A Cook's Confessions
by Simon Holt
Zadok Perspectives Issue No. 62
Spring/Summer 1998/1999

The gospel and food

Lastly, Jesus' actions at the dinner table remind us that hospitality is mission and mission is hospitality. As we have seen, sitting at the table with the despised, the disenfranchised, the closed-out, was a clear indication that the kingdom of God is a place of welcome, refuge and healing. Jesus could well have limited his proclamation of the gospel to preaching in the synagogues and public squares. Instead, these moments were the exception for Jesus. Most commonly, he was to be found sharing the good news in neighbourhoods and homes, and most often at the dinner table.

Mission is essentially about relationships-inviting people into relationship with us and with God. Relationship is nowhere more tangibly demonstrated than at the table. As with the communion table in our churches, the dinner table is the relational centre in our homes. When we invite outsiders to share our food and our table with us, we are inviting them into the intimacy of our household community. We are saying that, for the duration of this meal at least, you are one of us. It seems a tragedy to me that the rituals of the communion table today are often more an indication of who is 'in' and who is 'out' than an open celebration of the all-encompassing embrace of God.

Similarly, it is a tragedy that with the increasing privatisation of the family home, the dining room is more a refuge of exclusivity and retreat than an open place of welcome. Recent research shows that the gift of meal-time hospitality is given with greater reluctance and less frequency today than 50 years ago. An increasing number of young Australians testify to having never had the company of an outside guest (other than a relatives) at the family dinner table.

Hospitality is listed as an essential gift in the life of the Christian community. The act of eating together was vital to the ministry of Jesus and to the beginnings of the early church. It remains so today, for each time we open our tables to the stranger, the outsider, we are demonstrating and anticipating the inclusivity of the kingdom of God. What could be more tangibly mission than this. "For I was hungry," Jesus said, "and you gave me something to eat; was thirsty and you gave me something to drink; I was a stranger and you invited me in." For all our complex and time-consuming programs and strategies for mission and evangelism, perhaps the simplest and most time-honored method of all is as close and as simple as setting an extra place or two at our dining room table.

I have confessed my interest in food, but the fact is we all eat, whether it fascinates us or not. It seems to me that the meal table presents us with an opportunity to nurture a spirituality that is much more a part of the dailyness of life. For each time you sit down to a simple meal, you are in a small but significant way anticipating that great feast of heaven that is yet to come.

Isaiah foretold it when he said, "On this mountain the Lord Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet of aged wine, the best of meats and the finest of wines. On this mountain he will destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that covers all nations; he will swallow up death forever and wipe away the tears from all faces."

To: Perspectives Issue 62

Simon Holt Simon Holt is a regular contributor to Zadok Perspectives.