The wedding analogy: choose life or doom. Draft
By Thomas Jones Bsc LLB. 16 Sept 2021. Updated 15 Dec 2021
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Introduction
Jesus uses a wedding banquet analogy in scriptures to explain heaven and hell. I call that ‘Choose life or Doom.’ He is the Way, the Truth and the Life. Groom (Jesus) will return for His bride (invited Christians). Doom is when everybody else is outside the wedding doors [kingdom of heaven]. Choose Life, Choose Jesus before the ‘wedding guests’ hall’ is full. Doom is also eternal suffering in hell, which was written about two thousand years ago in the ancient Greek. After scriptures an explanation is provided.
Matthew 22: wedding analogy for heaven: wedding guests
The Parable of the Wedding Feast
1 And Jesus answered and spoke to them again by parables and said: 2 “The kingdom of heaven is like a certain king who arranged a marriage for his son, 3 and sent out his servants to call those who were invited to the wedding; and they were not willing to come. 4 Again, he sent out other servants, saying, ‘Tell those who are invited, “See, I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and fatted cattle are killed, and all things are ready. Come to the wedding.” ’ 5 But they made light of it and went their ways, one to his own farm, another to his business. 6 And the rest seized his servants, treated them [a] spitefully, and killed them. 7 But when the king heard about it, he was furious. And he sent out his armies, destroyed those murderers, and burned up their city. 8 Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy. 9 Therefore go into the highways, and as many as you find, invite to the wedding.’ 10 So those servants went out into the highways and gathered together all whom they found, both bad and good. And the wedding hall was filled with guests.
11 “But when the king came in to see the guests, he saw a man there who did not have on a wedding garment. 12 So he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?’ And he was speechless. 13 Then the king said to the servants, ‘Bind him hand and foot, [b] take him away, and cast him into outer darkness; there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’
14 “For many are called, but few are chosen.”
Matthew 24: wedding analogy: 2
The Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins
1 “Then the kingdom of heaven shall be likened to ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. 2 Now five of them were wise, and five were foolish. 3 Those who were foolish took their lamps and took no oil with them, 4 but the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. 5 But while the bridegroom was delayed, they all slumbered and slept.
6 “And at midnight a cry was heard: ‘Behold, the bridegroom [a] is coming; go out to meet him!’ 7 Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps. 8 And the foolish said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ 9 But the wise answered, saying, ‘No, lest there should not be enough for us and you; but go rather to those who sell, and buy for yourselves.’ 10 And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the wedding; and the door was shut.
11 “Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, ‘Lord, Lord, open to us!’ 12 But he answered and said, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, I do not know you.’
13 “Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour [b] in which the Son of Man is coming.
Discussion
Choose Jesus, choose life, not doom. In the bible at the Book of Matthew, as above, Jesus uses a type of situation to explain life and death matters when human beings die. He uses an analogy of a wedding banquet, where the groom is Jesus, the bride is Christians (previously both good and bad people), and where the wedding doors will soon shut. The persons originally invited were the Jews but many have rejected the invite (up to now). Places remain in the wedding hall for new guests, invites for Life in this one and for the eternal one to come. The alternative is hell where the ones who rejected the invitation to the wedding banquet will be locked outside the wedding doors, to weeping and gnashing of teeth. The wedding doors are doors for entrance to the Kingdom of Heaven. It is not too late! I call this situation, ‘choose life or doom.’ Choose Jesus, Choose Life before the wedding doors shut. In that way, some will go on to have life with Jesus but the rest of the whole world will have doom, more about that in a bit.
wedding banquet
Jesus above uses 2 wedding analogies to explain heaven and hell. These situations (parables/ analogies) show what it will be like at the end of this age. The bible says that the truth of heaven and hell cannot be accepted to, what the bible says is a, perishing world. It says for instance that the god of this world has hardened their hearts. The wedding banquet symbolises life for eternity with Jesus [when everyone dies]. Jesus is the groom and the bride are those Christians who accept Him into their hearts and also to Him they commit their lives. He uses heaven and hell analogy to show those who whilst alive will make a choice to either go on to have life [with Him]) or doom. I want make this clear. Everyone alive right now is either chosen for life or ‘doom.’ This is based on decisions made whilst alive today and not when people die. Everybody who does not choose life sadly will not be recorded in the lamb’s (Jesus’s) Book of Life. No one knows whose names are in the Book of Life. Whoever makes the choice now to follow Him inevitably will be one of those who have Life. If there is no life, the only alternative is eternal doom. The wedding doors [to His kingdom] will soon close and that according to the bible there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Doom is separation from Him for eternity, or to put it another way according to the bible it is suffering for eternity in a real place called Hell.
Jesus, the only way
Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life. Jesus for instance died on the cross so that everybody alive can Choose Life and not Doom. The movie Trainspotting also has a theme in it which is “choose life” (sic). This is what inspired me to use Choose Life not Doom. I say here Choose Jesus, Choose Life not Doom! The bible uses an analogy of wedding guests because for those alive now have a choice to make of more than life or death matters. That choice is what will determine for those who choose Him, who is The Way, The Truth and The Life, for where they will spend eternity. In that way, those who choose Jesus in this present lifetime will have been chosen before the foundations of this world. Many people had been invited to the wedding but did not turn up. Instead strangers (good and not perfect) can still take the invited places. The chosen were the Jewish people as everybody else (those who become Christians through Christ) have been “grafted in” to take their seats to the wedding. The wedding doors will shut in not too long from now.
Choose life or doom. Ask yourself the question, what you see going on around you in Covid time in 2021 is that closer to freedom or slavery? The bible says when the door is shut, there will be weeping, and, of teeth – you know when you’re so frightened that your teeth shake. That’s how the bible describes doom when there was a choice for life but doom was chosen instead. The bible also says before the end of this current age there will be the mark which means ultimately human robots cannot cannot buy or survive essentially without that mark.
References
Choose Life, script: Trainspotting
Choose Jesus, Choose Life picture. Credit: Joy for Life Ministries
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