I love spoons. Not only do they help mix your chocolate milk, but they are essential in one of my favorite games, which just happens to share their name. Spoons, if you are not familiar with the game, don’t worry, you will learn about it this morning. I decided it would be better to make a short video so you can watch while I explain. So here is your list of things you need to play spoons. 1. Some people. 2. Playing cards. 3. Spoons, preferably ones that you don’t mind if they get bent, and you’ll need one less spoon than you have people. You could play seated on the floor, but those of us who have had knee surgery prefer to play seated around a table. (Start Video)
Everyone is dealt four cards and the spoons are arranged in the middle of the table. The dealer begins looking at the remaining cards and passing along cards that don’t help him. Cards are passed around the table. The goal is to match four of a kind. When you do, you grab a spoon. Once the first spoon is grabbed, the remaining players also need to grab a spoon. Since there is one less spoon than players, the one without a spoon in the end receives a letter. And when you spell SPOONS, you are out of the game. It continues this way until you are down to two players and one spoon, and finally a winner.
The more you play spoons, the more you begin to realize what type of spoons player you are. I can break the game up into three different styles, polite (respetuoso), mild (mediano), and full-contact (contacto full). Polite is a rather lady-like way to play. There isn’t much yelling, everything is orderly and spoons are voluntarily handed over “because they touched it first.” Mild is the world I live in when playing with rookies, or with people I don’t know well. It is the way the majority of people play the game. There is plenty of raucous, it is loud and occasionally someone ends up on the floor after a spoon. Full-contact is where I want to take you this morning. Full-contact is not for everyone. It requires a relationship with the people you are playing with. You never, never, play full-contact with a stranger. Full-contact is kind of self explanatory. Spoons are regularly fought over for 30-60 seconds while others watch. Blood is occasionally released from the fingernail area. Diving across the table for the last spoon is a requirement. Full-contact means whatever it takes to end up with a spoon.
And this is how I was taught to play. I’m only two years into my spoons career, but I’m learning from the best, my wife’s relatives. Let me give you a disclaimer before I continue. They play the game to win, but always in good fun, and always with love. That being said let me give you the highlights of the last two years. Knuckles have been clawed by fingernails, hands have been bitten in order to release a spoon, elbows have been delivered, chairs overturned, molding has been broken off the wall, the table has collapsed as I lay on top of it, and one young lady somehow ended up being drug into the family room and flew over the couch before releasing her end of the spoon. Good times!
Last week Pastor Mark shared with us about a verse from the book of Revelations. And he helped us to look at it in a different way. Revelations 3:20....Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.
Apocalipsis 3:20...Mira que estoy a la puerta y llamo. Si alguno oye mi voz y abre la puerta, entraré, y cenaré con él, y él conmigo.
This verse has been used for many years as an invitation to the non-believer to accept Christ into their heart. And while it is true that Christ desires to enter into the heart of the non-believer, the context of those words were to the church. Christ is speaking his followers, to those who already know him. He is saying, I’m at your door, and I’m knocking. I want to come in and sit down with you. I want to pick up on this theme that Pastor Mark started for us last week and answer a couple questions. What does that mean that Christ wants to come in and eat with us? Why would he do that?
We are going to rewind today in the bible from the book of Revelations to the gospel of Luke. Luke is one of four writers who wrote about the life of Jesus. Matthew, Mark, and Luke (the first three we find in the bible) are called the synoptic gospels. Synoptic is just a less known word to say that these three books are similar; they tell mostly the same story. But here is something interesting you might or might not know this morning. Even though they are similar, each author puts his own emphasis into their respective book. Today, we are going to look a special emphasis that we find in the book of Luke. This is something that Luke thought was especially important and so he specifically focuses on a theme or idea called Table Fellowship. This was the act of Jesus sharing a meal with people.
Some scholars have even said that in the book of Luke, Jesus is either on his way to a meal, at a meal, or on his way back from a meal. That is my kind of ministry!
To help us understand why Christ wants to come in and eat with us, I want to focus on three reasons why he shared meals with people in the book of Luke.
1. Sharing a meal as a means of teaching.
1. Compartir una comida como manera de enseñar.
In the 7th chapter of Luke we find one of several occasions when Jesus was invited to the house of a Pharisee. (The Pharisees were the religious leaders of that time, and often times not very fond of Jesus). So Jesus went to his home and they reclined at the table. Now a woman who had lived a sinful live learned that Jesus was eating at the Pharisee’s house. She took with her a jar of perfume and began to weep at his feet. She began to wet his feet with her tears and wiped them dry with her hair. Then she kissed them and poured perfume on them.
The Pharisee saw this and said to himself, “If this man were truly a prophet, he would know what kind of woman this is that is touching him, he would know that she is a sinner.”
Knowing the Pharisees attitude, Jesus took the opportunity to teach. He began to tell a story. Two men owed money to a moneylender. One of them owed 500 dollars while the other owed only 50 dollars. Neither of the men had the money to repay him, and so he canceled the debts. Now which one of them will love him more?
The Pharisee, named Simon replied, I suppose the one who had the bigger debt canceled. And Jesus said you’re right. Then he turned to the woman and said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I came into your house and you did not give me any water for my feet, but she wet my feet with her tears and dried them with her hair. You Simon didn’t even greet me with a kiss, yet she has not stopped kissing my feet. You did not put oil on my head, but she has poured perfume on my feet. Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven, for she loved much. But he who has been forgiven of little, loves little.”
As I read that story I could picture it in my head. I could see the woman at Jesus’ feet. The look on Jesus face was not of anger or frustration with Simon. I see a look of compassion. Simon did not understand the situation. And so Jesus says Simon, you are looking at it all wrong. No, don’t focus on her sinfulness; focus on her surrender to God, not the past, but the present.
The first reason Jesus desires to come into our hearts, to come into our lives and share a meal with us is so that he might have an opportunity to teach us. So that when our perspective is all messed up, when our understanding is wrong, He looks at us compassionately and explains the way it really is. He teaches us. Christ desires to sit down with us so he may teach us.
2. Sharing a meal as an opportunity to serve.
2. Compartir una comida para servir a la comunidad.
In the 9th chapter of Luke we find the famous story of Jesus feeding the five thousand. The story begins as a retreat of Jesus and the disciples to a small town to be alone. But the people learned where they were and went to them. Jesus healed many and spoke to them about the kingdom of God.
Late in the afternoon the twelve came to Jesus and said, “Send the crowd away so they can go to the surrounding villages and countryside and find food and lodging, because we are in a remote place here.”
Jesus replied, “You give them something to eat.” Let’s pause here for a moment. Put yourself in the place of a disciple. How would you react? I would be freaking out. You want us to feed them? What????!!!! Jesus there are five thousand men here, not including women and children, and I only have $34 dollars in my pocket. How do you expect us to feed all these people?
The disciples answered him and said, “We have only five loaves of bread and two fish.” Jesus had them sit down into groups of fifty and so the story goes, not only did everyone get something to eat, but they ate until they were satisfied. They ate as much as they wanted, and there were still leftovers.
It was a difficult thing to wrap my mind around this week. This is the statement I had trouble with. Jesus wants to share a meal with me as a means of serving me. (Repeat). I really struggled to accept that the God of the universe wants to serve me, to be my servant. But it is what scripture tell us is true. The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve.
Now before you burn me at the stake for being a heretic, we need to balance this out some. This statement needs to be understood in the context of scripture as a whole. Yes, God desires to serve us, and Christ came not to be served but to serve. But God also wants us to act like God acts. So if Christ wants to be our servants, then we too must become servants of all.
Christ wants to come in and share a meal with us as a way of serving us, and teaching us.
3. Sharing a meal as an opportunity for fellowship.
3. Compartir una comida como oportunidad para compañerismo.
In Jewish culture, any gathering of friends around the table was seen as an event that created a special tie among the diners. Throughout the gospels, Jesus used this truth to connect with those that were classified as “undesirable” by society. You see, you didn’t just go and eat with anyone; there were standards to be followed. But Jesus ignored them.
In fact in the 5th chapter of Luke when the tax collector Levi decides to follow Christ, he throws a party for Jesus. All of his tax collector friends come and the Pharisees start complaining. Why does this Jesus eat with tax collectors and sinners? You see they didn’t understand why Jesus ignored all the rules about who to eat with. And Jesus famously responds, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.”
In the final chapter of Luke, Jesus appears after his resurrection to two of his followers on the road to Emmaus. They are saddened by his death and confused and he inquires as to what they were talking about. They didn’t recognize him and shared the story about his death, and empty tomb, yet they were unsure what it all meant.
Continuing to walk with them he opened the word to them and explained from Moses all the way through the prophets everything that had been said about the messiah. It was not until they sat together at a table and he broke bread and gave it to them that they recognized him. And to this very day Christ desires to sit at the table with us, to be recognized by us. This is the very purpose of the Lords Supper, communion which he gave us as a reminder of him until his return. When we take the bread and the juice, we join in table fellowship with Christ, just as his disciples did thousands of years ago.
Fellowship means one thing to me, deepened relationships. With each meal, Jesus deepened his relationship with his followers. With each meal shared, the disciples felt more connected to Jesus. Jesus desires to share a meal with us because he wants us to get to know him. It is a simple rule that applies to all of our relationships. The people we spend the most time with are the ones we know the best.
And that is the reason I told you about Spoons. Yes it gave us a laugh, but it has been influential, the time around a table has been instrumental in my relationships with Jens family. Without that time, without those experiences together I would not feel the connection that I do.
And so let’s wrap it all into a neat little package that we can take home today. If you haven’t accepted Christ as your Lord and Savior, he is waiting for you to do just that. To open your heart to him and welcome him in.
But for those of us who already belief, those who have accepted, he is knocking on your hearts door. He wants to come in and sit down to share a meal with you. And the gospel shows us three reasons why. To teach us, to serve so that we might serve others also, and to deepen our relationship with him.
We are going to close this morning giving God thanks for his goodness to us. I hope we do not lose our awe that the God of the universe knows us by name, and cares enough about us to want to spend that personal time with us. So let’s close by telling God how Good he is. Amen.
