Preparing for Eucharist

John Mark Hicks, Come to the Table: Revisioning the Lord’s Supper , explores themes of the Eucharist in such a fresh manner.

The Table testifies to — tells the story of — the communal ethic of the followers of Jesus. We eat together and we share our food with one another.

Hicks stretches us here: he calls for the Table to share food with the poor in the community. 

He pushes further: “invite the poor, the disenfranchised and the outsider to share food … as a witness to the grace of God.”

Hicks doesn’t quite say he believes in open communion, but one thing is clear to me: the Table involves not just the small piece of bread and a dip of wine but a meal, and once the Table involves a meal the community testifies to God’s grace by sharing food with others.