Have you ever noticed how much of Jesus' ministry happens around meals? The feeding of the 5,000. Dinner at Zacchaeus' house. Parables about banquets. The Last Supper. Bread broken in Emmaus. Breakfast on the beach.

Our lives revolve around tables too.

Picture good friends on a Saturday night, sharing a meal and maybe a bottle of wine… looking back over 25 years of friendship. You can almost hear the laughter. "Remember that time…?"

Picture another night. Dinner is over. The children have been excused. The husband, now sitting alone with his wife says, "I lost my job today…” And she says, “Oh…Well, we’ll figure it out…”

Picture a baby's first birthday. The highchair. The family gathered around. Cake smashed… everywhere. When the cake is taken away, there are tears. Sixteen years later, that same family sits at that same table, looking back at the pictures. Where did the time go?

Picture Thanksgiving, when Granddad offers the blessing for the last time. The words fall sacred and soft.

And I think about my grandmother, Mamaw. Later in life she often ate dinner alone, next to the chair where Popsi sat for all those years. I imagine she could still hear the voices that had gathered around that table. Her four boys. Then the grandchildren. Then the great-grandchildren. One of those voices was mine.

I think about others who often eat alone, with the television or the phone for company. People eating in a hurry between jobs. Single moms struggling to get food on the table. People with no table at all, in refugee camps and on the run.

And I think about church tables, where people who vote very differently sit side by side. Happens all the time!

So many tables. So much laughter, and so many tears, over a lifetime.

And I think about Jesus… meeting us at every one of them.

Prayer: Come, Lord Jesus, be our guest, in our homes and churches and around our tables. Open our eyes to your presence, even here, even now. Amen.

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