Article: Why is Feasting So Important to Jesus?
Shortly after his final entry into Jerusalem, Jesus tells the parable of the wedding feast. You know the story: a king prepares a wedding banquet, but those he invites do not come. So, instead, he send his servants to invite those from the streets so his banquet will be full of guests.
For Jesus, the wedding feast isn't intended to symbolize a church service. Instead, the church service is supposed to symbolize a wedding feast!
The Scriptures don't show a single time when Jesus is inviting someone to go to the synagogue (the Jewish "church meeting" of his day) with him. But the Scriptures do show that the most common invitation Jesus offers to people is to share bread with him. God loves to fellowship with his creation around the dinner table!
Peter Leithart from New St. Andrews College says,
"Especially in Jesus' teaching, the renewed and fulfilled creation that is the kingdom of God takes the specific form of a feast. Jesus used the image of the feast more than any other to describe the reality of his kingdom" (Peter J. Leithart, Blessed are the Hungry, Moscow, ID: Canonpress, 2000, p. 162).
Why is feasting so important to Jesus?
As Leithart explains, the book of Revelation shows that,
"In short, this is the way the world ends: with neither bang nor whimper but with the laughter of the wedding feast" (Leithart, p. 163).
Why a feast? Well, think what happens there:
- People who don't get along with each other have to reconcile. Have you ever tried to eat with someone that you don't get along with? Either you won't be able to eat together or you will begin to overcome your differences.
- People find a "true home" (Koenig, p. 43)-somewhere where they belong, fit in, have friends. Have you ever had to eat alone, like at school or in an airport restaurant? What would it have been like to have been called over to someone else's table?
- People who have nothing become full through a sumptuous meal-one of the best they've ever had-all provided for by the host.
- People come to know God as a table companion and other humans as God's guests, fellowshipping in his name and for his purpose.
Reconciliation. Belonging. Provision. Fellowship with God and humanity. What else does the human being need? What could give a better "taste" of the new heavens and the new earth than a feast like the ones that Jesus provided?
Now, how might this affect the way you think about meals, church, and the life to come? What will you do different having learned this?
