A Meal With Jesus
How would you finish this sentence - “The Son of Man came….”? The answer to this question reveals how we view the mission of Jesus Christ and how we view our mission as His disciples. This is the question the Raymond Youth Group will be seeking to answer over the summer as we read A Meal With Jesus. So what is the answer? Luke says: “The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and you say, 'Look at this glutton and drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!'“ (Luke 7:34) What a statement! Jesus’ table fellowship reveals the grace, mission, and community which Jesus sought to establish by His earthly ministry then, and Tim Chester’s A Meal With Jesus seeks to rekindle that same table fellowship among Christ’s church today.
Let me ask the question - how would you define grace? Better yet, let me ask the same question in a more pointed way - who gathers around your kitchen table? Who we gather around our kitchen functions as a barometer of both our social relations and our understanding of the gospel of grace. In our age of fear and polarization, we harbor a great trepidation in hosting those different from us. Am I right? And yet the Son of Man ate with sinners and tax collectors. Regardless of how we define grace on paper, our deep divisions have fostered an “us versus them” mentality that affects our functional definition of grace. We want people to hear the gospel from afar, forgetting that Jesus brought grace from heaven down into the kitchen. We want sinners “cleaned up” before they are invited into our presence, yet Jesus routinely came to them as they were. If we believe that Jesus didn’t save us because we were good but to make us good, then this belief should be displayed in the meals we eat. Jesus’ meals in the Gospel of Luke and His routine in the Lord’s Supper challenges us to live out practically the grace we define theoretically.
A second area of challenge is the mission of the church. We like to say, “Let’s get the gospel right so that we can get the gospel out.” Though our educational content is of a high quality, we must reach a point of “getting the gospel out.” How can we do that in a way achievable by everyone? What about eating a meal together? Yet, our heart provides pushback against that idea. Often, we content ourselves with writing a check to the poor, but eating with them is a different matter. This is, as Tim Chester puts it, “compassion mingled with superiority.” How we share the gospel communicates as much as who we share the gospel with. Yes, we believe “sinners and tax collectors” need to hear the gospel, but are we willing to share that message across our kitchen table? Gospel grace which affects our view of gospel mission entails meeting ordinary people around this most ordinary location. To be honest, this proves a great challenge because it requires us to look extraordinarily ordinary. The fear of man which drives us to have Martha Stewart homes and picture perfect families must melt away as we move out in mission for God.
Life-defining moments occur around dining room tables, and so do kingdom-defining moments. How will the kingdom of God grow in Raymond, Mississippi through paper plates and pulled pork sandwiches? That is the question the Raymond Youth Group seeks to answer, and we invite you to read it with us! If you’d like a copy, please let Pastor Zach know. You can also listen to the book free (with an Audible subscription) by clicking here.
