A Meal with Jesus
This book has help shape my theology on meals and I would highly recommend it to those who love to eat!
Bellow is a review from a member of Academia church:
“Tim Chester’s book does what it intends to do, namely it presents the centrality of table fellowship to the mission of Jesus. He colorfully illustrates experiences from his own personal life wherein sharing a meal at table with someone has served to strengthen bonds between himself and someone on the other side of a social divide, and how meals help to familiarize himself with people from other cultures. However, I thinks book suffers from a perceived ignorance on the way in which meals functioned in the Greco-Roman era, approaching the topic from a first-century sociological perspective, then attempting to understand how the meal might function in our modern society. In my opinion, such an approach serves to bridge the gap between the meals that characterized Jesus’ Palestinian mission, and the way in which Jesus was remembered and celebrated after his resurrection and ascension by devoted followers in regions of the world outside of Palestine. I believe there is a gap, far from insurmountable, but a gap nonetheless between Jesus breaking bread with his disciples, and Jesus being remembered after his departure in the breaking of bread by his disciples. It must be said that the latter is deeply dependent on the former, yet I’m convinced insight in this area would undoubtedly assist Jesus’ modern-day followers in their approach to remembering Jesus at table as well.
That said, Chester’s fourth chapter- “Meals as Enacted Mission”- moved me to the core, inspired me to share God’s table with others, and view that table-fellowship as an opportunity to involve myself in God’s mission of restoring his broken world. He emphasizes the difference between giving food TO people in need, which can often come off as a patronizing act, and eating food WITH people, which can be empowering and create lasting relationships. He cites Christine Pohl whose book “Friendship at the Margins” was the first to illuminate me to this reality at a very practical, missional level (future book of the month perhaps?). I’ll end by quoting a couple of paragraphs from Chester’s fourth chapter:
“We think we’re enacting grace if we provide for the poor. But we’re only halfway there. We’ve missed the social dynamics. What we communicate is that we’re able and you’re unable. ‘I can do something for you, but you can do nothing for me. I’m superior to you.’ We cloak our superiority in compassion, but superiority cloaked in compassion is patronizing.
Think how different the dynamic is when we sit and eat with someone. We meet as equals. We share together. We affirm one another and enjoy one another. A woman once told me: ‘I know people do a lot to help me. But what I want is for someone to be my friend.’ People don’t wand to be projects. The poor need a welcome to replace their marginalizations, inclusion to replace their exclusion, a place where they matter to replace their powerlessness. They need community. They need the Christian community.”
