The image of the wedding feast was a common picture used by the Old Testament prophets to depict the new age of the Kingdom. Jesus was announcing that the new age of the Kingdom was at hand; the doors of the wedding feast were open: “Everything is ready. Come to the wedding banquet.” It is important to recognise that this is not just pointing to something that is future. Jesus used this metaphor of the wedding feast to emphasise that the Kingdom had come in him and that he was sending out the call to come to the feast. The image of the feast is one that symbolises the joy and blessing of the Kingdom of God. This joy and blessing is available to us now, but we will only experience it in its fulness after Jesus’ return in ‘the new heavens and the new earth’ (Revelation 21). Perhaps we could say that the present age is like the entrée that wedding guests are served as people are still arriving and while the doors are still open. It’s good but it’s just the ‘hors d’oeuvre’. The main course will be served when Christ the bridegroom comes and after the doors are closed. However we envisage it, the point is that the call is out to come to the table now. God is inviting us to come to the table now and receive from him. God calls us to give ourselves over to him so that we can receive from his abundance. We give our lives to him so that he can fill us with “the good things of his house” (Psalm 65:4).
Ask God to fill you with the good things of his house.
Read Matthew 22:1-14 and Isaiah 55:1-2
