52 Weeks at the Table – Week 15

The last of the judges was a boy named Samuel, a child in a family living among the descendants of Ephraim. Though his mother dressed him like a priest, he was not really a priest. He would grow up to crown a king or two, but not become one. He would be known as a seer, but serve God too early to be remembered as a prophet. For God’s people rejected his leadership as judge and begged for a king. God would tell him that they had really rejected Him as their King, so they could be like all the other nations – just like everyone else. They were to be a called-out people, but they wanted Samuel to call in this favor for them.

In the waning days of Israel’s true kings, a prophet named Isaiah would describe One later known as Prophet, Priest and King – One who would know rejection, yet nobly serve as a sacrificial Lamb; One who would suffer and die yet see the light of life and be satisfied; One who would bear the sins of many and intercede for them as a priest would intercede. And, having accomplished all, would finally serve as the last of the judges.

A Prayer Over the Bread

Father God, we so often want to be just like everyone else – even though we know you have called us out to be a people in the image of Your Son. We reject Your leadership and want to be in control of our own lives – though we have seen the disaster it can lead to. We think we know what the future holds, but we can’t even see the next moment. We want to judge others, but rarely ourselves. We need this bread of Your Word to give us Your leadership and vision and discernment and judgment. Feed us always with this Bread of Life. Amen.

A Prayer Over the Cup

Wondrous and Mighty Lord, we remember the sacrificed blood of the Lamb of God as we share this cup. We recognize the Sovereign King, the Prophet of Eternity, the High Priest of Heaven interceding for us through His own sacrifice. As our lives approach the day when You both will judge us all, we thirst for the perfection that it offers; the light of life that satisfies You and compels our adoration. We gladly yield it through Jesus: Amen.

52 Weeks At the Table – Week 14

An older man. A younger woman. He was a Jew, perhaps never married. She was from hated Moab, a widow. He was wealthy. She was destitute. It would seem that they had nothing in common – so the stage is set in the four brief chapters of Ruth for one of the most treasured love stories in scripture. It is a beautiful dance of first-look attraction, of quaint custom revolving around levirate marriage law, and the counsel of a doting dance coach. Naomi, Ruth’s mother-in-law, would observe the ritual from afar, returning the loyalty and love of her foreign daughter-in-law by dispensing the right advice at the right time. It would all seem to be a matter of chance – how Ruth and Boaz meet; their common clan; the nearer kinsman-redeemer’s existing marriage and inheritance – were it not for the name of the Lord, invoked in blessing at every seeming coincidence. They meet while harvesting grain in his field – grain that would doubtless be made into bread – and he invites her to a meal: “Come over here. Have some bread and dip it in the wine vinegar.” She eats her fill. Later, after he has celebrated with wine, she demonstrates to him her desire to be covered by his tent. Bread. Wine. A few dipped morsels together. A sandal exchanged in a pledge of purchase and troth. A bond that would lead to the birth of wealthy King David’s grandfather … and a poor Descendent whose cross would describe Him as The King of the Jews.

Two men among twelve, both Jews, both friends, both travelers in a ministry pilgrimage that covered many miles, fed many mouths, healed many stricken bodies, soothed many tortured souls, immersed many penitent believers. It would have seemed that they had everything in common – yet Jesus and Judas were from completely different worlds. So the stage is set in the latter words of each gospel for the most horrifyingly fascinating story of love and betrayal in all of scripture. For Judas’ heart was in bound up in his purse – a child of this world; an open door to the temptation of Satan. Jesus’ heart was the most free of any man who ever lived – a child of heaven and earth; free to love all, open even to someone who would betray Him. They shared a meal. Bread. Wine. A few dipped morsels together. Then Jesus spoke the truth they both knew: “The one who has dipped his hand into the bowl with me will betray me.” Their bond was shattered. No remorse could un-do it. Not even a kiss could repair it – for the kiss was the sign that would betray the King of heaven into the hands of hell … a life exchanged in a pledge of purchase and troth by the nearest Kinsman-Redeemer of all.

A Prayer Over the Bread

May the glory of Your visage, Holy Father, contain a look of love toward us even when we betray the Son we love by our sin, our denial. Rekindle in our penitent hearts the love we had at first glance over the sharing of these morsels of bread, His body. Observe and advise us in love. Reunite us in the One with Whom we have too often broken our bond of faith and fealty. Through Jesus Himself we ask You, and confirm with our “Amen!”

A Prayer Over the Cup

Almighty One of all ages, we crave the bond with You that was pledged and purchased with the blood of Your Son so that we would no longer be foreigners, but family. Bring us together always around this, His table, to remember with this cup how poor we were, and how generous You are. Help us see Your providence when we are tempted to only see coincidence. May we always invoke Your name in blessing through Jesus. Amen!

52 Weeks at the Table – Week 13

Israel’s judge, Samson, became famed for his physical strength. He had been set apart from birth by the instruction of an angel to be a Nazirite, and to touch no wine or unclean thing. When the Spirit of the Lord came upon him, he could tear a lion into pieces or best thirty Philistines with his bare hands; he could uproot a city gate and carry it away; he could snap new ropes binding him or strike down a thousand with the jawbone of a dead donkey. Yet his weakness was his passion for a woman outside of God’s will for him. Shorn of his Nazarite locks, he was also abandoned by the Lord. When Philistines had bound him with bronze, blinded him and paraded him before all the people in Dagon’s temple, he prayed for strength one last time, and God gave it. It is hard not to picture him in a cruciform position, arms stretched between that temple’s two pillars, pushing them apart with all his returned might, until they collapsed and the roof caved in on himself and the rulers of the Philistines.

The Judge of this world – Jesus – was also a man of great strength. Led by God’s Spirit into the wild, he could fast for forty days and nights and return to Galilee in the Spirit’s power; He could order evil spirits to leave and they would; He could go around doing good and healing those under the power of the devil; He could endure being bound and tortured and paraded before the people until stretched cruciform by the shame of the cross and be raised from the dead by the power of God. Then He could, through His riches, strengthen us with power through His Spirit in our inner being. For his greatest strength was His passion for His bride, given Him by His Father – and for doing God’s will for her. And with that rock-like strength, He said that the gates of death could not prevail against her, for He had bound the strength of Satan, and robbed him of his goal.

A Prayer Over the Bread

God of the Spirit which strengthened Samson and Your Son, we beg the strength that goes beyond what is found in ordinary bread. We ask the strength of character that seeks to do Your will; to love You with heart, mind, soul and strength – and to love those around us as ourselves. We ask for the power of the Body of Christ, the power of resurrection giving us new life beyond this one and new life within this one. We ask for this through the One who gave His body, remembered in this bread. Amen.

A Prayer Over the Cup

Father of the Son whose blood was given for us, we renew our prayer to be set apart for your purposes as the Nazirites once were; not for indulgence in the ordinary wine craved by self, but for the extraordinary cup which You offer through Christ. We know that You did not let this cup pass from Him, and we know that what it holds for us is not freedom from shame or pain, but freedom from sin and guilt – and the promise of life without end, life with and through the One who bears this prayer to You. Amen.

52 Weeks at the Table – Week 12

The descendants of Israel, over the centuries, endured many dark ages. Their sojourn in Egypt had become slavery, and though Moses and Joshua had led them out and through a desert time, both died. And the theme of the book detailing their succeeding – but largely failing – judges was one of the darkest. Twice it reminds us, “In those days Israel had no king; everyone did as he saw fit.” (Judges 17:6; 21:25). Mostly, they saw fit to do evil in the eyes of the Lord, an expression found seven times within its pages. Idolatry, forbidden intermarriage, internecine warfare – many of their sins began with “I.” Women like the prophetess Deborah and housewife Jael (and an unnamed female warrior who dropped a millstone on the head of an attacking king) rose to noble roles while men followed meekly. Just as often, they were the objects of cruelty from plundering armies, and an anonymous Levite who let the perverts of Gibeah complete the abominable sin threatened at Sodom centuries before.

Into such a dark age came Jesus of Nazareth, when a puppet king named Herod ruled Israel and puppet priests had made an idol of their interpretations of God’s law. Pharisees quibbled with Sadducees while Zealots plotted to overthrow occupying rule, including collaborators like tax collectors. Women like the prophetess Anna, Jesus’ mother Mary, an entourage of supporting listeners, an an unnamed soul at a well in Sychar of Samaria, rose to positions of honor by telling others about Him while men followed meekly. Just as often, women of poor reputation or caught in sin were made objects of ridicule and threat. So noble women stood at a distance from His cross of shame and went to keep vigil at His tomb.

A Prayer Over the Bread

Father God, each of us lives through our own dark times, times when our sins begin with “I.” We lose our faith, regain it, only to lose it again. And each of us does as he or she sees fit. We fail to destroy the idols in our lives. We flirt with evil. We bicker with our brothers and sisters. And we yearn to live nobly. Thank You for Jesus, who calls us to nobility; to a position of judging self, and judging rightly. Thank You for His willingness to be the object of cruelty to show us what true evil is – His willingness to be the body on that cross; His power to abandon that tomb. And His willingness to make us part of His body, His church. Thank You for this bread, His body. Amen.

A Prayer Over the Cup

Righteous God, though we may not have spilled blood, the malice in our hearts has sometimes made them as wicked as if we had. Forgive us of these our sins through the blood of your Son, and through this cup of remembrance, let His blood flow in us to cleanse and renew and invigorate and give life that is better, life without end. Life that does as You see fit, not us. Turn our times of darkness into Your glorious light. Turn our cowardice into courage. Inspire us to speak Your words and do Your will, for the sake of the blood of Your Son. In His name we say: Amen.

52 Weeks at the Table – Week 11

Joshua went where Moses could not go – into the land promised to Abraham (Genesis 12:7), to Isaac and his descendants (Genesis 24:7), to Moses and his followers (Exodus 3:17). The Lord provided access to the land by parting the waters of the Jordan River just as He had provided escape from Egypt through the Red Sea (Joshua 3) – the very same river where Jesus would be baptized (Matthew 3) hundreds of years later. Through Jesus, the Father would provide access to Himself (Romans 5:1-5).

Joshua chose twelve men, each to carry a stone of remembrance from the Jordan to build an altar to the Lord (Joshua 4); his namesake Jesus chose twelve men and named their faith as cornerstones in the building of His assembly; His church (Matthew 16:13-20) – which the gates of Hades could no more overcome than Jericho could reinforce its own walls against the call of the final trumpet. The parallels extend even to the saving of a woman with many sins who showed faith through kindness (Luke 7:36-50) as Joshua’s spies had spared Rahab (Joshua 2; 6). Jesus’ plan – His passion; His sacrifice on the altar of crossbeams – was to spare us, wanderers in deserts of sin and self, and empower us to conquer and build and reside in a land long promised to those who believe.

Only He could go where we could not (Hebrews 9).

A Prayer Over the Bread

God of mercy and grace; of righteousness and justice … Yours is all glory and praise for Your compassion on Your children of promise. Nothing we have done; nothing we have achieved brings us closer to You or into Your assembled people – Your church. Thank You for making us members of the body of Christ through the giving of His body, remembered as steadfastly as stone through this bread. Thank You for hearing our prayers through Him: Amen!

A Prayer Over the Cup

Father of patriarchs, prophets and priests … we glorify You and give thanks for our deliverance through waters of peril and promise by Your unmatched power. Through the fluid power of the blood that coursed through the veins of Your Son we have deliverance from sin and guilt and self, and we cannot forget the promise to draw us closer to the land of Your heart as we share it and pray through Jesus: Amen!

52 Weeks at the Table – Week 10

At a time when God’s people had lived under the domination of foreigners, and no one had spoken for Him for years, a baby was born whose very life was soon endangered by the regime in power. He was delivered from danger by the hospitality of Egypt, and grew to manhood experiencing a call of God Himself to lead His people, to give them instructions that would bless their lives, to bring them from slavery to freedom. He would display God’s power through miracles; God’s wisdom through teaching; God’s purity through a glorious transfigured face; God’s love through selfless service. He would bring deliverance through water. He would care for the hunger and thirst of thousands through God’s own providence. He would establish a meal to celebrate deliverance and freedom and fulfillment that would endure for generations.

The similarities between Moses and Jesus are made even more deeply astounding by the fact that they were prophetic. Both Peter in one of his earliest sermons and Stephen in his last sermon quoted God’s promise to reassure Moses, which Moses repeated to reassure Israel: “The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own brothers. You must listen to him. For this is what you asked of the LORD your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly when you said, ‘Let us not hear the voice of the LORD our God nor see this great fire anymore, or we will die.’ The LORD said to me: “What they say is good. I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers; I will put my words in his mouth, and he will tell them everything I command him.”~ Deuteronomy 18:15-19

“I will raise up.” “A prophet like Moses.” “Put words in his mouth.” That prophet’s name?

Joshua. Yeshua.

Jesus.

A Prayer Over the Bread

God of Moses and Israel and Abraham, hear our prayer and incline Your heart to our words, for we have listened and obeyed Yours with such uneven faith. We have wandered long in deserts of sin. We needed a deliverer and You sent Your Son. When our sin and rebellion brought the threat of certain death, You raised Him up in the wilderness, and by lifting our eyes on the One lifted up, we were healed. Bless now this bread, His body, which feeds our starving souls as we anticipate a promised land in which we find ultimate deliverance through Him. Amen.

A Prayer Over the Cup

Lord God, we praise You and honor You for sharing Your power, Your wisdom, Your purity, Your love through a prophet from among our own brothers, Jesus, who shared this cup, His blood. Thank You for our deliverance through water. Thank You for the thirst for righteousness that only Your grace can slake. Thank You for this meal; this cup which commemorates Jesus’ blood, which provides it. Amen.

52 Weeks at the Table – Week 9

Israel’s favorite son – dreamer of strange dreams, wearer of colorful robe, nuisance to his brothers – was sold into slavery rather than being murdered by them. So began the connection between Egypt where the slave-traders took Joseph and the people of Israel. Though he served a ruler well, his innocence got him a jail term anyway – served with the chief wine-taster and chief bread-baker to Egypt’s king, Pharaoh. The cupbearer’s dream foretold his head lifted up and restored to his position. The baker’s dream prophesied that his head would be lifted off and his body hung on a tree. Remembered later by the cupbearer for his accuracy in interpreting the dreams, Joseph was called upon to interpret Pharaoh’s dream, one of seven years of plenty followed by seven years of famine – for which Pharaoh appointed Joseph to prepare his nation. It was the famine which brought Joseph’s brothers to Egypt for food and a feast with the country’s second-in-command. After the meal, a cup and some grain precipitated the moment he revealed himself to them as the lost brother they betrayed, now king of all Egypt’s resources. He gathered them close, begged them to bring back his father Israel, and told them, “Do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you.” And at last the family of twelve brothers and a loving father was reunited.

It was a meal with a cup and a loaf made from grain at which Jesus revealed to his twelve closest friends that God had sent Him to serve and that they must serve too. His words were the culmination of His prophecies that He would be lifted up. And they would soon see for themselves that meant He would be hung on a tree, and serve as a ransom to save many. Through Him, the family of God would be reunited forever.

A Prayer Over the Bread

Father of Abraham, Isaac and Israel; Father of Jesus the Christ; Father of all You have gathered close into Your family, we praise and glorify You. The bread and the grain it was made from sustain us, during plenty and during famine. The dream You share with us of being reunited around Your table in eternity fills us with hope. Thank You for revealing Yourself to us through Christ, through His servant nature, through this bread which speaks of His sacrifice while hanging on a tree. Amen.

A Prayer Over the Cup

God of twelve brothers; twelve tribes; twelve apostles … we honor You for sending Your Son here as a loving response to our voluntary slavery to sin. Thank You for setting us free from it through His blood. Thank You for this cup which represents it, hidden among our treasures, drawing us back together with You for to save our lives from self; our souls from sin. Help us to leave behind our anger and remorse at our betrayals; help us journey toward Your table in heaven. Lift us up and restore us in Your kingdom. We pray this through the King of all its resources, Jesus: Amen.

52 Weeks at the Table – Week 8

Abraham’s grandson Jacob cheated his older brother Esau out of the blessing that belonged to him for the price of a cup of red stew. Before the inevitable reunion of the two brothers, Jacob sent his family away in two groups so he might not lose all to Esau’s wrath – then sent gifts to placate him. Camping at a place where he had seen angels before, Jacob prayed for safety and mercy on those he loved, then fought all night with someone who touched his the socket of his hip and made it impossible to run from the one who was wronged, and blessed him with the name Israel – “Wrestler with God.” Israel felt he had seen God face to face yet had lived. But the real surprise was yet to come, when his brother Esau ran from a distance to greet him, embrace his neck, and weep together for joy with him.

In an upper room, at a meal to celebrate God’s rescue of Israel’s descendants from Egypt, Jesus prayed for the safety and unity of those He loved – a few of the many souls throughout time whom He was about to reconcile with God, but at the cost of His life. In a garden, He wrestled with God over what had to be done. When some of Israel’s descendants came to arrest Him, they saw Him and did not recognize the face of God – so they struck that face. And lived with what they had done.

A Prayer Over the Bread

Father, forgive us, for we don’t always know what we are doing. Yet You let us live with what we have done. Too often we do know what we have done, though, and we are aware enough to dread our inevitable reunion with You. But this feast touches the socket of our reflex to run; immobilizes us with Your passion for us to be reconciled to You; stuns us with the promise of Your embrace. God, forgive us as we remember Jesus and recognize His body in this bread. Amen.

A Prayer Over the Cup

God of Israel, we have often cheated ourselves out of great blessing for little more gratification than some stew. We have alienated ourselves from brothers we love. And we have wronged You. This cup reminds us of the price of our selfishness and foolishness and fear; it reminds us that the blood of Your Son bought our reconciliation with You, and we have no words adequate to express our thanks. Accept our lives, we pray through Him. Amen.”

52 Weeks at the Table – Week 7

In a single day, the greatest man in all the East – one of the richest, wisest, and most righteous before God – lost it all. He lost his herds and his flocks; his wealth and his dear children. He fell to his knees in mournful worship. Then Job lost his health, crippled by searingly painful boils upon his flesh. And he knew that God permitted it, because God could have prevented it. He flung his question at God as any man would – “WHY?” – but never doubted that God still reigned over everything. He accepted the response that he would not be able to understand God’s answer. He never knew that he had been the object of a wager between God and the accuser Satan over his faithfulness – or that God had bet on him. God believed in Job as much as Job believed in God. At the end of the account, God restored to Job all that had been snatched away from him – some of it doubly.

On one early-darkening day, the greatest Man who ever lived lost it all – the respect of those who had called Him “Rabbi;” the companionship of followers, friends, family; His freedom; His dignity; His comfort; and His very lifeblood. Knowing that all of it was coming – on the night before it did – Jesus fell to His knees in mournful worship. Then the pummeling, the crown of thorns, the whip of cords, and the nails assaulted His flesh. And He knew that God was permitting it, because He had begged God to prevent it. He never doubted that God still reigned over life and death. He accepted the response that was God’s tortured silence, for He already understood God’s answer. He knew that all mankind was the object of a wager between God and the accuser over His faithfulness, and that God was counting on Him to suffer and die – as much as He was counting on God to raise Him up. In the end, God not only restored unending life to Him, but the promise of it to all who would follow … so great a family that only God could number them.

A Prayer Over the Bread

O God and Father, You comprehend mysteries beyond our grasp: how your justice and mercy are served by the suffering of Your Servant; Your Son. As we try to understand the sacrifice of His body while we eat this bread, we confess to You our shortcomings, our insufficiency, our sin. And we glorify Your Name through His. Amen.

A Prayer Over the Cup

Gracious and Righteous God, we fall to our knees in worship – mournful of our sin and its consequences; joyous for the hope we have through Jesus, the Christ. Though we know very few of life’s answers, You have shown Yourself to us through Him, and it is all the answer we need. Bless us in the sharing of this cup as we remember what won the wager and won our souls from endless death: the blood of Your Son and our Intercessor. Amen.

52 Weeks at the Table – Week 6

It was a hideously unreasonable request. God asked Abraham to sacrifice his one-and-only son – Ishmael having been banished from the family – as a burnt offering. This was the son born to him in his hundredth year by the Lord’s own promise. Scripture does not record God asking anyone to offer anything before; the altars seem to have been built and the sacrifices offered by freewill and in gratitude. After a three-day journey with the boy Isaac, his father’s answer to the boy’s natural question was prophecy: “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” Yet God tested Abraham all the way to the moment that he took out the knife to slay his child. God’s angel called out to halt the sacrifice, passing over this precious son. Then God provided a ram caught by its horns, and a blessing of an incalculable descendency through whom all nations would be blessed.

Hebrews 11 says that “Abraham reasoned that God could raise the dead, and figuratively speaking, he did receive Isaac back from death.” Galatians 3 urges us to “Consider Abraham: ‘He believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.’ Understand, then, that those who believe are children of Abraham. The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: ‘All nations will be blessed through you.’ So those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.” Surely it is next to impossible to reason and believe in such measure, while holding your son’s life in your hands. Yet that is what God asked of Abraham. And that is what God himself did: He believed in us enough to reason that it was worth sacrificing His own Son on our behalf. So, within us, God kindles the desire to sacrifice our lives; our selves – to Him.

Because He would never ask anyone to do what He was not willing to do Himself.

A Prayer Over the Bread

Father God, we praise Your name because You truly have blessed all nations of the earth through the sacrifice of Your Son. As we meditate on this bread, we cannot help but picture You, hovering over His body, like Abraham over Isaac, deciding that we were somehow worth what had to be done to credit Christ’s righteousness to us. Thank you for believing in us. Thank you for this bread, His body. Help us in the moment we share it to sacrifice self and become more like the One who bears this request to You. Amen.

A Prayer Over the Cup

God of supreme mercy and justice, we pause before consuming this cup and remember the blood of Jesus, spilled by fist and thorn and whip and nail and sword, for us who believe. We are overwhelmed by the passion of what You ask us to believe. We want to be able to reason out this unreasonable passion, but it is incalculable. We want to be able to believe Your incredible faith in our worth, but it’s virtually impossible for us. We want to have the faith of Abraham, but we are not him. Help our unbelief, we beg through Jesus: Amen.