On Friday, I ate at an Indian restaurant by myself. I chose not to pray before I ate. Not sure why. I probably didn’t do it because I have been rather litigious about that in the past. When I was in college, I started praying before meal at restaurants. I was motivated by the desire to be a good witness and resist the fear to be intimidated by others.
After not praying at the Indian restaurant on Friday, it hit me why I might actually pray before a meal. I pray not because I want to influence others. I pray not because I want to combat any fear of judgement. (At least not now) I pray because Jesus people are thankful people, because Jesus people recognize the source of food. Prayer is not about other people. It’s about being who I am. If that impacts others then so be it, but that’s not my motivation. A “witness” only needs to demonstrate what is true. A “witness” does not have to be more than that to make an impact.
I think this also relates to what it means to be missional. Last week I challenged some of the forms of “doing” mission that turn people into projects. Over the last year, as I have challenged this doing mission perspective, I’ve gotten some push back because people want practical things that can be done to help people get started on mission. No doubt this is true. I don’t want to be impractical.
Instead, I want to invite people into a different imagination. We can do things to change the world, and most of the time we turn people into projects because we want to get something done. Or we can be who we are as God’s missional people and we will learn to love people and thereby change the world. Things change because we love and I don’t know if there is anything more practical than that.
