Missing from the Table

NOTE: I write this blog post in light of my brother-in-law (Ray) who is serving his third tour of duty in the U.S. military. Ray--we can't wait until you come home in a few weeks.

On my drive from my parents-in-law to my mom and dad's home, I listened to a show on NPR dedicated to the people who were missing from the family table this Thanksgiving weekend.

One caller told about his dad who was killed in Vietnam several decades ago. He was just two. He never knew his dad, yet he desperately wanted him at the table. Another caller wept as she described her son's drug addiction, his status in rehab, and the grim reality that his spot at the family table would remain empty for the foreseeable future.

An Alaskan called in saying this was the first time he would not be in the "lower 48" (a phrase that is now in mainstream culture thanks to Gov. Palin) for the first time ever. He was sending out a word of encouragement and thanksgiving to his family.

A middle-age man called in lamenting his parents unexpected divorce. Now the family was divided into two camps: those spending Turkey Day with mom . . . and those spending the beloved holiday with dad. His call was essentially a lament.

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The Greek word for which we get communion and Lord's Supper is the word "eucharisteo" (often used in English as simply The Eucharist). The word simply means "to give thanks" or "I give thanks."

I've always been convinced that Thanksgiving has the potential for Christians to really be the church. To welcome all sorts of people to the table (family, friends, estranged, broken, forgotten) and the midst of sweet potatoes, pumpkin pie, mashed potatoes, green-beans take the bread and the wine and give thanks for the tables and people in our lives.

And . . . to remember that Jesus himself would remind us that a day is on its way when he will reside at the table and we will no longer have to lament the broken relationships, addictions, divorces, and death in our lives for all things will be made new.