Sitting Together At the Family Table

There was a minister, who had grown up on a small farm in the south, who found himself and his wife at an inner city church in the middle of a large city in the middle of an area full of crime and edition and family disputes and poverty. His church membership consisted of people with the problems that we associate with life in the poor inner city area of a large city. But even though the experiences of the people in his congregation were so different that anything he had ever experienced and even though it was hard to adapt to this new way of understanding what life was like in an inner city, the minister grew to love his congregation and began to learn what their life was all about.
He made himself available to every member of his congregation and so his phone would often sigh in the middle of they night and he would find him at a home helping with a domestic dispute, or in the hospital for a congregational member with a drug overdose or a shooting. There was one young family in his congregation who were struggling with drug addiction. They had a young son named Roger and the minister found himself several times at Roger’s house helping in one way or another. He worried about this young boy who was growing up in this home where he may or may not have a regular meal, where he often took care of his parents when they were in a drugged stupor. The minster ended up writing his number on the wall beside the phone in their home so it would always be where Roger could ind it if he needed it. And it turned out that one night Roger did need it. It was 2:00 in the morning when the minister’s phone rang. It was Roger and he said he couldn’t wake up his parents. The minister told Roger to wait and told him that he would be over in a minute. When the minister got to Roger’s house he couldn’t wake up Roger’s parents either and immediately called the police and the EMTS.
Roger’s parents didn’t make it and the minister wondered what would happen to Roger? The minister decided to take Roger home and and somewhere on the ride home in the car, the minister decided he would adopt Roger.
Talking later about this experience, the minister admits that perhaps he should have called his wife, or talked about it to his two sons, but that night in the dark hours when he was driving home with this young boy, adoption seems to be the perfect solution.
And so Roger became part of the family, an equal heir to the two sons already in the family. They knew it would be a struggle - the minister’s family was a very regulated, regimented family and it was said of them that they had never met a rule they didn’t like! Roger, was raised by drug addicts and Roger had never met a rule. And so the transformation of Roger began.
Most of this transformation took place at the dinner table. Roger had never really sat through a meal before - especially a meal at a diner table with a family who ate dinner by a set of very specific rules. The first night they sat down, all the food was on the table in serving bowls, and Roger immediately got up from his chair and started to grab on elf the bowls of food. Roger’s new mother, calmly but sternly said, “Roger, we don’t do that here.” Remember the few times that Roger may have had a real meal on a table, he probably had to grab what he could so that he would have something to eat. So after Roger sat back in his chair, Roger’s new mother picked up a bowl and past around until it got to Roger, where Roger was amazed that there was plenty left in the bowl for him. Around come another bowl and so Roger learned that there would always be food for him. As soon as he got done eating, Roger jumped up to leave and again came the words, “Roger, we don’t do that here.” and Roger sat down as the family lingered after dinner to talk. they they all got up together. And the next years with Roger in this new family provide to be interesting, hard and transforming.
As we come to this table this morning, we all come as Rogers. We have been adopted into the family of God by the grace of god. Not because o anything we did to earn it but because of how much God loves us. Just as Roger did nothing to become a member of his new family, but was brought into the family because of their love for him. But it was after he became a member of that family, that around the family table, the transformation began.
And that is what the table will do for us, We are all part of God’s family and as we come around this table, that is when our transformation begins to take place. Being able to come around this table, realizing what it stands for, realizing that we got here because the self-less act of Jesus Christ - this meal changes us. Realizing the grace of God, who calls us all here together as one family, changes us.
It is even more significant that we gather around this table on World Communion Sunday where people all around the world are coming together as adopted brothers and sisters. Perhaps all this social distancing has helped us better learn the true power of the Holy Spirit to bring us all together. Maybe this social distancing has helped us better grasp that as we come to this table around the world, we really are one big family, adopted as brothers and sisters with God as our father who brings us into his family as one - simply because he loves us.
That is what we celebrate today around this table - a table prepared for the family of God where together we learn there is always enough and God provides exactly what we need in order to work and worship and serve together - with all the churches and all the people and all our brothers and sisters around the world.
Just as Roger was transformed at the family table, the spirit of God transforms us to be his people, the people of God, as we come here together as one, around the family table of God.

Amen!