From Tablet to Table: Where Community Is Found and Identity Is Formed

Worship Leader magazine has named From Tablet to Table one of the five best books of 2015!
What if the Bible were seen less as a tablet of ink than as a table of food? From Tablet to Table invites readers to explore the importance of The Table in biblical theology, and what it might mean for us to bring back the table to our homes, our churches, and our neighborhoods. The table pictures the grace of God’s provision for all aspects of our lives, a place of safe gathering, of finding identity in shared stories, of imparting food and faith, of playing host and finding satisfaction as a guest. Sweet explores how our failure to understand and appreciate “the most sacred item of furniture in every home” has created such a deficit in our fast-food, take-what-you-like-smorgasbord, together-but-separate society.

When was the last time a meal changed your life?
The story of God is full of references to food. From the Garden of Eden to the Last Supper to the wedding feast of the Lamb, God sets a table before us and invites us to join Him there.

Contrast this rich and filling good news with the thin and meager fare to which we’ve become accustomed in our relationships, in our churches, or even in our families. We consume fast food in front of our smartphones, never facing each other, barely acknowledging the existence of one another. We consume bite-size Scriptures and reduce our world so that we can move through it quickly without being distracted by the activities that surround us.

It’s time to look up from our tablets and notice our neighbors, our loved ones, our Lord. Leonard Sweet’s From Tablet to Table shows us how to repent of our “tabletized” ways and rediscover the gift of fellowship, story-based faith, and the fullness of life as God intends it.