The Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost A

The king possesses two priorities.  The first is his insistence upon a well-populated crowd present at his son’s wedding feast.  The second is his determination that all the guests enjoy appropriate dress for the occasion.  The king’s first priority is achieved when his designated servants fill the wedding hall with guests.  By gathering indiscriminately all they encountered with no thought to whether they were good or bad, those servants brought in a crowd delighting the king in its magnitude.  The achievement of the king’s second priority was spoiled by a presumptuous guest, one who did not enjoy appropriate dress.  We are not told whether the guest himself is at fault for refusing the wedding garment offered him by the servants.  Or, if the servants themselves had simply overlooked the man and his appropriate dress.  The inappropriately clad guest bore the consequences:  expulsion!  The king of heaven populates the Great Banquet—the Wedding Feast of the Lamb—with a great crowd by gathering all, whether good or bad.  The one stipulation is that their wedding garments be washed in the blood of the Lamb.  The Lord will accept no other attire for the guests at his Son’s wedding feast.  It’s not a come-as-you-are party where you display the finery of your virtues or the boldness of your vices.  No, you may only come clothed in the forgiveness of Christ.

Prayers from those who would clothe themselves in the finery of their virtues or boldness of their vices…

Father in heaven, you would have your Son’s wedding feast be well-populated.  Thank you for sending out your servants… those whom you have established as preachers of your Son, him crucified and him alone.  They preach this Gospel, and the Holy Spirit then gathers in all who hear.  Father in heaven, give me ears to hear.

Father in heaven, you would have your Son’s wedding feast be well-populated.  Thank you for the Holy Spirit’s gathering me into the wedding hall and clothing me in a robe washed in the blood of the Lamb.  Father in heaven, give me ears to hear.

Father in heaven, you would have your Son’s wedding feast be well-populated.  Thank you for my being numbered among the Great Banquet’s crowd.  Its members delight and surprise me with their abundance and their conformity to your Son.  Father in heaven, give me ears to hear.

Father in heaven, you would have your Son’s wedding feast be well-populated.  Thank you for the neighbors you have provided me in this old and passing-away creation.  Give me lips to tell them of the Great Banquet of the Lamb and how all, whether good or bad, are being gathered in.  Father in heaven, give me ears to hear.

Father in heaven, you would have your Son’s wedding feast be well-populated.  Thank you for the neighbors you have provided me in this old and passing-away creation.  So set my hands to service useful to them that together we would enjoy well-ordered lives in the midst of sin’s brokenness.  Father in heaven, give me ears to hear.

Father in heaven, you would have your Son’s wedding feast be well-populated.  See to it that the Institute of Lutheran Theology raise up servants… raise up preachers… to gather in the guests for your Son’s Great Feast.  Father in heaven, give me ears to hear.

Father in heaven, you would have your Son’s wedding feast be well-populated.  Thank you for providing me with ears to hear the Gospel of your Son Jesus Christ.  Grant to me the hearing of this Word all the days of my baptism that I would be confident in attending the Banquet Feast of the Lamb.  Father in heaven, give me ears to hear.