According to Brides magazine, the average bridal gown in the United States costs between $1,800 and $2,400. But the wedding dresses of royalty operate on a whole other level. Kate Middleton’s dress as she wed Prince William with hand-cut lace from the Royal School of Needlework, cost $400,000 to make. Duchess of Sussex, Meghan Markle’s silk Cady dress cost $265,000. When Marie-Chantal Miller married Crown Prince Pavlos of Greece, the dress took 25 seamstresses and more than four months of meticulous handwork to complete. Designed by Spanish couturier Manuel Pertegaz, the gown of Queen Letizia of Spain cost upwards of $8 million with intricate gold-thread embroidery.
Weddings call for unique and special attire and all the right protocols. In the parable, one wedding guest is not dressed for the feast. The wedding robes were garments given to each guest as they walked in. The host fully prepares everyone to be dressed in the expected attire. But one guest hasn’t complied with the proper dress code.
Imagine being the wedding guest without dress clothes, out of place, and then literally outside the party. If jeans are not allowed or collared shirts are required, that leaves some uneasy or uninvited. Sometimes I get asked about the dress code for worship, yet God is more concerned with the heart than any outward appearance. As we seek to give our best, the church is a place hopefully from God’s own nature that embraces vulnerabilities and honesty and a belonging in our love for one another.
One traditional interpretation of Jesus’ parable is that the king in the parable is God. The son/bridegroom is Jesus. The wedding feast is the great Messianic banquet at the end of time. The rejected and/or murdered slaves are the Old Testament prophets. The guests who turn down the invitation to the wedding feast are the Israelites, God’s chosen ones. And the guests who fill the hall at the last minute are us – the Gentiles.
But if God is the king, this God is monstrous, to quote one commentator: “petty, vengeful, hotheaded and thin-skinned.” The king “burns an entire city to the ground,” “forces people to celebrate his son’s marriage while his armies wreak destruction right outside.” And then casts the guest not wearing the right clothing into outer darkness. Parables can have many interpretations, and surely the parable asks for some better interpretations.
It makes more sense to me that the king represents evil, rich, greedy rulers. And the one forced out—for not wearing the correct marriage robe— is the Christ—thrust into the outer darkness of death. From last week’s Gospel: “the stone the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone.”
In Isaiah’s vision from the first reading, there is a shroud of death cast over the nations and peoples. But in the glorious vision, God hosts a feast for all people with rave reviews, with the best, aged wine possible and rich, satisfying food.
Maybe the point is that in Jesus, God flings wide the doors and everyone is a guest to a royal party. Not in some distant future afterlife, but here and now. The Holy One invites us all to be honored guests. God’s invitation isn’t just to come to church. God’s invitation for all is the banquet of life – eternal. God’s got a party going on, so throw on your party clothes and get on the dance floor.
But what will you wear? Did you get in your RSVP? Be sure to send in your thank-you and don’t forget to bring your card or gift. The seating chart ensures that old animosities don’t flare. Miss Manors keeps etiquette in place for good social skills. But maybe we need a couple thousand dollar wardrobe of hand knitted gold threads – thankfully.
The Scriptures uproot the rules and confuse the standards. The feast in Psalm 23 calls for enemies sitting across from one another. Euodia and Syntyche in the second reading lift up fortunate and prosperous women (that’s what their names mean) who have been in a public tiff with one another to be reconciled. And from prison, Paul calls not for a pity party but for rejoicing, peace and thanksgiving. Paul declares that God looks not at our outward appearances but at the heart of purity, truth and justice.
Here is a feast. The invitation is for you this day. And for all longing for good news. Come to the banquet, the feast of the universe. Amid your deepest worries, come and celebrate God’s dream of a world where death and evil are destroyed.
Sara Miles writes: “One early, cloudy morning when I was forty-six, I walked into a church, ate a piece of bread, took a sip of wine. This was my first communion. It changed everything. The mysterious sacrament turned out to be not a symbolic wafer at all but actual food—indeed, the bread of life. I realized that what I’d been doing with my life all along was what I was meant to do: feed people. And so I did. I took communion, I passed the bread to others, and then I kept going, compelled to find new ways to share what I’d experienced. I started a food pantry and gave away literally tons of fruit and vegetables and cereal around the same altar where I’d first received the body of Christ. I organized new pantries all over my city to provide hundreds and hundreds of hungry families with free groceries each week. . . . Holy communion knocked me upside down and forced me to deal with the impossible reality of God.”
God throws a feast both now and at the end of time. At the communion table we imagine, we celebrate, we take into our bodies this meal that strengthens us when we can’t go on. This banquet that unites us with the people of God across generations and geography. The meal as a sign of God’s victory over death and evil in God’s faithfulness, whatever life may bring.
You have put on Christ. You are dressed and ready for the ongoing feast of life. God does not enforce this dress code or punish us as the king in today’s parable. Instead, God invites us over and over again to be present, to share in joy with others, to be engaged in the abundant life God offers. When God is the host, the food is rich beyond our imagination or understanding. When God is the host, we are nourished not just for this hour in the morning, but for always. And when God is the host, everyone gets the same gift: undeserved and inexhaustible love and grace. Taste and see the goodness of God.
