Mt 13:33.
Covered up - So that, for a time, nothing of it appeared.
Strive to enter in - Agonize. Strive as in an agony. So the word signifies Otherwise none shall enter in. Barely seeking will not avail. Mt 7:13.
And even agonizing will not avail, after the door is shut. Agonize, therefore, now by faith, prayer, holiness, patience. And ye begin to stand without - Till then they had not thought of it! O how new will that sense of their misery be? How late? How lasting? I know not whence ye are - I know not, that is, I approve not of your ways.
Mt 7:23.
Mt 8:11.
They shall sit down in the kingdom of God - Both the kingdom of grace and of glory.
But there are last - Many of the Gentiles who were latest called, shall be most highly rewarded; and many of the Jews who were first called, shall have no reward at all. Mt 19:30.
Herod is minded to kill thee - Possibly they gave him the caution out of good will.
And he said, Go and tell that fox - With great propriety so called, for his subtilty and cowardice. The meaning of our Lord's answer is, Notwithstanding all that he can do, I shall for the short time I have left, do the works of him that sent me. When that time is fulfilled, I shall be offered up. Yet not here, but in the bloody city. Behold, I cast out devils - With what majesty does he speak to his enemies! With what tenderness to his friends! The third day I am perfected - On the third day he left Galilee, and set out for Jerusalem, to die there. But let us carefully distinguish between those things wherein Christ is our pattern, and those which were peculiar to his office. His extraordinary office justified him in using that severity of language, when speaking of wicked princes, and corrupt teachers, to which we have no call; and by which we should only bring scandal on religion, and ruin on ourselves, while we irritated rather than convinced or reformed those whom we so indecently rebuked.
It cannot be, that a prophet perish out of Jerusalem - Which claims prescription for murdering the messengers of God. Such cruelty and malice cannot be found elsewhere.
How often would I have gathered thy children together - Three solemn visits he had made to Jerusalem since his baptism for this very purpose. Mt 23:37.
Your house is left to you desolate - Is now irrecoverably consigned to desolation and destruction: And verily I say to you, after a very short space, ye shall not see me till the time come, when taught by your calamities, ye shall be ready and disposed to say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord. It does not imply, that they should then see Jesus at all; but only that they would earnestly wish for the Messiah, and in their extremity be ready to entertain any who should assume that character.
There was a certain man before him - It does not appear that he was come thither with any insidious design. Probably he came, hoping for a cure, or perhaps was one of the family.
And Jesus answering, spake - Answering the thoughts which he saw rising in their hearts.
He spake a parable - The ensuing discourse is so termed, because several parts are not to be understood literally. The general scope of it is, Not only at a marriage feast, but on every occasion, he that exalteth himself shall be abased, and he that abaseth himself shall be exalted.
Mt 23:12.
Call not thy friends - That is, I do not bid thee call thy friends or thy neighbours. Our Lord leaves these offices of humanity and courtesy as they were, and teaches a higher duty. But is it not implied herein, that we should be sparing in entertaining those that need it not, in order to assist those that do need, with all that is saved from those needless entertainments? Lest a recompense be made - This fear is as much unknown to the world, as even the fear of riches.
One of them that sat at table hearing these things - And being touched therewith, said, Happy is he that shall eat bread in the kingdom of God - Alluding to what had just been spoken. It means, he that shall have a part in the resurrection of the just.
Then said he - Continuing the allusion. A certain man made a great supper - As if he had said, All men are not sensible of this happiness. Many might have a part in it, and will not.
They all began to make excuse - One of them pleads only his own will, I go: another, a pretended necessity, I must needs go: the third, impossibility, I cannot come: all of them want the holy hatred mentioned Lu 14:26. All of them perish by things in themselves lawful. I must needs go - The most urgent worldly affairs frequently fall out just at the time when God makes the freest offers of salvation.
The servant came and showed his lord these things - So ministers ought to lay before the Lord in prayer the obedience or disobedience of their hearers.
Compel them to come in - With all the violence of love, and the force of God's word. Such compulsion, and such only, in matters of religion, was used by Christ and his apostles.
For refers to Go out, Lu 14:23.
If any man come to me, and hate not his father - Comparatively to Christ: yea, so as actually to renounce his field, oxen, wife, all things, and act as if he hated them, when they stand in competition with him. Mt 10:37.
And which of you intending to build a tower - That is, and whoever of you intends to follow me, let him first seriously weigh these things.
Another king - Does this mean, the prince of this world? Certainly he has greater numbers on his side. How numerous are his children and servants!
So - Like this man, who, being afraid to face his enemy, sends to make peace with him, every one who forsaketh not all that he hath - By withdrawing his affections from all the creatures; By enjoying them only in and for God, only in such a measure and manner as leads to him; By hating them all, in the sense above mentioned, cannot be my disciple - But will surely desist from building that tower, neither can he persevere in fighting the good fight of faith.
Salt - Every Christian, but more eminently every minister. Mt 5:13; Mr 9:50.
All the publicans - That is, all who were in that place. It seems our Lord was in some town of Galilee of the Gentiles, from whence he afterward went to Jerusalem, Lu 17:11.
He spake - Three parables of the same import: for the sheep, the piece of silver, and the lost son, all declare (in direct contrariety to the Pharisees and scribes) in what manner God receiveth sinners.
Leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness - Where they used to feed: all uncultivated ground, like our commons, was by the Jews termed wilderness or desert. And go after - In recovering a lost soul, God as it were labours. May we not learn hence, that to let them alone who are in sin, is both unchristian and inhuman! Mt 18:12.
Joy shall be - Solemn and festal joy, in heaven - First, in our blessed Lord himself, and then among the angels and spirits of just men, perhaps informed thereof by God himself, or by the angels who ministered to them. Over one sinner - One gross, open, notorious sinner, that repenteth - That is, thoroughly changed in heart and life; more than over ninety and nine just persons - Comparatively just, outwardly blameless: that need not such a repentance - For they need not, cannot repent of the sins which they never committed. The sum is, as a father peculiarly rejoices when an extravagant child, supposed to be utterly lost, comes to a thorough sense of his duty; or as any other person who has recovered what he had given up for gone, has a more sensible satisfaction in it, than in several other things equally valuable, but not in such danger: so do the angels in heaven peculiarly rejoice in the conversion of the most abandoned sinners. Yea, and God himself so readily forgives and receives them, that he may be represented as having part in the joy.
Give me the part of goods that falleth to me - See the root of all sin! A desire of disposing of ourselves; of independency on God!
He took a journey into a far country - Far from God: God was not in all his thoughts: And squandered away his substance - All the grace he had received.
He began to be in want - All his worldly pleasures failing, he grew conscious of his want of real good.
And he joined himself to a citizen of that country - Either the devil or one of his children, the genuine citizens of that country which is far from God. He sent him to feed swine - He employed him in the base drudgery of sin.
He would fain have filled his belly with the husks - He would fain have satisfied himself with worldly comforts. Vain, fruitless endeavour!
And coming to himself - For till then he was beside himself, as all men are, so long as they are without God in the world.
I will arise and go to my father - How accurately are the first steps of true repentance here pointed out! Against Heaven - Against God.
And he arose and came to his father - The moment he had resolved, he began to execute his resolution. While he was yet a great way off, his father saw him - Returning, starved, naked.
But the father said - Interrupting him before he had finished what he intended to say. So does God frequently cut an earnest confession short by a display of his pardoning love.
Let us be merry - Both here, and wherever else this word occurs, whether in the Old or New Testament, it implies nothing of levity, but a solid, serious, religious, heartfelt joy: indeed this was the ordinary meaning of the word two hundred years ago, when our translation was made.
The elder son seems to represent the Pharisees and scribes, mentioned Lu 15:2.
Thy father hath killed the fatted calf - Perhaps he mentions this rather than the robe or ring, as having a nearer connection with the music and dancing.