Social anthropologists remind us that if we want to understand folks, we need to take the time to sit down and dine with them. Please note that the operative activity is “dine with,” not “parallel feed.” Dining includes conversation as well as the food set before us. Eating together is one of the fundamental ways we humans connect. It is the way the smallest child learns to become part of the family, begins to fathom how to take part in the family’s free-flowing chatter about life and its challenges, and recognizes and acknowledges the extended family and circle of friends. People in relationship who gather at table get to practice what it means to be hospitable, gracious, patient, and at peace with one another. Selfish, boorish behavior at table isn’t acceptable because it literally kills appetites and stops conversation. (Sadly, so do our addictions to smartphones and television.) Imagine trying to eat with someone you can’t stand. You quickly get the picture.
God’s people should find all this self-evident. Numerous scriptural passages outline the qualities necessary for dwelling together as God’s beloved children. Paul’s Letter to the Romans sets forth the characteristics of holy community:
Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honor. Do not lag in zeal, be ardent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to strangers.
Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another; do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly;do not claim to be wiser than you are. Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all [Romans 12:9-18].
This is superb advice for gracious dining as much as for living faithfully as God’s people.
This Sunday’s readings set the stage for understanding the life of faith as the outgrowth of table fellowship. Last week we recited the familiar words of Psalm 23, a song and prayer of trust and thankfulness for God’s lavish generosity. It reminds us that God perpetually sets before us a bounteous table so that we may be sustained in the best and worst of times. The many readings in the coming six weeks unfold what that means for our own lives. We begin to imagine the world from Jesus’ perspective. We realize that we, too, have been given eyes to see the hungry and needy, ears to hear the cries of the poor and lonely, minds to find ways to embrace the generosity God makes possible, and hearts to receive the hungry, forgotten, shunned, and strangers as God’s diverse, beloved children. What we learn and practice at our own tables shapes how we interact with the rest of God’s creation. Bluntly stated, we can never be God’s hospitable people if we fail to be welcoming participants and hosts at our own table. The author of I John summarizes: We lovebecause [God] first loved us. Those who say, “I love God,” and hate their brothers or sisters, are liars; for those who do not love a brother or sisterwhom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen. The commandment we have from him is this: those who love God must love their brothers and sistersalso [I John 4:19-21].
Ma Kettle is one of my all-time favorite Hollywood characters. Wikipedia ® describes Marjorie Main who played Ma in ten popular films as “…abrasive, domineering, and salty” with a brash, gravelly voice to match. What the website fails to mention is her unabashed, unbridled love for her unruly brood of fifteen children and no-account but devoted husband, Pa, usually played by Percy Kilbride. Her devotion was manifest in Herculean efforts to get food cooked and dished up. Calling her family to the dinner table was always an act of courage. The ensuing stampede was chaotic, supervised by a harried but beaming Ma, inordinately proud of her familial mob. As other characters in the films get to know her, the sloppy, higgledy-piggledy surroundings of the Kettles’ household are dispelled, revealing a strong woman of integrity, generous of spirit, and ready to affirm the goodness in those she meets.
Perhaps Ma’s gift for welcoming her family and strangers alike is what Sunday’s second reading addresses: God’s readiness to see beloved children despite the unholy mess of our lives. Ephesians suggests that we, too, have that God-given ability …to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God [Ephesians 3:18-19]. Moreover, it is a God-given ability which results in prayers of thanksgiving, as Sunday’s psalm also reminds us.