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Senator Mitt Romney, Republican of Utah, who has been one of the few members of the president’s party to criticize Mr. Trump’s conduct on Ukraine, attended the lunch but said Mr. Trump shook his hand and did not mention the comments about his conduct.

The staff-level discussions with the senators on Thursday focused on the variety of ways that a Senate trial could play out and decisions that Senator Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky and the majority leader, will eventually have to make about the rules that will govern it.

Those rules, which were last developed for the impeachment trial of former President Bill Clinton in early 1999, govern how the two sides present evidence, whether they can call witnesses, and what role senators would have as they serve as quasi-jurors on the Senate floor. The answers to those questions — which would have to be negotiated with Democratic senators — would affect how long a trial would last.

In Mr. Clinton’s case, senators agreed that Republicans could only call three witnesses to make their case against the president, making the trial much shorter than it might have been if they were allowed to present a longer case.

In recent weeks, Mr. Trump — who frequently calls Republican lawmakers to comment on their television appearances — has begun reaching out to them by inviting small groups of senators to the White House for lunch. While the meetings have not been billed as pertaining to a certain topic, the impeachment inquiry has come up. Mr. Trump has also had Republican lawmakers review transcripts of both of his phone calls with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, before either call was released to the public for the first time.

Mr. Trump has also weighed in with his impressions of the House proceedings, and discussed strategy during the lunches.

“They’re just waiting for the House thing to play out,” said Senator Kevin Cramer, Republican of North Dakota, who attended a lunch last week.