“‘Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding robe?’ And he was speechless.” -Matthew 22:12.
Things didn’t go so well for that friend after that. The party was over for him. The king had him thrown out to the outer darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
Pretty harsh treatment for not wearing the right outfit to a wedding banquet.
We don’t know what the man was wearing. Maybe he was dressed to the nines and prepared to make a big splash on the red carpet at the King’s wedding banquet for his son. Perhaps that was his big mistake. He thought he had it covered–his own outfit was all he needed.
What he needed, however, was a tailor.
God’s invitation to the great wedding banquet of Jesus is vast and generous. It is even a come as you are invitation. You can’t earn it. You can’t dress for it. Those with the finest attire–those clothed in some perceived sense of righteousness and self-worth, are invited just the same as those clothed in the humble habit of sin and shame. The Lord’s wedding banquet is an invitation to all.
But while the invitation is broad, attendance means transformation, and that requires wearing the clothes that only the Tailor of new life and salvation can provide. We cannot fashion ourselves as worthy or dress ourselves for success in the kingdom of God. Only God can do that. And thank God we have been given the perfect robe that fits us all: Jesus.
“Just as I am: thou wilt receive; wilt welcome, pardon, cleanse, relieve, because thy promise I believe, O Lamb of God, I come, I come..” (Hymn 693)
