Discovering Who Jesus Is: Seven Days on the Seven I Am StatementsSample

Let The Party Continue

The table in our house is built on a cross. Literally. We commissioned it from a fabulous furniture maker by the name of Levi, who runs a company called Birch and Bennett Co. We wanted reclaimed wood on the top, but we also wanted the structure underneath to be metal and have a modern feel. He sourced the wood from a hundred-year-old church building; the surface buffed smooth by ten decades of footsteps. And he built a cross into the design—an enormous, seven-foot, stainless steel cross forms the base for the table.

This table is now the heart of our home, and the cross is the heart of the table. Games are played, prayers are prayed. Hands are held. Tears are shed. Life is lived. And, of course, food is eaten.

At its core, food is intrinsically social. It’s connected to relationships like air is to breathing. There’s something about coming together and eating with someone that is both intimate and endearing. It can also be humbling because it’s tough to eat buffalo wings and not appear clumsy.

It is with this rich, sensual, symbolic imagery in mind that we are ready to begin our approach to the concept of Jesus’ first “I Am” declaration recorded in the Gospel of John. “I am the bread of life” (John 6:35 NKJV).

Bread abounds in the life of Jesus. From the bread Satan tried to get him to make out of rocks (Matt. 4:3) to the bread of the Last Supper, this wonderful food features prominently in Jesus’ three years of public ministry.

We know that one of Jesus’ favorite things to do was break bread with people—any people. Sinners, saints, prostitutes, publicans. He was nicknamed the friend of sinners (Matt. 11:9) and was willing to eat with anyone who wanted to hang. Jesus, the party animal. Probably not the image Sunday school drove home for you. But the popular image of the Son of Man’s ministry is summarized by the three words eating and drinking.

Matthew 9:11 explains, “When the Pharisees saw it, they said to His disciples, ‘Why does your Teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?’” (NKJV). With contempt, Jesus’ enemies spit through their teeth while talking about the riffraff with who Jesus sat around the table. They simply couldn’t fathom why he would allow himself to be united with people who would defile him with their super sinful cooties. Jesus wasn’t surprised or worried about being defiled by people’s dirty, sinful condition. That’s the reason He came.

The church is a table held up by a cross. It is nineteen people crammed into a booth for a dinner party. And speaking of parties, Jesus frequently compared the kingdom of God to the festivities that accompanied a wedding.

Weddings, and the parties surrounding them, are often the pinnacle of human joy. You put on your best clothes and come ready to laugh until it hurts. And eat lots of dessert. Dancing. Crying. Watching the ring bearer veer off course or the flower girl get stage fright. It’s all the best parts of being alive. And that is God’s kingdom.

All of history points forward to and is explained by, feasting…celebration…a party. This is why turning water into wine at a wedding was Jesus’ first miracle. He was pointing to life on the other side of Gethsemane. It was in that garden, as he prayed that he contemplated taking up the cup. In the end, despite everything in him telling him not to do it, he was willing to go through with the plan for the joy that was set before him (Heb. 12:2). Whose joy? Yours!

He swallowed your sorrow so you could sip on joy! That is why I want you to wonder at the majesty of space. To explore the moon and be willing to explore your own soul. It can awaken your curiosity so God’s goodness can free you from the somber seriousness of religion and allow the vitality of friendship to lead you down a path of celebration and excitement, and newness. Heaven is not just out there; the kingdom of God is within, in your inner space.

Response

Who is someone in your life that you can invite to your table–literally or metaphorically? Ask God to show you any areas in your life you've been not so happy as He means you to be, and ask him to breathe vibrancy and joy into those areas.

Prayer

Jesus, thank you for being a God who eats and drinks with sinners. Thank you for the relationship and life and celebration I find in you. Help me to bring that life to others,