Dinner On The Grounds

Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. 1 Corinthians 10:31

Our little country church, Cornerstone Baptist Church, has been without a pastor for a while.  We have been praying and waiting and praying and waiting some more.  Well, good things come to those who pray (and wait).  Our new pastor started at the first of the year.  We are so happy to have him and his family!  One of the first things he requested is that we have...  Dinner on the Grounds!

See, this guy is starting things off on the right foot!  We usually have about 40 people attending morning worship services on Sunday Morning.  As I mentioned, we are a small church, but we are big on our love for the Lord, big on enjoying fellowship with one another, and big on having meals.  Generally, when we eat in our fellowship hall, if it will be light foods, we call it "Finger Foods or snacks."  If we are going to really get serious about eating, we call it "Dinner on the Grounds."

The term has a couple of mis-nomers in it.  It is not Dinner and it is not on the Ground.  We generally call the meal at noon, lunch.  We generally call the meal at night, supper.  But, oh well.  Secondly, we don't eat on the ground.  We all acted like respectable adults and sat in chairs around tables.  Seriously, I think the term means we are eating on the grounds of the church.  And that's what we did.

Dinner on the Grounds is when we ask everyone to just cook a meal with the main dish and ALL the sides like you ordinarily would for your family, but bring it to the church to share with everyone else.  Folks show up before Sunday School with all sorts of pots and pans, trays, and roasting pans, tupperware and aluminum foil wrapped goodies and put them on the table in the fellowship hall.  There are admonitions against sneaking a cookie or a slice of pie before church.  Then we go to Sunday School and "Big" church where we pray, sing hymns of praise, and of course, open the Word.  When the last verse of the Hymn of Invitation is sung, the preacher prays for the congregation and also blesses the food we are about to consume.

We put our "game faces" on and walk across the breezeway into the Fellowship Hall.  The aroma of roast beef, rice & gravy, jambalaya, sausage, fried chicken, and dozens of casseroles!  A few bowls of healthy salad stand in defiance against a table of any manner and sort of dessert.  Why, there are homemade pies and cakes and cookies and puddings.  At the end of the table, there are soft drinks, where you can choose what type of "Coke" you'll have: Dr. Pepper, Sprite, Barq's Root Beer, Pop Rouge, or Orange, oh, and of course, Coke.

Then we sit down and eat and visit with neighbors and eat and talk some more and eat and laugh.  Then, we'll get up and circle the table in search of something that we heard was good that we weren't able to fit on our plates on the first go-round.  Everyone brings their best and no one leaves hungry.  At the end everyone pitches in to clean things up.  We bid each other farewell, but knowing we'll be back at 5 pm for Evening Worship.  We leave the parking lot slow, thinking about going home and taking a big nap.

Church Fellowships like "Dinner on the Grounds" are a good opportunity to break bread with Christian brothers and sisters and truly be nourished both physically and spiritually.  Everyone is always glad they came.