The Parable of the Wedding Banquet
1Jesus spoke to them again in parables, saying: 2"The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son. 3He 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. 6The rest seized his servants, mistreated them and killed them. 7The 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. 9Go to the street corners and invite to the banquet anyone you find.' 10So the servants went out into the streets and gathered all the people they could find, both good and bad, 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'Friend,' he asked, 'how did you get in here without wedding clothes?' 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."
There is a sign outside a church that I sometimes see that makes me laugh when I see it. The sign says "Many want to serve God but only as advisers". Before we come to Christ honestly and completely in our heart we are like the wedding guest in the story above. We know that we are supposed to do what God wants us to do, but that doesn't seem like fun so we continue to go to church sometimes and even be involved in the church while we continue to live our life " in the world" outside of God's protection. Personally, I was a rock 'n' roller in my previous life. I don't know if I ever understood what God was offering to me. There are so many times in my life that I look back on now and I can see that I was being protected by God's amazing saving grace. I was that man at the wedding banquet who wouldn't put on the wedding attire for the host because what I came with was more comfortable to me. Looking back I don't know if I ever fully realized, even going to church as a child, just what it meant to have God in my life. On December 10Th of this year I will start another year in the faith. A lot of things have happened since then that I just have to thank God for letting happen. I have finally walked over to where the servants are holding my wedding outfit for me to wear. It fits me really well and I have never looked better, I have never felt better either. That doesn't mean that once I excepted Jesus into my heart that I became perfect. I let God have my best that I can give, if it is pleasing to Him then I have been successful. I want to take full advantage of the blessings that God will give me in my life. I know along the way that trials will come; I need to remember that when trials come that God is training me to be successful in the future. At that point I can have a bad time at the party or I can leave. God gave me and you and everyone else in the Universe free will, God will never force us to stay. He will stay where He is waiting for us to come to the party if we so choose. In reality if we no longer hear his invitation or hear His pleading in our lives then we have moved too far away from Him. Even the most vile unworthy creature full of sin can come back to God just by reaching, screaming out to God to come back into your life. Remember as long as we confess our sins He is merciful and just to forgive us. So why wasn't the wedding guest forgiven? He rejected the mercy and grace that was offered to him and he was cast into the fire pit at the end time to be burned up.
God bless
No comments:
Post a Comment