The Parable of Great Feast
Luke 14: 15-24
FOR THE BANQUET…..
The leaders of Israel are invited for a banquet well in advance.
The recipients have responded that they would be coming.
But, when the big day arrives, they give reasons why they couldn’t attend.
They are expecting the master of the bouquet (God) to excuse them.
FURY OF THE MASTER
∗ When the master of the house hears these flimsy excuses, he is angry.
∗ He tells his servant to forget the guest list, go into the back streets, all the ways of the town and invite “the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame” (verse 21).
∗ The servant has already brought in the down-and-out townspeople, and still there is room in the banquet hall.
∗ So the master sends his servant on a broader search: “Go out to the roads and country lanes and make them come in, so that my house will be full” (verses 22-23).
∗ What the Pharisee’s dinner guest said was correct. 14:15
(Blessed is he that shall eat bread in the Kingdom of God.)
∗ The bouquet is there, but the guest list is totally different.
REPRESENTATION
In this parable, the host represents God, the great feast represents admission into Heaven, the servant is functioning like the Holy Spirit does today and the invited guests picture the Jewish nation. The invitation to dine is a metaphor for Divine illumination. We cannot come to God until He first extends an invitation to us.
The kingdom was prepared for them, but when Jesus came preaching that “the kingdom of heaven is near” (Matthew 4:17), He was rejected. “He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him” (John 1:11).
THE EXCUSES WITH NO RELEVANCE
∗ The excuses for skipping the banquet are laughably bad.
∗ The excuses made by the invitees are worldly and irrelevant.
∗ No one buys land without seeing it first, and the same can be applied for buying oxen.
∗ And what, exactly, would keep a newly married couple from attending a social event?
∗ All the three excuses in the parable reveal insincerity on the part of those invited.
∗ The worldly affairs can not put off the Holy Spirit.
∗ The world can not say, “I can catch it up later.”
∗ The world can not assume that God’s invitation will be available all the time.
∗ It most certainly will not.
∗ The Jews of Jesus’ day had no valid excuse for spurning Jesus’ message.
∗ In fact, they had every reason to accept Him as their Messiah.
THE INVITATION TO THE DOWNTRODDEN
∗ The detail that the invitation is opened up to society’s maimed and downtrodden is important.
∗ These are the types of people that the Pharisees consider “unclean” and “under God’s curse.” (John 9:1-2, 34).
∗ Jesus, however, teaches that the kingdom is available even to those considered “unclean” (Acts 10).
∗ His involvement with tax collectors and sinners brings condemnation from the Pharisees, yet it shows the extent of God’s grace (Matthew 9:10-11).
∗ The fact that the master in the parable sends the servant far afield to persuade everyone to come indicates that the offer of salvation would be extended to the Gentiles and “to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8).
∗ The master dispatches his servant a third time, once again instructing him to focus on the overlooked and unwanted.
∗ The master is not satisfied with a partially full banquet hall; he wants every place at the table to be filled.
∗ He then declares that none of those punks who rejected his first round of invitation will taste one bite of his great food.
∗ “Rejoice, O Gentiles, with his people” (Romans 15:10).
∗ John MacArthur’s comment on this fact is that “God is more willing to save sinners than sinners are to be saved.”
THE PURPOSE OF THIS PARABLE
∗ So what is the purpose of this parable? This parable is to show how affronted God is, when we put Him off.
∗ Jesus is warning that if we stay too caught up in the cares of the world, we will find ourselves eternally cast out.
∗ Remember that Jesus is dining at a Pharisee’s house. Pharisees were rich and steeped in self-exaltation and spiritual rebellion. Pharisees liked to hang out with fellow snobs, so when Jesus looks around this table, He’s undoubtedly seeing a bunch of souls who are putting God off.
∗ Earlier in this chapter, He warned everyone about how much God dislikes self-exaltation.
∗ The Pharisees not only considered themselves to be in good standing with God, they considered themselves to be among the spiritually elite.
GOD’S JUDGEMENT
∗ Those who ignored the invitation to the banquet choose their own punishment—they miss out.
∗ The master respects their choice by making it permanent: they would not “taste of my banquet.”
∗ So God’s judgement on those who choose to reject Christ: they will have their choice confirmed, and they will never taste the joys of heaven.
∗ God’s patience does not last forever.
∗ He delights in being generous, but He is not a doormat.
∗ If we keep putting Him off, the day comes, when He gets royally offended and slams the door permanently closed.
∗ In the Gospel books, Jesus puts out many chilling parables of what happens to souls who put God off for too long.
GOD’S MESSAGE
∗ The basic message of the Parable of the Great Banquet could be stated this way: “The tragedy of the Jewish rejection of Christ has opened the door of salvation to the Gentiles.
∗ The blessings of the kingdom are available to all who will come to Christ by faith.”
∗ The inclusion of the Gentiles is a fulfilment of Hosea 2:23, “I will say to those called ‘Not my people,’ ‘You are my people’; and they will say, ‘You are my God.” God is “not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9), and “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (Romans 10:13).
Let’s pray ……..
Lord, let’s be the participants of Your big banquet. Amen.
Glory be to God
0
0
0
0
0
0