Believe me, some days when the Sabbath is approaching, you may feel like it is an impossible task to prepare a Sabbath dinner. I have certainly felt that way before. But the thing that encourages me is thinking that if this truly is an important, potent celebration, I should expect to get resistance. Anything to get me to give up! Remember you will get resistance too. You may feel tired, out of good meal ideas, bored of cooking, or it may be too hot to cook. Whatever the reason, remember that when you overcome your duddiness to prepare a feast for the family, God will not only bless you for it, He will meet you in it and give you the strength to overcome the obstacles. You’ve heard it said that anything worth doing will be difficult at times. I agree. Some of those Sabbath dinners when I felt fresh out of steam or ideas ended up being the sweetest. So do what you need to do to perk yourself up. Read some cookbooks, have a double-shot iced mocha, try a new recipe, eat outside, invite some friends to potluck with you, go to a park. And if you really can’t pull it off, well then, order pizza, open the wine, and light the candles. We have done things like that before, especially if we’ve just gotten home from a trip or if we’ve had a wedding in the afternoon. Recently after a late afternoon wedding, we picked up some things at the deli and used paper plates. That’s all we could muster! After we prayed, we put the kids at the table and the adults sat in the living room. It was very pleasant. Tomorrow I expect we will sit outside and enjoy the warm weather. Fire up the grill and take it easy. Don’t give up, and God will bless it!
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Thank you for this reminder. I oftentimes want to just come home and spend time with my family because it will require less food to make and we can just “rest”. It is only when I stray from my selfishness and invite others to fellowship with us on the Lord’s Day that I truly rest as He has commanded us. I’ve even begun to like it when my husband tells me that he invited people over just as we are heading home from church. No time for thinking about what to eat, I just need to do it! Thank you again for your simple reminder of how we can honor the Lord in preparing for the Sabbath.
I’ve just found your blog and have appreciated so many things about your thoughts. This one was particularly timely as just yesterday, I spent nearly an hour just preparing our family’s Sunday meal. I botched a new recipe I was trying, got frustrated and huffed to my husband that this was for the birds. It was actually perfectly edible and I just needed to be less vain about the presentation 🙂 We young moms with young families welcome lots of nuggets of advice on how to make Sundays run smoothly, from wake-up to sunset. We do well to honor God first and foremost in each tiny activity, although, easier said than done sometimes, thanks to our nature.