This parable is not an obvious place with which to begin a meditation on the Lord's Supper. The parable, after all, is about a banquet. In the Mediterranean world, a banquet was a multi-media event. This banquet is not a Chamber-of-Commerce-type affair, held in a drafty hall at the Convention Center, at which you pay a month's salary for a piece of foam rubber masquerading as chicken placed alongside three or four warmed-over green peas. This is a real celebration: polished silver, linen tablecloth, smoked salmon, candlelight.

We call what we are about to have "the Lord's supper." But we are really having a crust of bread and a sip of lukewarm grape juice. In fact, if you are really thirsty, there is probably just enough grape juice to make you thirstier. How does this qualify as a banquet?

Furthermore, the text does not explicitly mention the Lord's supper.

Yet when we read this parable in the full context of Luke and Acts, we discover that it evokes the Lord's supper in two ways. First, scholars today agree that whenever Luke describes a meal, he is bringing to consciousness the many-faceted understanding of meals in Judaism and early Christianity.

The Jewish people of Luke's day believed that every meal was a religious occasion. Eating breakfast was like going to church. To invite another person to eat with you was to say, "I accept you. I want you to be a part of this earthly life, so here is some of my food." That is the point of Jesus' eating and drinking with sinners. And many Jewish people believed that on the last day, when God's love would be known from shore to shore, God would put on a great banquet (e.g. Isaiah 25:6-8). To many early Christians, the Lord's supper was a preview or appetizer of this great banquet.

Second is the reference to bread. The parable is introduced by a statement from an unnamed guest, "Blessed is the one who shall eat bread in the sovereign domain of God!" After the giving of the manna in the wilderness, bread became a symbol of God's constant presence for Jewish people. When they ate bread, they were reminded of the constant presence of God. Luke uses the symbol of bread as a way of speaking of this divine presence known to the disciples through the presence of the resurrected Jesus in the Lord's supper.

On the road to Emmaus the travelers became aware of the risen Jesus with them when "he was known to them in the breaking of bread." The phrase "breaking of bread" is the way Luke speaks of the Lord's supper repeatedly in the book of Acts.

Why give such a banquet? Partly, I suppose, to celebrate. Then, as now, food was a sign of celebration. When you get a promotion, you burst in the door and say to your spouse or friend, "Come on! We're going out to dinner!"

And more, sometimes we need something physical to say, "Hey, this is really happening. This is not a dream." You have heard someone say, "Pinch me so I will know I'm awake!" The food can be such a touch, such a reminder.