Proper 23: Old Testament, Isaiah 25:6-9                                       

Isaiah 25:6-9

Dinner plans can be better kept secret. Especially when the plans are for a special night out at a favorite restaurant. My, it can be distracting. At least for me. I will think of it for several days prior and the consideration of what to order might take away from other more important issues. Though I cannot think of what would be more important.

In Isaiah 25 we have the LORD setting the table. Have you ever noticed the importance of the common meal setting in the Scripture? From Passover to Eucharist. Wider yet are the bookends-think the bread and wine of Melchizedek to the final feast pictured in the Revelation. Eating together around the Lord’s prescribed plans is pivotal to the biblical narrative. “On this mountain the LORD of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wine, of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well refined” (Isaiah 25:6). It is a feast with life giving and life saving implications. The veil of death is removed from all the nations. Death is swallowed even as the feast is consumed. Is that not an amazing consideration?

Are there connections with the Supper of our Lord Jesus? Who can say definitively but the common table is so prevalent in the Bible, it surely seems the comparison would be a welcome one. New life from what is provided and served. The end of tears and reproach. And the task of those in Isaiah’s day and before? Wait. Wait for the Lord.

I absolutely love the conclusion of our text. I will close with Isaiah’s proclamation. it will be enough.

“It will be said on that day,

‘Behold, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us.

This is the LORD; we have waited for him; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation’” (Isaiah 25:9).