The Table is Wide

Wilderness Journals #3

A series by Sarah Yardley

The Table is Wide

Building a life of hospitality and welcome.

s arahyardley.com

To God be the glory.

I am a Californian based in Cornwall who loves Jesus, family and friends, feasting and travel, long walks and deep conversations. I have lived in the UK since 2014 as a full- time missionary with Creation Fest UK to celebrate and share the good news of the God who loves us. I wrote a short book called More> Change, write for Lectio 365 with 247 Prayer, and pray as a Canon of Truro Cathedral. I love discovering what it means to follow Jesus and inviting others to know and follow Him. Gifts enable me to continue to live with generosity in my community, writing, and calling to share the love of Jesus.

Sarah Yardley

The Table is Wide

“For the despondent, every day brings trouble; for the happy heart, life is a continual feast.”

Proverbs 15:15

The Table is Wide

Most of my best conversations come in the company of a good meal. We wrestle with our big questions over a big bowl of pasta, wonder about meaning over a Cadbury’s chocolate, sift through our sorrows with olives and hummus. A shared meal immediately says two things:

First, I’m not in a hurry for this conversation. Let’s start it out over an appetiser, stretch it through a main course, finish it over tea. A meal immediately relaxes a conversation. Second, it says: the table is wide. In my house, there is always another chair, another place set, a couch buffet where half the group sits criss - cross. A table tells us that there are edges to the story, perspectives we have not yet heard, layers that might help shape the ending. A meal shared widens our hearts.

So what does it look like to build a life of hospitality? Very different for each of us, but here are a few of the key commitments I have made in my journey to a wider table:

Prepare a Space

For some, this will be a literal space; a room, a table, a house, but for some of us, this might be a mental preparation. Your house might not suit for hosting, but you can host a conversation on a walk, or an invitation to a shared cup of coffee. Prepare your space with beauty and attention to detail. What will distract you from entering the conversation? How can you make everyone present feel at ease? What age or mobility details are unique to this group? Have you restocked your toilets (if you are hosting)?

The Table is Wide

Prepare a Meal

The preparation of a meal is so much more than just chopping vegetables, although every chop can be a sacred act. Preparation involves asking about dietary requirements and preferences, meal and meeting times, and considering whether or not a dish is attainable to prepare in the time you have allocated. I host often, so I do a mix of slow cooked dishes and fresh dishes, and usually have a gluten - free, dairyfree, or other dietary represented at the table. I’m always thinking about how my hospitality can make everyone present feel welcome and loved.

Prepare a Conversation

Some meals have direct intent; you might be meeting with a friend to discuss their marriage, their faith, their adoption, their sadness. Some meals are more social; simply a chance to catch up and share stories. In either gathering, I’m thoughtful about the questions I want to ask, and I am genuinely curious about the guests at my table. It’s helpful to create a space where everyone represented carries a voice.

Prepare for the Unexpected

Hosting is an act of grace, but it creates a collision of time, expectations, conversations, and people. So prepare for the unexpected.

Your meal might burn. Your guests might run late. Your ceiling might collapse. Your conversations might feel flat. I’ve experienced all of these and much, much more. Also, your time might feel magical, not because you’ve been the perfect host, but because the spark of people, space, time, and preparations creates a beautiful alchemy and your time has been gold. Prepare for the unexpected, and laugh when things don’t go according to plan.

A Parable of a Wedding Feast

When Jesus noticed that all who had come to the dinner were trying to sit in the seats of honor near the head of the table, he gave them this advice: “When you are invited to a wedding feast, don’t sit in the seat of honor . What if someone who is more distinguished than you has also been invited? The host will come and say, ‘Give this person your seat.’ Then you will be embarrassed, and you will have to take whatever seat is left at the foot of the table!

“Instead, take the lowest place at the foot of the table. Then when your host sees you, he will come and say, ‘Friend, we have a better place for you!’ Then you will be honored in front of all the other guests. For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

Then he turned to his host. “When you put on a luncheon or a banquet,” he said, “don’t invite your friends, brothers, relatives, and rich neighbors. For they will invite you back, and that will be your only reward. Instead, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. Then at the resurrection of the righteous, God will reward you for inviting those who could not repay you.”

Hearing this, a man sitting at the table with Jesus exclaimed, “What a blessing it will be to attend a banquet in the Kingdom of God!”

Jesus replied with this story: “A man prepared a great feast and sent out many invitations. When the banquet was ready, he sent his servant to tell the guests, ‘Come, the banquet is ready.’ But they all began making excuses. One said, ‘I have just bought a field and must inspect it. Please excuse me.’ Another said, ‘I have just bought five pairs of oxen, and I want to try them out. Please excuse me.’ Another said, ‘I just got married, so I can’t come.’

“The servant returned and told his master what they had said. His master was furious and said, ‘Go quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and invite the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame.’ After the servant had done this, he reported, ‘There is still room for more.’ So his master said, ‘Go out into the country lanes and behind the hedges and urge anyone you find to come, so that the house will be full. For none of those I first invited will get even the smallest taste of my banquet.’”

This story holds so many edges. The lost, the forgotten, the excuses, the preparation, the honour, the purpose of feasting. I was supposed to go on a date recently, all excited and ready. It was my first date in almost 4 years, and I was trying to be cautious but he was a good friend of a good friend. I’d planned my outfit, prepared my day, done all the silly little things you do to prepare. And then in the morning: a text that he needed to have a doctor’s appointment instead. I understand. Health matters. But there is something about an invitation that you’ve prepared for that is cancelled at the last minute that feels a bit like a blow. This story gives us a glimpse of a feast, prepared, and teaches us about feasting in the name of Jesus.

Thoughts on Feasting

Feasting Exposes our Fears

Feasting exposes many of our fears and insecurities

What if someone I invite says no?

What if I find myself in a space that is uncomfortable?

What if a conversation goes in a direction I can’t control?

What if my space isn’t nice enough?

What if I don’t have time to clean the house?

What if I can’t cook?

What if I accidentally serve peanuts and they have an allergy and the paramedics can’t get there in time because it’s Cornwall?

Jesus reminds me that I am often grasping - for the best space, the most comfortable area, the highest honour. And that kind of exaltation will always lead to humbling, but when we are humbled, God allows us to be exalted.

I’m always so grateful for those who seem so effortlessly outward - focused that in the rooms or spaces they enter, they are operating in humility. And in the presence of the God who is kindness, the hierarchy of our invitation becomes into His love, not our own securities.

Feasting is for Invitation

One of the beauties of the local church, a community gathered, is that it is one of the few remaining places in our society where all are genuinely welcomed, across cultural, class, and generational spectrums. I often say of my church communities over the years that there are many I would never know without the invitation of faith.

Jesus pushes this beyond simply a church gathering to our very lives - to say that we are daily meant to be inviting into our lives the ones with whom we might not naturally be friends. This is deeply challenging because as much as I am passionate about giving good invitations, feasting in presence, rejoicing in hope, I tend to invite the ones whose presence will be sweet to me (my friends, brothers, relatives, rich neighbours). And Jesus reminds me: the table is wide for the forgotten, the isolated, the lonely.

Feasting is a Choice

Feasting holds these two edges:

• Being fully present to God, feasting literally and figuratively in His presence.

• Being fully present to others, holding the kind of wide - open welcoming invitation that is an image of the abundant life of the follower of Jesus.

And within this story, we see a whole host of excuses. I wonder today:

What excuses are limiting me from receiving God’s presence?

What excuses are keeping me from sharing his love?

Nothing is wasted in the kingdom of God.

GO DEEPER

Books to Read

Encounters with Jesus by Timothy Keller

Just Open the Door by Jen Schmidt

The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker

The Gospel Comes with a House Key by Rosaria Butterfield

Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara

Questions for Reflection

•What in your life did you think was wasted that might actually be part of the feast?

•What would it look like for you to invite someone who now feels like stranger and welcome them home?

•What parts of your story push you to the insider, to the outsider to invite them to feasting?

What part of your life might need to be rearranged to feast in God’s presence yourselves or to invite others to the feast?

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