A Table in Enemy Country

Psalm 23:5 (NRSVUE)

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows.

Most of us know Psalm 23 by heart. The Lord is my Shepherd. Green pastures. Quiet waters. We even boldly declare that we walk "through the valley of the shadow of death" without hesitation, because we have repeated this statement so often that it's almost become automatic.

And then all of a sudden, it becomes a psalm about dinner.

We usually move right through this passage to get to the next one, about dwelling "in the house of the Lord forever." But notice where the dinner table is. Not somewhere safely away from enemies. Not after enemies have been defeated. In the presence of them.

This psalm is identified as a "psalm of David." We do not know for sure when he wrote this psalm or which enemies he meant. Nor do we know whether it represents a particular point in David's life. Maybe it was the time he hid in the wilderness while Saul pursued him. Maybe it was when his son Absalom drove him from his own home. We'll never know for sure. What we do know is who "you" refers to in this psalm. The Lord is my shepherd. You guide me. You restore me. Now, you are preparing a table. He is certainly not writing about being fed by strangers. He is writing about being served by God himself.

In David's world, a table meant something specific. To sit as someone's guest, at their table, anointed and fed, meant coming under that host's protection. For as long as the meal lasted, you were untouchable by whatever or whoever was outside the tent. So when David writes this, he's describing a claim: the enemy is right there, but it doesn't matter because God is his host. It is his table. He set it himself, and he decides what happens at it.

A thousand years later, God sets a table again. This time in person.

It is the night before the crucifixion. Jesus — who had already told his followers, "I am the good shepherd" — takes bread, breaks it, and shares it. Then he takes a cup and passes it around the room. That room includes Judas, who is well on his way to betraying Jesus. He's been paid, and his mind is made up. He is at the table, close enough to share the same plate with Jesus.

The enemy is not outside the room. He is sitting at the table. Even so, the shepherd prepares the meal for both him and others.

This is not a coincidence of imagery. This is the same host David wrote about, delivering in the flesh what he described over a thousand years earlier in a psalm: the table is spread before the enemy leaves the room, not afterward.

That table continues to be spread, and the host is the same shepherd that served David. Death and sin continue to operate within the world today. And there is still a table.

David wrote that his cup overflowed. He couldn't have known that centuries later, another cup would be poured out at another table — not overflowing for the one who drank it, but emptied out for the sake of everyone else in the room, and for us.

Prayer

Father, thank you for the table you set for us, even when trouble is still in the room. Help us trust you instead of the enemy in front of us. Amen.

This devotional was written and read by Cliff McCartney.

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