“Be dressed ready for service and keep your lamps burning, like servants waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet, so that when he comes and knocks, they can immediately open the door for him. It will be good for those servants whose master finds them watching when he comes.”

                                                                                                Luke 12:35-36

I was reading this scripture recently, and the familiarity of it almost made me put my Bible down. But I decided to read on, and boy was it worth my while! Here’s what it says next that I never realized before.

“Truly I tell you, he will dress himself to serve, will have them recline at the table and will come and wait on them.”

This is the same Jesus who said, “I did not come to be served but to serve”. I got to thinking about that and it struck me. Here we all are, coming into that great Upper Room, fresh from meeting Jesus in the air when He comes back to get us and the dead in Christ rise, all of us in our new immortal bodies.

And before us is spread the banquet of all banquets – the banquet when Jesus takes His bride, the Church. It is the wedding reception of all wedding receptions. The Lord has prepared a place for each of us at the table and He invites us to recline there. “On this mountain the Lord Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet of aged wine – the best of meats and the finest of wines.”

But then, instead of taking His seat at the head of the table, the Lord lays aside his blood-dipped, gleaming white robe and golden sash . . . to dress as a servant. AND HE BEGINS TO WAIT ON US!  (But that shouldn’t surprise us – after all, serving IS in His nature.)

Then I got to thinking about the last time Jesus sat down to eat, that night with the disciples when Judas betrayed Him. They were aghast when Jesus washed their feet. So, imagine what they – and us - will be like when He starts to wait on us! But it’s true. John says that “even in Glory Jesus (will) bear the very nature of a servant.”

Just makes you want to sing about Resurrection Day, doesn’t it?! “What a day, glorious day, that will be!”

Father, prepare us for the time when we come into Your Glory, and are served by the greatest servant of all time . In Jesus’ name, AMEN.