Garments befitting Righteousness

Pas­sage: The Para­ble of the Wed­ding Feast
Matthew 22:1–14

Jesus tells a para­ble about a Wed­ding Feast. The King sends his ser­vants to call those who were invited to the feast, but when they are invited, they won’t come: they ignore the ser­vants or even worse, treat them shame­fully and kill them. So the King becomes angry and destroys the mur­der­ers as well as their town. He sends out his ser­vants once again, telling them to invite every­one that they can find, both good and bad to the wed­ding feast, and even­tu­ally the hall is full.

11 But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who had no wed­ding gar­ment. 12 And he said to him, Friend, how did you get in here with­out a wed­ding gar­ment? And he was speech­less. 13 Then the king said to the atten­dants, Bind him hand and foot and cast him into the outer dark­ness. In that place there will be weep­ing and gnash­ing of teeth. 14 For many are called, but few are chosen.

I read this and the post-title was given to describe what the man thrown into the dark­ness was lack­ing. He thought he could come into the feast totally unpre­pared. He is like those that say “Lord, Lord” “Look at all that we have done for you” but Jesus says to them “I never knew you! Depart from me” Is this man as shocked as the oth­ers? Or was his head hang­ing very low, out of shame?