Choosing Mercy
Series: Parables - Small Stories, Big Truths
Brad Bailey – August 22, 2021
Intro
My added welcome to each of you.
I want to begin with a moment to unite us in prayer for Afghanistan.
I imagine each of us has seen something of what has unfolded over the past week... and have been affected by the tragic nature of how these 20 years of involvement in Afghanistan have unraveled. [1]
I can still recall the moment I stood right here almost exactly 20 years ago.
It was October 7...2001... just weeks after the shocking events of 9/11... and I had been following the challenges being made to the leaders of Afghanistan. Then on that Sunday...during our second service...I received news that that we had just begun our attacks in the country. I got up before the congregation to lead us in prayer....and wept. I was struck with a sense of tragic loss in that moment when the war began...as I have been this past week.
It’s a moment to face the problems that lie within our human nature....and seek God’s heart and hand.
And before we pray.... I want to recognize that this this is a time that is especially difficult for so many who have served in the military.... or whose loved ones have served in the military. For them... what is playing out is related to what they literally gave their lives to. And I want to take a moment and recognize, that in the midst of the tragedy... there is a breadth of service and sacrifice to honor as well. I want to take a moment and recognize that so many lives have served a mission that HAS made a difference.
More than 775,000 American troops served in Afghanistan since 2001....many for multiple periods of time. [2]
Over 2400 military men and women were killed... and 20,000 wounded. These were sons and daughters... fathers and mothers.
These are not the lives who chose this war ... they are the lives that served as called upon. And that service and sacrifice has made differences.
Thanks to that service...there has NOT been another major terrorist attack in our nation for 20 years... nor has there been a major event across all western nations since the London bombings in 2005.
Thanks to that service...a new generation of Afghans have schools and hospitals across the country in a level that has been life changing,
Thanks to that service...Infant mortality rates in Afghanistan fell by half.
Thanks to that service... a generation of Afghans has been through school through these 20 years.
As one 21-year-old young Afghan woman, Shogufa, shared... the presence of American troops the past 20 years changed her life. When she was born.... few women could read or write.... and when she was still in her infancy, she was pledged to marry a much older cousin in the countryside to pay off a loan. But one of the non-profit development groups that came during these years... provided a different path. She got a job and is now pursuing a bachelor’s degree in business administration.
So in the midst of the current crisis... I want those who have served and sacrificed to know that you have made a difference... and to express what that young woman shared as her message to those Americans departing: “Thank you for everything you have done in Afghanistan.” [3]
And now I invite us to unite with God’s heart as I lead us in prayer ....
PRAY:
• Peace for those who served... to grasp how they have faithfully served what they were responsible for.
• Provision to fulfill the promises that have been made... to reach and rescue those who gave their trust....and to give us the hearts to receive and welcome the many refugees in need
• Protection of our brothers and sister in Christ... pour out faith and wisdom
• Grace upon country
Let me add that one of the gifts of being a part of the Vineyard movement of churches...is that we have churches in both Haiti and Afghanistan... and that we also contribute financially to work that is going on in both those countries even now. I hope you are blessed to know that...and I will try and share a report in our weekly email.
And now... we have the privilege to hear Jesus...as we come to the final week in our summer focus on the Parables of Jesus.
Throughout this series we have noted that Parables are short stories... or illustrations...that capture a significant truth. Or as our series title says...they are small stories with big truths.
And the parables are some of the most dynamic teachings of Jesus.
Jesus used them to help explain how the kingdom of God was at hand... that is... how the reign of rule of God... was now at hand. When a king comes and defeats the powers that be... that kingdom now reigns across the whole region which had previously been ruled by another power... even if it takes time to become manifest there. And of course whose kingdom one belongs to... ultimately is defined by who they choose to give their allegiance to.
I think that the events of this past week in Afghanistan can help us appreciate the nature of such allegiance. There has been a lot of focus on how the Afghan military seemed to simply dissolve when America began to withdraw. I found it helpful to imagine their unsettledness. They have been a people who feel lost in finding an allegiance to belong to. They see the Taliban as oppressors... but who look like them… and they see the western alliance and fragile Afghan government as those whose commitment is uncertain.
This morning.... I believe some of you may feel lost in your own identity and allegiance. Like many of the Afghan people... you may feel lost between the old and the new... you may wonder
WHO IS THE RIGHTFUL RULER.
Jesus is very clear... that the powers that have ruled this world... are those which have been the oppressing occupiers of this world...and your world.
He comes bearing the restoration of the rightful rule of God... the source of life itself.
Some forces in this world will oppress us... some will abandon us... but look close at Jesus...listen closely...and you can discover that he is the one with true authority...and he is the who has given his life for you.
And in this final parable that we will engage, Jesus continues to explain what is unfolding as he brings the Kingdom of God to infiltrate this world.
Lets listen to Jesus from the Gospel of Matthew [4]....
Matthew 22:1-14 ?1 Jesus spoke to them again in parables, saying: 2 "The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son. 3 He sent his servants to those who had been invited to the banquet to tell them to come, but they refused to come. 4 "Then he sent some more servants and said, 'Tell those who have been invited that I have prepared my dinner: My oxen and fattened cattle have been butchered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding banquet.' 5 "But they paid no attention and went off--one to his field, another to his business. 6 The rest seized his servants, mistreated them and killed them. 7 The king was enraged. He sent his army and destroyed those murderers and burned their city. 8 "Then he said to his servants, 'The wedding banquet is ready, but those I invited did not deserve to come. 9 Go to the street corners and invite to the banquet anyone you find.' 10 So the servants went out into the streets and gathered all the people they could find, both good and bad, and the wedding hall was filled with guests. 11 "But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing wedding clothes. 12 'Friend,' he asked, 'how did you get in here without wedding clothes?' The man was speechless. 13 "Then the king told the attendants, 'Tie him hand and foot, and throw him outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.' 14 "For many are invited, but few are chosen."
Like so many of the parables Jesus tells... there is a sense of drawing from familiar aspects of life...but also some very provocative surprises to make a point.
Once again, we have a parable that includes the reality of judgment... of tragic consequences. . I believe that it’s important to understand that Jesus is not trying to explain the literal form or fashion of judgment... but rather he’s explaining what is unfolding that will lead to such tragedy. [5a]
In the context of these parables,,,, he is not trying to explain the literal HOW of judgment ... but rather he is explaining the WHY. He is explaining the nature of God’s provision and human response. [5b]
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Our text begins stating that, “Jesus spoke to them again in parables …” You have to go all the way back into chapter 21 to find out who the “them” is. The them are the religious leaders of the day - the chief priests and the scribes and the Pharisees and the teachers of the law. They were growing in the fear of Jesus... and they were plotting together to kill him. Knowing this, Jesus spoke very sharply to them and informed them very clearly about what was going to happen. Part of that information was given in the form of this parable, which is built upon what he had said to them earlier, as he said, "Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a nation producing the fruits of it." (21:43) Here is his announcement to these Pharisees that they were to lose their privileged position and that the gospel was thereafter to go out to all nations everywhere.
Why couldn’t they produce fruit? Because they had created a religion based in their own goodness... rather than God’s goodness... based on merit rather than mercy.
And now he tells this parable to capture how the kingdom is based in God’s mercy....and we will find he highlights this mercy in three ways... in the nature of the feast... the calling...and the covering provided.
Jesus begins... in verse 2 - "The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son.”
[To be on screen for mild reference during this portion...]
Matthew 22:2 ?The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son.
It’s rather clear that the king represents God... and Jesus is speaking of what God has prepared... and it can be represented as a wedding banquet... a feast. We see the...
The Feast of Mercy
Jesus is capturing how mercy comes as God’s culminating feast.
Any Jewish listener will hear in this story an allusion to what God had spoken long ago through the prophet Isaiah. We can read in Isaiah chapter 25....
Isaiah 25:6-8
On this mountain the LORD Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet of aged wine-- the best of meats and the finest of wines. On this mountain he will destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that covers all nations; he will swallow up death forever. The Sovereign LORD will wipe away the tears from all faces; he will remove the disgrace of his people from all the earth. The LORD has spoken.
God is describing the culmination of His will... of what would come.
The feast is part of that which brings the fulfillment of all that we long for...but that is always just out of reach. It speaks of...
Rich food for all people.
The end of that which shrouds the nations in darkness and division.
The end of death itself...and all the pain the lies in it.
And the end of disgrace.
It is not the reward for anything earned... it is that which exists n the goodness of the king... which exists in the eternal goodness that we have lost.
It is the feast of mercy.
It is human existence... which has always known a longing for what could never be fulfilled... being fulfilled.
It is a security we’ve never found.
It is justice we have believed should be set right.
It’s a depth of belonging that we have never fully felt... and love with no end.
The longings of this world point beyond this world... to that which transcends time and space. It is an invitation to life. This is what we so desperately need to understand.
And all this is captured in the nature of this wedding feast. Even in our modern western culture we recognize that wedding receptions are often the ultimate in celebrations. They aren’t solemn and stuffy ...but rather occasions filled with generosity and delight.
There’s a good challenge here. If we think that God represents that which wants to quench life... we really don’t understand God or life... or both.
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And this wedding...is the wedding of the King’s son. This isn’t incidental.
When a kingdom celebrates the wedding of the king’s son... they are celebrating what is to come... the new stage of the kingdom.
And God had declared that Christ was that son... that incarnate representation of Himself... who would restore our relationship with the King... the source of life...and fulfill the reign of the King.
That is why the Scriptures would go on to speak of the culmination of this age as the wedding feast in which Christ is the groom and we are the bride.
It is in Christ that God’s mercy is manifest.[6]
And it is in the coming of Christ that the feast of mercy is prepared.
Now in ancient Israel... such a wedding was the lifelong height of all celebration by anyone. And preparing a feast in Jesus’ day was a costly and time-consuming process. Formal invitations would be issued far ahead, and then, on the basis of the number of those who had accepted, the host would slaughter the appropriate number of animals and ultimately prepare the meal over several days. Only then would the second invitation, that the feast was ready, be sent out.
And so Jesus draws upon that very process.
[To be on screen for mild reference during this portion...]
Matthew 22:3-6 ?He sent his servants to those who had been invited to the banquet to tell them to come, but they refused to come. 4 "Then he sent some more servants and said, 'Tell those who have been invited that I have prepared my dinner: My oxen and fattened cattle have been butchered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding banquet.' 5 "But they paid no attention and went off--one to his field, another to his business. 6 The rest seized his servants, mistreated them and killed them.
He sends his messengers out to whom? Look carefully. It says in verse 3. “He sent his servants to those who had been invited to the banquet to tell them to come …” Notice carefully. They’d already been invited.
These are people who had already been invited... they had already said, “Yes.” Now the messengers were simply going out to announce, “It’s time to get dressed and to come. Get on your clothes and come.”
It helps to recall that he is speaking to the religious leaders... the leaders of Israel. They had said they would come... but now the message has come... that the time has come... that everything is ready...and now they refuse.
Parables are often a mixture of conventional expectations with a shocking reversal of expectation. And the first shock here comes with the response of those first invited.
This is an invitation by the king.... to the wedding of his son... it’s an offer of relationship... and goodness they have never known...and so there is something shocking when it says they refused.
And it’s important to see that the king doesn’t initially act in anger... but rather he sends out more servants to bring even greater news... to convey that the feast is all prepared.
Jesus is describing ...
The Call of Mercy
Jesus is capturing how mercy comes as a calling...an invitation.
Notice the nature of the call here. It is an invitation. It is not a summons from the draft board to report for duty; it is an invitation. It does not come with force... but with freedom. [7] And this makes their refusal all the more tragic.
And now the nature of this refusal becomes even more notable.
Initially some simply ignore the king’s call....and simply give themselves to their own little lives. But then we watch in horror as the servants sent by the king to announce the party are seized, abused, and murdered (verse 6).
All of this reveals a very great mystery about human lives. Apart from the mercy of God... when grace is refused... something happens to human life.
Humanity begins to deteriorate, to fall apart. We see these two effects. First, the loss of perspective ... in which trivial things become all-important, we just cling to our fields and business...while really important things are treated lightly and with scorn. And secondly...there is a hostility that can arise... and with it.... a violence that lashes out.
It’s interesting that many would identify the two major problems of the day in which we live as that of meaninglessness and violence. When we lose our capacity to receive the grace of God...we lose such an essential element of human life ... we lose our sense of unconditional value and purpose...and we become consumed with our own little self-consumed kingdoms... and we can develop a hostility towards the gift of grace...towards the grace of God. We no longer remain human beings in the deepest sense.
Jesus explains the consequences that will come. Those who refuse the grace of God will not survive. They who choose to war with God will not win. Jesus speaks not only of their destruction. ....but of the very city that we would presume was once the king’s own city now being destroyed... let in ashes. And most believe that Jesus is once again foretelling of what will come upon Jerusalem itself in a short time. For it would be these who refused the way of grace.... who would soon try to rise up in violence against Rome... and it would lead to the city of Jerusalem being utterly destroyed just years later in 70 AD.... within this generation of lives. Jerusalem is now no longer God’s city but ‘theirs’...because of what they have made of it... and the community as a whole is implicated in their rebellion and its punishment. [8]
But the story is clear that mercy will prevail. The call of God’s mercy is only going to expand.
[To be on screen for mild reference during this portion...]
Matthew 22:8-10 ?"Then he said to his servants, 'The wedding banquet is ready, but those I invited did not deserve to come. 9 Go to the street corners and invite to the banquet anyone you find.' 10 So the servants went out into the streets and gathered all the people they could find, both good and bad, and the wedding hall was filled with guests.
The king now sends his servants to go out to streets... and invite everyone to the feast. The words translated as street corners actually describes that place where all the roads leading into a city connect.
Those are the places where you saw everybody. You saw the rich and the poor and people traveling across many cultures. That is where the king directs his servants. And verse 10 says they “gathered all the people they could find, both good and bad, and the wedding hall was filled with guests.”
Here again... the parable is provocative... it says that the king...which is God... invites to the wedding of his son... which is Christ...those who are good and bad.
And this captures the nature of mercy’s invitation. This captures the whole conflict that Jesus is having with the religious mindset. They saw a world divided between good and bad people. And in fact, I believe that this isn’t unique to them at all. They have their own religious version...but there are just as many secular versions. We can all tend to see the world divided between our versions of good and bad. And Jesus simply doesn’t relate to the world that way ,,,,because he sees a world in which all people have gone astray....and the real difference is that there are those who know they need grace and those who don’t seem to know it.
And we may wonder... what could make such lives be fitting of such an honorable event?
Well that leads to a strange figure Jesus describes being discovered. Verse 11 describes the king making his way among the guests and discovering a man who was not wearing the proper wedding garments. And having the many thrown out.
Matthew 22:11-13
"But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing wedding clothes. 12 'Friend,' he asked, 'how did you get in here without wedding clothes?' The man was speechless. 13 "Then the king told the attendants, 'Tie him hand and foot, and throw him outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'
What’s he describing? Well, given that those coming were coming from every place... the assumption would be that they could not have been prepared and properly dressed. And for such an affair it would have been normal for the king to provide all the guests some proper wedding garments. They would be clothed in such a way as to be identified as fitting.
And here Jesus is identifying....
The Covering of Mercy
Jesus is capturing how mercy comes as a covering.
As some may recall.... this is how the Bible speaks of our being clothed in Christ... that is... the Bible uses the image of garments to describe how God replaces our unrighteousness nature with that of Christ’s righteousness. We can be accepted based on what Christ has done on our behalf.
We can be accepted in God’s presence when we accept being clothed in the garment of Christ’s... which involves renouncing any dependence upon ourselves, or upon anything we have done, or our background, or anything else we might think makes us worthy. If we renounce our righteousness, which, as the Scripture says, is as filthy rags, then God has the gift of his righteousness to give to us.
This man had the opportunity to put on the proper garment because it was provided free of charge with the invite. So this man... who decides to just wear his own clothes.... appears to represent the nature of presuming that we can come into the grace of God based on our own goodness. He is choosing merits rather than mercy. Jesus is quite clear that this man cannot come to God’s mercy on his own merits. [9]
It’s been said that there are two ways of being separated from God...one is by our badness.... the shame we bear for obvious ways we cannot be united into God’s perfection...and the other is our goodness... the ways we presume that we are good and worthy.... which separates us from God’s mercy.
It’s important to grasp that Jesus is not speaking of some cheap idea that “God just accepts everybody the way they are.” Contrary to what may popular mindset of current culture... such mercy is not simply an affirmation that everything is good. That belief proves both false... and flat... and bears no hope for ultimate justice or a better world. The mercy of God is that we receive acceptance based on the righteousness of Christ... as we truly receive his transforming work within us. The transforming power is God’s love... His mercy. At the center of the story is a king seeking those who will enter into a feast that is provided through mercy...mot merit.
What we see is that the King is seeking those who will come enjoy the feast ...the feast that represents mercy...not merit.
If a guest is looking at the food and unable to enjoy it...because they’re struggling to sense they deserve it.... they are actually rejecting the feast ... and the king who has provided it. If we are refusing to eat and dance and celebrate...because we don’t think they have the merits to be there... we are refusing the very nature of the feast and the provider of the feast.
The king is looking for those who feast freely in mercy...and are grateful for it....and whose hearts are ever more deeply given to the king.... and to his son.
So we need to ask ourselves... have we really joined the feast of mercy... that honors the God of mercy....or have we become like those religious leaders Jesus described as having said “yes”... but then refusing to come celebrate? Are our hearts filled with gratitude for so much that we don’t deserve .... with an ever-deepening love and allegiance to the king and his son.... or are we still enamored with our own clothes...and comparing our own merits?
Jesus is calling us to the feast of grace.
And ultimately...Jesus is explaining the significance of responding to the invitation... to the calling.
He is speaking to those who had initially said they were coming... but then refuse to come to the feast of mercy. He is highlighting the significance of that calling.
Anybody who has experienced the mercy of God.... will sense that something beckoned them
We realize that there is a divine interplay... one in which we can rightfully say that we made a decision... but soon sense that we were also decided upon.
We can resonate with the words of an old hymn [10]...
‘Tis not that I did choose Thee,
For Lord, that could not be;
This heart would still refuse Thee,
Hadst Thou not chosen me …
You may be one who may be exploring what you believe. You may be among those who are really exploring who Jesus is... and who Jesus is to you.
Maybe you’re sensing an invitation... Maybe you are feeling a spiritual tug. I want to encourage you to value that prompting... to follow it through...not in some forced manner. It’s important to seek understanding. To count the costs. But there is a vital truth that Jesus reminds us of today... which is not to ignore that call indefinitely.
The fact is that mercy is extended .... and somewhere within us...we are always becoming more open or more closed.... more receptive or more rejecting.
So let’s take a moment...and open our hearts to mercy.
PRAY
Help us recognize the feast.... that the very qualities that we know but cannot fully reach... exist in your presence.
Some of us... too proud of our own garments... of our own merits.
Some of us...may sense that we have been stuck focused on our own merits... unable to celebrate with you...because we trying to prove we deserve it.
Resources: Timothy J. Keller (Salvation; Merit or Mercy? 12/07/97); Ian Paul (Grace and judgement at the wedding feast in Matthew 22); Ray C. Stedman (The Chance to Live);
Notes:
1. In facing the political responsibility for the tragic conclusion of withdrawal, I would encourage reading this article which seems to step back in a fair manner to see the breadth of responsibility that spans across both political parties - Withdrawing From Afghanistan May Be The One Thing Biden And Trump Agree On; August 18, 2021 - here
2.WP article. 2.8 million service members have been to the war zones of Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001, and over half of them have deployed more than once.
3. Cited here in Yahoo New of SIGAR report and here in AP News.
4. This Parable is often listed as having parallels in Gospel accounts of Mark and Luke. However, there are differences of such significance that I believe it is better to assume that Jesus drew on similar backdrops to tell stories that emphasized different aspects of truth. Mark.(12:1-11) speaks of a master returning to tenants who kill his servants...and then his son.... to which the owner punishes... notes the son had been the “cornerstone” rejected. and gives to another. In Luke (12:35-48), the point is about delay and presuming no need to be ready....whereas this is about the rejection of owners servants and son.
Mark A. Barber (The Parable of the Wedding Banquet: An Exposition of Matthew 22:1-14) provides a good summary of the who and what that Jesus most likely was speaking of: “The father in the parable is God the Father, and Jesus is the son who is the groom. The bridal feast is the marriage supper of the lamb at the end of the age. The guests who refused the invite are the Jews, especially the leaders. The city that is destroyed is Jerusalem with its corrupt religious establishment. The servants are the prophets in the Old Testament and the Apostles in the New. The people in the highways and byways are the common people. At first, these were the common people of Israel. The invitations went to the Jews first. But this also included the Greeks. We see in Matthew that Gentiles came along with Jews to the Sermon on the Mount. The Canaanite woman and the roman Centurion also had their requests for healing granted.”
5a. Jesus himself explained they are intended to teach but not simply in straightforward literal manner… but with a story that captures the heart of the problem… a problem those who are bound in … will not understand.
I think that the story of the Tortoise and the hare can serve as an example. It is one of Aesop's Fables, a collection of stories passed down by word of mouth since ancient Greece.
The hare is very confident of winning, so it stops during the race and falls asleep. The tortoise continues to move very slowly but without stopping and finally it wins the race. The moral lesson of the story is that you can be more successful by doing things slowly and steadily than by acting quickly and carelessly.
The point is that the fable is not intended to teach a literal point about slow always wins… but that the nature of those who act in speed like a hare… can find themselves dismayed when the kind of slow and steady nature of the tortoise wins. The person who is able to identify with how their own expediency can fail them in fulfilling the goals they desire…will see the point. Those who are trapped in expediency… cutting corners… getting ahead at all costs….will not understand the point…in fact…they will perpetuate it…and pay the price. (Aesop's Fables, or the Aesopica, is a collection of fables credited to Aesop, a slave and storyteller believed to have lived in ancient Greece between 620 and 564 BCE. Of diverse origins, the stories associated with his name have descended to modern times through a number of sources and continue to be reinterpreted in different verbal registers and in popular as well as artistic media. A fun article seeking how this relates to actual nature notes that “anybody who has spent time outside knows that rabbits run in circles... so the tortoise wins." And that “the biological evidence suggests there is some truth to Aesop's fable: slow and steady – over a long lifetime – certainly can win a race.”)
5b. When it comes to the whole idea of judgment... of being accountable beings... we tend to react with a combination of denial and dismissal... we want to place it outside the nature of our existence. As modern men and women...our version of the human position is to focus on our rights... and ignore our responsibility. Or to identify with our moral superiority more than or moral responsibility. Yet our human nature cannot escape knowing at our very cores...that some actions are wrong... fundamentally worthy of an individual having to be held responsible and to face consequences... in other words... judgment.
So we see this theme of judgment in several parables... ending with being held responsible...and facing the consequences of destruction... of gnashing of teeth and fire.
6. And in the accompanying parables... Jesus shared how the people first reject the servants... and then they kill the son. It is explained how the son is the chief cornerstone which they rejected.
7. "Come, all you who are weary and heavy laden," says Jesus, "and I will give you rest," (Matthew 11:28). "Come if you really want to live," is the nature of the invitation.
8. It is worth noting that this element of the narrative doesn’t actually fit in the story very well; it seems rather unlikely that a king would invite people to his son’s wedding who are from another city, rather than his own. Most commentators see this as an allusion to the coming destruction of Jerusalem at the hands of the Romans. This is recorded by the Jewish historian Josephus, The Jewish War 6.353–355, 363–64, 406–8)
Jerusalem is now no longer God’s city but ‘theirs’, and the community as a whole is implicated in their rebellion and its punishment, as had so often happened in the past when Israel’s sins had led to the city’s destruction by invading armies (R T France, NICNT, p 825).
9. This man was standing there without a wedding garment. And, in the original language, the account makes clear that his was a deliberate refusal. Ray Stedman notes: There are two Greek words fornot and both of them are used in this account. In the first sentence we read, "But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who had not a wedding garment." The word simply means the negative. He did not have one, that's all. A plain statement of fact. But when the king said to him, "Friend, how did you get in here not having a wedding garment?" he uses another Greek word. It is a word that implies a deliberate action of the will. This king is saying to him, "Look, friend, you are here under false pretenses. You are deliberately rejecting what has been provided. Your being here without a wedding garment implies that you are in rebellion against all that this wedding feast stands for. You are here as a phony, a sham."
10. "Lord, 'Tis Not that I did Choose Thee" by Josiah Conder, 1789-1855
