At a Banquet with Mustard on My Blue Suit

My dear friends, I have a searching sermon for you tonight, and you not want to miss it, though some of you are like a thief who doesn't want to be searched and found out. Some of you have been hiding in the church for years. May God, by His Spirit, point you out tonight, for God's Word speaks of His infallible detective.

For behold, you have sinned against the Lord, and be sure your sin will find you out. You may have your friends fooled, that you are a Christian, perhaps even some of your family fooled, but God is not fooled by an empty religious profession. He will say to you on that terrible day, Away with you, I never knew you, and then you'll be taken to a region of outer darkness where you don't want to go and you never can get out.

Oh friends, I have not come to entertain you tonight, as others do, but my sermon to you this evening is a solemn warning, and I come to you this evening with a fire in my bones and a burden for your souls. We will be in Matthew's gospel in chapter 22. You can turn in your Bibles there now, friends.

We will be in verses 1 through 14. It's about the parable of the wedding banquet. Weddings are happy occasions and time for great celebration, but this is not the case with our text tonight, friends.

No, this is a sobering text. May God use it to sober some of us up to see the realities of eternity and the God of that eternity. I have never seen a biblical narrative loaded with more gospel doctrines than this one.

We should all sit up and take notice and get the wax out of our ears to hear it. I will give you, friends, the unvarnished, undiluted gospel tonight, for as we say in the South, I will give you the oil straight from the can. But first, let me pray for God's gracious assistance.

Great God in heaven, oh ancient of days, you who dwell among the cherubim, you who dwell in a high and lofty place, whose name is holy, I need your assistance, Lord, to preach your gospel of the cross tonight. Lord, I need you for what is man but a guilty rebel. Every one of us are but hell-deserving sinners.

Perhaps in your mercy and by your grace you will take your preached word and by your spirit apply it to the heart of some poor sinner. May your word run like a fire and fall. Let it fall with the weight and force of a hammer and combust up someone's false foundation.

May your spirit bring conviction and burn into the conscience of some like a fire and smoke out every false refuge to where men and women and boys and girls will flee to the only refuge and remedy for sin in the person of your dear son, Jesus. Oh Lord, make your word a claymore in my hands and strengthen me not to spare but to hew and cut down the old man of Agag, cut him down all to pieces. Give me grace, I pray, to preach with a thunder tonight to where by your spirit I am like Mount Sinai all together on a smoke for thee.

Open hearts, I pray, of some poor sinners within the sound of my voice and pour your saving grace in there. I pray these things in the strong name of Jesus. Amen.

Well, let's get down to cases, friends. We read in our text a parable of Jesus. And why did Jesus speak in parables? I think because his hearers could not have handled bare naked truth.

It would have killed some of them. So he often wrapped his message in a message. Listen to the word of God now.

And Jesus answered and spake unto them again by parables and said, The kingdom of heaven is like unto a certain king which made a marriage for his son and sent forth his servants to call them that were bidden to the wedding, and they would not come. Again he sent other servants saying, Tell them which are bidden. Behold, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fatlands are killed, and all things are ready.

Come unto the marriage. But they made light of it and went their ways, one to his farm, another to his merchandise. And the remnant took his servants and entreated them spitefully and slew them.

But when the king heard thereof, he was wroth, and he sent forth his armies and destroyed those murderers and burned up their city. Then saith he to his servants, The wedding is ready. But they which were bidden were not worthy.

Go ye therefore into the highways, and as many as ye shall find bid to the marriage. So those servants went out into the highways and gathered together all, as many as they found, both bad and good. And the wedding was furnished with guests.

And when the king came in to see the guests, he saw there a man which had not on a wedding garment. And he saith unto him, Friend, how camest thou in hither, not having a wedding garment? And he was speechless. Then said the king to the servants, Bind him hand and foot, and take him away, and cast him into outer darkness.

There should be weeping and gnashing of teeth, for many are called, but few are chosen. Well, I've never seen a passage more loaded with doctrines in this striking passage of Scripture. We have the great doctrines of grace, of the gospel.

We have the doctrine of the kingdom of heaven, the doctrine of justification, the doctrine of the imputed righteousness of Christ, the doctrine of the wedding supper of the Lamb. We have the doctrine of the last judgment, the doctrine of the strictness and severity of God's unbinding law, where every mouth will be stopped. We find also, friends, in this parable, the doctrine of original sin, the doctrine of the gospel call, the doctrine of the lordship of Christ, the doctrine of sin's misery in an everlasting hell.

And we have the doctrine of the good news of the gospel, the doctrine of regeneration, and the doctrine of election, which highlights the doctrine of God's everlasting covenant of grace, where Jesus is the sum and substance of the gospel, as seen by God the Father, according as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, who drew the plan of salvation, and appointed men to it, and made a covenant with his Son, in which it is provided and secured, and sent him into the world to obtain it, and engaged him as a surety to effect it by his assuming human nature, and suffering, and bleeding, and dying on a cross to procure it, and by whose spirit makes men sensible of their need for it, sets it before them, and applies it to them, and gives them faith and hope in it, here in his love, not that we love God, but that he loved us, and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. My friends, this is good news, the good news of the gospel, and it makes me want to sing along with the psalmist, the Lord liveth, and blessed be my rock, and let the God of my salvation be exalted. Well, let me gather myself a minute, friends, I plumb wore myself out in my little introduction before I ever got started.

Well, I just quoted a text, here in his love, not that we love God, but that he loved us, his believers. Did we love God first, or did he love us first? God says he did. Well, who am I to argue with him? I remember playing golf with a giant of a man.

He stood six feet five, and he was as wide as a brick wall, and every time this big man took a swing at the ball, he cursed God, and cussed man, why, he had the filthiest mouth of any man I ever heard. Finally, I couldn't take it anymore, so I turned to him on a tee box, and said, friend, can I ask you a question? He said, shoot. I asked, how was your relationship with God? He smiled a big grin, and said, fine, I have a great relationship with God.

I leave him alone, and he leaves me alone. That's what the big man said, but do you know what, friend? Well, it breaks my heart to say it. All you have to do to go to hell is for God to leave you alone.

If you're here tonight, and you're saved, it's because God gave you saving faith. Salvation is in the hands of God. Well, friends, in our parable from Matthew's gospel of the wedding banquet and the guest without a wedding garment, it leads me to my own similar story.

Let me say, let me say with Mark Antony, friends, countrymen, lend me your ears. Listen to this story, friends. Years ago, I was preaching in a church down south of Mississippi one Sunday morning as a guest preacher, and it was customary down south, after the service was over, to have a big banquet a big smorgasbord for the visiting preacher.

Well, we all went to the fellowship hall, where on picnic tables were meals that the members had prepared, and this buffet food was sitting there in various casserole dishes. Well, I like hot dogs, so I loaded up my plate with a few hot dogs, and I like mustard on my hot dogs. Some of you kids might like mustard on your hot dogs as well.

So I lathered them up from a jar of mustard on the table that was before me. I sat down with an old deacon and his wife, and I wondered why they were staring at me so, until I realized I had smeared yellow mustard all over the front of my brand new pinstripe blue suit. The old deacon shook his head and said, well, at least we know you're human.

Well, I took that suit to the cleaner's, friends, but that mustard stain never came out of that blue suit. It's always had a green hue. Every time after that, when I wore that suit and looked in the mirror, it always carried that stain, and that's what sin does to your friend.

It stains you, and it won't come out. It won't come off of you. Oh, you can try to whitewash sin by calling other names, but that won't do.

A fib is still a lie. Taking something that doesn't belong to you is still stealing. Fooling around is still adultery.

You can't whitewash sin by renaming it. Now listen to me, friends. Sin is still sin, and it leaves a stain on you morally that you can't wash out, even by church membership.

My new blue suit had that mustard stain, and it's still there, even though the suit is old. Being a member of a church for a long time can't make you clean. The title of my message this evening, friends, is At a Banquet with Mustard on My Blue Suit, and like mustard on a blue suit, sin stains the soul.

But in God's word, in Isaiah, we read, Come now and let us reason together, saith the Lord. Though your sins be as scarlet, they should be as white as snow. Though they be red like crimson, they should be as wool.

And in Isaiah, we have the best definition of sin I can find in my Bible. We read in Isaiah 53-6, All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way.

And that's what sin is, friends. It's going our way when we know it isn't God's way. Young woman, young man, you know the life you're living isn't pleasing to God.

You know you've been going your own way and not God's way. Mr. Businessman, you know you've been going your way and not God's way. Your excuses won't help you.

Let me address some wives here. Listen to me, you wives. What you watch on TV may give you a thrill, but you know God is against that hellish entertainment.

You're going your own selfish way when you choose entertainment that's displeasing to a holy God. We all have our little excuses to sin, but any way you slice it, friend, sin stains. It stains the soul like mustard on a suit.

And I'm telling you, friends, God is a God who must ponder sin. Oh, you can just set aside that little God of yours, the God you've been serving, the God you carved out for yourselves that won't get in the way of your daily living, the God of your imagination who's nothing more than a big jolly Santa Claus who exists solely to bless his little darlings. But the Bible says that the God of the Bible must ponder sin.

He took his darling son and gave him as a sacrifice for sin. Listen, friends, to this moving passage from Matthew, and I want you to see that man on that cross and ask yourself, why, why, why should he love me so? Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the common hall and gathered unto him the whole band of soldiers. And they stripped him and put on him a scarlet robe.

And when they had plaited a crown of thorns, they put it upon his head and a reed in his right hand. And they bowed the knee before him and mocked him saying, hail king of the Jews. And they spit upon him and they took the reed and smote him on the head.

And after that, they had mocked him. They took the robe off from him and put his own raiment on him and led him away to crucify him. And as those cruel Roman soldiers fastened the son of God to that tree, as they raised their hammers to drive the nails into his hands and feet, every stroke of the hammer was an explanation point, crying out to God, crying out to man, God must ponder sin.

God must ponder sin. God must ponder sin. Listen to me, friends.

Look, see a bloodstained Christ hanging on that cross at Calvary. Look at him as he squirms and wiggles beneath the weight of sin, my filthy sins, your wretched sins. And on that bloody cross, the son of God is crucified as the earth quakes and trembles, as rocks are torn asunder, as the sky darkens, and as the veil in the temple, which was 60 feet high and four inches thick, was torn asunder like it was made of paper mache.

Oh, wonder of wonders, as the angels in heaven look down in amazement at such a terrible scene. Perhaps, friend, if you look yonder, you can see that bloodstained Christ nailed there on that tree with his arms outstretched as he beckons you to come to him and believe on him. Oh, I think I can hear his cry.

Look unto me and be ye saved, all ye ends of the earth, for I am God and there is none else. Look at that man on the cross, friend. Look at that bloodstained savior for sin.

Will you come to him and believe on him? Or will you wag your head like the lost religious leaders of his day and just point at that bloody spectacle of the son of God hanging there in the shame and pain of Calvary while you indifferently just pass on by? Will you leave this sermon without it doing you any good? What are you waiting for, mister? Don't wait until you better. Come, come, come to the fountain of living water and drink. Listen, friend.

In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. Will you go home this evening, friend, so cold-hearted, with dry eyes and neglect so great salvation? Will you turn from your wicked ways and turn to God with all your heart and lay down your weapons of rebellion at his nail-pierced feet? The cross is the place where men try to get rid of him, but by his death it becomes the place where his saving power flows out to all who come in repentance, confessing they are sinners and own him as Savior and Lord.

But you must close with Christ, friend. Salvation is in Christ Jesus. I'm all worn out, I'm all worn out, friends.

I'm an old man with a bad heart and a pacemaker, and I must end my preaching to you of a remedy for sin and the person of Christ Jesus. But before I let you go, my hands are clean from your blood, for I have preached to you the full counsel of God, even though some will reject this message, as the apostle Paul said, for the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness, but unto us which are saved it is the power of God. That word power in the Greek language is the word dunamis, where we get our English word dynamite from.

Friends, I'll preach you tonight with my Bible in one hand and a stick of dynamite in the other. How can you ignore the safety of your eternal soul? How can you be so indifferent to your eternal destiny? Are you a statue made of stone? Do you have blood in your veins? Is there a hungry heart yet in you? Some of you, within the sound of my voice, hear me. You may be dead this year before it's over.

Sudden death is all around us, friends. Oh, I'm warning you. I had a friend getting his airplane, but before his plane got him to his business, it crashed on the ground and it became his coffin.

I had another friend driving to work one day when his car was hit by a truck head-on and he died instantly. I said goodbye to one friend in the hallway of a building, and later that night after midnight, he awoke suddenly, got out of bed, took two steps, and dropped to the floor dead with a heart attack. You have no guarantee of tomorrow, friend.

God may require your soul tonight. My sermon is now over, but before we part, may someone here yet come to Christ for pardon of sin? The gospel is for the hungry, the weary, and the thirsty. You must feel your need of a savior for sin.

With my eyes full of tears and my heart full of love, I'll leave you with this final gospel plea. And the spirit and the bride say, come. And let him that hears say, come.

And let him that is a thirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.