Come to the Table

Do y'all remember when I had the opportunity to test a recipe for a new cookbook that was yet-to-be-released?

Well, that book was released TODAY! If you love food, gathering around the table, or encouraging words in book form, Shauna Niequist's new book, Bread & Wine: A Love Letter to Life Around the Table With Recipes, is one you want to pick up.

I was given the incredible opportunity to receive an advanced reader copy to review and holy cow. I've always known Shauna and I were soul sisters, but these words in this book about this topic...blew me away. What I love most about Shauna is that she writes about things that I know to be true deep down in my bones and she puts them out there for me to read and then I know I'm not alone. The world gets a little smaller and a little less scary. Kinda like when you gather around the table.

Ah...the table. I grew up in a home where the table was the center of family life. As an Air Force family, my parents knew how important it was to provide a constant when everything else in our lives was changing every 3 years. The table was that constant. It was where we gathered at the end of hectic days to reconnect, to learn a little more about each other, and to remind one another that whatever else happened that day, you would encounter love and life-giving nourishment for body and soul there. That has carried our family through so many changes and life-moments, I wouldn't even know where to begin. To this day, with my sister and I both grown and living our own lives, when we gather at my parents table we find that same love and life. As Little Sister and I have expanded our lives, the table has expanded as well to include those we bring with us to it. That's always been the case at my parent's table...it was never closed to anyone needing to encounter love and life and nourishment.

I suppose it should come as no surprise then that as I've grown into adulthood and begun to establish my own home that the table would be the center of that home. My life's ministry is to create an environment in which intimacy can flourish wherever I am and, for me, that starts in my home...at my table. It is where I have encountered Jesus most frequently in the last several years...more so than in any church service. I say that because He shows up in the people sitting around the table - in their words, in their ideas, their hopes, and their fears. He speaks truth to me through these people and when I hear their stories, the pain and the joy of their lives, it is quite literally Jesus with skin on sitting there, calling me into real life. He calls me out of my own comfortable world and into their reality and I see the Kingdom begin to come to earth as it is in heaven. The beauty and diversity of it is breath-taking. Jesus Himself sits at my table, in the form of the person He sent me, and we all break bread together and drink wine and REMEMBER. 

Shauna gets all of this. Like, GETS IT, gets it. And she wrote it all down. In a book. And then I got to read it. As I did so, I shouted  "YES!" and "THIS!" and underlined furiously and read aloud passages to Mr. Ford who would, infuriatingly, reply, "Yes, I know. You say that all the time". And I would say, "I KNOW! BUT SHE SAID IT TOO SO THAT MEANS I'M NOT CRAZY!" 

She says:

"What's becoming clearer and clearer to me is the most sacred moments, the ones in which I feel God's presence most profoundly, when I feel the goodness of the world most arrestingly, take place at the table...It's about what happens when we come together, slow down, open our homes, look into one another's faces, listen to one another's stories" (p. 13).

Um. Yeah, Hi! SHE GETS IT! I mean, I could keep going, quoting her, but really you ought to just grab the book for yourself and read these truths. You won't regret it. 

When I was offered the chance to read this advanced copy, I was provided several ideas for ways to engage the book. Since there are recipes throughout, following nearly every essay, they suggested hosting a dinner party and cooking through one of the menus provided at the end of the book. I LOVE a good dinner party, so I thought that was what I wanted to do...invite several people over and make it a picture perfect evening. But as it often does, life got busy. I read the book (okay, devoured it) and loved every word, but things got crazy and I couldn't find a time that would allow me to create the perfect evening I was envisioning. 

I did end up making a pan of Annette's Enchiladas for a couple in our small group that was dealing with some tough family stuff so they wouldn't have to worry about where dinner was coming from. Mr. Ford and I delivered the enchiladas and sat with them for awhile, and we looked into their faces and listened to their story.

We had some other friends over and I did end up making the suggested "Fiesta" menu, mostly because the suggested dessert was a Dark Chocolate Sea Salted Toffee with Vanilla Ice Cream, and I know how much my friend loves salted dark chocolate. That night was so sweet...laughter and conversation and planning with two people that have quickly become confidantes and partners in ministry in countless ways. That time around the table came at the end of a particularly difficult day and brought a great deal of healing to my weary heart and soul. 

I used some of Shauna's tips on quick weeknight cooking and was able to whip up something delightful without too much effort to nourish Mr. Ford and myself after a long day of work for us both.

I made the White Chicken Chili to feed a crowd and the lingering that happened at the end of the night saw new friendships forged.

I made the Mini Mac and Cheese for Ladies Night Out with the women's ministry from our church. I had a total off night in the kitchen that night, wherein I mis-calculated my proportions for doubling the recipe and then dumped half the macaroni all over the floor (Tootles was quite pleased with that particular mishap). Then when I plated them on the serving platter and cut them into quarters to try to make them stretch, I knew that Tom Colicchio and Padma Lakshi would have told me to pack my knives and go on account of the AWFUL presentation (total user error, BTW).

Basically, I've been cooking my way through the book for the last couple of weeks. Every recipe has been, not surprisingly, unbelievably tasty and pretty simple as well. But the most important thing I've learned in all of these adventures in the kitchen, is in large part due to one of Shauna's refrains throughout the book, that it's not a performance and it isn't about perfection. It's about nourishing the people I'm feeding, body and soul. It's about letting go of the need to be Martha Stewart and instead embracing the opportunity to create something with my hands and present it to the people I love as an invitation to holy ground. There we will usher one another into the Kingdom of God simply by sharing the bread and the wine. This is what Shauna says of bread and wine:

"I believe the bread and wine is for all of us, for every person, an invitation to believe, a hand extended from divine to human. I believe it's to be torn and handled, gulped. I believe that we can practice the sacrament of Communion anywhere at all, that a forest clearing can become a church and that any one of us a preist as we bless the bread and wine. And I believe that Jesus asked for us to remember him during the breaking of the bread and the drinking of the wine every time, every meal, every day - no matter where we are, who we are, what we've done" (p. 252)

My heart soars reading those words and my soul settles itself down. I ache to remember Jesus truthfully and in a manner that is holy. When I break bread and drink wine with those I love, I find that I cannot be more truthful or holy than that.

In the final essay of the book, "Come to the Table", Shauna writes: 

"...if you can satiate a person's hunger, you can get a glimpse of their heart....I want you to invest yourself wholly and deeply in friendship, God's greatest evidence of himself here on earth. More than anything, I want you to come to the table. In all sorts of ways, both literally and metaphorically, come to the table" (p 258).

God has called each of us, by name, to His table. Let us now call Him, let us now call others, to our tables and there remember that He is good and He is faithful and that we all have stories to tell.

***

I am grateful that Shauna has written so beautifully to remind us of these truths we already know. If even the tiniest portion of this resonates for you in any way, get your hands on this book. Just reading her words will nourish you. 

Oh, that one word...

God has been so faithful to us this last month. I don't know why I continue to be surprised when He is, because I've never known Him to be anything other than completely faithful. But there it is. I am still human after all.

Within about a 36 hour span of time, in the middle of January, God answered most of the questions we had about our more immediate future. Questions we assumed we'd have the answers to probably in April, May at the latest. God delights in surprising His children, I suppose, because He surprised us by giving us answers and direction and settling some unknowns in order to prepare us for things we would need to focus more of our attention on. All within about 36 hours. This is not a joke.

On a Sunday, we had lunch with the Pastor of our church campus and his wife, and the current Director of Operations for our campus and her husband. It was an informal interview for me to come on staff as the Campus Administrator so the Director of Operations could move into a new role for our campus. By the end of the lunch, it was fairly clear that if I wanted to accept the position, it would be mine. And I knew I wanted to do it. I felt God's call very strongly.

We walked out of the restaurant, got into our car, and Mr. Ford checked his phone and he had a voicemail from his mom. We called her, sitting in the parking lot, and learned that Mr. Ford's Grampa... the one he had moved up to Sacramento to live with for a time, the one with whom we spent a great deal of time in the first year of our dating life...was no longer able to live independently in his home due to his rapidly deteriorating eyesight. It was time to begin the process of moving him into an assisted living near Mr. Ford's parents. This was bittersweet news for us, and I think for most of the family. We knew he would be so much better off, but it was the end of an era and things that had played such an important role in mine and Mr. Ford's story. So we went to visit with him and being WITH Grampa on his new adventure began.

Monday morning, Mr. Ford received word that he had NOT made it through to the next round of the application process for the Foreign Services. We had assumed he would at least make it through this round and if it wasn't going to happen for us this time, we'd find out at the end of the next round, after a nice little trip to DC. In April. We were bummed, but okay. We had already come to a place of peace with either outcome so we allowed ourselves to feel our disappointment for a time and then were prepared to move on. 

That afternoon, not six hours after news of the Foreign Services, Mr. Ford was called into his boss' office and offered a permanent, full-time position at the company he's been contracting with since November. Again, we felt fairly confident that this would come, but not until his contract was up. In April. Are you seeing the hand of God yet? What provision, what care! Mr. Ford's (honest) response was, "Well, I'm not looking for anything else!" :)

On Tuesday, I officially accepted the offer for the position at the church. 

It was crystal clear that God had more for us to do here in Sacramento. Our work for His kingdom here in this city is not yet over. We have not given up on the dream of the Foreign Services...it's just been delayed a bit. We are just grateful to be used by God for His work, wherever that might be.

The beautiful providence of God here is that with so many questions that had been filling so much of our brain space answered, we were able to more fully devote our time and energy to being WITH Grampa during this transitional time for him. Again, God's perfect faithfulness and provision astound me. It was emotionally taxing on us...on the whole family. As these things are.

But the Lord always does you one better. We have been learning to be WITH Grampa and WITH one another, and I continue to learn what it means to mourn WITH those that mourn, and so many other ways to be WITH people. But God has revealed to us that perhaps what He wants to teach us through our OneWord for 2013 is that what we really need is to learn to allow others to be WITH us as well. 

The Lord has provided us with such an incredible community of faithful friends here. And I'm realizing this lesson of allowing others to be WITH us, is one more reason He has decided to keep us here for now. To learn to lean into that truth. To let our people, our tribe, be WITH us.

Our tribe has been amazing.

They have offered countless words of encouragement and prayers sent via text and Facebook.

They have pushed us to follow where we feel God leading us, sitting at a table in a dessert diner in downtown Sacramento on a Friday night.

They have offered hugs and an ear.

 They have stepped into our weaknesses and been willing to take things off our plates because they just know. They have sensed we need the help and they came riding in on grace and they have been WITH us. 

The faithfulness of His people have been His faithfulness to us. 

This word...WITH...it is is so much more than a word. It is a way of life and of faith. It is how the Kingdom of God comes to earth, as it is in heaven. 

And it's only February. Hang on, Mr. Ford...it's gonna be a wild year. 

WITH

I've never been one for New Year's Resolutions. I don't really know why...the idea just never resonated with me. Lately though, I've been hearing of a movement that has really resonated. The OneWord movement? Have you heard of this?

Basically, you choose one word that will serve as a guide post for the rest of your year and open yourself up to allowing God to define, explore, and reveal the multitude of meanings for that word in your life. It makes so much sense to me as it's easy to remember and free from the guilt and shame that failure to follow through on a resolution can bring. 

It's hard to choose the right word, because I want it to be a Spirit-led decision. As I've thought about it and prayed about it over the last week or so though, one word kept rising to the surface and I have a great sense of expectation about this word and this year. 

Mr. Ford and I will experience a lot of change and shifting in 2013. There are several answers that will be provided to us this year that we've been waiting for and those answers will determine a lot about the path our life together will take. We are ready and eager for whatever answers God gives us. We have spent a lot of time praying and talking and coming to a place of absolute contentment and trust in whatever the Lord brings us. Knowing this, in large part, has led me to my word for 2013, because I think it is how the Holy Spirit wants to guide me through these answers.

My OneWord for 2013 is WITH.

I just finished reading Radical Hospitality (um, game changer) and I am bowled over by the difficult simplicity of the true heart of hospitality. It is basically about just being present. To be WITH people, to walk WITH them. In their pain, in their suffering, in their joy, in their difficult-to-love states. To look them in the eye and say "I am WITH you now, in this moment, regardless of where or what else I could or 'should' be doing". That repositioning and re-posturing is simple, yet profound. I want to be intentional about being WITH people this year.

I want to be WITH God this year. To be WITH Him in His word and in prayer and in my eucharisteo. 

I want to be WITH my husband this year and in all that God is sure to bring our way in 2013.

WITH my church as we grow and expand.

WITH my friends in deeper and truer ways.

WITH my family in new and more intentional ways.

I want to walk through my days WITH gratitude.

WITH grace.

WITH wonder.

WITH joy.

WITH tenderness and gentleness and mercy.

WITH expectation and trust.

WITH certainty in the hope and promise of God's faithfulness.

WITH a spirit of learning and a heart of giving.

WITH the sole purpose of being grace to all I encounter.

This word, WITH, is a powerful and profound preposition. It bolsters the action verb and is active, even in it's passivity. I don't claim to have a full understanding of the preposition now, but my prayer and my expectation is that God will use it to affirm what I already know, shake up what I think I know, and reveal what I do not know about the meaning of the word WITH. 

And so I enter 2013 WITH a guiding word and a guiding principle and WITH great expectation and excitement. 

Let's do this.

A Splintered Flash of Grace

Image source

Regarding experience and what it means for hospitality, from the book Radical Hospitality, by Lonni Collins Pratt:

Letting ourselves believe that our experience constitutes normality and that other ways of doing life are abnormal is delusional and dangerous (pg 105).

and later:

When we hold tightly to a worldview in which our experience is at the center, we live small lives. If we don't consider the ramifications of such a life we can easily slip into suspicion, misunderstanding, and prejudice of strangers -- those who do not meet our standard of 'normal' (pg.111).

God has been repeating this truth to me over and over, clear as day, lately. I don't know that I've ever heard Him so clearly on anything before. Well, except for when He assured me that He would mold Mr. Ford into the man that would become my husband. He is faithful!

But what these quotes reflect, and what I have been discovering from other conversations, things I've read, and time seeking God on the true meaning of hospitality, is that we MUST be open to hearing the stories and the experiences of "the other". (No, not "The Others", from "The Island"...calm down LOST fanatics.) But "the other", meaning anyone who is not you. No two experiences are the same and that is as it should be. But we cannot fall into the trap of believing that OUR experience is the correct one or the normal one. When we do that, we cut off our ability to fully, deeply, and truly love. We must dare to believe that "the other's" experience -- their story -- has something to teach us; that by opening up to those stories, we are in essence opening ourselves up to the Grand Story that God is telling through each individual person and that He has been telling from the beginning of time.

That's not to say that it is easy. It's a HARD thing. There is a sense of security in believing that everyone else's experiences are, or ought to be, like mine. But it is a false sense of security. Allowing other's experiences to be valid, rather than invalidating them by calling them "abnormal", is scandalous, actually. It opens us up to a greater capacity to be hurt, to be taken advantage of, to be walked on. It is grace. But what you discover as you slowly, tiny piece by tiny piece, begin to allow other's into your heart, your life and to really let them feel about a situation however they feel about it (rather than imposing how YOU would feel about that situation on THEM) is a thin place. Holiness begins to seep through the cracks and explode you wide open. I am beginning to experience these moments, here and there. They are glimpses of the Holy. And I find myself feeling, in those moments, more compassion, less anger, and the beginnings of a deeper understanding of the love that I think 1 Corinthians 13 is really speaking of.

Pratt says it so eloquently, so beautifully:

You will be tucking a child into bed, or pouring a second cup of coffee for you neighbor, or sharing a breadstick with your friend. You will be trying to know what is holy in us all and wondering how to be known by the Holy. You will have read a few books and maybe taken a workshop. You will have spent some time with people reputed to be experts on the subject of hospitality. You will wing it more often than not.

And then that splinter of light will get through the great mysterious confusion, who knows when or where or why, and grace will sneak up on you and you will know, if only for a splintered flash of a second, you will know that your trying is making a difference and your trying is enough (pp. 125-126).

Oh, that I might never stop trying, if only for those splintered flashes!