prayer. it’s what’s for dinner.

 

My family doesn’t pray for a meal when we sit down in restaurant or other public place.  We do pray over a meal in our home, and we usually rotate who prays; but we don’t like to in public.  It just doesn’t seem right to us.

If you’ve been around religious people during a meal at a restaurant, you’ve seen it happen.  After the server brings out the food, there’s that small window of time before they come back to refill your drinks that you can thank God for the meal you’re about to consume.

Don’t get me wrong, I understand the sentiment.  I grew up with it.  That’s what Christian families do, right? They pray before meals.  But what if that’s all it is; just a sentiment?  How much meaning is really behind a prayer for a meal in a restaurant?  To use a very cheesy line (see previous post): is it about conversation or declaration?

I mean, you’ve got the nice idea of thanking God for the food in one hand, and then you’ve got what Jesus says in Matthew 6 in another.  Things like “don’t pray like the hypocrites who do it in their temples and on street corners for all to hear,” or, “don’t babble on and on merely repeating the same words again and again,” but instead He says, “go away by yourself and shut the door behind you.”

The people in the booth next to me don’t need another reason to think that following Jesus is psycho.  

Maybe my friends that are sitting next to me at my table who aren’t following Jesus are as uncomfortable as my server, waiting there for me to finish thanking God for my food, and anything else that crosses my mind at the time.

I wonder what my server is thinking as he or she is standing there, waiting for our table to finish praying, so that they can refill my drink.  

I wonder if I should bring up the gospel before or after dessert.

things i’m tired of

I’m really tired of 3-point sermons.

Why do they have to be 3 points?  Why not 1 or 5 or 9?  Is it because we believe in the Trinity, and so, our sermons should reflect that; as if to say having a three part sermon might make it more holy?

And why do they have to be points anyway?  Why can’t a pastor just talk to me like we’re having a conversation?

I think if I hear one more snappy, peppy point like, “If you don’t believe in Hell, you’d better be right,” or something to that nature,  I’m going to hurl.

church first, God second

A couple of months ago my wife and I were watching the movie The Good Shepherd starring a slew of talented actors.  There’s this one scene where Matt Damon and Angelina Jolie are at a ball with his former “fraternity” brothers, and before they ask God’s blessing, all the men honor their group, The Bonesmen.  Angelina Jolie the says a line that has stuck with me for a while.  She says, “Bonesmen first, God second.”

It made me wonder how often our church services are like that.  How often are they more about being a production than meeting with God in community?  

Do we pray to God during a service because we acknowledge that we are His children–together for our weekly family reunion; and we are intent in seeking Him in that moment?

When did prayer become the bookends of our “services”?  Why is it just something we do to kick off church, and bring it to an end?  Does that mean prayer is that nice rug that really ties the room together?

When did we start doing church; and stop being The Church?