Matthew 8:11

“And I say to you, that many will come from the east and the west, and will recline (at table) with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the Kingly Rule of heaven,”

The incident brought home to Jesus that in the future many Gentiles would be found in the eternal Kingly Rule of Heaven. We are left to recognise at this stage that it will be as a result of His activity (Matthew 28:20). While at present His ministry must be aimed at the lost sheep of the house of Israel (those in Israel who were open to His message because they were like sheep without a shepherd - Matthew 9:36) there was still to be an opening for Gentiles, and in the future that would become a wide open door. ‘East' included Arabia, Assyria, Babylon and Persia, ‘West' included the coastlands and the lands across the Great Sea (the Mediterranean). All these had been included in Old Testament promises. See Matthew 12:18; Matthew 12:21; Isaiah 2:2; Isaiah 42:4; Isaiah 42:6; Isaiah 42:11; Isaiah 49:6; Isaiah 49:12; Isaiah 60:6; Isaiah 19:23; Isaiah 43:14; etc. But the description is deliberately general.

The future life was regularly depicted in terms of Abraham (compare Luke 16:22), for all who come there will do so as a result of the promises to Abraham. Here the other patriarchs are also included. Thus in mind here is the coming eternal Kingly Rule, when His present Kingly Rule over the hearts of believers will merge with that in the eternal kingdom. For ‘recline' (the equivalent of our ‘sitting down at table') with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob' compare ‘in Abraham's bosom' (Luke 16:22), signifying reclining at table next to him. The idea is to present the eternal kingdom in terms of the great future Messianic feast (e.g. Isaiah 25:6; Isaiah 65:13; and regularly in Jewish literature) of which the Lord's Table is a foretaste, a feast which in this case pictures the everlasting kingdom, when God has finally triumphed on behalf of His people. The idea therefore is of large scale participation in God's future blessings by the Gentiles. (As with the Kingly Rule of Heaven, the Messianic feast could signify spiritual blessing here as found in Christ, and also the future spiritual blessing which will be ours eternally).

Even the Scribes and Pharisees were content for Gentiles to be converted to Judaism and become proselytes by being circumcised and purified. Thus the idea that Gentiles could enjoy the future blessing of God was not new. But they did not tend to think in large numbers like this, and they did not actually seek to evangelise them. They simply accepted them because the Law had said that they must (Exodus 12:48; Deuteronomy 23:3). Nor did Jewish concepts of the Messianic banquet tend to include Gentiles.

However, undoubtedly being powerfully expressed here was the thought that those who were ‘sons of Abraham' (Matthew 3:9), and who therefore thought of themselves as heirs to God's Kingly Rule, and expected their part in the coming Kingly Rule, would discover that they, in the end, had no part with Abraham, while those whom they dismissed as not having any connection with Abraham would find themselves sharing the table with Abraham (compare Matthew 22:43).