Oct 4th: Making Time and Room at the Table, with Rev. Dr. Steven Koski.

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Making Time and Room at the Table, with Rev. Dr. Steven Koski. Series: Unhurried. A Spacious Christianity, First Presbyterian Church of Bend, Oregon. Scripture: Luke 15:1–2; Acts 2:42–47.
Ever feel like life’s rush keeps you from truly connecting with others? This week’s message explores how hurry can push people away and how sharing a meal can open space for welcome and belonging. Join us in person or online to hear how a simple table can become a place of grace, friendship, and hope.
Transcript:
Speaker 0 00:00:00 Where did you eat breakfast this morning? I mean, some of you sat down, some of you ate standing at the kitchen counter, scrolling the news. Some of you ate in the car, coffee balance between your knees, and some of you perhaps skip breakfast altogether because you’re in too big of a hurry. You know, I eat really, really, really fast. I’m the youngest of five kids. If there was any hope of getting seconds, you had, you had to be the first to clean your plate. So eating in a hurry is still a bad habit of buying. We’ve become very efficient eaters. Food has become fuel. Something you, you grab so you can get back on the road. There’s an old word that remembers what we’ve forgotten. Companion. It comes from the Latin calm with and panis bread. A companion is someone you share bread with. And here’s what I’ve noticed about Hurry. It doesn’t only change how we eat. It actually changes who we have time for. When life gets rushed, welcome, hospitality are the first things to go. We don’t decide to shut people out. We just don’t have time to let them in. Luke 15 opens with two short verses that tell us everything about Jesus.
Speaker 0 00:01:45 It says, now, all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to Jesus and the Pharisees and the scribes. You know, the, the religious leaders were grumbling and saying, this man welcome sinners and eats with them. So notice who’s drawing near the hated tax collectors who had collaborated with Rome and sinners, which actually was a catchall phrase for, for people who couldn’t keep the religious rules, people who were considered unclean, unwelcome, unacceptable. People used to being kept at a distance. They were the ones coming near to Jesus. Now, it’s easy to make the Pharisees, the villains, but they were actually faithful people who wanted to protect what was holy in their world. A shared table was, was a statement of, of acceptance. And that’s exactly why they were upset at Jesus. You know, if we’re honest,
Speaker 1 00:03:00 Uh, the Pharisee look a lot like church people, , they look a lot like me. People who care about doing things right and who can slowly start to care more about the right way than the right people. The most common complaint about Jesus wasn’t his theology. It was his dinner guest list. It was how long he stayed. Now, now they meant the grumbling. They, they, they meant it as an accusation, but it turns out to be the best description of Jesus. Anyone ever gave the Pharisees had rules, rules for keeping people at a distance. I mean, most of us actually don’t need rules because we have schedules. You know, uh, I, I’d love to, I I’d love to get together, but you know, this week’s kind of crazy or, or we say we should, we should get together sometime, but never seem to find the time.
Speaker 1 00:04:12 Hurry, hurry keeps people at, at arm’s length, just as well as any rule does. It lets us sort people without ever taking the time to sit down to hear their story. Jesus refused that shortcut. Now, he could have done his ministry more efficiently, preach a sermon, heal a few people, move on to the next town. Instead, he kept sitting down. He went to dinner at Levi’s house with a room full of tax collectors on his way through Jericho with crowds pressing in on him. He stopped under a sycamore tree. He looked up at a, at a tax collector, the most despised man in town, and said, Zacchaeus, hurry and come down. I am staying and eating at your house today. The only hurry Jesus ever asked for was a hurry towards welcome. And when a woman with reputation crashed a dinner party at Simon’s house and wept at the feet of Jesus, Jesus didn’t pull away. He had time for her. He turned towards her. He said, he said to his host, do you see this woman? You know, that question might just be at the heart of it. Do you see her? Not her label, not her reputation,
Speaker 2 00:05:57 Her? Have you taken the time to see her at a table? You are not an audience. You are a guest. You are seen, you are, you are served. The table. The table was not a break from Jesus’s ministry. The table was his ministry. And here’s the good news, I I don’t want us to rush past. Before Jesus ever asked us to make room for anyone else, he makes room for us. Now, every one of us has been Zacchaeus up in the tree or the woman nobody wanted at dinner, or the one who felt too far gone to come near. And Jesus looks up and says, I’m staying at your house today.
Speaker 2 00:07:02 He isn’t checking the clock. He has all the time in the world for you. That’s where welcome comes from. We don’t make room at the table for others to, to earn our place at the table. May we make room because someone has made room for us. Now, after Jesus died, after Jesus was gone, his followers, his followers kept the table going. Acts, acts chapter two describes the early church right after the Pentecost. And what’s remarkable is how ordinary it sounds. It says in scripture, acts chapter two, day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they, they broke bread at home and they ate their food with, with glad and generous hearts. Now, Pentecost, the coming of the Holy Spirit, Pentecost was wind and fire. But afterwards, notice, notice where the spirit settles in around kitchen tables, overbred. They spent much time together day by day, giving to all as any had need and not with some sense of grim duty or obligation. It says with glad and generous hearts, that’s what an unhurried church looks
Speaker 3 00:08:55 Like. Not a church that does less, but a church that has time for people and finds joy in it. Now, this weekend, we’re celebrating World Communion Sunday. It actually began in 1933 at Shadyside Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh. In the depths of the great depression, as Nazism spread across Europe and war drew near, I mean, people were afraid. They needed to be reminded that we are one in Christ. We we belong to God. And in belonging to God, we belong to one another. This weekend, in our own time of of deep division, the sun will rise over congregations in Korea and Kenya and Brazil, and and Scotland. some with rice cakes, some with flatbread, some with tortillas, some with a loaf of bread like ours. Different breads, different languages.
Speaker 3 00:10:08 One host, one table, one table that knows no strangers or enemies sharing a love stronger than hate, sharing a love mightier than missiles. Now we at First Presbyterian, we, we say there’s actually a sign outside our door. We say, all are welcome. Always a table is where we find, find out whether we mean it or not. So here’s the question, Jesus’ table keeps asking us, who isn’t here yet? Right here in Van Oregon, there are children who get their most reliable food at school and dread the weekend. There are older adults choosing between groceries and prescriptions. There are neighbors sleeping in cars and camps who haven’t had a table of their own in months, maybe years. And there’s another hunger too, the widower who eats standing at the sink because setting one place feels too lonely. And the sad newcomer who, who doesn’t know anyone yet the person whose hardest moment of the day isn’t finding food, but that no one is sitting across from them when they eat it. If that’s you, Jesus sees you. There is a place for you. Here’s a gentle invitation for this week.
Speaker 4 00:11:52 Make time. Make time for one unhurried meal with room for someone else. Invite the neighbor you’ve waved at for three years. Serve a meal. Learn the names of the people you’re serving. And when you give thanks for your daily bread, drop a coin in your sensibility jar and pray for someone who has no bread. Welcome almost always begins with time we didn’t think we had. There’s an old story, one of my favorite stories about a man who asked to see heaven and hell in hell. People sat at a banquet table with, with delicious stew starving because their spoons were longer than their arms and heaven, heaven looked exactly the same. Same table, same delicious stew, same long spoon. But there everyone was laughing and full.
Speaker 4 00:13:05 What’s the difference? The man asked God. And God said here, here they have learned to feed each other. Wherever you’re listening at a, at a kitchen table, on a couch in the car, you’re closer to Jesus’s table than you might think. It was never only in the temple or sanctuary. It’s in homes the way it was in ax. And he still keeps the same guest list. You don’t have to have figured anything out or have had a good week. Wherever, however you find yourself, there is a place for you at the table of Jesus. I mean, they meant it as a complaint. This man welcome sinners, E each with them. Ah, thank God that’s still true. So the next time you sit down to eat, slow down, set out one more chair in your home or or in your heart. And may the spirit meet you there as she met them in Jerusalem, in the breaking of the bread. May it be so.