So here’s the plan: each week that the gospels are covered in Sunday School, I will post one question from my book along with a brief discussion of the issues that it raises.
In what ways is a wedding celebration a good metaphor for the coming of the kingdom (see Matthew 25:1-13)?
(adapted from Search, Ponder, and Pray: A Guide to the Gospels)
You know the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding? My people are Italian, but it’s a pretty similar dynamic. As the humorist Dave Barry explained, “I have been to both WASP and non-WASP weddings, and your WASP couple can get married, go on their honeymoon, come home, pursue careers, have children and get divorced in less time than it takes for a non-WASP couple to get to the part of their reception where everyone drinks champagne from the maid of honor’s brassiere.” Which is a long way of saying that all you seventh generation Mormons of good New England Puritan stock have no idea whatsoever how to have fun.
Which is why I love the scriptures which speak about the coming of the kingdom or the return of Jesus or the day of the Lord as a banquet and as a feast. See Isaiah 25:6, Isaiah 55:1-2, Psalm 23:5, Joel 2:24-26, Revelation 7:16-17, and many others. It’s a party, people! It’s going to be a happy, happy occasion when all of the sins and troubles and angst and suffering of a fallen world are done away. We’re going to sit down like old friends around a table groaning with great food–and the calories won’t even count! It’s going to be the best party ever.