AUGUST 31 THE JESUS QUESTIONS JQ#27 “Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?” (Matthew 22:12)

 

AUGUST 31  THE JESUS QUESTIONS   JQ#27  

“Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?”  

(Matthew 22:12)

LIVING FOR JESUS  Daily Prayer    

JESUS, Lord I give You all Praise, Glory, and Honor for the 

Great Sacrifice that You Planned and Executed on my behalf, Lord Jesus

 I know that I am undeserving and that makes Your Sacrifice 

even greater still. Lord, add to the simple truth that we are underserving

 and that You were perfectly innocent and did not need us

 in any way, it is incomprehensible that You would become flesh

 and endure the temptations of the world to be our Savior?!? Jesus, 

help me Lord to be more like You in everything I do that my old 

selfish desires will be crucified with You and that I will be a new 

glorified creature in Your Resurrection. 

 {{In 2004 I wrote the following prayer which

 I think is very appropriate and relative to today:

 “Jesus, Jesus, Immanuel, God IS with us! 

You Lord are here and now, You hear me EVERY TIME I call Your Name

 from my heart, Your Holy Spirit indwells us and leads us through 

our daily lives. Take me and make me to conform to Thy Will. Lord,

 let my lips and my mind praise You continually for in our praise we

 are drawn nearer to You and the closer we can get t o You, the 

closer we are to one day leaving this sin-filled world and our 

sin-filled ways.You are the Way, the Truth and the Life — 

You are the Messiah, the Son of God Most High.

 Glory and Honor to Jesus the Christ,

 our Savior, our Lord and our friend.” }}   

AMEN

THE JESUS QUESTIONS

Jesus is building His Lesson in this 3rd Parable on God’s Authority

 around a traditional “marriage” where the “father” arranges 

the “marriage for his son” and this Lesson is understood by all Israel. 

Jesus is able to hit at the core of the “traditions of men” by Teaching 

this “authority” issue because there is no questioning the “authority”

 of the “father”!!!. The accepted “tradition” in Israel of the father

 arranging marriages has literally been upheld by every Israelite

 for thousands of years. Jesus in using His 15 Phrases in 

His 3rd Parable to introduce the problem using the nations own

 “traditions” and once the problem is introduced, Jesus really drives

 the point home when He follows

 {Phrase 5} : “…[the certain king] sent out servants to call those who were invited to the wedding…” with

 {Phrase 6} “…the invited were not willing to come…”!!!

 Being invited to a marriage was understood on a very personal

 level by everyone listening to Jesus. It could also be for certain that

 everyone listening had been involved in a marriage, and many of 

the rulers had been in the position of arranging marriages for their

 own sons, and probably most everyone had at one time or 

another in their lifetime “excused” themselves from a wedding they 

had been invited to for some reason or another, so Jesus has again

 used a “Universal Experience” to Teach this most valuable of Lessons

 on “authority” in a way that could be understood by the entire nation

 of Israel using the “traditions of men” that all Israel had been living

 with for generations upon generations. Jesus places words in 

just the right order to Teach great Lessons with a single, perfectly

 placed word or phrase and 

{Phrase 7} “…again…” is one of those “Perfect” words for it Teaches the

 Truth of God that He is MERCIFUL, PATIENT, and 

GOES THE EXTRA MILE and will AGAIN and AGAIN 

do everything that He can to draw us to Himself!!! 

The word “…AGAIN…” placed at this point also points to the Message

 that John the Baptist and Jesus has been preaching and that is REPENT.

 By extending the invitation  “AGAIN”, God is saying that He is 

giving everyone a chance to “relent (repent)” from our unwillingness

 to accept His invitation as Jesus Taught in Parable 1 that

 “the son that had done the father’s will” 

was the one that 

“regretted [telling the father ‘no’] and went and worked

 [as the father had commanded]” (Matthew 21:29) 

Jesus is using all these 3 parables in a specific order and now He is using 

the 3rd Parable in a specific word/phrase order to 

Teach the Truth of God

 in a way that everyone can understand!

 {Phrase 8} “…sent out other servants…” and 

{Phrase 9} “…tell the invited…” makes me think of 

another description that Isaiah writes of God 

“…the LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator 

of the ends of the earth…His understanding is unsearchable…” 

(Isaiah 40:28) 

and if we think of all that God has done from Creation 

to the Crucifixion to “invite” everyone to the kingdom of God, 

we cannot deny that God has done more than any of us would 

have done to provide a Path of Repentance to Eternal Life 

— we are not able in the first place to “Provide” eternal life for ourself

 so how do we even consider we could be gracious enough to provide 

for those who reject our every invitation to “come”, we haven’t 

even “Prepared” a place for our guests — 

God continually proves Himself Faithful and Just, 

——— why oh why do we reject His Mercy and Grace?!?!?!?!

AUGUST 30 THE JESUS QUESTIONS JQ#27 “Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?” (Matthew 22:12)

 

AUGUST 30  THE JESUS QUESTIONS  JQ#27

  “Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?”  

(Matthew 22:12)

LIVING FOR JESUS  Daily Prayer    

JESUS, Lord, Giver of all things good in my life, I can only give 

You praise for the change that Your Love has made in my life and 

I pray that because of Your Love that others will see the “change” 

and that Your Love will change them as well. Lord I know it was 

a small thing but I felt Your Grace so full with the opportunity 

You gave us with the McKenzie Acre boys and girls — Lord I pray

 for Your Love to be poured out on them and last night showed

 me that it will be through being obedient to Your command to

 “love one another” that we are indeed sharing You and Your Love

 with our world — Lord what a gift it is for “giving” and “forgiving” and 

to just see others through Your eyes, may I in the future let Your Love

 pour out of me into these kids and see that “change” that only Your Love

 can bring about in our lives.   

AMEN

THE JESUS QUESTIONS

Jesus has placed this 3rd Parable at the end of 3 Parables on the

 “Authority of God” for a specific reason and it could be argued 

from the Book of Revelation that there is great significance in Jesus

 being the Lamb of God and in the End Time that all heaven will rejoice 

“…for the marriage of the Lamb has come and His bride 

has made herself ready…” (Revelation 19:6-9) 

Jesus has been Teaching about the problem of how “Israel” has 

treated “her God” ——— the prophet Isaiah after writing about 

the “Suffering Servant” in Isaiah 53 and continues in Isaiah 54 

writing about Israel: 

“For your Maker is your husband, the LORD of hosts 

is His name; and your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel; 

He is called the God of the whole earth.” (Isaiah 54:5)  

Therefore all Israel understood Jesus Teaching about a “marriage”

 and soon they will see with their own eyes what John the Baptist had 

declared about Jesus, “Behold the Lamb of God” (John 1:29)

 and all the pieces will fit as during this Special Passover when 

God will “provide Himself the lamb” as Abraham promised Isaac

 on Mount Moriah before Israel became a nation. Jesus Teaching this

 3rd Parable about 

{Phrase 1} “The kingdom of heaven is like…”

 {Phrase 2} “…a certain king…” who 

{Phrase 3} “…arranged a marriage…” fits into the traditions and the 

Holy Scriptures that Israel has been living with since Abraham arranged

 a marriage for his “Promised Son” Isaac and the fulfilling of God’s

 covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob pertaining to the nation

 of God’s chosen people, Israel. However, Israel had become so 

entrenched in her “traditions” and “doctrines of men” that they as a

 Holy Nation had been led away from the “command of God” which is

 the main problem Jesus introduces starting with 

{Phrase 4} “…for his son…” (which Jesus had already Taught

 about the chief cornerstone being “rejected by the builders”

 and had become the great “stumbling block” for God’s chosen nation)

 — Jesus never introduces a “problem” without immediately 

pointing to the solution which 

Jesus in His Divine Role as the Master Teacher,

 details the problem which illuminates the solution

 to the problem He details with 

{Phrase 5} “…[the certain king] sent out servants to call

 those who were invited to the wedding…”. 

Israel knows as a nation that God has been sending out His servants

 in the form of prophets, judges, kings, and even His enemies as

 servants to fulfill His covenant with the nation Israel whom God 

has called to be a “chosen peoples”. It is obvious that at this Passover

 that Jesus will fulfill His Divine Task of being the Passover Lamb and 

this is necessary because 

{Phrase 6} “…the invited were not willing to come…” 

This is a problem with our spiritual journey that each pilgrim takes

 to find our God and the Land of Promise that He has prepared for us. 

If we do not reach our destination it is not because of a shortcoming

 of God but because we have not followed His Path for our life —

 God has prepared and God has provided 

but we have strayed from His Plan and are 

“not willing to come” even though we have been “invited”

 by the King Himself —

 how long will you “make excuses” not to attend this

 Marriage Feast and the Wedding of the King’s Son?