`These armies' are also foretold in Luke 21:20. This parable is veritable history in advance.

Those that had been twice bidden to the marriage are now pronounced `not worthy'. So we read:

`Seeing ye put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles' (Acts

The matter however did not end with the failure of Israel.

THE INVITATION IS EXTENDED TO THE GENTILES.

`Go ye therefore into the highways, and as many as ye shall find, bid to the marriage ... and the wedding was

furnished with guests' (Matt. 22:9,10).

Earlier the apostles had been commanded to avoid going into `the way (hodos) of the Gentiles' (Matt. 10:5), but

now the order is reversed `Go ye into the highways (hodos) and the Gentiles receive and respond to the invitation. It

is here that the Gospel of John comes into the story.

Clement of Alexandria (A.D. 150-215) writes:

`St. John, the last (of the evangelists), when he saw that the outward bodily facts had been set forth in the existing

Gospels, impelled by his friends (and) divinely moved by the Spirit, made a spiritual Gospel'.

Irenaeus who was born A.D. 98 and knew, personally, Polycarp a disciple of John, unhesitatingly ascribes the

fourth gospel to John, and speaks of this belief as universal acceptance in his day.

and his GENTILE READERS.

Not only is it evident that John had a message to the `world', but it is clear that he envisaged Gentiles who would

not be conversant with the every day things of Israel. For example, in chapter 1, he pauses to interpret three well

known Hebrew words, Rabbi, Messias and Cephas (John 1:38,41,42). No Jew needed to be told that Rabbi meant

`Master' and that Messias meant `The Christ'. He speaks of `A feast of the Jews' (John 5:1) and goes out of his way

to tell his reader that the feast of dedication was held in the `winter' (John 10:22), which, if he had Israel only before

his mind, was quite an unnecessary piece of information. Whereas the rejection of Christ slowly becomes evident as

we go through the gospel of Matthew, the rejection of Christ meets us in the beginning of John:

`He came unto His own, and His own received Him not' (John 1:11).

Another suggestive fact is that John makes no mention of the New Covenant feast `The Lord's Supper' and

`miracles' as such are not spoken of but `signs' are employed instead.

In connection with the thought that John's ministry is especially concerned with gathering from the highways

those who shall be the `guests' at the marriage of the King's Son, we remember the first sign took place at a

`Marriage' at Cana, where the Lord and His disciples were `guests'. The marriage of Cana is said to have been on

the `third day'. In John 1:19-28; 29-34; 35-42 and 43-51 we have four consecutive days, the marriage at Cana

therefore being the Seventh Day, and a foreshadowing of the Millennium, with its Marriage of the Lamb.

John, alone of all the N.T. writers speaks of the Marriage of the Lamb, of the Marriage Supper of the Lamb, and

of those who, as guests, were `called' to this Marriage (Rev. 19:7-9). While all four Gospels tell of John the Baptist,

as the Forerunner prophesied by Isaiah, it is John alone that says of John the Baptist, that he was `The friend of the

Bridegroom', and that `He that hath the bride is the bridegroom' (John 3:29). It is, we submit, no mere assumption,

no fishing round for some pretext to support an unscriptural theory, that we see in John's Gospel the fulfilment of the

closing words of the parable of the Marriage of the King's Son; and that instead of assuming those who believe

John's Gospel and have `life', are, whether they know it or not, members of the Church of the One Body, they are

specifically `guests' being called out during Israel's defection since Acts 28.