There is a time to pray for your family, your friends, yourself, those suffering, our country and this crazy world we live in. Mealtime is not the time.
When I first started going to church and then branched out to other events with my new Christian friends, I thought a long drawn out blessing was just how you prayed. For everything. And especially when it came to meal time. I guess we think since we have the attention of everyone who is waiting to scarf down some groceries, that's the best time to make all of our petitions known to God and man.
STOP IT!
It's about blessing the food.
I didn't even realize it until our Preacher brought it up. He said, "have you ever been sitting there after church, hungry, and some one blesses the food by praying all the way around the world?" and that got me to thinkin' (oh my!)
There is a time to pray for family, for friends, for the salvation of lost loved ones. During the blessing of a meal is not that time.
Just bless the food. Thank God for his daily provision and ask him to nourish us through what He has provided, finish it up and let everyone eat.You've done your job, you blessed the food, which is what everyone was there for in the first place.
Don't get me wrong, we should bring all of our petitions before God, but blessing the meal is just that, blessing the meal.
You can deny it all you want but you know there are times when someone is called to bless the meal that you are silently praying, "please don't ask so and so, please don't ask so and so" because you know you're going to be there a good while listening to prayers about everything but the food you are about to eat.
Just bless the food.
Jesus did it...
Mathew 14:19
19 Ordering the [a]people to [b]sit down on the grass, He took the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up toward heaven, He blessed the food, and breaking the loaves He gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds,
Mathew 15:36
36 and He took the seven loaves and the fish; and giving thanks, He broke them and started giving them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the people.
Mathew 26:26
26 Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.”
None of these verses say He prayed a long drawn out prayer. He blessed the food and fed the people.
There are times when prayer is added to the blessing.
We have a Sunday School Social about twice a year. Our teacher is having some medical issues, we gathered around him, put our hands on him and prayed over him, for his health, for His guidance for all medical providers, for his family. Then the meal was blessed.
It was planned prayer before the blessing, something we wanted to do to provide comfort to our brother first, before the food was blessed.
This is not the rule, it's the exception.
At our house the general rule is, ask God to provide for the hungry in the world, thank God for the provision for us that day, ask blessing for the one who prepared the food and Amen.
No long detailed prayer about who provided, how they provided or why. Just a thankful prayer that once again our loving Father provided for us, this day, what we needed to nourish us and give us strength.
Thank you God for our daily bread
Just sayin'
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