Taste and See
O taste and see that the Lord is good. – Psalm 34:8a (NRSV)
My friend and I meet at Panera. I read the menu out loud since she can’t make out the words printed high over the counter. We each order, and the clerk asks a question. “Huh?” I ask, elbowing my friend.
“They said, do you want chips or an apple?” my friend enunciates.
My friend is visually impaired. I am hard of hearing. We both are capable of navigating a lunch order alone and have done so many times, but it’s so much easier and more pleasant together. My gifts fill in around her gaps. My challenges are met with the easy competence of her capabilities. So, there we are in the strip mall, sharing communion.
Ok, those lunches over a cup of soup and half a salad aren’t exactly communion. Or are they? Because isn’t that what communion is for? A reminder that though we can easily do this life on our own, it’s just so much better when we do it together. A conscious moment of being in one another’s presence long enough to notice what gifts we each bring to the moment, and then the dance of giving and receiving, receiving and giving.
“On the night before Jesus was killed by those who feared him, he gathered with his friends and chosen family.” So begin the words of institution I learned long ago. Before the bread, before the cup, before the forgiveness—the gathering. Bumping elbows and knees, those first followers came together around the table. Doing the sacred dance of common life, and in so doing, filling each other’s gaps.
Prayer
Holy One, here we are, your people. Whatever gift we may bring, gather us around the table to taste and see that life in you is so very, very good. Amen.
About the AuthorJennifer Ruth Lynn Garrison is a pastor, writer, spiritual companion and unlikely yoga instructor in the Pacific Northwest. You can find her writing in several books from The Pilgrim Press.