There is a time set aside in our worship service where we offer the invitation of Christ. You see, I feel like a lot times we make assumptions that just aren’t so. And what is it they say happens when we assume too much? Well anyway:
1. We get to thinking the invitation is not only extended by the preacher. 2. We get to thinking the invitation is extended only at the end of the sermon or devotional. 3. We get to thinking the invitation is only available to the people who attend the service. Before we get to these three points, let’s read together Matthew 22:1-10: |
And Jesus answered and spoke to them again in parables, saying, "The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king, who gave a wedding feast for his son. And he sent out his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding feast, and they were unwilling to come. Again he sent out other slaves saying, 'Tell those who have been invited, "Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and my fattened livestock are all butchered and everything is ready; come to the wedding feast.” But they paid no attention and went their way, one to his own farm, another to his business, and the rest seized his slaves and mistreated them and killed them. But the king was enraged and sent his armies, and destroyed those murderers, and set their city on fire.
“Then he said to his slaves, 'The wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy. Go therefore to the main highways, and as many as you find there, invite to the wedding feast.' And those slaves went out into the streets, and gathered together all they found, both evil and good; and the wedding hall was filled with dinner guests.”
Secondly, notice in verses nine and ten, that the invitation was not offered only to the people who visited the worship services of the Lord. Verse nine: Go therefore to the main highways; and verse 10: those slaves went out into the streets, and gathered together all they found, both good and evil. It doesn’t much sound like the invitation is only to come at the end of a fine sermon delivered by a preacher, does it? I don’t think so. So, Jesus makes it clear that we are responsible for taking the invitation to others, and the others are outside this building, in common places – places in the community.
Thirdly, notice whom is invited. Returning to verse nine, we can see the king wants as many as you find; in verse ten, it says they gathered together all they found. This dispels what we often think about the church building being the best place to talk to people about becoming a Christian. Notice, the king sent out his slaves in verses three and four; notice, the king told the slaves to Go (verse nine) and they went out in verse ten; also in verse ten, the passage expressly makes the point to show that the slaves (That’s you and me, remember.) "gathered together all they found, both good and evil…" This is obviously pointing us to the world to find new converts to the kingdom of heaven.
Finally, the parable is incomplete without verses 11-14. Jesus continues:
"But when the king came in to look over the dinner guests, he saw there a man not dressed in wedding clothes, and he said to him, 'Friend, how did you come in here without wedding clothes?' And he was speechless.
"Then the king said to the servants, 'Bind him hand and foot, and cast him into the outer darkness; in that place there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.' For many are called, but few are chosen."
The classic work of T. W. Brents, The Gospel Plan of Salvation, concludes with the author’s urging those who read his words to obey the gospel of Christ. He wrote:
And why should you not come? Is it not strange that, while God, Jesus, angels, and all good men are concerned for you, you, the most directly interested, are still unconcerned for yourself? What has the devil with which to reward you for a life of devotion to him? Esau was regarded as a profane person for selling his birthright for a mess of pottage; are you not doing worse, bartering a home in heaven for the momentary gratification of fleshly lusts, pride, and appetite? Surely these are not sufficient to compensate you for an eternity of misery and woe! Were you to acquire the cattle of a thousand hills, yea, and all the gold of California and Peru, these could not purchase one drop of water with which to cool your parching tongue in the rude flames of an angry Hell; then what will it profit if you gain the whole world and lose your soul at last? Or what will you give in exchange for your soul? If you could possess the world and its treasures, the time may come when you would give them all for an interest in the blood of Jesus. How unwise to reject it! Oh, then flee from the wrath to come and lay hold on eternal life!