Prayer of Thanksgiving

⁸ First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed throughout the world.^{(A) 9} For God, whom I serve with my spirit by announcing the gospel^[a] of his Son, is my witness that without ceasing I remember you always in my prayers,^{(B) 10} asking that by God’s will I may somehow at last succeed in coming to you. ¹¹ For I long to see you so that I may share with you some spiritual gift so that you may be strengthened— ¹² or rather so that we may be mutually encouraged by each other’s faith, both yours and mine. ¹³ I do not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that I have often intended to come to you (but thus far have been prevented), in order that I may reap some harvest among you, as I have among the rest of the gentiles. ¹⁴ I am obligated both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish, ¹⁵ hence my eagerness to proclaim the gospel to you also who are in Rome.

The Parable of the Wedding Banquet

22 Once more Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying: ² “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son.^{(A) 3} He sent his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding banquet, but they would not come.^{(B) 4} Again he sent other slaves, saying, ‘Tell those who have been invited: Look, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready; come to the wedding banquet.’^{(C) 5} But they made light of it and went away, one to his farm, another to his business, ⁶ while the rest seized his slaves, mistreated them, and killed them. ⁷ The king was enraged. He sent his troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city.^{(D) 8} Then he said to his slaves, ‘The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy.^{(E) 9} Go therefore into the main streets, and invite everyone you find to the wedding banquet.’ ¹⁰ Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered all whom they found, both good and bad, so the wedding hall was filled with guests.^(F)

¹¹ “But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing a wedding robe,^{(G) 12} and he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding robe?’ And he was speechless.^{(H) 13} Then the king said to the attendants, ‘Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’^{(I) 14} For many are called, but few are chosen.”