Bring Back the Family Table

One of my objectives in life is to bring back the family table. When I was growing up we had dinner (supper) together as a family every night. When my children were growing up we had dinner together every night. Some nights it may have been at the baseball field (original tailgating) but we ate together. With the busy lives of today's families this family tradition seems to be going to the way side. You know it is a problem when there is a television commercial urging everyone to turn their phones off on Sunday night and enjoy a meal with their family. I am not naive enough to believe that the family table will return overnight. It disappeared over several years when we began getting busy with outside activities. Even if the food has to be 'take out' it should be eaten together.

My husband, Bob, sent me the following article. I wish I knew who to thank for the article but I don't.

She rises also while it is still night and gives food to her household. - PROVERBS 31:15

R. V. Brown was the sixteenth of 17 children. As he and his siblings arrived at the dinner table, he never understood why his mother stood in the corner with a bowed head. When he was older, he learned that she was praying that the butter beans and cornbread would make it to one end of the table and back without running out!

Of all the rich memories forged in his childhood home, this was the best: dinnertime. Everybody gathered around. Talking, listening and enjoying the laughter and noise of family togetherness.

He can still hear the older kids talking about the work they'd been doing that day. Or about what had happened at school. Another might tell a story he remembered from his stint in the army. And before they finished, R.V.'s daddy, who couldn't read or write, would lean back in his chair and begin sharing from his heart in that soft, arresting voice of his. Little bits of wisdom. Nuggets about how to treat people. Pearls about how to always give your best, settling little problems by using some patience and understanding and not hurting anybody.

I hate to think what the pace of life in today's families has done to memories like these. How many kids, when they grow up and look back on their childhood, will reflect on how much it meant for them to wolf down a fast-food hamburger in the car between ball practice and youth group? I think that what we stand to lose by consistently eating on the run may be a generation that has learned to value activity over relationship . . . and continues to feed self when they could be feasting together.

Give your children something they'll always remember: Give them dinnertime.

Be honest about your dinnertime habits. Are they what they should be? What's one thing you want to do differently about your dinnertime?

Ask God to help you place more value on being together than on doing it all.

These flowers were a gift from my friend, Joan Tornquist, she picked them from her rose garden. I 'had' to use one of my vintage table cloths for these beautiful flowers for dinner that night. Pick some flowers from your garden or from the side of the road and use them for your centerpiece at 'The Family Dinner Table'. Have a blessed day.