Pentecost 12 – The Wedding Garment

Reformation, Media

Larry V. Smoose

Would you rather celebrate Christmas with young children or by yourself or with other adults? 

(with children – why?)  Fresh eyes.

How long has it been since you’ve seen a new born child?  What do you remember about the experience?  (tiny fingers with details – etc.)

What do you imagine was the reaction of the Prodigal Son when the father gave him a new robe and a ring and shoes? 

What was the reaction of the older brother?  

The answers to these questions give us clues to the meaning of this strange parable.

It seems to be confusing, especially with its placement in Matthew’s Gospel – immediately following the parable of the wedding feast.  You might remember the parable of the wedding feast.  A king gives a wedding banquet for his son and all of the invited guests back out with lame excuses at the last minute and so he tells his servants to go out into the streets and invite everyone – good and bad – to come and enjoy the wedding feast so that the banquet hall would be full. 

And then, with a wedding hall filled with last minute guests who came in off the streets, we have this parable about the man who is spotted not wearing a wedding robe and who is then thrown out into the outer darkness.  The first question that comes to my mind is why would a person invited at the last minute, out on the street, be expected to have a wedding garment on?  Who goes around wearing a tux?  They would be more likely to have on jeans.  Most  likely this parable originally stood by itself as a separate parable, which would explain a lot of the reaction. 

If this stands alone, then the king had announced the wedding of his son and this person was actually an invited guest, who did not have a wedding garment.  Now lest you think he was supposed to have a tux (or some fancy robe) that is not the issue.  In Jesus’ day, a wedding garment was not some special garment worn on festive occasions, it was simply a washed garment.  This person somehow had gotten into the wedding wearing dirty clothes!  How could this happen? 

Let me begin to explain this with a quick lesson on Eastern wedding traditions.  In Jesus’ day, and in some countries even today, weddings were arranged.  When families agreed to have their son and daughter married, they would announce the wedding, but the day and time was not announced.  I know that seems strange, but the families had to do some negotiation on dowry and the bride price and the conditions of the marriage.  This might take a day or it might take several days, but as soon as the negotiations were over, the procession to the banquet hall would begin, and all of the invited guests in the town were expected to join in the procession and gather in the hall. 

That meant you had to be ready for the procession.  Those who were smart (wise) would be dressed and ready – sort of like the wise maidens with extra oil for their lamps.  But the foolish ones might take a chance and want to get an extra day’s work in, and find themselves with no time to change their clothes.  In that case, they would miss out on the banquet – because without the clean garment, they could not get in it was an insult to the host not to be prepared for the feast.

The next thing that we need to know to understand this strange parable is that the wedding feast is always a sign of the fulfillment of God’s kingdom.  It is the banquet  in which God is the host and so in this context, wearing the wedding garment, the clean garment has additional meaning.  We might look to Isaiah 61 “He has clothed me with the garments of salvation, he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself out with a garland and a bride adorns herself with jewels.”  So God has given those invited the proper garment, the key is to know when to put it on, so that you don’t miss the wedding feast. 

Wait a minute!  How do I know when to be wearing it if I don’t know the day and the time of the wedding celebration?  Now we are beginning to ask the right questions.  Rabbi Eliezer at the end of the first century said to his students, “Repent one day before you die.”  The students responded, “how can a person know the day of his death?”  “Exactly, “ said the rabbi, “Since we may die tomorrow, we should repent today,” so all of life becomes a constant state of repentance.

Put on the wedding garment one day before the banquet!  God gives us the robe of forgiveness and renewal and  wants us to wear that robe every day of our lives. 

For Jesus, being part of the kingdom was like being at a wedding banquet!  It was music and dancing.  It was the joy of a lost son returning home – you give him a new robe and you throw a party!  It is a new chance, a new life and all of the joy that comes with that realization, and he wanted everyone to be able to join in the celebration and in that moment, to renew the joy in their own lives.   Life in the kingdom is to be lived every day.

But sometimes our lives become so monotonous, so routine, so predictable, that we forget the wonder and mystery, we lose the joy, we can look right at something and no longer see it.  The older brother most likely had a robe but it is forgotten in the attic, the shoes are unpolished in the closet, the ring sits on the dresser.  Sonship had become so mundane to him, that when he could not put on his own robe and join the celebration of the return of his brother, he became blind to the joy of his own relationship with the Father and sitting outside in his work clothes, he ended up missing the feast. 

It’s like having too many Christmas’ without children – it just seems like any other day, we might even skip putting up a tree.  It’s forgetting the joy and wonder of a new born child, so that we take the wonder and preciousness of life for granted.  It’s taking care of the garden for so long that you no longer take time to really look at the splendor of the flowers and become calloused to the beauty of creation. 

Put on the robe—for the wedding garment that Jesus wants us to wear is a life of joy and thanksgiving for life given, for forgiveness established, for salvation secured, and an invitation received.     

When did you last take a look at the invitation to the banquet that Jesus engraved on your forehead?  How long has it been since you brought to mind your image of the bridegroom?  Is worship becoming too routine, and you find yourself just going through the motions?  Maybe it’s time to take out the robe of salvation, dust it off and prepare to celebrate.  Maybe we need to listen again to the music – prelude for a coming wedding feast.  Perhaps we need to sip the wine and recall Jesus’ miracle at the wedding of Cana and give thanks that one of these days we will taste some of that wine in his kingdom. 

Put on the robe – put it on Today.

Amen.