Clothed with the Righteousness of Another (a sermon)

Text: Matthew 22:1-14

How do we know we’ll be saved?

How does a person know, for sure, they’re a Christian?

As more than one famous person has said or written over the years, perhaps we shouldn’t call ourselves Christians at all and should instead say we would like to be Christians one day. After all, doesn’t the word “Christian” mean something akin to, “little Christ”? How honestly christlike are any of us? And how often? And how consistently?

But when you come to a church like ours, you suddenly hear all of this confident language:

“When were you saved?”

“I’m so glad that I’m saved.”

“It’s been twenty years since I first got saved.”

Where do all these people get this idea that they’re going to heaven? It seems a bit presumptuous, to say the least. After all, how much time have you spent around Christians? Once the Sunday-morning veneer wears off, they don’t seem that much different than other folks. And, if I had to venture a bet, I’d bet that your average unbeliever lives more consistently with their chosen values—whatever those values happen to be, of course—than your average Christian lives by theirs. 

Our text this morning continues the confrontation between Jesus and the religious leaders in Jerusalem that began a chapter ago with Jesus cleansing the temple. The religious leaders have demanded of Jesus where he got the authority to do such a thing (21:23-27). Jesus has called the priests and elders disobedient, lip-serving sons (21:28-32). And last week, Jason Deuman walked you through Jesus’ parable of the wicked tenants, which the chief priests and the Pharisees quickly realized was about them (21:45 and context). 

“They wanted to arrest him,” Matthew tells us in 21:46, “but they feared the crowds.”

And now Jesus is on a roll. The religious leaders are on their back foot, and Jesus decides to deliver another blow. 

“The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king,” he says, “who gave a wedding banquet for his son…”

This king, says Jesus, sends out his servants (or, as my translation puts it, slaves) to gather the people who were invited. But the king’s subjects, one by one, dismiss the invitation and decide not to go. Some of them even become strangely upset over the invitation and react to the king’s servants with violence. 

The king, for his part, is enraged. He is their king, after all. They are his subjects. He’s honored them by inviting them to his son’s wedding, and they’ve presumably all said they would come. But now they blow-off the king’s invitation, at best. At worst, they rebel and murder his servants. So the king rouses his army and sends them off to squash the rebellion and burn down the city of the rebels. 

This first part of the story, of course, simply continues the debate between Jesus and the religious leaders of Jerusalem. They are clearly the ones who were invited to the king’s wedding feast. Their apparent dedication to God and his word are their way of having said Yes to God’s invitation. But now that it’s time for the feast to begin, for the kingdom of heaven to come on earth as in heaven, they take offense at God’s invitation—an invitation that happens to look like Jesus and his ragtag band of buffoons.

And this is, Jesus’ story implies, the story of the Old Testament, too. Remember how the leaders of the people treated Elijah, Elisha, and the prophets? Remember how they imprisoned Jeremiah for telling them the truth? And now that the feast of God’s kingdom is here, and the kingdom has come in the person of God’s Son, the religious leaders show they really want none of it. They refuse the king’s invitation.

However, at this point, Jesus’ parable goes on…

“The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy,” the king tells his servants in Jesus’ story, “Go therefore…and invite everyone you find to the wedding banquet” (verses 8-9). 

This invitation to whoever might show up, first and foremost presumably refers to the sinners who have gathered around Jesus—the “good and the bad” of verse 10—the tax-collectors and prostitutes, among others. It’s also likely a reference to what we call the church age, and the gathering-in of Gentiles like us into the kingdom of God. The king’s invitation is indiscriminate. Everyone is invited, pedigree and moral character notwithstanding. This sounds, to me, like the dispensation of grace, when those who have lived under the law and those who have not are all invited to the feast.

“But when the king came in to see the guests,” Jesus continues in verse 11, “he noticed a man who was not wearing a wedding robe.” 

“Friend,” the king asks, “how did you get in here without a wedding robe?”

The man, for his part, doesn’t know what to say. So he says nothing. Which isn’t the right move when your king asks you a question.

To this, the king has the man bound hand and foot and thrown out into the dark, “where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” 

“For many are called,” Jesus concludes—or, as the NIV puts it, “Many are invited”—“but few are chosen.”

This is a weird way, if you ask me, for Jesus to end his parable. His argument so far has been with the leaders of the people. And most of this parable has continued that strain. But then here at the end, it’s like Jesus suddenly considers his own followers and says, “But not all of you are going to make it, either.” Yikes.

Perhaps Jesus is thinking of Judas. There is only one guest that gets thrown out, after all. And Judas Iscariot is the only one of the twelve who will betray him.

Or perhaps he’s addressing the fickleness of the crowds, who have loved to follow him and hear his teaching and receive his mercy and healing, but who will perhaps not follow him to the end or be a part of his people after the cross and resurrection.

And yet, maybe he’s thinking about us, the Christian church. Maybe he’s saying that not everyone in the church is going be welcome at the feast.

These are probably all true, in one way or another, and Jesus may in some sense have all of these meanings in mind. But if that’s the case, it tells me that I really want to know what that robe means—the wedding garment, or wedding clothes, this particular guest seems to lack. 

In the history of the church, this robe has been interpreted as everything from baptism to good works. But I think the best understanding is to think of it as the righteousness of Jesus Christ himself, given to us through faith. 

In Romans 13:14, the apostle Paul tells his readers to “clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the flesh.”

In Romans chapter 6, we are told that to be baptized in water is to be baptized into Jesus’ death, so that “just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father” (Romans 6:4) “we too may live a new life.”

And in Philippians chapter 3, as Paul looks back on his old life of religious devotion, he says of all the things he has done, “I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ” (Philippians 3:8-9) “and be found in him not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ.”

The confidence believers have in their salvation is a confidence that Jesus has done all they need—and will do all they need—for them to be accepted by God. In taking our sin off of us, and in placing his own sonship and righteousness on our shoulders, Jesus has done all that is needed for us to be saved. And he will do all that is needed, as he works in our hearts by his Spirit to produce a life of love, obedience, sorrow for sin, repentance, and gratitude. 

So what is the warning, implied in Jesus’ story, against showing up to God’s feast without a robe? Perhaps it’s a warning against a life of disobedience. Perhaps it’s a warning against taking a light view of the ordinances God has given the church, such as baptism. But I think it’s primarily an observation that not all who outwardly accept the invitation to God’s feast really have a heart for God’s Son. As we might put it, they don’t come to Christ in true faith. They wear the name of Christian for some other reason than Christ himself.

Because who shows up to the Prince’s wedding without at least making an effort of looking decent? Someone who doesn’t care much for the Prince.

The book of Matthew repeatedly tells us that Judgment Day will be a surprise. Many will come to Jesus saying, “Lord, Lord,” but Jesus will say, “I never knew you.” Many will say, “When did we see you naked and not clothe you, or hungry and not feed you?,” and Jesus will say, “When you didn’t do it to the least of these, my brothers and sisters.” 

Not all who call themselves Christians are really believers in Christ. But those who cast themselves on Jesus alone for salvation, who clothe themselves with the goodness of another and place all their hope in the word of the cross, God will in no-wise cast them out. 

Those who have been changed by the gospel belong to God forever. 

As the Scripture has said, “All who call on the name of the Lord will be saved,” and, “those who believe will not be put to shame.”

Let’s Pray