What if your table was less about impressing your guests and more about truly seeing them? Discover how a 1970s design trend and a convicting passage from Luke 14 will change the way you think about who you invite — and why.
Put Down the Agenda, Pull Up a Chair
The dinner dishes are cleared, the table reset for tomorrow’s chaos, and my 16-year-old daughter and I claim our spots on the couch. This is our ritual: nail polish bottles lined up between us, our favorite HGTV house design show on TV, and the kind of conversations that only happen when your hands are busy, and your guard is down.
When we aren’t talking about nails, my daughter, Emily, likes to discuss what she loves and dislikes about each house design. She’s been telling me what is right and wrong with houses since she was 10 years old. She wants to be an architect when she grows up – not a surprise.
The Pit We Forgot We Needed
During one of our recent shows, “World’s Most Secret Homes”, we got to travel to Italy to see a home tucked into the hillside landscape of Sardinia Island. It was a beautifully modern home that earned rave reviews from us. As the camera panned out around the house, they zoomed in on the backyard space. My mouth dropped, and I immediately said, “Wow, I just love that.”
We were looking at an area the homeowners described as having an inside-outside connection. When you walk from inside their home to the outdoors, you enter a walkout area with a sunken living space. Just a few concrete steps down, you can sit and relax in this squared-off space with multiple couches. From every angle, you feel like part of everyone’s conversation.
Emily informed me that the proper name of this space is called a conversation pit and that it was most popular in the 1970’s. While we don’t often see this design anymore, we find ourselves having conversations in a different way – around a table. And really, tables have become our modern-day conversation pit.
The Table as an Invitation
Friends get together for coffee around a table. Families share dinner and chat around a table. We negotiate, celebrate, grieve, and laugh around tables. A table is not just furniture — it’s an invitation to be present with one another. And being truly present is harder than it sounds.
Jesus knew this. Over two thousand years ago, He met people around their tables. Most of his messages and stories in the Bible were shared as he sat around a table. In Luke, we see Jesus in a prominent Pharisee’s home, invited for a discussion. But the Pharisee saw it as a way to trap Jesus—to catch him saying or doing something that would lead to his arrest. Instead, we learn a valuable lesson about who we should invite to our tables and why.
Jesus responded by flipping the script on what a table is even for.
“When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or sisters, your relatives, or your rich neighbors; if you do, they may invite you back and so you will be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed.” (Luke 14:12-14, NIV)
When the Table Becomes a Stage
It’s a convicting passage — and an honest mirror. How often do we set our tables for an audience rather than for the people sitting at them?
The spaces where we hold conversations should not be limited to only those we know best. Jesus stretches us outside of our comfort zones to invite specific strangers. Living in today’s time and yesteryears leads to the same conclusions.
We often have a heart to entertain and share our home with our closest friends and family. And to be honest, many of us practice rituals to make our homes look and feel better for the sake of uplifting ourselves. “Oh, look at our new wallpaper we just put up.” “Yes, we just had our kitchen remodeled.” Or “How do you like our new light fixture?”
We invite the people who will admire what we’ve built. Without realizing it, the table stops being a place of connection and becomes a stage for our own story. Our guests don’t leave feeling seen — they leave feeling like props.
Instead of making our guests feel welcome, we make them feel envious of what we have. It becomes a trap of sorts—a hidden agenda. And maybe it wasn’t on your radar, but it happened. Our purpose shifts from honoring others to making them admire what we have, which is not God-led.
The Real Reason We Gather
Jesus isn’t just telling us who to invite. He’s telling us why we gather at all. The purpose of the table is to honor the person across from it — not to be honored ourselves.
When we get that right, something remarkable happens. Strangers become friends. Walls come down. The conversation goes somewhere real. And in those unguarded moments — hands busy, guards down — we find the space to share the one story that actually matters.
Emily and I don’t have a sunken conversation pit in our living room. But we have a couch, a collection of nail polish, and a standing invitation to show up for each other without an agenda.
That’s enough. That’s the point.
So the next time you set your table — whether it’s for a holiday dinner, a casual coffee, or a couch ritual with someone you love — ask yourself this: Am I creating a space where people feel truly seen, or am I setting a stage where I feel admired?
Let’s Pray Together
Dear Heavenly Father,
We thank you first for the friends who pull up a chair and the family who fills our tables. Thank You for these ordinary moments — the shared meals, the long conversations, the hands that reach across to help. We are grateful for every person You have placed in our lives and for the spaces where we get to do life together. And yet, Lord, help remind us not to just stop there. Stretch our hearts beyond the familiar and the comfortable. Give us eyes to see, hearts to understand, and ears for listening. May our tables reflect Your generosity — open, unhurried, and full of grace.
In this, we ask in your precious name, Jesus. Amen!
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