Jesus offered a third parable to the chief priests and scribes or rabbis (Matthew 21:15), also called elders (Matthew 21:23) and Pharisees (Matthew 21:45). The first two parables concerned the faithlessness of the then present leadership of the Jews. The problem was, they were disobedient, but they appeared righteous (Parable of the Two Sons). They labored in what seemed to have been faithful obedience, but the fact was, they labored for their own interests and refused to give the Lord the fruits of the Kingdom, which were rightfully his. Moreover, they conspired together to take what belonged to God and forever keep him from regaining what was rightfully his (Parable of the Tenants). In the third parable, which Jesus offered his listeners in the Temple, the Parable of the Wedding Feast, Jesus vindicated God, who is represented in the two former parables as forgiving, graceful and patient, showing him as the Judge of evildoers. Nevertheless, although the Jewish leaders would successfully slay God’s son, the Lord’s plan to initiate a New Covenant, represented in this third parable, the Parable of the Wedding Feast, remained unchanged. It was fulfilled, but not with the original folks that the Lord had invited.
Many folks want to make Jesus into a mind reader, but this simply isn’t so. He couldn’t read a person’s thoughts, any more than you and I are able to do so. The fact is, Jesus exchanged the powers of God for the office of a servant, when he took the form of man by becoming flesh (Philippians 2:6-7; John 1:14). In other words, Jesus was completely dependent upon his Father to do the miracles, which we read about him doing in the Gospel narratives (John 5:19; 14:10; Acts 10:38).
In Matthew 22:1 Jesus is still speaking with the Jewish leaders (Matthew 21:15, 23, 45). We are told in the text that Jesus “spoke unto them again” with another parable, meaning he spoke with the same folks he was speaking to earlier (Matthew 21). However, they didn’t openly respond to Jesus’ second parable. Instead, they “sought,” vis-à-vis they wanted to “Lay hands on him…” but they didn’t, because they feared the people (Matthew 21:45). Apparently, they made a gesture to arrest Jesus, but didn’t follow through, and just as we could conclude correctly, what a person was thinking to do, if he made a gesture of violence toward us, but refrained from carrying out his desire, so Jesus knew the hearts of the Jewish authorities. It wasn’t difficult, and he “answered… them” with a third parable (Matthew 22:1).
Jesus’ third parable began with, “The Kingdom of Heaven is like…” and he identified the two main characters of the parable, the king and his son, who, of course, represent the Father and Jesus, God’s Son (Matthew 22:2). The king prepared a marriage, vis-à-vis a covenant, for his son.
In the parable, the king sent his servants, vis-à-vis the prophets, to call those whom he invited to the wedding. In other words, he referred to the Jews; they were his invited guests. They had broken their previous covenant, which they had made with God, so the Lord sent out his messengers, the prophets, promising to make a New Covenant with them (cp. Jeremiah 31:31-32), which is represented in the wedding, but they refused to believe a new covenant was necessary (Matthew 22:3). When the time arrived for establishing the new covenant, a second invitation was sent out through the preaching of the Gospel by Jesus’ disciples, but those, whom the Lord invited, not only made light of and refused the invitation, but some of them mistreated his messengers, slaying many of them (Matthew 22:4-6). When these things were reported to the King, he was angry with those, whom he had invited, and he sent forth his armies, in the persons of Vespasian and Titus (Caesar and his son) and destroyed them and burned their city, vis-à-vis Jerusalem and the Temple in AD 70. Thus, Jesus answered them (Matthew 22:1), that is, he “answered” the Jewish authorities’ threat of arrest (Matthew 21:45-46) with a warning of judgment, in which they would be destroyed, if they didn’t repent of the thing they thought to do (Matthew 22:7).
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