I don’t like religious table blessings, but I love the positive emotion of gratitude! Here’s why.

I seldom pray out loud before I eat. Why? When I pray, I want to pray with all my heart. When I am praying while food is waiting to be eaten, people don’t want me to pray passionately. I feel great pressure to disobey Scripture and quench the Spirit (who I feel stirring up my heart) so that the food doesn’t cool off and so that people don’t get irritated with me for a long, fired-up prayer.

Having been an ordained traditional (Presbyterian & non-denominational) pastor for several years, family members and friends would call on me to “say the blessing.” I’ve prayed a few long, heart-felt ones, but after a while I learned to cut it short (quench the Spirit) and make it simple and sweet. It’s easy for a table blessing to become a religious quicky. Maybe other people don’t feel stirred up to pray intensely before a meal, but I do, so rather than do a half-way prayer, I tend to pass. (By the way, I don’t know of a Bible verse that tells us to pray out loud before all our meals.)

Occasionally I feel prompted by the Spirit to say a blessing. When that happens, I am raring to go. (I’m speaking from my own experience, not intending to put this on others. Short prayers can be sincere; however, they usually stir me up to want to pray more and longer!)

Sometimes the Spirit leads us to pray short prayers and sometimes to pray long ones. Usually when I start talking to God from my heart, an inner flow rises up from deep within me. When I’m at the dinner table with other people I feel compelled to stop that flow so that I don’t get them irritated with me. In that case, I usually give in to the fear of man and follow religious tradition rather than what God’s Spirit is releasing in and through my heart.

Casual Christianity is counterfeit Christianity. Christ-followers are called to so much more than comfortable religious routine. Eyesight without insight and foresight dims your inner light with oversights and blind spots that keep glorious, tangible hope out of sight.