There are many experiences in life that come down to a matter of perspective. Two different people can see the same thing, and have completely different perspectives on what happened. Our Gospel for this weekend offers a few very interesting perspectives. In the Parable of the wedding feast, we might be tempted to look at the king from a limited perspective and see him as harsh and demanding.
He offers this magnificent wedding feast for his son and those invited refuse the invitation. Not immediately deterred, the king sends out servants to persuade them, and that is when things get a little difficult. Some ignore the invitation, choosing instead to tend to other commitments on their farm or concerning business. That can happen. Others mistreat the servants and even kill them. The king's response is immediate and decisive: “The king was enraged and sent his troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city” (Matthew 22:7). Wow, there is no room for subtlety there! Finally, there is the man who comes to this feast where both the good and bad are gathered. But when the king sees that the man is not wearing the proper wedding garment, he is not merely asked to leave. No, the man is bound, hand and foot, and cast into the darkness outside!
It can be troubling to see this parable from the perspective of a harsh king. Of course, that is not what the parable is about at all. It is not a parable about an ill-tempered ruler, or time management, or about proper dress codes and just desserts.
It is a parable about eternal life. It is the story of our salvation and the totally gratuitous gift of heaven that God is extending to each and every one of us. The point of the parable, the main perspective, really, is that we have been invited to the greatest experience of our existence, eternal life with God. Refusal of the invitation is simply not a logical or reasonable option.
From that perspective we can now see that those who ignore the invitation, those who find farm and business more important, those that are threatened by God’s totally gratuitous offer and strike out violently, these are the ones who act harshly and hence are ill-tempered and ill-fated. We see that the man not properly dressed did not come to the feast with the appropriate dispositions, and presumed that he could enter on his own terms and not the king’s. By their decisions, or by simply not making a choice at all, they have forfeited the greatest and most valuable gift they could have ever received.
In his fictional work, The Great Divorce, Christian author C.S. Lewis offers a pithy summary of this critical choice through the perspective of one of the main characters. Basically, he says that there will be “two kinds of people” in the end. There will be those who have said to God, “Thy will be done.” Like Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, and perhaps in many moments as challenging as that, they have said to God, “Thy will be done. I want what you want, even if it is difficult.” But then there will be those to whom God must say, and with great sorrow, “THY will be done.” Some may have refused or ignored the invitation; others may have acted in violence and rebellion, but in the end they will sadly be given their own way. “THY will be done.” It is a challenging perspective.
One final perspective that I would like to mention, however, is the one found in the Resposorial Psalm this morning, Psalm 23. It is totally compatible with the main perspective of our parable, and shows us the heart of the king in the love of a shepherd:
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
In verdant pastures he gives me repose;
beside restful waters he leads me;
he refreshes my soul.
There are many times in our lives when we do not listen well to God’s invitation or are tempted to be rebellious and stubborn. With great love, God follows after us, seeks us out, and leads us to the very place where we will find rest and refreshment. He goes to the extreme of entering into this world to find us, and gives His very life to save us. We could not be treated more tenderly or lovingly than that!
There is a wonderful poem written in the 16th Century by the Spanish mystic, St. John of the Cross. He tells the story of salvation in poetic verse, from the perspective of the shepherd:
A lone young shepherd lived in pain
withdrawn from pleasure and contentment,
his thoughts fixed on a shepherd-girl
his heart an open wound with love.
He weeps, but not from the wound of love,
there is no pain in such affliction,
even though the heart is pierced;
he weeps in knowing he’s been forgotten.
There were many, we are told in the Gospel, that refused the invitation that God offered. Many more ignored it and found other things to do. The Sacred Heart of Jesus is wounded when we forget about Him and are ungrateful. God’s response to that ingratitude and forgetfulness is striking and amazing. St. John of the Cross continues:
That one thought: his shining one has forgotten him,
is such great pain
that he bows to brutal handling in a foreign land,
his heart an open wound with love.
Jesus comes, knowing that He will be ignored and refused. He comes, knowing that He will “bow to brutal handling in a foreign land,” even though that land was created by Him, and fashioned for the receptivity of love. In fact, it is this very brutality that God will use, in the most surprising way, to save us. St. John of the Cross concludes:
After a long time he climbed a tree,
and spread his shining arms,
and hung by them, and died,
his heart an open wound with love.
-St. John of the Cross
“Stanzas Applied Spiritually to God and the Soul”
This is God’s invitation to the banquet of eternal life. Christ climbs upon the cross and stretches out His shining arms to welcome us. Isaiah the Prophet, in our first reading this weekend, describes that same invitation and sacrifice:
On this mountain the Lord of hosts will provide for all peoples a feast of rich food and choice wines, juicy, rich food and pure, choice wines. On this mountain he will destroy the veil that veils all peoples, the web that is woven over all nations; he will destroy death forever . . . For the hand of the Lord will rest on this mountain.
—Isaiah 25:6-10
The mountain that Isaiah is referring to is the mountain of Calvary. It is there that God will mount the wood of the cross and destroy death forever. It is on that mountain that He will offer His body and blood as the sacrifice that will open the gates of heaven for us to enter. It is His body and blood, offered as a rich feast in the Sacrament of the Eucharist, that gives us access to the very life of God and the resurrection. We are invited this morning to nothing less than this.
Today God leads us to the place where we most need to be. He is calling us and reminding us that He knows more than we do what is necessary, essential and good for us. Today we look to the perspective of God, and remember:
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
In verdant pastures he gives me repose;
beside restful waters he leads me;
he refreshes my soul.
