Sit, Stay Awhile

My grandfather was a notoriously slow eater. I mean slow. Meals were not merely a physical necessity to him, a functional means of putting food into his body for sustenance, but rather more about everything else surrounding the occasion. Conversations. Stories. People. Relationships. Community. 

For the better part of a decade, my grandparents were fixtures at the local Amish restaurant every morning for breakfast. Typically the only day they didn't go was on Sundays and that was only because they didn't have a say in the matter. The place was closed. The creed of the US Postal Service really was the creed of my grandparents: "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds."  They were relationship couriers hell-bent on making their appointed rounds, just perhaps minus the swift part.

My grandfather would sit at that table like a king conducting the affairs of his court and all the courtiers that came with it. He was never in a hurry. He rarely had anywhere else to be and the coffee and conversation were always in steady supply. He and my grandmother would talk for hours upon hours upon hours. They came for breakfast but they might as well have stayed for lunch, maybe even dinner, too. And they didn't know a stranger. If a couple or a family were sitting a table or two away, minding their own business, inevitably, my grandfather would somehow draw them into a conversation. Strangers became friends who were welcomed into the affairs of the royal court. 

My grandfather was well-versed in the art of lingering. 

He knew what it meant to sit and stay awhile.

I, on the other hand, eat most of my meals standing at the kitchen counter.

Granted, I live alone and there's no one else around to share a meal with so I usually just stand or stay in motion, cleaning up the kitchen or doing more food prep in between bites. Always in motion, always moving.

I am not well-versed in the art of lingering like my grandfather was. 

And neither were the ancient Israelites.

As we move toward Passover in a few weeks, there is a part of the Old Testament exodus story we can easily gloss over and miss the depth of its meaning if we are not careful. We must linger here, just as I need to learn to linger over meals.

When we pick up the story of the Israelites in Exodus 12, they are still in slavery in Egypt, but their deliverance is drawing near. Nine of the ten plagues have been unleashed. The final plague - the death of every firstborn in Egypt, from man to livestock - is about to bring low the heart of Pharaoh himself. In preparation, the Lord issues a command to the people: prepare the Passover feast. Slaughter the lamb, put the blood on the doorframes, make the bread without yeast. 

And then the Lord gives this seemingly insignificant but very important command:

"This is how you are to eat it: with your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand. Eat it in haste..." (Exodus 12:11).

When you are about to run for your very life, you have no time to linger over your meal. You make-ready to make haste because time will be your enemy if you don't. Now is not the time to linger, to pull up a chair, make new friends and chew the fat, figuratively speaking. Now is the time you eat in haste. 

When the final plague of death was delivered, Pharaoh would give the order to release all of the Israelites from slavery. And once that command came, there wouldn't be a moment to waste. So God made it clear to his people the stance with which they were to eat the Passover meal, to be like runners crouched at the starting blocks waiting for the gun to go off and the race to begin.  

You eat in haste when you are outrunning your captor.

You eat in haste when you are scrambling to set foot in the Promised Land.

You eat in haste when you are living on the brink of death.

For those who live apart from Christ, this is how you spiritually eat. Constantly on the run, nerves on edge, one eye on your plate, one eye on the door, shoveling spoonfuls in your mouth, eating in haste. And it's not just how you eat now, it's how you will eat for all eternity should you continue to choose to stand as an enemy of the cross of Christ. There will be no lingering over meals in hell because you will be perpetually starved of all things good and right and true. Hell does not come equipped with a kitchen table. 

For those who belong to Christ, however, the day will come when we sit down to eat another feast and God will not give us the same command he gave his people in Exodus 12.  The command he gave then is not how he intends his people to eat all their meals for all their days. It was for a specific purpose at a specific time under specific circumstances.

No, at the end of time, at the wedding feast of the Lamb, God will invite his people to linger. He will invite us to pull up a chair and stay awhile, to get comfortable, to take off our shoes and set aside our staff. He will invite us to become well-acquainted with the art of lingering. 

And he will invite us to eat slowly. 

You are no longer outrunning your captor. 

He has been vanquished.

You are no longer scrambling to set foot in the Promised Land. 

You are already in it. 

You are no longer living on the brink of death.

You have life everlasting.    

So, sit, stay awhile. 

You no longer have to eat in haste at the Lord's table.

"Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb!” (Revelation 19:9).