Let's start with a story told by Jesus:
16 Jesus replied: 'A certain man was preparing a great banquet and invited many guests. 17 At the time of the banquet he sent his servant to tell those who had been invited, 'Come, for everything is now ready.' 18 But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said, 'I have just bought a field, and I must go and see it. Please excuse me.' 19 Another said, 'I have just bought five yoke of oxen, and I'm on my way to try them out. Please excuse me.' 20 Still another said, 'I just got married, so I can't come.' 21 The servant came back and reported this to his master. Then the owner of the house became angry and ordered his servant, 'Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame.' 22 'Sir,' the servant said, 'what you ordered has been done, but there is still room.' 23 Then the master told his servant, 'Go out to the roads and country lanes and make them come in, so that my house will be full.
Above is the Luke 14:23 scripture in a little wider context. It is a powerful parable that Jesus is telling as is the context of the telling. Let's spend a moment with it.
Just before Luke 14:16, Jesus is at a Pharisee's house on the Sabbath and he heals a man suffering from dropsy (Luke 14:1-6). This healing on the Sabbath prompts a discussion about what is lawful to do on the Sabbath.
Then, noticing how the guests picked the places of honor at the table, Jesus tells a parable to those who had been invited, teaching them to not take the place of honor, for a more distinguished person than you may have been invited. Instead, when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he may say to you, 'Friend, move up higher.' (Luke 14:7-11).
Then, Jesus also tells his Pharisee host to not invite friends, brothers, relatives, or rich neighbors to a banquet, because they may invite you back and you will be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. You will be repaid at the resurrection of the just (Luke 14:12-14).
Luke 14:16 then begins the Parable of the Great Banquet and there are a few takeaways to note from it:
- 1. Everything with Jesus is about the Kingdom of God—its coming, its proclamation, its establishment, and its work with himself at the head of it all. Moreover, the Spirit of God (gift of the father) is squarely set into this very task as well.
- 2. There are several inferences that are deeply linked to the Kingdom that matter a great deal. While they can be understood somewhat from a 21st century American worldview, it is the ancient near eastern and first century Jewish Essenic worldview that helps flesh it out, putting a lot more meat on the bones!
- 3. There is a secondary and equally important matter that is front-and-center in Jesus' mind as he delivers the Proclamation of the arrival of the Kingdom of God (and himself as King): The Great and Terrible Day of the Lord.
The Kingdom of God | Day of the Lord combination is critical to understanding both Old Testament and New. These two realities go together like peas in a pod. They are inseparable. In fact, I will go so far as to strongly suggest that they are the two primary central themes of the entirety of scripture. The only other is the war with the kingdom(s) of darkness. It it literally these three together that form the core of the story of scripture: A Trifecta!
NOTE: This is a good place to suggest that we read every scripture with this triad or trifecta in plain view. For example, for each passage, ask yourself: What does this have to do with the Kingdom of God, Day of the Lord, and war with the kingdom(s) of darkness? Do this with the mind and thinking of a ancient near easterner or Jew, and you'll have a much richer understanding of the scripture overall and your place within it! Keep reading to see it applied here to Luke 14.
Keeping all of this in mind: Here are some impacts of doing as suggested above to the parable Jesus tells in Luke 14 about the Banquet.
The Banquet is the Wedding Feast of the Bridegroom and his Bride (us, church). We are the invited poor, lame, oppressed, abused, and victims (Jews first, and then ...) and then we are also those in the highways and hedges, which (in fact) is Jesus pointing directly at the Gentiles. This leads to another question (I like to turn things around as you may have noticed already): Who is doing the oppressing? Who is being treated as perpetrator and who is being treated as victim? Who is blessed and who already has their reward?
I want you to notice that the Kingdom of God, Day of the Lord, and kingdom(s) of darkness are all included in this story; each and every one! Nevertheless, let's start somewhere with a question: Who are the oppressors? The answer is a little complex, but let's go there, shall we!?
Ultimately, the oppressors are two-fold: They are both human and supernatural (gods and demons). The rich, wealthy, powerful, and influential humans are unwitting pawns drawn into the continuing, 5,000 year old (from now, back) war of fallen angels (gods) and demons against God, with humanity attacked and then used and violently abused in the middle.
Therefore, it is plain to see one of the clear strategies of hell against humanity: Lure humans into the unseen realm power structure, enticing them with the pleasures of their flesh through wealth and power. In Jesus' time, these people within Judaism were people like Pharisees and Sadducees (not Essenes, who reject wealth and power completely).
If one points out the puppetry of the rich and powerful by unseen realm gods (fallen angels) and demons (disembodied demigods, aka giants), then what does that leave? It leaves precisely who Jesus points out: The lower classes, the poor, the oppressed, and those with no position, influence, worth, or value in the eyes of upper classes as one climbs the human power-ladder.
The question is: Why? What is it about these lower class off-scouring and shunned-by-the-world people that make them a particular target of the preaching and proclaiming of the Kingdom of God? The storyline is transparent in scripture: The kingdoms of this world are fleeting, temporary, evil-minded, and will ultimately be destroyed by the King (Jesus) at the Day of the Lord judgment!
The lower-class, poor, oppressed, and shunned have far less hooks of gods and demons by means of worldly enticement, power, wealth, influence, and so on. These are the people most likely to respond to a new Kingdom and King—but—there is a price! The price involves rejecting the pleasures of the flesh, reject the enticements of wealth and influence that lure people into entrapment by world system—literally disavowing them and giving and maintaining a strong allegiance to the new King in the new Kingdom that is coming. It is a war between instant-gratification and delayed-gratification.
The world is a push towards pleasures of the flesh now with wealth that will be be destroyed versus wealth stored in heavenly places, built up like a heavenly bank account, that will only be fully received through the grace, forgiveness, and undeserved favor of the King on the Great and Notable Day of the Lord at the judgment.
Do you see how the trifecta of Kingdom of God, Day of the Lord, and opposing war with the kingdoms of darkness is playing out?
I am going to suggest to you that the issue isn't the money that you have at your disposal, but what you do with it that matters. This is the story of the rich young ruler, isn't it? The rich young ruler is trying to have his cake and eat it too! He is completely in the snare of enjoying his wealth to the pleasures of his flesh and thinks that his actions in Judaism can save him.
He doesn't ask Jesus the question of "What must I do to inherit eternal life?" expecting an honest answer. It seem rather clear that he asks the question hoping that Jesus will validate not only what he's been taught, but look the other way at his ensnarement by the world system through his wealth.
Jesus then proceeds to blow his world up by telling him, "This one thing you lack: Go, sell all that you have, give it to the poor, and come, and follow me!"
Do you see it? The very act of obeying Jesus in the way the King is asking him to will be his declaration of allegiance and loyalty to his new King (Jesus) and disavowal of his present masters, gods and demons through the enticement of money, wealth, and power. This is precisely what the disciples said to Jesus when they said, "We have left everything to follow you!" and it was starkly true. The disciples had disavowed the world and asserted their loyalty to Christ above all in their actions.
The Trifecta
Once more—there is a trifecta going on in scripture. It is a war between two kingdoms: The Kingdom of God reigning supreme and unassailable, and pathetic (but still powerful) kingdoms of darkness ruled by gods and demons that attacked humanity starting in Genesis 3 (Adam vs Nechash) and again in Genesis 6 (Flood - Noah vs sons of God and giants) and then 10 and 11 (Tower of Babel - more fallen sons of God vs Abraham in Chapter 12). The ultimate crescendo of the war will be the Day of the Lord.
Now, when it comes to the Day of the Lord, we have to acquire an ancient Jewish mind with a contrary-context of ancient near eastern paganism as a contrast.
The overall calendar of the Lord given to Enoch and then carried out through time consists of 7,000 years of history. This time is carved up several ways: Ages, Onahs, and Weeks, where there are four (4) ages (1 - Creation|Chaos, 2 - Torah|Abraham, 3 - Grace|Church|Suffering-servant, 4 - King|Kindom), fourteen (14) Onahs (500 year halves of each Age), and (finally) ten (10) Weeks (700 year periods dividing 7,000 years of history into 10 periods).
But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.
This aligns with the story starting in Genesis, where God tells Adam:
And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, 'You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.
It turns out that God was telling Adam a simple thought: In the 1,000-year-period (Day) that you eat, within that period (Day) you shall die. Sure enough, Adam lived to be 936 years old, which means from his creation (day 1), he was something less than 64 years old when he fell with Eve. Nevertheless, the critical thing to see here is that God marks out human history by "Days" (1,000 year periods). Therefore, the "Day of the Lord" (e.g., the "Day of the King") is the Millennial Reign of Christ. Thus, everything described in the Day of the Lord is happening some time within or very near to that 1,000-year period of time.
I am going to strong suggest to you that the 7 years of Tribulation comes in the final Jubilee cycle leading up to the beginning of the Day of the Lord, where it all ends with the appearance of Jesus as King and he wipes out the forces of evil, placing their gods (fallen angels still loose) into the same prison as the former (Genesis 6) gods, banishing demon spirits to the underworld with them in the Abyss to be held until judgment, which comes at the end of the 1,000 year reign, where Revelation describes them as being loosed to test humanity who has witnessed the King ruling for all of that time.
It is my further suggestion that some portion of the 7 years of Tribulation is the Wedding Feast and Wedding Chamber event for the church from the Church Age (what we have been in for the last 2,000 years and is coming to a close in the next 51). With this all in mind, I want to point out what Essene Jews thought—both right and wrong.
Essenes, Teacher of Righteousness, and Jesus
I am going to make a statement here that some of you reading will find offensive, but I will say it anyway because it is true and it is the truth that you know that will set you free. So, let's do some truth-telling!
At the end of the day, it doesn't matter if you think materials like 1 Enoch is scripture or not: The Essenes (who accurately saw Jesus (Messiah) coming) thought materials like 1 Enoch was scripture and held it as critical to the task of engaging with Messiah, which thing they did through men like John the Baptist and his disciples, including one who would become a primary disciples: Andrew, brother of Peter.
Given the above, I am going to give you a rather lengthy quote from 1 Enoch, chapters 63 and 64 from Dr. Ken Johnson's rendering of the book from the DSS. Ready? Here we go!
63
In those days will the mighty kings who possess the earth implore Him to grant them a little respite from His angels of punishment to whom they were delivered, that they might fall down and worship before the Lord of Spirits, and confess their sins before Him. 2 And they will bless and glorify the Lord of Spirits, and say, “Blessed is the Lord of Spirits and the Lord of kings, and the Lord of the mighty and the Lord of the rulers, and the Lord of glory and the Lord of wisdom, and every secret is clear: 3 Your power from generation to generation, and Your glory forever. Deep are all Your innumerable secrets, and Your righteousness is beyond reckoning. 4 Now we know that we should glorify and bless the Lord of kings, who rules over all kings.”
5 They will say, “Who will give us rest to glorify, give thanks, and confess our faith before His glory? 6 Now we long for a little rest but cannot find it. We are driven away and cannot obtain it, and light has vanished before us, and darkness is our dwelling-place forever. 7 For we have not believed before Him nor glorified the name of the Lord of Spirits, but our hope was in the scepter of our kingdom and glory. 8 And in the day of our suffering and tribulation He did not save us; and we find no respite for confession that our Lord is true in all His works, judgments, and justice and His judgments have no respect of persons.[cliv] 9 We will disappear before His face on account of our works, and all our sins are reckoned up in righteousness.”
10 Now they will say unto themselves, “Our souls are full of unrighteous gain, but it does not prevent us from going into the painful flames of hell.” 11 After that their faces will be filled with darkness and shame before that Son of Man, and they will be driven from His presence, and the sword will abide before His face in their midst.
12 Thus said the Lord of Spirits, “This is the ordinance and judgment with respect to the mighty and the kings and the exalted and those who possess the earth before the Lord of Spirits.”
64
And I saw other forms hidden in that place. 2 I heard the voice of the angel saying, “These are the angels who descended from heaven to earth, and revealed what was hidden to the children of men, and seduced the children of men into committing sin.”
Remember, this text was found in the Dead Sea Scrolls and was being copied from older texts starting in about 300 BC—literally, three hundred years before Jesus was even born!
NOTE: The Essene Jews split from the Sadducees and Pharisee sects in about 150 BC as a result of a contention over prophecy about the Messiah, the Zadokite calendar used to understand when Messiah was coming, and over the materials that lensed it all from the Torah (e.g. OT scripture). It was the lensing of materials like 1 Enoch and the other Testaments of the Patriarchs (also found in the DSS) that led the Essenes straight into the arms of Messiah, Jesus. So strong was their rejection of Sadducees and Pharisaical wealth and power that the Essenes sold all that they had, moved into the deserts away from what they saw as evil and corruption of the Temple in Jerusalem. This led to a vast number of Essenic groups spread all over northern Israel and Judea, which is precisely where Jesus spent a great deal of his time preaching and proclaiming and demonstrating the power of the Kingdom of God!
Notice the flavor of 1 Enoch 63 and 64. It contains all of the trifecta elements: King & Kingdom, Judgment, and fallen angelic gods and demons (kingdoms of darkness). From the view of a Second Temple Era and first century Jew, the transparency of the trifecta would be hard to miss. It ought to be plainly obvious to us today once we know what they knew!
Conclusion
It is amazing, isn't it? All of this comes rolling out of Luke 14 and Jesus having a discussion and then telling a parable at a dinner party that he is invited to.
It is here that I will offer one final and strong suggestion: It is time to let all of the materials that informed our first century Christian fathers through the gates of our minds and hearts so we can embrace it. Why? Partly because it helps us understand where they were, why they thought and did what they thought and did, which ended up being immortalized in what we call scripture.
Secondarily, it helps us prepare for the future that is coming to each of us and this world as the close of the present Church Age or Age of Grace comes to a close in the final Jubilee cycle (50 years - circa 2025 to 2075). It is my strong contention that the final Tribulation is circa 2068 to 2075 AD, which gives us about (plus or minus) 44 years remaining to prepare ourselves for the onslaught of the return of the gods and demons before the Day of the Lord (King Jesus) comes.
NOTE: Jesus is clear: "Just as it was in the days of Noah, so also will it be in the days of the Son of Man. People were eating, drinking, marrying and being given in marriage up to the day Noah entered the ark. Then the flood came and destroyed them all." — Luke 17:26-27, NIV
What happened in the days of Noah? God gave mankind 120 years to repent before the flood: "Then the Lord said, 'My Spirit will not contend with humans forever, for they are mortal; their days will be a hundred and twenty years.'" — Genesis 6:3, a countdown to the Great Flood, giving humanity 120 years to repent.
Israel came back as a nation (first sign of the Last Days of the Age of Grace) in 1948. If you subtract 2068 from 1948, you get precisely 120 years. Therefore, Jesus is providing a generalized overview that is a rinse-and-repeat of the Noahide warning to man, which they ignored (eating, drinking, marrying, et al). We have been given the same warning: REPENT—turn from the kingdoms of darkness to the King and Kingdom of God. The Day of the Lord and his judgment of all is coming. You don't want to be on the wrong side of that equation!
This article is a plea to all who will read it to pay attention and wake up. Now, a final quote from 1 Enoch, first chapter:
End-Time Outline - Chapters 1-5
Chapter 1 The Time of Destruction
“These are the words of the blessing of Enoch, to bless the elect and righteous,[i] who will be living in the day of Tribulation, when all the wicked and godless will be destroyed. 2 God opened the eyes of the righteous Enoch, so that the angels could show him a vision of the Holy One in the heavens. ‘From them I understood that the vision I saw was not for my generation, but for a far distant one.’
3 On the account of the elect, the great Holy One, the God of the world, will come forth from His dwelling and 4 tread upon the earth,[ii] appearing with His host in the strength of His might from the heavens.
5 All will be afraid and the Watchers[iii] will tremble. Great fear and trembling will seize everyone all over the whole earth. 6 The high mountains will be shaken, and the high hills will be brought low, melting like wax in a flame.[iv] 7 The earth will be torn apart, and life on earth will perish. All men will be judged.
8 However, He will make peace with them, protecting the elect, and showing the righteous the Mercy.[v] For they all belong to God, and will prosper and be blessed when they see Him at His appearing.”
“9 Behold! He comes with ten thousands of His holy ones to execute judgment upon all, to destroy all the ungodly, to convict all flesh of all the works of their ungodliness which they have ungodly committed, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.” Quoted in Jude 14-15
It is now time to decide. A choice stands before you. Will you relent and give all you have in reasonable service and allegiance to the King of kings and Lord of all lords and his Kingdom?—or—Will you continue to imbibe the pleasures of the flesh using the corrupted wealth of this world and the kingdoms of darkness, where judgment and destruction is the only outcome at the seat of his judgment on the Day of the Lord?
Decide.