God is our Father, and one of the things that fathers are called to do is provide. “The blessing of the LORD, it maketh rich, and he addeth no sorrow with it” (Prov. 10:22). Now this meal is the blessing of the Lord—we are told explicitly that the cup is the cup of blessing. Now when the Lord brings blessing, it is possible to receive it wrongly, to twist it in such a way that our observance of the Supper does, as Paul put it once, more harm than good.
But that ought to be the exceptional case. That is not to be the ordinary way we come to our Father to be fed. He adds no sorrow to it. And yet, why is it that so many Christians come to this Table cringing?
There are two basic reasons, and I have little doubt that they are related. The first is that a teaching has gotten abroad in the Church that the Father is pleased when we come to this Table in order to abase ourselves. But I know, as a father, that it would displease me extremely if I were to discover that my children or grandchildren were coming to my table in the conviction that the food was poisoned, and would likely do them in. Fathers don’t do that—Jesus even acknowledged that evil fathers don’t do that. What father would give his son a stone when he had asked for bread?
But here is the second reason, and it is likely the reason that the doctrine mentioned above has come to make any sense to people at all. Fathers don’t give their children physical poison at the dinner table, but they often administer the poisons of a harsh and critical tongue, on the one hand, or a distance and detachment on the other. When fathers fail to nourish the souls of the little ones around their tables, it creates the false impression that tables are something we come to reluctantly, if at all. We think that fathers have nothing to do with fat souls, but in reality, only the Father can do this. Come then. This Table was set in fulfillment of the Father’s will.