A Table For Two

“Thou preprarest a table before me…” Psl. 23:5

I once saw a cookbook with recipes proportioned for two people with this title. I didn’t buy it, although it would have been appropriate now; but as you can see, I did steal the title.

I love big family get-togethers that invariably include a time of gathering around a table (or tables) for a happy, noisy meal. The last time we had all our family (children and grandchildren) together for such a time was some thirteen years ago. And, sad to say, I can’t imagine there will be another one anytime soon. But I will say this: As precious as such times are to my heart, I will have to say that intimate little dinners in quaint surroundings that I have shared with my husband of fifty-three years hold a place in my heart and memory that bigger, noisier, even grander feasts, cannot rival.

In the same way, I’ve also been in church services, and other assemblies of God’s people, when the glory of the Lord was present and the fellowship sweet. Getting together with the family of God is not just something I’m “into”; it’s something that’s in me. I am a friend of sinners, like my Lord, but I am most comfortable with Family.

Still, sweetest of all are those intimate times of fellowship I share with Jesus Christ, the Lover of my soul. Those times when I can “sup with him and he with me (Rev. 3:20); when He Himself reaches out and feeds me, as Boaz reached the parched corn to Ruth from his own hands (Ruth 2:14). When He takes me to His “banqueting house,” where I am able to sit down “under his shadow with great delight,” and partake of His fruit that is indeed “sweet to my taste" (Song of Sol. 2:3-4).

Under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, the Apostle John wrote, “Blessed are they which are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb” (Rev. 19:19). What a grand and glorious celebration that will be! And as someone who can claim a place at that table, purchased and reserved for me by the Blood of the Lamb, I look forward to that time. But until then, I am well satisfied to linger over an intimate “table for two,” if the two are Jesus and me.