{"id":393,"date":"2018-11-23T11:15:00","date_gmt":"2018-11-23T17:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/is-jesus-invited-guest-at-your-table\/"},"modified":"2019-02-18T10:15:50","modified_gmt":"2019-02-18T16:15:50","slug":"is-jesus-invited-guest-at-your-table","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/?p=393","title":{"rendered":"Is Jesus an Invited Guest at Your Table?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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This day after Thanksgiving comes with relaxation for those that poured their hearts and souls into their grand Thanksgiving feast day \u2013 preparing for days, baking, cooking, cleaning up \u2013 with the best part that makes it all worth it, being so thankful to serve and embrace family time together. We had a special invited guest that joined our Frisco crew, a beautiful single mom that admitted she would be alone on Thanksgiving. Well, we weren\u2019t about to let that happen, so this precious woman joined us. We held to our annual tradition as each one at the table shared what they were thankful for and I could almost see Jesus sitting with us at the table. Scripture says in Psalm 22:3 \u201cGod inhabits the praises of His people!\u201d When we are thanking and praising our Lord, He takes a seat at the table with us. <\/p>\n

The big day is past now, but I\u2019m still basking in the joys of yesterday. Though Christmas is already in full swing with the hustle and bustle that Black Friday holds for so many, Black Friday will be glorious Friday for me as my Austin family will arrive (after having been with Shawntel\u2019s family in Muldrow, OK) and we\u2019ll have our \u201cGood\u201d Friday Thanksgiving together today. We\u2019ll have more opportunities to give thanks and praises and welcome our Lord Jesus to the table with us. <\/p>\n

Yesterday, my scripture reading was about Jesus weeping over Jerusalem because the people were missing Him so much. (Luke 19:41-42). He, their greatest gift, had been with them every day, talking with them, feeding them, teaching them, loving them. And they missed Him. They missed Him because He didn\u2019t seem like anything or anyone special. He looked and talked like them. They didn\u2019t fully understand (or agree with) what He said. Many knew Him from childhood. They knew who His parents were, where He grew up, and what He did for a living. Nothing special. Nothing impressive. Our Lord was among them and they didn\u2019t notice Him.<\/p>\n

And here\u2019s a very important matter to consider: because every human person is created in the image and likeness of God, our Lord visits us in every human person we encounter. Every. Single. Person. Did you miss Him at your dinner table yesterday? You know, the one who served and waited on you after working for days on a meal that is consumed in a matter of minutes? Or did you miss Him in the one who sat at the table and might have been concerned and worried and couldn\u2019t really get into the Thanksgiving conversation? Did you, by chance, get past \u201cpassing the sweet potatoes\u201d to take a moment to put your arm around them because you saw Jesus in them. Oh, pray tell, you noticed Him. \u201cFor I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in.\u201d Matthew 25:35<\/p>\n

The closer we get to Jesus, the more we\u2019ll recognize Him in both strangers and those who eat at the table with us. The more of Jesus in us actually makes us more aware of His presence in other people. If we truly deeply care about others, as Jesus cared about others, we\u2019ll pattern our lives after Him and He will help us see Him in others and respond to their existence with profound thankfulness (even those who are hardest to love).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This day after Thanksgiving comes with relaxation for those that poured their hearts and souls into their grand Thanksgiving feast day \u2013 preparing for days, baking, cooking, cleaning up \u2013 with the best part that makes it all worth it, being so thankful to serve and embrace family time together. We had a special invited…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[829,830,831,832,833,749,834,595,835,775],"class_list":["post-393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-black-friday","tag-created-in-his-image","tag-day-after-thanksgiving","tag-i-was-hungry-and-you-gave-me-something-to-eat","tag-invited-guest","tag-jesus","tag-luke-1941-42","tag-matthew-2535","tag-table","tag-thanksgiving"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=393"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/393\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8807,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/393\/revisions\/8807"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}