The Table

For this time in my life, there are 3 generations living under one roof. Our house is not large but we still have days that we don't all see one another. Between work and school schedules, outside activities and all the other busyness that is our world today, we must make time to be with one another. We are blessed to have a couple of days each week that we all sit together for supper. 

The table is set and we look each other in the eyes, we touch as we pass the food, we share our thoughts...and it is communion. Not in the actual "bread and cup" but communion of the heart.

Henri Nouwen says:

The table is one of the most intimate places in our lives. It is there that we give ourselves to one another. When we say, "Take some more, let me serve you another plate, let me pour you another glass, don't be shy, enjoy it," we say a lot more than our words express. We invite our friends to become part of our lives. We want them to be nurtured by the same food and drink that nurture us. We desire communion. That is why a refusal to eat and drink what a host offers is so offensive. It feels like a rejection of an invitation to intimacy.

Strange as it may sound, the table is the place where we want to become food for one another. Every breakfast, lunch, or dinner can become a time of growing communion with one another.

Make it a priority to be food for one another, especially for those who are closest to you.

Unity

In light of yesterday's "What's Next?" meeting at church, I felt this was most timely (emphasis mine):

 The Eucharist is the sacrament of unity.  It makes us into one body.  The apostle Paul writes:  "As there is one loaf, so we, although there are many of us, are one single body, for we all share in the one loaf" (1 Corinthians 10:17).

The Eucharist is much more than a place where we celebrate our unity in Christ.  The Eucharist creates this unity.  By eating from the same bread and drinking from the same cup, we become the body of Christ present in the world.  Just as Christ becomes really present to us in the breaking of the bread, we become really present to one another as brothers and sisters of Christ, members of the same body.  Thus the Eucharist not only signifies unity but also creates it.                                 Henri Nouwen

Endorsements

The closer we get to November 7th, the more contentious the rhetoric seems to get. The question is, do you believe that pastors should endorse a candidate from the pulpit? The IRS Tax Code is set up to deny pastors that right...but is it truly a "right"?

This is a most interesting survey...

Meanwhile, in many mainline churches, the curious thing this Oct. 7 will not be Pulpit Freedom Sunday, but World Communion Sunday. In these churches, the day’s worship will not be centered on one man (because it is almost always a man who enjoy freedom to speak in a pulpit in most churches) at the podium, but on the body of Christ around the world feasting at a communal table.

The difference in how this Sunday will be marked seems instructive, symbolic even. In one, the focus rests on the importance of freedom and of an individual speaking out, fist pounding with righteous fury about a fleeting moment in one country’s political history. In the other, the focus will be on men, women, children, rich, poor, gays, lesbians, Africans, Asians, Australians, Europeans, and Americans, coming to a shared table with thanksgiving and solidarity, palms outstretched receiving a piece of bread, a sip of wine, eternal life. 

Read the rest...

Communion

Please tell me this will NEVER happen!


Asbo Jesus