Driving through one of my favorite parks, I passed the cemetery while on my way to a quiet place to sit for a bit. A memory flashed, reminding me of the stillness I felt when my husband wasn’t working (due to his injury.) At the time it was unsettling. I felt like the world was passing me by. This was triggered by a thought: ‘the dead are eternally frozen in time. During that season I couldn’t wait to get out of that stand-still place, I felt like I was missing out on some collective progression of moving forward, with a fear of forever being left to the wayside. Tears brimmed my eyes as I thought how much I’d love to get back to that place of stillness.

While the stand-still season was challenging in many ways, I have longed for the togetherness our family had. It drew us closer, and I believe that it was part of what preserved us through that season.

As the children grow and seasons shift, I have found that life ‘structures’ seem to want to pull us all in different directions. I have often asked: is this best? Meanwhile, life has seemed to be winding up to take-off. My heart has felt conflicted, wondering, is fast-paced good? Or are we subscribing to a life of busyness while completely missing the point?

This has been a season of trying to balance interests and commitments, meanwhile working to figure out what allows room for the most growth as a whole unit. It can get complicated quickly with multiple children. Last summer I spent my time driving from one event to another, prepping for the fair while missing out on opportunities to really connect as a family.

The afternoon that I drove past that cemetery, I was feeling conflicted with the weight of commitments, both present and potential futures ones. I was asking: How does it serve my family? What stays and what goes?

The Holy Spirit responded with: ‘Come back to my table.’

When he said that, I breathed a sigh of relief. I knew that this was Holy Spirit inviting me to simplify and refocus. He’s simply asking us to come and sit with Him, first and foremost.

Come Back To My Table

A table is a place of gathering together, a place where we are sustained through what we eat – connected through conversation and rejuvenated with laughter. It can be a place of intimacy. A place where we receive directions and instructions. Or a place to sit and just be within the safe confines of the company we choose to entertain. Notably, the most important table setting to have taken place, was when Jesus gathered his disciples together and shared with them the Last Supper. Essentially this was a beginning of something powerful, wrapped up within an ending. At this table, Jesus was preparing his disciples to step into the next season. He never leaves us unprepared for what we are about to face, and He knew that his followers would need his life-source because of what they were about to face.

For me, this phrase means leading my family back into a slower season. Intentionally creating a space where we will have time to connect and explore, but more importantly, leaving room where we can grow together again.

I began to ask Holy Spirit: “What does it look like to come to your table?’

He told me: “What do you need?”

I said: “I could use your peace today, and I would like to learn how to carry your presence with me.”

In exchange for the anxieties that had been plaguing me that day, he handed me a piece of pumpkin pie. It was large, with layers of delicious whipped cream on top. His peace is both substantial and light. When I took it and put it into me, I felt the weight of the anxiousness lift off of me. When he handed me a slice of His presence, it was a many layered cake, filled with an abundance of frosting between each layer.

He said to me: My presence is filled with many layers of sweetness.

In Psalm 23:5, David says: “You become my delicious feast, even when my enemies dare to fight.”

“I alone am this living Bread that has come to you from heaven. Eat this Bread and you will live forever. The living Bread I give you is my body, which I will offer as a sacrifice so that all may live.””

John 6:51 TPT

He has been speaking to me throughout these last months, that His heart is to capture our hearts. To heal, restore, and resurrect what had been lost and broken.

Jesus has invited us to his table so that we might partake in the living bread, or the bread of life. His sacrifice for us upon that cross, was everything. When we partake of His body in communion, we are tapping into that life-source, the resurrection power: the very same living bread that He laid out on the table of communion 2,000 years ago.

He’s calling us back to His table that we might align with his heartbeat through greater connection with Him.

I think that the word that I’m looking for here is discipleship.

What does that look like, but to come to the table and gaze upon Jesus (and His word) as our teacher? As we draw near to Him, He draws near to us; guiding us step by step on how to walk, how to love, how to live. Not just to live, but living within the Kingdom realm that He purchased the access for us. This is something we MUST make room for in our lives, before the other commitments that tend to sweep us away in the doing of things.

Jesus is standing at the door of your heart saying:

“Behold, I’m standing at the door, knocking. If your heart is open to hear my voice and you open the door within, I will come in to you and feast with you, and you will feast with me.”

Revelation 3:20 TPT

Invitation:

Ask Jesus to speak to your heart, what ‘coming to the table,’ looks like for you.

If you’re up to praying a dangerous prayer, ask him to structure your days in this new season; lay your ideas and expectations on the table in exchange for His.