The New Year’s Meal We Need In 2021
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The New Year’s Day Meal:
Pork
Collards
Corn bread
Black eyed peas
Health
Prosperity
Good luck
Y’all.
We need that food this New Year more than we ever have before, am I right? I mean, we need one huge serving, (and seconds) of all of that as we move into 2021. This year has been too. Much.
So the other day when I started to plan our meal for tonight, I started thinking about all the health, wealth, and good luck that we need right this minute… but then I really started thinking about how we don’t actually need any of that at all, do we?
Friends, the food we need in 2021 isn’t material or temporal food... the food we need in 2021 is spiritual food!
We need the Bread of Life!
We need Jesus!
That’s it! So simple, but so profoundly more important than anything that health, prosperity, and luck could ever bring our way.
We. Need. Jesus.
So we’re doing something different this year.
We have decided to sit at the dinner table tonight and talk about what we really and truly need in 2021 - what will bring our hearts true healing, peace, and contentment.
And it’s not about money and luck… it’s not even about our health or our personal safety.
We are going to sit and eat and talk about the many ways we can taste and see that our God is GOOD… the ways He has been good throughout 2020 and the ways He will continue to be who He is in 2021. How we can find true safety and refuge in Him, and Him alone, in the uncertainty of the days and months to come.
Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him!
Psalm 34:8
We’re going to center our New Year’s meal on several truths we know about God - how He gives good gifts to His children, how He roots us in His promises and builds us up as we walk in Him, how He cleanses us from our brokenness, and sanctifies us, making us like Him.
If you’re interested in joining us, here’s what our dinner table will look like tonight, and some scripture we’ll read, along with some questions and thoughts to talk about around the table.
ENTREE - Salmon, shrimp pasta, and rolls
Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!
Matthew 7:7-11
This scripture encourages us to ask our Father for good gifts. We’ll encourage each other to do just that in 2021. He loves to give good gifts to His children… going around the table, we’ll ask: What are the good gifts you will ask of God in 2021?
But we won’t stop there, because this passage isn’t about the earthly gifts and blessings we wish for and hope to receive - the things our hearts are prone to request, the things that will satisfy our temporal and material desires… we’ll spend some time talking about the good gifts God promises to those whose trust is in Him: peace, contentment, joy, hope, salvation, and all the many gifts that come along with His good and perfect will.
SIDE - roasted root vegetables (parsnips, radishes, turnips, sweet potatoes, and red onion)
Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.
Colossians 2:6-7
I did some research on root vegetables after deciding on this for our side. Come to find out, they are nutrient dense, absorbing all the minerals and nutrients from the soil where they grow, AND they are excellent for your heart!
With all of that information on our plates, we’ll encourage each other to root ourselves in HIM and in His word in 2021! We’ll talk about how His word is dense in nutrients for our soul, and excellent for our heart health, and how rooting ourselves in Him will build us up, grow us deeper, establishing a strong faith in Him and His promises.
BEVERAGE - fruit punch
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.
Galatians 5:22-23
What better way to quench our thirst and compliment this meal than with the simple sweetness of fruit punch?
As we taste the various fruit flavors in our cups, we’ll encourage each other to pray that God would sanctify us, making us more like Him each day of 2021 - that He would increase the fruit of the Spirit in our hearts, our heads, and our lives, and that others would notice the fruit that we bear, and desire it in their own lives.
DESSERT - Cheesecake
Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
Psalm 51:7
Ending this meal in gratitude, we’ll talk about the complicated task of attempting to make cheesecake FROM SCRATCH. When we cut into it, we’ll (hopefully) find a white center, giving us the opportunity to talk about the incredibly difficult, painful torment Jesus experienced in order to create us anew, washing us white as snow. What a gift of grace! As we close out our New Years dinner, we’ll remind each other to live in gratitude in 2021 for the great sacrifice Jesus made on our behalf.
For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person-though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die- but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.
Romans 5:6-11
