The Rev. Dayle Casey
The Chapel of Our Saviour
Colorado Springs, Colorado
October 12, 2008

Proper 23-A
Isaiah 25:1-9
Philippians 4:4-13
Matthew 22:1-14

Woody Guthrie used to say that “life is tough, and you’re lucky if you live through it.” And now, with daily reports of financial meltdown , now today many wonder if we’re not headed back to the hard times of the 1930s Guthrie sang about. Markets around the world are in a downward spiral, credit is tight, jobs are disappearing, homes are being lost, retirement plans are crumbling, political rhetoric is escalating beyond acceptable limits, and everywhere, it seems, dreams are fading – and fear, that most noxious and debilitating of human emotions, is on the loose.

“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” So Franklin Roosevelt reminded us in 1933. But Jesus, of course, reminded us of the same long before Roosevelt. Fear is worthless, Jesus said. “Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten by God. Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.” “Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and the things you need for life will be given to you as well.” “Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not be afraid. You have heard me say that I am going away and am coming back to you. Trust in God; trust also in me, because I am going to prepare a place for you, and I will come back and take you with me, that you also may be where I am.” So do not be afraid; our destiny is sure, backed by the promise of God himself.

“This great Nation will endure as it has endured,” Roosevelt began at his inauguration in 1933. “[We] will revive and will prosper. So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself, nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. In every dark hour of our national life, [our challenges have been met with wise leadership supported by a national unity and purpose, and] I am convinced that you will again give that support to leadership in these critical times. In such a spirit, on my part and yours, we [will] face our common difficulties, [and] they concern, thank God, only material things.”

“Yet our distress comes from no failure of substance. We are stricken by no plague of locusts.... Nature still offers her bounty and human efforts have multiplied it. Plenty is at our doorstep, but a generous use of it languishes in the very sight of the supply.” And that, Roosevelt then explained, is because we have not been good stewards of our financial institutions. The rulers of the exchange of mankind’s goods have failed. “Their efforts have been cast in the pattern of an outworn tradition, [and] they have no vision, and when there is no vision the people perish.”

Changing this pattern and restoring our national vision will require our united efforts, Roosevelt went on to say. It will require commitment and sacrifice, because “values have shrunken to fantastic levels; taxes have risen; our ability to pay has fallen;...the means of exchange are frozen in the currents of trade; the withered leaves of industrial enterprise lie on every side;...the savings of many years in thousands of families are gone,” and “only a foolish optimist can deny the dark realities of the moment.”

Then, following this realistic assessment of the nation’s malaise, Roosevelt went on to lay out his vision for the future, and he assured us that he was undertaking the responsibilities of the office of President with confidence in a people who would support his leadership. Working together, he said, we will be “willing to sacrifice for the good of a common discipline,” so that not only the economy, but also the nation’s vision, the nation’s confidence and spirit, might be restored.

Actually, fear is worse than worthless. The problem with fear is that fear undermines all efforts toward restoration, and, what is worse yet, it corrodes the soul. Fear undermines even life itself, because fear brought to a boil as despair creates a dead end, a kind of death. Despair is a denial of any meaningful future, and such a dead end is the natural legacy of fear left unchecked. But despair, as John Claypool reminds us, is always presumptuous, because it is saying something about the future you have no right to say, for the simple reason that you haven’t been there yet.

“So, why are you afraid, little ones?” Jesus asks. God promises you a place in his kingdom. God invites you to his heavenly banquet. And this is why St. Paul urges us to “rejoice in the Lord, always!” “Do not be anxious about anything,” Paul urges, ”but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable – if anything is excellent or praiseworthy – think about these things, and the God of peace will be with you.... I know what is is to be in need,” Paul adds, ”and I know what it is to have plenty. [In Christ] I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, regardless of circumstances, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want, [because in Christ] I can do everything through him who gives me strength.”

What had Paul discovered that made him so transparently confident?

It was this – that Paul knew something about living in Christ that others hadn’t yet discovered and that many of us still haven’t discovered. And this is what it is – that sharing in the resurrection life of Christ, the kingdom of heaven, is like a great wedding feast held by a king for his son. And here is what one finds at that feast:

There once was a man who went to work day after day, week after week, month after month, and after a time he began to believe that he was due a raise. But week after week, month after month, he put off talking with his boss about it, because he was afraid. He was afraid his boss would say no. Then one morning he decided that today was the day he would speak with his boss, and he told his wife that he was going to march right into his boss’s office that morning and do it.

When he got to work, however, his courage failed him. His fear returned, and he put it off and didn’t go in to see his boss right away. But toward the end of the day he had screwed up his courage again, and he knocked on his boss’s door, and before he could change his mind again he blurted out that he thought it was time for a raise. And to his delight, his employer agreed.

When he got home, he noticed that the dining table was set with the best china and silver, and the dining room was aglow with candle light. His wife had prepared a festive meal. He thought to himself that someone from the office must have called to tip her off that he had gotten his raise, and he went into the kitchen to tell his wife the good news himself. She kissed him, and they sat down to the wonderful meal she had prepared.

Beside his plate was a beautifully lettered note that read, “Congratulations, darling. I knew you would get that raise. I prepared this meal and this evening to tell you how much I love you.”

They enjoyed the fine meal and the relaxing evening at table together. And when his wife got up to get the dessert, the man noticed that a second card had fallen out of her pocket. He bent over and picked it up. It read, “Don’t worry, darling, about not getting the raise. You are more important to me than any raise! I prepared this meal and this evening to tell you how much I love you.”

That’s what Paul had discovered from Christ about the feast that God prepares for his Son and for us – that God’s love does not depend upon human circumstance. God invites us to his feast, the good and the bad alike, just because he loves us and wants us and his Son to get to know each other. And that’s why Paul can rejoice. In fact, that’s why Paul cannot help but rejoice. That’s news so good that Paul cannot contain himself. The word is out; the invitations are on the way. “So rejoice!” he says. “Rejoice in the Lord, always.”

But some say, “Wait a minute, Dayle. We heard that parable a moment ago, and there were some people in Jesus’ story who didn’t take part in the feast. What about them?”

That’s right. There were two kinds of people who were excluded from the king’s feast. The first were a group of people who were excluded because they excluded themselves. They had been invited. In fact, they were among the very first to be invited, but they had other things they believed were more important, so they chose not to come. “I’ve got business to attend to; I don’t have time to come,” they said.

And that’s the way it is with us, isn’t it – that often we are so busy making a living that we forget to make a life. The two things are not the same, making a living and making a life. And it’s possible, isn’t it, to get so preoccupied and busy with securing an income, with getting things we’d like to have – even, sometimes, so busy with climbing over other people or tearing them down to get those things – that we forget to be grateful for the gift of life itself and miss celebrating the gift with the Giver.

Or maybe some folks just believe that any feast that is open to everyone, rather than restricted to the special chosen, is going to include some folks they didn’t care for. So they refuse to go as well, which is another way of excluding oneself.

And so we miss the point of it all. We miss the celebration of life itself! We miss the feast. We miss the life God has prepared for us just because he loves us, and because both God and his Son cherish our presence.

And the other kind of person who missed the feast is the one the king kicked out because he wasn’t wearing wedding garments. But when we think about it a little we realize that this guy, too, had actually excluded himself, because he came only for the treats. He came only for the eats, not for the celebration, not for the companionship and the love. And the host took offense at that, not because the man’s clothes were old or poor, but because he hadn’t dressed in the best he had, in gratitude and grace, as was fitting for such an occasion.

A wedding feast, any true celebration, calls for one to come prepared, clothed in the appropriate spirit, with appropriate expectations and gratitude, ready to do what the feast is for, ready to enjoy and celebrate the companionship and love of the occasion.

So it is important that we realize what Jesus’ parable is not saying. It is not saying that only the rich who can afford expensive and fashionable party clothes are welcome. What it is saying is that life is an opportunity. Life is our opportunity to clothe ourselves for the feast to which we have already been invited by God, our opportunity to clothe ourselves with the vestments of faith and gratitude, prepared for the kiss of God and mankind in Jesus.

If we come to the feast unprepared to celebrate that marriage, then we might be invited to leave, not because the host does not want us there – after all he has sent out a general invitation – but because, by showing up in the wrong spirit, or for the wrong reason, by showing up in inappropriate spiritual dress, prepared only for the goodies and eats and not for the marriage, we exclude ourselves from the benefits of the day.

And that’s why we pray, as we will later this morning, that God might accept our offerings at his banquet table, “not weighing our merits, but pardoning our offenses,” and that we might be delivered “from the presumption of coming to God’s Table for solace only, and not for strength; for pardon only, and not for (the) renewal (of our lives).”

Faith, someone once said, is life lived in scorn of circumstance. So Paul, in scorn of circumstance, pressed on to take hold of the prize of his marriage with Christ, knowing that his very life was for the purpose of preparing the spiritual garments he would want to wear to the feast. And his great joy lay in the good news that even if he proved to be all thumbs, even if he failed to be a very good tailor, God would not measure him by the straightness of the seams he sewed, but by the faithfulness and spirit with which he sewed them.

Life lived in faith, life lived in scorn of circumstance, is life lived with confidence in the future, both in this world and in the next. It is “the substance of what we hope for, the evidence of things not [yet] seen.”

I want to end with a suggestion for the future, both for the future of our nation and for the life to come. No, it is more than a suggestion; it is a pastoral exhortation. Ask yourself two questions: How big is your future? How big is your hope? And ask yourself what kind of future you expect, and also what your responsibility is in the creation of it. Rein in your fear. Resist the fear expressed by others, that it might not infect you. Share with others the charity of Christ in all things. Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable – if anything is excellent or praiseworthy – think about these things, and the God of peace will be with you. Remember that trust in God overcomes anxiety.

The weeks and months ahead are a season for important decisions, and all our decisions say something about our belief in the future, both in this world and in the next. I, for one, do not plan to live as a fearful person in a fearful land. So my hope is this – that in whatever decisions you make, in whatever venue, you will vote your hope, not your fear. And encourage hope and trust in others. That, President Roosevelt assured us, is the tonic for what ails us as a nation, the key to a healthy future. There is hard work to do, but the nation “will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper,” if, pulling together, we are “willing to sacrifice for the good of a common discipline,” so that not only the economy, but also the nation’s vision, the nation’s confidence and spirit, might be restored.

Vote your hope, not your fear. It is also the way to the life to come. I, for one, do not expect to spend eternity in fear. God’s Table is set for us – on no condition at all, other than that we accept the invitation with gratitude and grace. God loves us as he loves his own Son, and he wants us to get to know each other, and to share a life together.

Now that’s news one can rejoice in, and the invitation is open to all. The only questions are: Will you go? And what spiritual clothes are you preparing now to wear?

In the Name of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.