How does the table we sit around now in our worship compare to the table scene that awaits us in the end? We discuss eschatology and the Lords Supper in this episode.

Music:
“Kid Kodi”
Blue Dot Sessions
www.sessions.blue

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Episode #53 – The Lord’s Supper: Part 2 – The Eschatological Banquet

What is the Eschatological Banquet?

• Eschatology is the study of the end times (i.e., heaven, hell, new creation, etc.). 
• Jesus, Jews, and Christians believed in and talked about a banquet in the Eschaton (i.e., heaven). All of God’s people will be gathered together to partake in this meal. 

“Fulfilled in the Kingdom of God”

• Jesus will not partake of the Passover meal again until the kingdom of God.
• A reference to the eschatological banquet

The Parable of the Great Banquet (Luke 14:1–24)

• Jesus tells the parable in response to one of the guest’s statements, “’Blessed is anyone who will eat bread in the kingdom of God!’” (v. 15), a direct reference to the eschatological banquet.
• However, Jesus’ parable illustrates that the eschatological banquet will not include the people the Pharisees think. It will not look like the current table Jesus is sitting at, which is filled with wealthy Pharisees who can repay one another and enhance or maintain their relative honor status. Rather, the eschatological banquet will be more inclusive. The host does not exclude anyone. It will include “the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame” (v. 21). The very people this Pharisee hosting Jesus has excluded (v. 13). The host will even send his servant out “into the roads and lanes” to “compel” people to come to his banquet.
• The parable ends with these words, “’For I tell you, none of those who were invited will taste my dinner.’” (v. 24). “You” is plural, indicating that the host in the parable is no longer speaking to his servant but that Jesus is speaking to his table companions. Jesus has now become the host of the eschatological banquet envisioned by the parable, speaking of “my dinner.” Similarly, Jesus is the host of the Lord’s Supper, which looks for its fulfillment in Jesus’ hosting the eschatological banquet.

Who Will Be Included in Heaven?

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Looking for more study? Listen to our episode on What It Means to Think Theologically below: