Feast or Famine
Rev. Dr. Durrell Watkins

Let us dwell together in peace; and let us not be instruments of our own or others’ oppression. And now, may God’s word be spoken, may only God’s word be heard. Amen.

Some king throws a party but apparently doesn’t know anyone, so he invites the world and turns out, the world is busy. Then he gets an attitude.

After multiple attempts to get people to show up to his soiree (and some bloodshed along the way), finally, he gets a room full, only then to throw some dude out for not dressing well enough. Who could like this king?

The guy is not just asked to leave; he is tied up and told he’s being tossed into a dark place where light will never reach him (for showing up wrinkled or without a tie).
The attire and the darkness are probably metaphors (spoiler alert: they are totally metaphors) and we’ll get to them later.

The 21 chapters that lead up to chapter 22 in Matthew’s gospel are full of good news: Healing, feeding, forgiving, inclusion, hope, peace, generosity. So what’s up with today’s psychodrama?

To make it more perplexing, if we read just 22 verses ahead in the same chapter, we’d see Jesus saying the greatest commandments are to love God and love people. Just love.

But punishing people for not coming to your party isn’t love.
Violently tossing out an invited guest because they didn’t look right isn’t love.

But this is a parable and if we take it literally we’ll miss it entirely. Parables call for and require out of the box thinking.

In today’s parable, the people don’t trust the party host, but the host desperately wants to feed the people and give them joy, but they can’t believe the offer is genuine…they’ve been burned a time or two before, and so they resist the king or even put up a fight when he sends people to collect them.

Matthew imagines this is what it’s like for God: forever preparing beautiful feasts and endlessly begging people to enjoy them, but so many people not being able to trust the invitation, not believing they are welcome just as they are.

It’s like, Matthew has been telling us for 21 chapters that God is good and we are good and we are meant to enjoy sweet communion with God every moment, but as many ways as he’s tried to tell us that we are God’s miracle and not God’s mistake, some people are still saying, “That is just too good to be true.” They aren’t showing up to the party, or worse, they are even attacking those who are catering it.

It is worth noting that no matter how many times people refuse to come to the party, the host keeps sending out invitations. The invitation is delivered
by Jesus, by Krishna, by Sidhartha, by Lao Tzu,
by Amma, by Mother Teresa, by Father Richard Rohr,
by Nona Brooks, by Paramahansa Yogananda,
by Louise Hay, by Bishop Barbara Harris,
by Bishop Yvette Flunder, by Thich Nhat Hanh, by the Hebrew prophets, by us!

God will never stop calling us to wake up to who and whose we really are.

So what about that “few are chosen” statement? What’s up with that? I’m glad you asked.
Our contemporary ears might hear it more easily if it could be stated like this: “Everyone is part of God, but we tend to be slow to wake up to that fact.”
Everyone is invited to wake up to our magnificence, but we’re not all fully awake yet.

And what about the garment? It’s not about fashion.

Clean garments represent righteousness, that is, the work to make the world a more just and peaceful place.

The host begs and begs and begs people to come to the party, to realize they are made of starlight and joy, that they are part of a creation that is very good, that they are animated with God’s own breath.
Come to the party! Please! Live in the joy of this banquet.

And, once you wake up to who you are, get to work to help others wake up.

The garment that isn’t appropriate suggests someone who gets that they are okay, but they aren’t interested in helping others know it too. So, they aren’t really experiencing the light fully. They think that because they didn’t have to earn the seat at the table, they don’t have to make room for others. But that means they don’t really understand what the party is about. There in the dark about it.

The darkness isn’t punishment, it’s a false perception…it’s lack of awareness that there is not a spot where God is not.

Matthew’s Jesus is saying, “Please come. And, once you’re here, get involved. Help us help others know what we are learning…that we are God’s miracle and not God’s mistake.”

St. Paul put it this way in letter to the Galatians: “You who were baptized in Christ have clothed yourselves in Christ.”
The wedding garment is about putting on our Christ clothes – our healing, helping, hope sharing outfits.

Worship weekly, pray daily, give generously, volunteer, come to our shows or tell people about our groups, take one of our classes, join our justice work, participate in our efforts to reach more people with more good news.

You can’t do it all, but you can do something and your doing something is going to help someone else get a glimpse of light within them that they didn’t know was there.

That’s what it means to wear the appropriate garment. Come to the party ready to help other people come to the party.

A narrow reading of today’s story makes it look like a choice between feast or famine…accept the invitation, or get forever abandoned; and, even if you accept the invitation, you might still be rejected. But that understanding rejects the larger witness of love and inclusion that Matthew has been sharing throughout his gospel. So today’s parable can’t be about who’s in and who’s out…that isn’t good news.

This story, like all of the gospel, is about including everyone, getting them involved, and thereby helping them discover and share the light that has always been theirs.

First, trust the invitation to the party really is for you.
Second, show up dressed to pass on the blessings you’ve received so others will know the party is for them, too.

You can do that in a tank top, in leather, in sweat pants, in a tuxedo, in a sundress and sneakers…it’s not about the clothes, it’s about the commitment to love yourself more and then to love others as you love yourself.
When we do that, as Matthew’s Jesus says in the sermon on the mount, we are the light of the world.

And this is the good news. Amen.

Thank you, God, for your feast of love.
Thank you for including us all.
Thank you for calling us to welcome others.
Thank you the light that shines within us.
Alleluia!
Amen.