The climactic celebratory feast of redemptive history, described in Revelation 19:6-9. After the fall of Babylon (chapter 18) and before the return of Christ (19:11ff.), a great multitude in heaven cries, "Hallelujah! For the Lord our God the Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and exult and give him the glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his Bride has made herself ready." The angel tells John: "Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb." The metaphor is Jewish wedding custom: the bridegroom (Christ) comes for the bride (the Church); after the presentation, a great feast celebrates the union.
The Marriage Supper of the Lamb is the happy ending of Scripture's central story. Five observations. (1) Covenant love consummated. The Bible opens with a wedding (Adam and Eve, Genesis 2) and closes with a wedding (Christ and Church, Revelation 19, 21). The whole story is a marriage tale — God's pursuit of a bride for His Son, the Son's sacrificial love, the Spirit's beautification, the final glad union. Every earthly Christian marriage is a parable pointing to this. (2) The Church made ready. "His Bride has made herself ready; it was granted her to clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure — for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints" (19:7-8). The Bride's wedding dress is dual: given by Christ (imputed righteousness) and woven out of her sanctified deeds. Both are true. (3) Celebration, not mere relief. The Marriage Supper is not simply "heaven where we escape earth's problems." It is a wedding banquet — the highest category of human joy, amplified to cosmic scale. Feasting, music, togetherness, the joy of the reunited beloveds. (4) Invited. "Blessed are those who are invited." The gospel is a wedding invitation. Every believer carries that invitation into the world. (5) Christ's own anticipation. "I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom" (Matthew 26:29). Jesus deferred the next glass of wine for this wedding. He is waiting for us — and His bride.