This morning, we are back at the table.
Last week, we began in the garden, where Nicky’s patient work had created enough room for new life to emerge. Then we brushed the dirt from our hands, came inside, and poured another cup of coffee.
This week, I have been remembering another table.
At my first church, we started a community meal for anyone who wanted to come. There were no forms to complete, no questions about income, and no requirement that anyone attend worship. The invitation was simple: come, enjoy a meal, and spend some time with other people.
And people came.
Some came because food was scarce. Others came because companionship was scarce. Some arrived knowing several people in the room, while others entered as strangers. No one was asked to explain why they were there. No one was turned away. We simply found them a place at the table.
Over time, something happened.
People who had arrived as strangers began remembering one another’s names. They asked about children, illnesses, jobs, and absent friends. They noticed when someone had not come and welcomed them back when they returned. Friendships formed among people whose lives might never otherwise have crossed.
The meal fed people physically, but it also offered another kind of nourishment. People left with full stomachs, certainly, but many also left knowing that someone had listened to them, remembered them, and would be glad to see them again.
It was never about deciding who was in and who was out. It was about bringing people together and sharing a meal.
Perhaps that is why I hear this week’s Gospel a little differently.
Matthew tells us that Jesus has withdrawn to a deserted place after hearing about the death of John the Baptist. John had been executed following a banquet at Herod’s palace—a meal surrounded by power and privilege that ended in violence and death.
Jesus leaves that world behind and goes into the wilderness carrying his grief. But the crowd follows him.
When Jesus sees them, he has compassion. His grief does not disappear, but neither does it prevent him from seeing the needs of others. He heals those who are sick and remains with the people until evening.
The disciples, however, have become concerned. The place is deserted, the hour is late, and the crowd is hungry. Their solution is perfectly reasonable:
“Send them away.”
Jesus responds, “They need not go away; you give them something to eat.”
They need not go away.
Before the bread is blessed or broken, Jesus decides that the people belong there. He does not ask why they failed to bring enough food. He does not separate the responsible from the irresponsible or the deserving from the undeserving. He does not divide the crowd into those who belong and those who do not.
They are hungry. That is enough.
The disciples look at what they have and see scarcity: five loaves and two fish. It is not enough to feed thousands of people. It may not even be enough to feed the disciples.
But Jesus does not ask them for what they do not have. He simply says, “Bring them here to me.”
Bring what you have.
Jesus takes the bread, looks toward heaven, blesses it, breaks it, and gives it to the disciples, who give it to the crowd.
Taken. Blessed. Broken. Given.
Those words should sound familiar. They are the language of the Eucharist, the pattern remembered whenever the Church gathers around the table. Ordinary bread is received with gratitude, blessed in the presence of God, broken open, and shared for the life of others.
Many Protestant churches traditionally celebrate Communion on the first Sunday of the month. I will not be celebrating the sacrament this week, but the language of the table is woven throughout this story. There is something Eucharistic happening in the wilderness as bread passes from the hands of Jesus, through the hands of the disciples, and into the hands of the people.
We often become so fascinated by the multiplication of the loaves and fishes that we overlook the other miracle taking place before us. Thousands of people who arrived as strangers sat down together. What was available was blessed, broken, and shared. No one was asked whether they deserved to eat. No one was sent away. Everyone received enough, and somehow there was more remaining than anyone imagined possible.
Perhaps the miracle was not only that the bread increased, but that fear decreased.
Matthew does not explain precisely how the food became sufficient. Perhaps the loaves and fish multiplied in the hands of Jesus. Perhaps his generosity encouraged people who had brought food to open their bags and share with those who had none. Perhaps the mystery is large enough to hold more than one kind of multiplication.
We do not need to understand the mechanics before receiving the meaning.
What we know is that a hungry crowd became a community. Something happened when the people sat down together, when what was available was blessed, and when the disciples began passing it from hand to hand.
Fear says there will never be enough, so protect what belongs to you.
Love says, “Bring what you have.”
Fear says, “Send them away.”
Love says, “They need not go away.”
Fear sees strangers.
Love sees friends.
That was the quiet miracle unfolding at our community meal. We began with food, tables, chairs, and a few willing hands. None of it seemed especially miraculous. But meals were prepared, doors were opened, people sat together, and strangers became friends.
The food mattered. Feeding hungry people always matters. But the meal offered something more than food. It created a place where people could be seen, known, and remembered. It gathered people who might otherwise have remained separated and allowed them to discover something they shared.
That is what a table can do.
The disciples see an enormous crowd and calculate what it will cost to feed them. Jesus sees people who are hungry and asks what is available to share. The difference is not the size of the crowd or the number of loaves. The difference is the way love teaches us to see.
And perhaps that is the question this story places before us. When we look at the people around us, what do we see?
Do we see strangers whose needs threaten what we possess? Or do we see neighbors whose lives have become bound together with our own?
Do we see a problem too large to solve? Or do we see an invitation to bring forward what we have?
Do we see reasons to send people away? Or do we hear Jesus saying, “They need not go away”?
The table of Jesus is never simply about what happens to the bread. It is also about what happens to us. Bread is blessed and broken, but hearts are opened. Food is shared, but so are stories, burdens, hopes, and lives. A collection of individuals becomes a community.
We return, then, to the question that has accompanied us through these Sundays in between:
What does love require of us now?
Perhaps love requires us to loosen our grip on what we have. Perhaps it asks us to make another place at the table. Perhaps it invites us to look again at someone we have regarded as a stranger and recognize a friend we have not yet met.
On that hillside, the bread increased, fear decreased, and no one was sent away.
At our community meal, strangers sat down together and friendships formed.
The garden teaches us to see. The table teaches us to love. And sometimes the miracle begins when someone pulls out a chair and says, “There is a place for you here.”
