A Sabbath Dinner with my Small Group

I have found, in my life thus far, that the best moments often happen around a table with those you love.

The dinner table is a place where friends, family, or even strangers can gather and have good conversation. I am sitting at a table now thinking about all of the words that have been shared between people, words of love, sorrow, joy, and more. What a gift it is to be able to share your thoughts and feelings with people!

My Small Group

Every Wednesday, my small group meets and we get to open the Word and have meaningful conversation with one another. This semester we have been studying John Mark Comer’s Practicing the Way.

This study, “is designed to help get you started on a journey of spiritual formation, help you get unstuck if you’ve stalled out, or just guide you into taking your next step. Ultimately its goal is to train you to live as an apprentice of Jesus: to be with Jesus, become like Him, and do as He did.” (Practicing the Way)

Within this course, there are different practices you can study such as sabbath, prayer, fasting, solitude, and generosity. My small group recently finished studying the practice of Sabbath.

Sabbath is a day that is set aside for us to stop, rest, delight, and worship. In Genesis 2 when God sabbathed He built a natural rhythm into the order of creation. If God, our Creator, spent a whole day resting then why shouldn’t we? And in this rest we may take the time to delight and worship, re-centering our hearts and minds back to God in preparation for the week ahead.

One of the habits mentioned to help us grow in this practice and enjoy God together, was to have a Sabbath dinner. So, at the end of the study our small group gathered and participated in a Sabbath dinner. 

Sabbath Dinner

It was the sweetest evening! Our small group leader (shout out to Rachel) hosted and created a space that was so intentionally welcoming. We all felt so loved!

The weather that night was nice, so we were able to have the dinner outside. Rachel set up a long table in her backyard, decorating it with an assortment of taper candles.

She made baked ziti (soooo good) and some friends brought salad, bread, and dessert to have with it. We all dished up, and took our seats outside.

To start off our Sabbath dinner Rachel read a liturgy for feasting with friends from the book Every Moment Holy. It was a beautiful liturgy and centered our minds towards the reason for our gathering, to celebrate life and the sabbath together.

If you do not have this book go and order it right now! It has prayers for the big and small moments of life, from the suffering of a loss to washing windows. I highly recommend.

At some point in the meal, we all went around and shared what we were grateful for and life updates. It was so special to hear from everyone and how God is blessing us and working in each of our lives, in some similar ways but also very unique ways. A reminder of how personal He is and how He knows and will meet our every need, even if it is not what we wanted or expected! 

I loved and enjoyed this night so much. For us to be able to gather in each others presence to center our lives around His overwhelmingly near presence was so special. My small group and the people who make it what it is has been an answered prayed in my own life. I love them so much and I am grateful for how they love me so well. To witness and experience an outpouring of His love in these friends of mine is such a beautiful reflection of the heart of Jesus. There are simply not enough words!

If you made it to the end here, then I would encourage you to host a sabbath dinner with your small group, church friends, or family. This was such a meaningful experience and I would love to continue implementing it into my sabbath day.

Thank you for taking the time to read this post. I hope you enjoyed. Let me know if you feel led to host a Sabbath dinner! If so, let me know here and I would love to help you plan it by sharing some ways you can create an intentional space for your guests.

To my followers, check your email inboxes! This weeks email includes the liturgy mentioned in this blog so you can share it with your guests if you decide to host a Sabbath dinner. If you would like to follow you can here and I will share the liturgy with you.

If you missed out on the last post, you can check it out here. Again, thank you for reading and for your support! Hope to see you in the next post!

Cheers,

Lilly!