If I’m the chef du jour, these words move my focus from food prep to table fellowship. If someone else is cooking, it’s my signal to leave whatever activity I’m doing in favor of breaking bread with loved ones.
What a marvelous way to meet the needs of the body while nourishing the soul in the company of others. For the meal and the time with others I am equally grateful.
Thank you for my daily bread. Amen.
This question is often the beginning of meal and snack prep, and a way to gauge how much food needs to be made – a pragmatic piece of courtesy.
Are you hungry? If you are, what will satisfy your hunger? When I ask such questions of others and of myself, I can better meet true physical needs and become aware of when I am eating (or offering food) when no need exists. Are you hungry is offering me the grace of intentionality in my eating and drinking, and a way for me to offer the same to others.
When asked in a spiritual sense, are you hungry? is an invitation to partake of God’s nourishing presence – as necessary and satisfying as food for the body. Perhaps Jesus spent so much time eating with others because he wanted them to make this connection. Perhaps we continue to break bread in his name because we realize that making the connection is the every day miracle we are starving for.
[This morning, I’m writing at the Dunkin’ Donuts just down the street from my home. Iced Signature Latte in hand, it struck me that this isn’t a question asked of anyone standing in the impressively long line of people working their way to the register. What can I get you, hot or iced, would you like an order of hash browns with that are the questions asked and answered. Perhaps the assumption is that anyone entering must be hungry or at least thirsty. For me on this particular day, it’s not an accurate assumption.]
Table Blessing: Thank you for the world so sweet, thank you for the food we eat, thank you for the birds that sing, thank you, God, for everything. Amen.
My grandfather used to ask me and my siblings this question every day when we got back from school. He asked on the days we had no school, too. Why do you ask the same thing every day?, I asked him more than once. Why do you think?, he asked back.
What did life bring today – it’s another way of asking the same thing. This day is an ephemeral creature: elusive, mysterious, and here for such a very brief moment. It’s so easy to let it pass by without giving it a second glance. Good, bad, or a mixed bag, today’s life won’t be here tomorrow and can’t be preserved in a mason jar like jam or pickles. This might be close to why my grandfather asked the same question every day.
There are days of joy, and days of immense pain. Not everything I’ve learned has made me happy, but not a single thing has been a waste of my time or attention. When my days are spent, and I’m asked what I learned from my time on this earth, with grateful thanks to my grandfather, I’ll have quite a few things to offer up.
[Today, I learned that potatoes are growing in the compost.]
It’s not just the words: it’s the tone of voice and the light in the eyes of the one who says them. To be welcome, truly welcome, in one’s own home is something precious. Those that were born into this blessing give it hardly a thought until life teaches them that it’s not offered in every home. Those who didn’t grow up in a home with this blessing come to believe that they have no home in this world where they are known and loved for the miracle of life they are.
I’ve made many mistakes as a parent and spouse. I hope withholding these words and the true welcome behind them isn’t one of them.
Lord, you have given me a home in your creation. May I do the same for the people you have given me to love. Amen.
It’s short for God be with you. If I truly, intentionally thought God be with you every time I parted from relative, friend, and stranger with this most common saying, who knows what blessings might come of it?
[This is one of the ongoing series, Every School Day. For more information, click above.]
The notes of the bell or buzzer travel throughout the school building, spilling onto the grounds and into neighboring yards – the audible signal that the school day is ended, and that it’s time for learners and teachers alike to leave the classroom behind. Life is more than a classroom, and it cannot be contained in school-shaped buildings. It’s time to leave it behind, until the next school day.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if there were a school bell equivalent for the rest of life? A bell rings, and it’s time to leave the unfinished work at the office; a buzzer sounds, and it’s time to stop cleaning the house. For many of us, there’s no bell or buzzer to remind us that life is more than whatever work we are currently doing – that life is more than this one thing, and that it cannot be contained in any work-shaped box.
I like working, and I enjoy accomplishing my goals. I don’t want to shirk my responsibilities or burden others with my tasks. I want to work hard without being a workaholic. But sometimes the line between the two gets blurry, and I could really use a bell to sound when I cross it. I think that’s why I say the same prayer every morning. Two of its lines are: In all things, help me to rely upon thy holy will. In every hour of the day, reveal thy will to me.
If I do my best to rely on God’s will, and humbly ask that it be revealed to me throughout my day, I swear I can hear the school bell ring when it’s time to put down my work – until it is time to pick it up again on another day.
Great God, give me ears to hear your voice as I seek to order my day. My endings and beginnings are yours. Amen.
Write down your homework assignments.
In my son Colin’s third grade classroom, all the homework assignments were written on the chalkboard, right next to the door. In my son Jared’s fifth grade classroom, the week’s worth of homework was posted on a board; each day’s work could be found under its day’s heading – Monday, Tuesday, etc. School life is a lot easier when expectations are clearly stated, and learners given the time and skills to meet them. It’s a good practice, this writing down assignments.
This past week, I began my fifth year as my public library’s learning gardener. With Marcia and Katarina, my co-leaders, an eight week plan was created, materials selected, and our overall expectations for the program listed. Each day, I do my best to encourage the pre-school participants (and their parents, grandparents, siblings, and other guardians) to experience the garden, learn one new skill or idea, and try a garden-based snack. Each week, my co-leaders and I sit down to review the week and evaluate what did and did not work. Ideas for the next year are jotted down – our best attempt to learn from our successes and failures. At the end of the summer, we’ll look back over the entire program – not just for the pleasure it gives, but to grow next year’s program from its fertile soil.
If I were to write my assignments on a board – what I need to do to grow as I foster the growth of my young learners, I guess the list would look something like this…
It’s not something anyone said when I was a child, but something very often heard when I became the mother of young children. It’s a reminder that high volume isn’t necessary in enclosed spaces. But there’s an assumption in these words that isn’t stated and often isn’t true: that the one who speaks with a quiet voice will be heard and listened to. Hearing doesn’t guarantee listening – a truth many toddlers are painfully acquainted with.
Still, small voices are often drowned out by louder and larger ones. Being overlooked and ignored can come with devastating consequences – it’s often what the holy, lovely, and precious experience. The wondrous is ignored and discarded in favor of the merely loud and obvious.
Today, Lord, help me listen to the quiet voices that sing of your love. May I recognize a quiet truth when it speaks. Amen.
[This is one in the series, Every School Day. For more, click “Every School Day” above]
How do I reply to someone who asks me an insulting question, an upsetting question, a question that at best is beside the point of whatever conversation it arose from? On good days, I answer with respectful disagreement, supportive correction, and a bridge between question and context. On days when I’m irritated or tired, I set the facts straight without thought or regard beyond factual accuracy. If I’m grieved or frightened, I return personal insult for personal insult with a roll of the eyes and click of the tongue. For the person on the receiving end, it won’t matter what words I use: it’s the ugliness of their delivery that remains. Insult for insult is still insulting.
But….
On the days I remember that God embraces whomever I meet in conversation, I’m aware that questions are often beside the point. The crux of the matter is the encounter with a living, breathing beloved child of God. Language provides a bridge between soul and soul. If such a one constructs a shaky bridge from insults or ignorant words, perhaps those are the only materials available at the time. Now the choice is mine: do I answer by tearing down the poorly made span, or do I use my answering words to shore it up?
It could be a vocabulary quiz or an math test; it might be directions for an experiment or a list of things needed for a holiday party. Every so often, perhaps a picture or article just for the sheer pleasure of seeing or reading something beautifully created. Whatever it was, it wasn’t meant to be hoarded by the one or two learners who were handed a whole pile of them. Whatever the teacher handed out was meant for everyone – the fun ones as much as the worksheets that required mastering a new skill or a significant time investment. No one needed two or more: one was more than sufficient.
I wonder if there’s a profound life lesson in this ordinary practice. What if I took only one of what was necessary for me to learn and live well? What if the rest I handed on to my neighbor, offering the opportunity to learn and grow, to work and play? Can it be that almost everything I’m handed is meant to be handed down the line?
Lord, give me the strength, wisdom, and generosity to hand on what was never meant for me to keep. Amen.