Clothed in a Righteousness Not Our Own

Read Matthew 22:1-14

     The meaning of the parable is obvious.  The invited guests are the sons of Israel who have refused to accept God’s Kingdom, and Son.  In fact, they have responded to invitations with violence (Jesus will be crucified within the week).  The King will turn instead to strangers, Gentiles, to fill the wedding hall. 

      But there was a dress code for this wedding feast.  We know because there was someone who wasn’t dressed properly, and he was cast out “into the outer darkness” where “there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (22:13).  Do the wedding garments represent the guests’ personal records of righteousness?  No, because the servants had “gathered all whom they found, both bad and good” (22:10).  There were “bad” people there clothed properly – only one (whether “bad” or “good” we are not told) who could not stay. 

      So where did the guests get the wedding garments?  Galatians 3:27 says “all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ” (NIV).    Don’t try to enter God’s Kingdom with “a righteousness of [your] own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith” (Philippians 3:9).