Gird your loins and light your lamps
There were to be like the Israelites in Egypt eating the Passover before their flight, since that people was commanded, "This is how you are to eat it: with your loins girt" (see Exodus 12:11). The disciples having their lamps lit would also be fitting for the imagery since the Passover took place at night.¹
and be like servants who await their master’s return from a wedding,
ready to open immediately when he comes and knocks.
There was an expectation that the the messiah would come during the celebration of a Passover meal (ibid). The disciples were not waiting to flee from Egypt, but rather for the messiah to come and lead them on the definitive exodus (see Luke 9:31) he was to accomplish, delivering his people from death and leading them to eternal life.
Blessed are those servants
whom the master finds vigilant on his arrival.
The master was to come and then the feast would truly begin and the deliverance would be accomplished. But it would be those awaiting his coming who would be prepared to participate in the feast. The messiah would indeed return, but some would be so caught up in worldly affairs and so compromised by collusion with evil that they would not only be unready but even unwilling to join the celebration. But those who were attentive to the presence of the master, looking to discover it in Scripture, the Sacraments, the believing community, and the poor and disadvantaged, would be ready to welcome the bridegroom when he arrived. By their faithfulness in the absence of the master they demonstrated their commitment to his Kingdom and their desire to dwell with him therein.
Amen, I say to you, he will gird himself,
have them recline at table, and proceed to wait on them.
We probably would have thought that those waiting would need to serve the master on his arrival. At a different time Jesus told his disciples that a typical master would in fact not say to his servant, "Come at once and recline at table" (see Luke 17:7). But that was a caution against the disciples developing an attitude of entitlement on the basis of their service. Nevertheless, when describing the coming on the messiah we see that Jesus said that he did in fact plan to do precisely this. He would not wait for the servants to serve him, but would in fact to wait on them. This is what we experience when we participate in the celebration of the Eucharist with eyes of faith. And it is the culmination of this banquet in heaven to which we look forward at the end of time.
Let us be prepared. Jesus desires to come and dwell within those who watch for him and wait for his coming. May we be among them.
Through him the whole structure is held together
and grows into a temple sacred in the Lord;
in him you also are being built together
into a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.
--
1) Gadenz, Pablo T.. The Gospel of Luke (Catholic Commentary on Sacred Scripture): (A Catholic Bible Commentary on the New Testament by Trusted Catholic Biblical Scholars - CCSS) (p. 244). Baker Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.
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