“Welcoming the Lost”

Scripture: Matthew 22:1-14

What if you threw a party for your closest friends and no one came? You put hours into the planning to make sure that everything is perfect, you hire the best caterer in town, you send out invitations to hundreds of people you have known for years, and when the RSVPs begin to come back, every one has the box checked that says “Sorry – unable to attend”.
But this party can’t be cancelled. It is a celebration of the joining together of your son and his brand new bride! How could you possibly cancel an event that has this much significance and has been in the making for so many years?

Read Matthew 22:1-3

So you send a personal message to each one, carried by your most trusted servants, pleading with each of your friends to please reschedule their activities, as their presence and witness at the wedding feast is so very important to you.

Read Matthew 22:4-7

An old story tells of a company attempting to start a new pension plan, which required 100% participation. Every employee signed up except one. No amount of argument or persuasion could get this person to change his mind. Finally, the president of the company called the man into his office.
“Here is a copy of the proposed pension plan and here is a pen”, he said. “Sign up or you're fired.” Whereupon the man immediately picked up the pen and signed his name. The president of the company then said, “I don't understand why you refused to sign until now. What was the problem?”
The man replied, “You're the first person who explained it to me clearly.”
- Homeletics OnLine

In Jesus’ parable, the king took a position that brought the invitation into perspective – “I offer you the opportunity to join me in rejoicing with my son, and not only won’t you come, not only are you ignoring my pleas, but then you have the audacity to treat my messengers brutally! You are no longer my people!”

Now before anyone thinks that these actions are all totally out of control, remember that we need to look at the situation from God’s perspective. What was Jesus really telling the people?

For many years, Israel had been trying to make their own way in the world, without paying their God any homage whatsoever. Many had begun to worship any god that happened to be convenient. Many had given their allegiance to Rome instead of to Jehovah. Many were out to make a buck on the backs of their brothers and sisters. Many were striving to gain prestige and power for themselves, and would give nothing of worth to those in need unless it brought them personal gain.
And God was telling them “If you don’t want to be my people, if you don’t want to celebrate with me, if you intend to continue to reject my blessings and my desires for your life, then I’ll find someone who will!”

Read Matthew 22:8-10

So what do you do when your closest friends won’t come to your celebration? You find others who will!

The servants in the parable have real world counterparts. Evangelism used to be an integral part of the Methodist tradition, although over the years we have begun to slide away from this vital issue. But evangelists still appear to us in many ways - as missionaries, as ministers, as preachers, as everyday Christians who are always ready to share their love of Christ with a neighbor. And as men and women who chose to be servants of the Risen Christ, we have an obligation to serve as He calls us, not as we want. Without this surrender to the Lord’s will, one of two things is going to happen.
First, if we should all decide to take the same tact in our service, we will be stumbling over each other, with none of us able to accomplish a single thing.
Second, as a result of choosing our own path, we will, undoubtedly, be walking away from Christ and not with Him, and we will no longer be His servants.

But the parable also tells us that with this final invitation to those who were “outsiders”, the room was filled. Some were “good” and some were “bad”, but all were welcomed to the banquet. But with the room being filled nearly to overflowing, how would the servants be able to tell who should be allowed to stay? After all, shouldn’t they keep the “bad”, the riffraff, the dregs out? As we read a little further in the parable, we discover the answer.

Read Matthew 22:11-14

It wasn’t the servants who did the separating – it was the King. As the Lord’s servants, we are charged with inviting and serving, with witnessing and ministering, not with the judging of who is dressed properly and who is not. We simply offer the “marriage clothing” of Christ to all, and each “invitee” must make the commitment to “put Him on” for themselves.

One of the greatest stumbling blocks in Christianity is this very issue of “Welcoming”. All too often, we want to get selective, we want to be the ones to decide who is prepared for heaven and who isn’t. Unfortunately, when we do this, we negate the generosity of Christ, who has extended the invitation to His glorious banquet to all – to the “good” and to the “bad”. And the Good News is that we don’t have to decide if the good are good enough, or if the bad are too bad. We are to just carry the invitation, and let the generosity of Christ be perfectly evident in us!

Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia was well known for his generosity and his love of the citizens of New York City. One bitterly cold night in January of 1935, the mayor turned up at a night court that served the poorest ward of the city. LaGuardia dismissed the judge for the evening and took over the bench himself. Within a few minutes, a tattered old woman was brought before him, charged with stealing a loaf of bread. She told LaGuardia that her daughter's husband had deserted her, her daughter was sick and her grandchildren were starving. But the shopkeeper, from whom the bread was stolen, refused to drop the charges. 'It's a bad neighborhood, your Honor,' the man told the mayor. 'She's got to be punished to teach other people around here a lesson.'

LaGuardia sighed. He turned to the woman and said 'I've got to punish you ... The law makes no exceptions - $10 or ten days in jail.' But even as he pronounced sentence, the mayor was already reaching into his pocket. He extracted a bill and tossed it into his famous sombrero saying:
“Here's the $10.00 fine which I now remit; and furthermore I'm going to fine everyone in this courtroom 50 cents for living in a town where a person has to steal bread so that her grandchildren can eat. Mr. Bailiff, collect the fines and give them to the defendant.”

So the following day the New York City newspapers reported that $47.50 was turned over to a bewildered old lady who had stolen a loaf of bread to feed her starving grandchildren, 50 cents of that amount being contributed by the red-faced grocery store owner, while some 70 petty criminals, people with traffic violations, and New York City policemen, each of whom had just paid fifty cents for the privilege of doing so, gave the mayor a standing ovation.

--James N. McCutcheon, The Righteous and the Good. Best Sermons 1, ed. James W. Cox
(San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1988), 238-39.

We have all been judged guilty of sin, but God Himself, in the person of Jesus Christ, has paid our penalty with His own Blood, and has now invited us to His banquet feast. And all that we are asked to do is to accept the invitation, and then to share whatever gifts God has given us with those who are still starving for His salvation.
We have all been blessed by being accepted as servants of God. But when was the last time we gave Him a standing and energetic ovation? It’s about time, don’t you think?

(At this point, all were invited to stand, applaude, shout out praises - anything to give God the glory, and we all did!

We need to welcome the “lost”, the “bad”, the outcast with just as much enthusiasm – and don’t worry about the “saved” – they are already in the Lord’s embrace. Give the world Jesus today!