 "Again he sent out other slaves saying, 'Tell those who have been invited, "Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and my fattened livestock are all butchered and everything is ready; come to the wedding feast."' Mat 22:5 "But they paid no attention and went their way, one to his own farm, another to his business, Mat 22:6 and the rest seized his slaves and mistreated them and killed them.

Now we just entered into a more serious area. The missionaries are killed of Christians are persecuted and killed. This would be like what is going on with the Islamic terrorists.

Mat 22:7 "But the king was enraged, and he sent his armies and destroyed those murderers and set their city on fire. Mat 22:8 "Then he *said to his slaves, 'The wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy. Mat 22:9 'Go therefore to the main highways, and as many as you find there, invite to the wedding feast.' Mat 22:10 "Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered together all they found, both evil and good; and the wedding hall was filled with dinner guests.

We are now invited if you are a gentile or messianic Jew. It does say good people and bad people however. The good people are those that have accepted Jesus as their savior. You can guess which ones are the bad.

Mat 22:11 "But when the king came in to look over the dinner guests, he saw a man there who was not dressed in wedding clothes, Mat 22:12 and he *said to him, 'Friend, how did you come in here without wedding clothes?' And the man was speechless. Mat 22:13 "Then the king said to the servants, 'Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.' Mat 22:14 "For many are called, but few are chosen."

If you haven’t put it together yet this parable is about the end of time when Jesus comes to save us. Isa_25:6-8; Eze_39:17-24; Rev_19:17-21. As gruesome as these parables sound we need to take warnings seriously. Think about what is being said here and if you are one of the “bad people” you may what to reconsider.

Agape
Dave

ASTERISKS are used to mark verbs that are historical presents in the Greek which have been translated with an English past tense in order to conform to modern usage.  The translators recognized that in some contexts the present tense seems more unexpected and unjustified to the English reader than a past tense would have been.  But Greek authors frequently used the present tense for the sake of heightened vividness, thereby transporting their readers in imagination to the actual scene at the time of occurrence. However, the translators felt that it would be wise to change these historical presents to English past tenses