Holy Responses

Matthew 22:1-14

I have heard that some people have trouble deciding what to wear to worship on Sundays. I think it is a pretty easy thing to decide. Every Sunday, I put on dark slacks, a white shirt, black Florsheim shoes, and a jacket. About the only thing I have to think about is which tie to wear, but I almost always choose my Campbell tartan tie that Pam got for me on one of her trips to England. It probably doesn’t matter all that much to you what I wear, because I cover it all up with this robe!

There is an old preacher’s story that I shared with the “Praying with John Wesley” class this past week that gets at some of this difficulty we have in trying to decide what we are to wear to church. As an aside, I want to point out that preacher stories are always true, even if they have no basis in fact.

There was an old farmer who decided that the time had come for him to get right with God. So on Sunday morning, he got up extra early, did all of his chores, and then headed across the field to the open country church that was a few miles away. When he got to the church, he was greeted by a deacon who told him how happy they were that the farmer had decided to come to church. As the farmer took that first step up to the door, the deacon stopped him.

“We are glad that you are here today, but I can’t let you in. You see, we have just installed new carpet in the church, and your boots are muddy.” The farmer thought about this for a moment, and decided that his first impression upon the congregation should not be as the guy who ruined their carpet. So he thanked the deacon, and made the walk home.

The next Sunday came, and again the farmer got up extra early, did all of his chores, grabbed a pair of shoes to carry with him, and then headed across the fields to get to church. When he got there, he was greeted by the same deacon. “So good to see you again! I see you have brought some shoes to change into. That is a wonderful gesture, but I am afraid I can’t let you in. Even though your shoes won’t dirty the carpet, I am afraid your overalls would make a mess of the pew cushions.” The farmer thought about this for a while, and decided he didn’t want to ruin their pew cushions. So he thanked the deacon, and made the walk home.

The next Sunday came, and the farmer got up even earlier, did all of his chores, changed into clean overalls, grabbed a pair of shoes, and then headed out over the fields to the church. Before he got to the door, the deacon said to him, “I guess I didn’t make my self clear. It isn’t enough that your clothes are clean. We believe that we should wear our very best when we come to worship, so that we may honor God.” The farmer thought about this for a while, and decided that he wanted to honor God, too. So he thanked the deacon, and made the walk home.

About halfway home, the farmer sat down under a shade tree and began to pray. “Lord, you know that I want to worship you. Can you please tell me what that deacon is going to object to next week, so I can get in the church?” There was a brief pause, and then the farmer heard a voice from heaven: “I don’t know. I have been trying to get into that church myself for over 20 years.”

Hopefully, at this point in our history as a church, we know that honoring God is not about the clothes we wear, but about being clothed by God. Many church members even know how we are to be clothed by God – weare to put on the armor of Christ. This image of putting on armor, though, may be why so many people have trouble with this parable, which is also about being clothed by God.

It was Paul, in his letter to the Ephesians, who painted a picture of what it takes to be a Christian in a hostile world that was actively attacking Christianity. Paul told us that the armor of God includes the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shoes of readiness, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit.

It’s easy to understand why Paul chose the imagery of armor, instead of something like a wedding gown. When Paul wrote his letter, the threat to Christianity came from lies told about disciples being cannibals who ate flesh and drank blood. Righteousness in the world was determined by who had the most power, instead of by God’s law. Heresy was believing that there was only one God, and not many gods bound up with narrow concerns. Faith was about little people, making little intercessions, seeking little interventions, from little gods, to solve the little problems, of the little people.

The battle for Paul was advocating an intercession as big as the Son of God, seeking a kingdom that covered the whole world, empowered by the one true God, to bring the paradise of heaven on earth for all the children of God. In the face of those challenges, the armor of God was an essential image for sending the church out into the world to share the good news of Jesus Christ.

But in our reading for today we have Jesus telling a parable about putting on the wedding garment. The people are invited to a celebration. When some reject the invitation, others are found. But there is one who accepts the invitation, but then gets thrown out because he refused to put on the wedding garment. And we wonder what all the fuss is about.

When John Wesley was 87 years old, he wrote a sermon to summarize his understanding of faith. He chose this passage for his supporting scripture. Wesley identified the wedding garment that we must put on to be part of the eternal celebration of life with God as the righteousness of Jesus Christ. Jesus is not telling us about what happens at the party, but he is telling us how we are to respond to the invitation Jesus extends to us. The toad in our parable wants the benefits of being saved, but doesn’t want to live as though he has been saved.

If we accept the invitation to be disciples of Jesus Christ, we must put on his righteousness. But what does it mean to put on the righteousness of Jesus Christ? For too many people, putting on righteousness is a bit like putting on an invisibility cloak from the Harry Potter books. We put it on, and suddenly the devil can’t find us at the time of judgment. We put it on, and suddenly God doesn’t see all the sinful things we do. We can go where we want and do whatever we want, because we are covered in grace through the blood of Jesus Christ. In other words, we act as if our ticket is already punched for the train that is bound for glory, so we can do whatever we want until the train comes to take us home.

The world of John Wesley was much different from the world of St. Paul. Instead of being arrested or put to death for following Jesus, being Christian was considered to be a birth rite, as every child was baptized and every person belonged to the Church of England. So when John wanted to talk about putting on righteousness, the wedding garment made for a better image for the people than did the armor of God.

The key for understanding this parable is found by looking at the rhythm of our salvation: first, God’s mighty actions; and then, our response. This is the rhythm we see repeated throughout the Old and New Testaments. This rhythm is woven into the themes of our relationships with God and each other. In I John 4:19, we find it beautifully summed up as “We love, because God first loved us.” We forgive, because God forgives us. We show mercy to others, because God has shown mercy to us. We provide for those in need, because God has provided everything we need. Another, and perhaps more helpful, way of thinking about sin is that it is a breaking of this rhythm: God acts, but our response does not acknowledge the actions of God.

In his tract, “A Plain Account of Christian Perfection,” John Wesley painted a picture of what it means to be a righteous disciple in a world that believes the true order of salvation, the gospel of self-righteousness, is “We act, and God responds.”

This tract was the last in a series that evolved over the course of Wesley’s life. In its first version, it was titled, “Cautions and Directions to the Greatest Professors of Methodism.” In this earliest version, Wesley’s concern was for those sins that are peculiar to those who are earnestly striving to go on to perfection in love. Wesley’s concern was for those persons who would seem to be the most righteous people among us. He identified those attitudes and actions that people claimed as righteousness but which were actually sins against the grace of God.

The first two cautions are sins against the prevenient grace of God – pride and enthusiasm. Pride in the inner sin that believes we have more grace than has been given to others. Enthusiasm is the outer sin that acts on that belief, living without humility before others. These are the sins of those who turned down the invitation because they thought they didn’t need any further blessing.

The next two cautions are sins against the justifying grace of God -- antinomianism and sins of omission. Antinomianism is the inner sin that believes we are no longer accountable for righteousness since we are already saved by grace. Sins of omission are those times we decline to act righteously, because we believe our salvation frees us fromhaving to care about others. These are the sins of the guest who accepts the invitation but does not put on the wedding garment.

The last two cautions are sins against the sanctifying grace of God – desiring anything but God and schism. Desiring anything but God is the inner sin that believes our truest happiness can be found apart from God. Schism is the outer sin that believes we can’t be happy or faithful if there are people who disagree with us and our opinions, so they can’t be with us in the Body of Christ. These are the sins by which the guest has himself thrown out of the kingdom of God.

The importance of identifying these six “unholy responses” is precisely because they attack what it means to be the ongoing incarnation of Christ as a revelation of perfect love. They are a negative witness to the world about what it means to be a Christian, and to be part of a Christian community. But by his writing of the last version of this tract, he was calling for what I call “the holy responses.” What Wesley learned as he grew in faith and love, as many of us do, is that telling others what is wrong only works if, at their core, they already know what is right. By the time Wesley wrote “A Plain Account of Christian Perfection,” he knew that most people no longer knew what was right, so they didn’t know how to be righteous.

It is a wonderful tract, and I encourage you all to read it at some other time. But for this morning, let me summarize it for you. Righteousness, or the holiness of perfect love, is revealed by the calmin our demeanor, a calm that is based on our dependence on God whom we trust. We can be calm because we haveconfidence in the Holy Spirit to guide us, and to complete us. We experience that completeness as we conform our lives to that of Christ, revealing his compassion to all of God’s children, particularly those who need it most. This life of calmness, confidence, conformity, and compassion is our constant rule as a sign of ourcommitment to Christ. And our commitment to love God and to love our neighbor necessarily means that we live together in thecommunity of Christ.

If you are feeling a little exposed this morning, or perhaps feel like you are wearing the wrong thing before God and our neighbors, hear the good news – Jesus has provided for us his righteousness to wear because we are children of the heavenly Father, and he has invited us to a celebration of God’s great love for us. It is time for us to accept the invitation, and to put on the righteousness of Christ.