If you received a special invitation to attend the wedding of a loved one who is dear to you, and there was no reason why you couldn't attend, would you refuse to go? Here's what another person had to say concerning such a situation.
“I got an invitation in the mail this morning. It's to my niece's wedding. I remember her birth like it was yesterday. I was one of her sponsors at her baptism. I watched her grow up into a beautiful and intelligent young lady. Now she's getting married and wants me to be there. Something is tugging at my heart. It's an invitation I can't refuse.”
I would say that person had good reason to attend the wedding of one who was close to him. And I'm sure he went, as I think all of us would under similar circumstances.
But there is an invitation like this which many people refuse; in fact the majority rejects it. It is God's invitation, His special invitation that He sends to all people. “You are invited,” He tells us, “to spend time and eternity with me at a heavenly banquet. It's given in honor of my Son who made this possible for you, paying the price for your entrance here. I'm expecting you. Come.”
It's an invitation that ought to tug at everyone's heart, but so many refuse to come. Why? What's wrong? Maybe it's God's fault. Maybe He didn't do enough; maybe He isn't trying hard enough to get them there. Do you really believe that to be true?
Have you ever prepared an important dinner, maybe a special celebration for someone close to you - something really special? Did you not try with all your might to make it the best celebration, the best dinner that you could? And then you sent out the invitations and very few came. How would you have felt if someone had told you that a lot of people didn't come to it because you didn't try hard enough? Would that be true? No! You did all that you could. The people just didn't want to come.
And so it is with God, as our text points out today. Let's look again at His invitation to each of us. It's an invitation that ought to tug at our hearts. It's an invitation that I cannot refuse, yes, dare not refuse to my eternal peril. May God the Holy Spirit graciously guide us to see Why We Can't Refuse God's Invitation. It involves 3 truths about His character. He's loving, angry, merciful.
I. God is loving; He wants us to be there.
Jesus got at that in our text by telling the parable of a king who had prepared a great banquet for his son. The king prepared an elaborate feast. Then he sent out his servants with invitations. But the people refused to come.
Now, a parable always parallels something in our lives. So, what's the real story behind this parable?
The king, of course, is God. The wedding banquet is eternal life. The son is Jesus. The servants are God's spokesmen, Christian men and women of every age in time. They invite people to the heavenly banquet that God has prepared for the whole world. But to some God's invitation doesn't matter. They refuse to come.
Yet God is patient with these people, maybe even more patient than you and I would be. If someone flat out refused an invitation to a special dinner that we sent them, we probably wouldn't give them a second chance. Would you send another invitation to someone who already refused to come, begging them to reconsider: “Oh, please, please, I want you to be there!” We probably wouldn't do that if they refused the first time. But that is exactly what God appears to do with His invitation. It says that after those who were invited refused the first time, “He sent some more servants and said, ‘Tell those who have been invited that I have prepared my dinner…and everything is ready. Come to the wedding banquet.”
How different He is. God is loving, isn't He. He really wants people to be there. God sends an invitation; He gets a refusal; then He sends the invitation again. Perhaps He thinks, “They just don't get it. They don't understand what's at stake. We're talking eternity here – either eternal life with me or eternal death apart from me. If they don't come, they'll be damned forever.” So He patiently, lovingly invites them again. Maybe they'll change their minds and come since it is obvious that He really wants them to be there.
But they don't come; they don't want to be there. Why not? Some have no interest whatsoever. Other are simply too busy with themselves. One has to take care of his fields while the sun is shining. Another has to tend to his business so he can make money. Others get downright criminal. They seize the servants with the invitations, abuse them, misuse them, and kill them.
As Jesus is telling this little story, He is first of all thinking about His own people, the Jews. Not only had they declined His gracious invitation, but they had persecuted and killed many of the
prophets and later the apostles that He sent to them. Think of John the Baptist being beheaded and Stephen being stoned to death. Though He sent servant after servant to them, showing them how much He really wanted them to be there , His own people refused.
But Jesus in no wise limits this to the Jews. What about the Gentiles, what about us modern-day people, all of whom He wants, all to whom He has sent His invitation in His Word? How many over the eons of time have sent Him their regrets? They're just too busy, too concerned with themselves to bother with Him. How sad that has to make Him.
After being treated like this for so long, throughout the history of the world, who could blame God for giving up? But He doesn't and the fact that we are here today listening to His Word is evidence that His invitation still goes forth. He doesn't withhold it from us. Why not? Because God is love; He really wants us to be there. And that's the first reason Why We Cannot Refuse the Invitation. His love tugs at our hearts.
II. God is angry; He means business.
His love tugs at everyone's heart; yet, so many reject it. That's a dangerous position into which many people place themselves – God's love tugging, but they continue rejecting it. It's dangerous because God is not only a loving God; He can also be an angry God who really means business.
In the parable Jesus said that the king was outraged at those who rejected his invitation the second time and killed his messengers. He was so angry that he sent his army to destroy them.
Again, the king, of course, is God. Here Jesus portrays God as angry. He is angry at sinners. Not just at their sins, mind you, but at sinners.
So often you hear people say that God loves the sinner, but hates the sin, as though one can separate the act from the person. Perhaps you've even said something similar to that. But beware, dear friends of overstating that, for here it is obvious that God not only abhors the act of rejecting His invitation, but He is angry at the person who did it. He is angry at sin and the sinner. He is angry because He has provided an escape for sinners through Christ but they have refused it. He's bent over backwards and invited them twice. Yet they've passed off the invitation casually, even criminally. No wonder God's angry. Sin makes Him angry with me. This is such a hard concept to get across to people. If people don't believe that there is a God, they couldn't care less about this. But if people believe there is a God, it so often seems that they naturally want to think that God is only merciful, and they so easily pass over His anger. They may say something like, “Yes, I've done this or that wrong. But, God will overlook it and quickly forgives. What else can He do? After all, I've got more good points to me than bad.” But without faith in Christ, God is still angry with them.
This is a hard concept to get across. Sometimes it's hard to get across to us, too. We have heard so often that God is loving and forgiving that we are tempted to ignore the other side of the coin – that God is also angry with us in our sin. Yes, each of us.
“How can that be?” we might ask. “We go to church. We believe the right things. We bring our offerings.” Don't you see how arguments like this sound just like the unbelieving world? What are we pointing at when we answer like that? We're pointing at ourselves, not Christ.
Neither the sinful world nor the sinful Christian is ready yet for God's mercy. If we continue on in our sin we are still under His wrath. The Bible is full of examples of this: Adam and Eve, the people at the time of the Great Flood, the builders of the Tower of Babel, Pharaoh, those who worshipped the golden calf, the Jews to whom Jesus spoke this parable.
Sometimes we can even see His anger in secular history. He punished the Babylonians, the Greeks, the Romans. Dare we say He cannot and does not punish us if we remain in sin?
The apostle had it right when he warned under inspiration of the Holy Spirit, “It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Hb.10:31). God has every right to be angry at the beings He has created as they continue in their sin and refuse His invitation. He means business. That's why I dare not refuse His invitation.
III. God is merciful; He fills His hall with guests.
Still, God is merciful otherwise no sinner could get into His banquet hall. But Jesus said that the “wedding hall was filled with guests.” God is angry. God is merciful. It seems like such a contradiction, doesn't it? How can we harmonize it?
The truth is that God is both; He works with us in two equal yet opposite ways. First He works with us in wrath. Luther called this the “strange” or the “alien work” of God (Plass III:1554). God doesn't like to work with us in wrath. However, when He has to, like when people refuse his invitation to salvation, then He will.
But God would much rather work with us in mercy. To that end He provided the One who saves us, who could withstand His anger against sin – His own Son, the Lord Jesus, who laid down His life to appease God's anger for sin. As we hear this good news of a Savior who cleanses us of all sin, the Holy Spirit works in our hearts to believe it and repent.
It's those who believe that are wearing the right clothing, the garments of Christ's righteousness – not their own, but Christ's. And the merciful God will never throw them out for His Son's sake. They will remain with Him forever and His hall will be filled with guests.
You know, dear friend, through faith in Christ each of us can say, “I'm already at the banquet. In Christ's salvation I'm at peace. And I look forward to that grand reception with all the saints that will be above. It was an invitation I couldn't refuse. God grant it in our lives of faith for Jesus' sake. Amen.