What Does Matthew 22:14 Mean?
Matthew 22:14 says, "For many are called but a few are chosen." This is another verse that is being misused by the conditional security crowd to justify their heresy. They say that this is where God picks people and that He later selects them who to keep and who to kick out. However, the whole passage is in relation to the wedding supper of the king's son. The king represents the Father and the prince is none other than Jesus Christ. So here the king was calling MANY into the feast but only a few responded. In the end, there was somebody without a wedding garment and was cast out. Just a little bit of a detail of Jewish royalty: in those days the king or whoever celebrated even a lesser nobleman, they would give their guests the wedding garment and that was required as the garment for the feast.
No garment meant no attendance. So the man who was not dressed in a wedding garment would represent somebody who had no righteousness from God, just his own. In his righteousness, man is just another filthy sinner (Isaiah 64:6). God warns in Ezekiel 18:24 that if a man turns from his righteousness, his works will be forgotten. On the other hand, one needs God's garment of righteousness (Isaiah 61:15). Man in general is a rotten sinner. Somebody can reason out saying, "Hey I only did venial sins, not mortal sins." Sadly Romans 3 is clear that all sin is sin, it agrees with James 2:10-11 (note that many works salvation preachers go to James 2 to try and justify their heresy) that it only takes one sin whether a sin not unto death or a sin unto death and there is NO mortal sin or venial sin- all sin is sin and it takes only ONE SIN for a person to fall short of the glory of God that's why we need the Lord Jesus Christ. Sin unto death actually means refers to physical death like in 1 Corinthians 11:30 where a believer may forfeit his/her life for attending the Lord's supper's disrespectfully that God has decided to call him/her home earlier than expected, which although he/she does not lose their salvation, he/she however loses their reward (1 Corinthians 3:15).