A Seat at My Table

We live in a culture that is training us on how to weaponize our time and attention by using withholding tactics, and it’s not healthy at all. Really, it’s like responding to hurt with even more hurt.

Yes, most of us have been in connections where we gave “too much” of ourselves to those who didn’t appreciate it— or worse, took advantage of it— however, this doesn’t mean the answer is to become miserly with the beautiful qualities God blessed us with. In fact, I’m challenging this concept from a Biblical standpoint…

To be clear, there are many healthy reasons to put distance between ourselves and others. In some cases, God advises us to do this by stepping in and redirecting our focus toward other things. Purposely using our absence as a weapon to punish or teach someone a “lesson” is not the same, and stems from the ego, not the higher self. The concept of boundary setting has been completely twisted into something dark in today’s world, and all these reels and posts are just firing up everyone’s ego engines.

Today, I saw a video from a man I had been following who I considered to be intelligent, emotionally mature, well-spoken, and in a solid place with God. Until I heard him say: “There are some people who don’t deserve your time. There are some people who don’t even deserve to be in your presence…” and then I un-followed him. Why? Let’s learn a little lesson about who deserves what…

In Matthew 15:21-28, a Cannan woman approached Jesus as He was walking with his disciples and begged Him to heal her daughter who was afflicted by a demon. Jesus’ own hand-picked crew basically shrugged her off, even advising Him to, “Send her away.” (Not great behavior, guys. WWJD?)

Luckily, every recorded moment of Jesus’ life was for the purpose of teaching all of us right from wrong. So, instead of dismissing her, Jesus tested… ALL of them at the same time with one statement:

“It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.”

(He said this because they were not there to help the Cannan people like herself.) You may be taken aback that He compared her to a dog, but her response proved that she was worthy of His healing:

“Yes, it is, Lord,” she said. “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”

Jesus replied, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.”

Her response proved that SHE herself would offer the least of us the crumbs that fall off the table at minimum, so He too should offer her a small crumb of His time and attention. Jesus then knew she understood the true meaning of giving, so he gave her what she asked for.

You see… there is a HUGE defining line between true followers of Christ and those who are still operating from the ego, and it’s ripping apart community and fellowship. Like the man in the video, I once believed in the distorted concept of withholding my attention from certain people who I felt didn’t “deserve me” any longer. Until one day, the Lord spoke to me about this amidst my pretentious, human complaining…

At the time, I loved someone who had been particularly “challenging” over the years. Nevertheless, God kept asking me to prepare a meal for them. Over and over again, He asked me to give. Give. Give. And keep giving. One day, I broke down and yelled out to Him saying, “Why, God?! They don’t deserve it! They don’t deserve my love, my texts, my time, my gifts! Why do you want me to keep giving when they don’t deserve any of it?!”

He responded…

“Because this is the one who NEEDS IT THE MOST.”

I fell to my knees and cried, as my ego shattered into the floorboards beneath my ungodly behavior. Now, I’m not saying to over give and be taken advantage of— God also does not want us to do that— I’m simply saying not to allow your ego to cloud your LOVE judgement. In my case, the truth is that God was asking me to steward my love toward someone who HE DEEMED WORTHY AND DESERVING of it, regardless of their response or my petty griping. Furthermore, if God says someone is important enough to His Kingdom that He would keep sending me, they should be a top priority of importance to me as well.

And just because “God be God-ing” like He does, when I asked for further clarification, He told me to open my devotional book to the VOTD, which was:

“It is not the healthy who need a doctor; it is the sick.”— Mark 2:17

Let’s be honest… this modern-day concept of withholding comes from unresolved pain within OURSELVES. It’s encouraged to shut out those who have hurt us, until we realize the truth— the hurting are the ones most in need of an invite to our church! Moreover, when we are aligned with God, He’ll ask us to do things that we may not understand or even want to do, but He will always reveal the deeper lesson. Here is mine…

It was on that day God showed me that my table should be OPEN TO ALL without any exceptions. It is not for me to judge who is deserving and undeserving of receiving. My job as a servant of the Lord is to invite EVERYONE to sit and eat with me. God used this situation to free me from acting out of unhealed pain and caving to this new-age way of withholding. Truly, those who this world would say deserve a meal the least are the MOST starving among us.

My “table” is my Tabernacle. My “feast” is the demonstration of godly character and sharing the love of Christ. Everyone is welcome to sit with me, forever and always. This is the true meaning of church. This is the life of fellowship. This is the answer to “WWJD?”

If you are reading this, you’re always invited to a seat at my table. No questions asked. No judgment. No exceptions. Just love.

Written by Michelle Jean