Invite Everyone You See

Matthew 22:1-14

October 12, 2014

Parable Of the Great Supper, Eugene Burnand  1900

The kingdom of God is like a king

who gave a wedding banquet.

but no one that was invited came.

So this outstanding party is thrown, lots of food, celebration,

games, music, good company, everything you want in a party.

But, the people who are invited to it are not interested.
They wave it off, go on with their normal

every day lives and ignore it.

People are so busy with whatever they’re doing

that they ignore the party invitation that’s offered them.

People of faith understand this.

We share a belief that we think is great and we can’t live without.

But there are so many people who just aren’t interested.

Who have put off God or the church for one reason or another.

This is an endless conversation these days

with church leaders and pastors.

“The church isn’t like it once was.”

I don’t think it’s anywhere near dying as some people make it out to be.

Seventy Five percent of people identify as Christian in the US.

40% say they go to church on a weekly basis.

And they guess that that’s more like 18%.

But that’s still 57 million people

But the question still arises:

What happened to all the guests we used to have?

Active Christians seem to like to blame the uninterested guests.

We say that people are too secular.
That they don’t have their priorities straightened out.

There’s no respect any more.

We wonder what’s wrong with them.

But it’s always a good thing to look at yourself first,

before you start looking at other people for the answer.

First possibility is,

We forgot that it was a celebration.

For the last 2000 years or so, we’ve had manditory sad music

and giving people stern looks if they laugh in church.

We’ve been obsessed with telling people not to have sex.

No drinking, no card playing, no dancing.

There’s been division, fights, tension and general grumpiness.

This hasn’t seemed like a celebration to most people.

But maybe the biggest reason

more people don’t come to the party

is that we stopped inviting people

Until about 30 years ago,

the next generation was always just taking our place.

We assumed that there would be people just like us to fill our shoes

and share the story with the next generation.

But lately, a lot of the next generation seems uninterested.

Lots of people are busy with other things

and they’ve decided that faith in God is not important to them.

But then we forgot the second part of this parable:

Where the King tells the servants to

Go into the streets and invite everyone they see.

We sit here inside this building with this wonderful gift,

the story of the gospel the freedom of Christ’s way,

that God is for everyone.

But we assume that people will just

happen to come in the doors to hear it.

That they would just know about God,

They would just know that we welcome and affirm all people here,

that they would just get the inkling from the sign

or the façade that we’re friendly people

and they would just know that God loves them no matter what they do.

That some how the glow of love will radiate

from behind Tim Horton’s and that would

ring out over all the other noise about God

and everything else that is in this world.

We think that we have the power to do that,

but even the presence of Jesus himself

was not able to make that happen without using words.

Even Jesus had to extend an invitation.

“Come and follow me”,

he said to Peter and James and John and the rest of them.

And then those people invited others.

And this parable asks us to do the same.

When none of the people we assume are

going to come join us at the banquet,

We are sent out into the streets to invite everyone.

Everyone, good and bad.

Invite without discrimination.

invite until the wedding hall is full of guests.

God’s grace will not go unused.

But don’t think this invitation is just about numbers.

it’s not just about filling up pews in church.

And it’s not mainly about inviting people to worship.
We’re inviting people into a relationship with God.

We’re inviting them to see the Spirit work in their lives.

We’re inviting them to know the Gospel of God’s

grace and love. To be set free

It may happen through coming to worship and it may not.

The invitation for all to hear and know God’s grace,

that is grace in itself.

God’s banquet is for those who can’t find grace anywhere else.

God’s banquet is for those who don’t fit in anywhere else.

God’s banquet is for choosing those who

haven’t been chosen for anything else.

And like Hank told us a couple of weeks ago,

when we give away our money,

it does something to us that is good.

So it is with God’s grace.

We need to give it away to truly feel it

to know the power of it,

and and hold it ourselves.

God’s grace is not done being given out.

The banquet hall is not full.

There are people who need to hear this message.

Go into the streets and invite everyone you see.

God’s grace will not go unused.