Luke 14:17

And he sent forth his servant at supper time to say to them that were bidden, Come; for all things are now ready.

The servant = God's messengers such as the Twelve and the Seventy

Supper time = The advent of the Messiah

Theophylact understood "the servant" to be none other than the Suffering Servant, Jesus himself; and others have supposed him to represent John the Baptist; but Trench is obviously correct. He said:

We behold in him, not the heralds who preceded, but those who accompanied the King, the evangelists and apostles ... who bade the Jews to enter on the enjoyment of those good things, no longer far off, but near.[26]

All things are now ready ... The fullness of time had come. The Messenger of the Covenant had arrived and would shortly make an atonement for sin. The first invitation (Luke 14:16) was the call of the Hebrews to be the chosen people and to receive the promises made to Abraham. This renewal of the invitation (Luke 14:17) through Christ and his apostles was the final call of Israel to the feast of the kingdom of God. Such a second invitation was customary in the East, and it would have been a serious breach of etiquette to have omitted it, a breach that Plummer described as "equivalent to canceling the more general invitation. To refuse the second invitation was an insult, equivalent among the Arab tribes to a declaration of war."[27]

[26] Ibid., p. 364.

[27] Alfred Plummer, op. cit., en loco.