An Image of an Intersection

An image came up for me in a spiritual direction session recently of a busy city intersection jammed full of honking cars and shouting people. As I envisioned the intersection, I could see myself faintly standing in it. But I couldn’t hear any of the noise. It was quiet, as if the noise didn’t exist. In the center of it, I held the tension of the reality around me. There was a rootedness, a calmness, a holy space, and I felt the Holy Spirit’s presence.

The Table

The communion table has this steady rootedness. The table signifies many things, including a rhythm, a routine, and the promise that this is the bread of life and the cup of salvation. Whenever we approach, we do so within and amid the chaotic bustling of the world around us and the many demands of our lives that seek to call our attention away.

More often than not, I administer the sacrament of communion, but on the occasional Sunday off, I attend worship elsewhere. On those occasions, I am able to come forward as my parishioners do to receive the Lord’s Supper. I feel enormously blessed, either administering or receiving the sacrament, but in different ways. When I administer the sacrament, I see the faces of the faithful as I say the Words of Institution. I see in their eyes that they are being planted again, rooted again, even as their sorrows and joys persist. They are still people of hope, people of God’s covenant, overflowing with God’s grace.

On those rare occasions when I’m off, when I come forward and receive the Lord’s Supper as a worshiping parishioner, there is a feeling of humility, of being grafted again into the holy mystery with an ever-needed reminder of being a beloved child of God.

The Table Out in the “Highways and Byways”

The communion table sometimes journeys out from the church sanctuary; it is taken into homes and hospital and hospice rooms. I’ve shared the Lord’s Supper with more than a few saints readying to enter the glory that waits beyond this life. These moments are filled with a fullness for which I lack words. It’s there that the sacrament testifies with reverberated significance of grace upon grace, a beacon of eternal hope that transverses the anthills of despair forever. 

I remember one of those moments when I walked into a busy hospital in a busy city borough. The palliative care doctor glanced at me and I gathered she’d been talking to “Bill” (I’m not using his actual name) for a while. The doctor’s eyes went to my clerical collar and she greeted me with warmth, saying, “I’ll let you two have your time.” Her vocation gave way to mine, an implicit recognition that there was nothing further Bill’s doctors could do.

In an unexpected and unusual turn of events, Bill’s wife, to whom he was very devoted, had passed away just about twelve hours earlier in another hospital. They never got to say goodbye to one another, something he said was his only regret, although he felt sure he would be seeing her soon.

We sat facing each other with only a hospital tray full of uneaten food between us. Bill wasn’t hungry. Our discussion bounced all over the place, from shared memories of people we both knew and memories of his life. When I asked what his greatest joy in life had been, Bill said, “Anything I did with my wife.” Knowing Bill, I knew how deeply genuine this statement was.

As our discussion continued, Bill offered hope for what his life had meant: He hoped he’d helped bring others to faith, and that he had done what he could to help anyone who needed it. I didn’t need to validate his reflections; I knew he had achieved both.

Eventually a lull in our conversation hit. As the quiet sat between us, I felt the Holy Spirit nudging me to ask Bill what he thought heaven would be like. He smiled and said, “You know, I’ve been thinking about that.” It’s hard to imagine how he couldn’t have been. Then he thought briefly for a moment or two further, and said with a smile and chuckle, “I’ll drop you a postcard and let you know.”

I then asked Bill if he wanted to receive communion. He readily said yes. 

There in that room, with the chaos of the hospital brimming about with noise just outside the door, in one of the most chaotic cities in the world, I pulled out two communion kits from my coat pocket and placed them on the hospital tray full of uneaten food. The bread and the juice, recalling the body and the blood of the Lord who dwells with us, were dwelling there amid the never-to-be-eaten hospital food. The Lord’s Supper, full of remembrance, communion, and hope, gave meaning to it all. I began reciting the liturgy, and among the words I said were these: “We come in hope, believing that this bread and this cup are a pledge and foretaste of the feast of love of which we shall fully partake when God’s kingdom has fully come, when with unveiled face we shall behold him, made like unto him in his glory,” knowing full well that one of us would be beholding the Lord soon with an unveiled face. Even the most thorough theological training in the world falls woefully short of ever describing what it will be like to behold the Lord with an unveiled face. 

While the chaotic hospital, city, and world swirled around us, that hospital room was a holy place as Bill and I feasted on the Lord’s Supper. The table summons us from the chaotic contours of our lives, nourishes us with the truth of Jesus Christ, and sends us back into our lives. The Lord’s Supper also reminds us that one day we too will gaze with unveiled face upon the one who graciously and lovingly became flesh and dwelt among us.

An Intersection and a Table

The psalmist inquires poignantly, “Can God spread a table in the wilderness?” (Ps. 78:19). We might also ask if God can spread a table in a chaotic city, amid honking horns, shouting voices, and jammed intersections. The table beckons us to take a seat, amid the chaos of our own disappointments, unexpressed expectations, and challenges. Whether we gather around the familiar solemnity of a sanctuary communion table or an unexpectedly sacred hospital food tray, the Lord keeps spreading a table.

Wherever it is set, the Lord’s table helps us remember that the promise of this feast has already been fulfilled. There’s a lot I could say about the depth and importance of sacramental theology, especially amid the chaos of our modern times, but instead I’ll only say this: the Lord’s Supper enables us to cultivate stillness, quiet, peace, and rootedness among life’s busy intersections. It equips us to proclaim the promise of the Lord’s Supper to others, “believing that this bread and this cup are a pledge and foretaste of the feast of love of which we shall partake when God’s kingdom has fully come, when with unveiled face we shall behold him, made like unto him in his glory.” Can we even begin to imagine such a fulfillment of that which we hope for in this earthly life?

I Corinthians 11:26 says, “For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.” That promise keeps us finding the quiet and peace amidst life’s many chaotic intersections. We take our seat once more at the table of grace, situated at the intersection of remembrance, communion, and hope, secured in and through the love of our savior Jesus Christ.

From the Communion Hymn, “Feed Us, Lord:”

“Lead us, Lord. Lead us, Lord, nourished here by Christ

given strength for life. Come and lead our hearts, O Lord.”