Should Christians PRAY BEFORE MEALS?

Nothing irks me more than the quick routine prayer "Dear Lord, thank you for this day, thank your for the food. Amen". Especially when it's muttered in two seconds. I just always pray seperatly anyways and thank the Lord in my own way.

 

Why? I ask this to bring this feeling into conversation. Are we short changing God with simple prayers? When the Bible says that Jesus "gave thanks" - what does that mean to you, and how long do you think he prayed?

I wonder sometimes if we pray longer as a sign of spirituality. When a person gives us something, we often say "thanks", or "thank you". Depending on the gift, we may say a little more about how much we like it.

How long a pray should we say? How many seconds or minutes is correct? What makes "Thank you, Lord" less appropriate than a long prayer?

 

Since everyone, so far, has either missed or ignored my “all that is within me” post, I will pursue a more serious tack.

Not to suggest that prayer for a meal should have long periods of silence and meditation, but, when Jesus prayed in Gethsemane, He only spoke a few words, yet remained in God’s presence for hours. I am afraid that all too often we are speaking so much in prayer that we cannot listen. Certainly do not want to get mystical and ethereal here, but there must be a balance in this somewhere.

 

Glory Bound, there is nothing wrong with simple prayers as long as you mean it. When I say "Thank you" to God I truly mean it. I am talking about those short prayers that people pray becuase they think that's what they are supposed to do. Nothing wrong if it's heartfelt, but sometimes people do it cause it's part of the eating routine.

 

I'm not picking on you, chipsgirl... but you touched on something that interested me.

I asked because I've felt "pressure" before to be more wordy... when others pray for several minutes, a simple "thank you for this food, Lord" doesn't come across as a "good" prayer of thanks. I've gotten the "evil eye" from Mrs. Glory Bound before saying a prayer when we have company over...

(Oh, yeah - rj - I got your joke. It made me laugh, I just didn't reply. I actually wondered if someone would argue with you, but no one took the bait.)

 

I just don't like it when people make prayer ritualistic. It doesn't matter whether its short or long. It should be spontaneous. We are Baptist and not Catholic afterall.

 

I grew up in a home where my family prayed at every meal. I always prayed out of habit, but a couple of years ago I was reading through the book of I Timothy and I came across I Tim. 4:3 "Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats, which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth."
When I read this, I was surprised to see that the Apostle Paul indicates that food is good and should be received with prayer. After that, I really began to pray consciously for my food, not just out of habit.

 

Lu 24:30 Now it came to pass, as He sat at the table with them, that He took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them.

Mt 14:19 Then He commanded the multitudes to sit down on the grass. And He took the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up to heaven, He blessed and broke and gave the loaves to the disciples; and the disciples gave to the multitudes.

Mt 26:26 And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to the disciples and said, "Take, eat; this is My body."

Jesus did.

 

I would do one of 3 things.

1. Pray silently to myself before eating.

2. Go outside, pray, and then come back in and eat.

3. Leave and find new friends who are not so offensive to me and my Lord.

 

I'm with Brownov on this one (thats my kid). Giving thanks is clearly taught by the example of Jesus and Paul in I Tim 4:3. My principle was if I could give thanks for it, I could eat it and keep it down!

Of course I saw one of those reality shows on TV and the girl had to eat some kind of "creepy crawlies" and I said you would never find me giving thanks for that!

Does it sometime become a ritual and maybe meaningless?, sure, but then that can happen with any Christian function or duty. Just because that is a risk does not mean we should avoid doing what is right!

 

In this passage, the focus was on the total reliance on God, something you'd think would have been easy for God's chosen people after the plagues, the Red Sea, Manna, water from the rock, Jericho, etc. I can only imagine how much more difficult it is for us in America to rely on God when we can get anything for ourselves. Hence the command to pray when you were full, saw this verse in a Bible Study last week, and we got into an interesting discussion about how ritualistic our mealtime prayer can become.

I'm with Brownov and Circuitrider on this one, great minds think alike, or fools seldom differ.

 

We should pray before meals ... and after meals ... and during meals ... and while vacuuming ... and while brushing our teeth, etc etc etc.

We should pray without ceasing.

If the VERY LEAST we do is require proper manners (like shaking hands, saying thank you, etc), the VERY LEAST we can do to show proper respect to the Lord is give thanks for our food.

What if you don't feel like working, or paying yoru bills? Should you force yourself to do those things?

No, you don't have to pray before meals, but, God doesn't have to provide you with food, either.

Do we sin if someone gives us a gift, and we don't say thank you? It may not be a sin, but it's incredibly rude. What would you think of a person who doesn't say thank you to someone? The same may be thought of a person who doesn't thank the Lord for his meal.

 

"Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly, and not after the tradition which he received of us." - 2 Thes. 3:6

"And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. " - Eph. 5:11

 

When a guest at someone's home, you always honor the host by abiding by his rules. If you can't abide by his rules, you ave no business being there. As a guest, however, even if at a Christian's home, it's not your place to initiate grace over the meal. It's the host's. If he doesn't do it, it doesn't necessarily mean that he's a heathen. For all you know, he might have blessed the food during it eing prepared. So don't jump to conclusions.

Getting back to the person who doesn't want prayer in his house. You thank the Lord privately in your own mind, without bringing attention to yourself. After all, it's not about you.

 

What does everyone think of "Charlie Anderson's" 'prayer' at the dinner table at the beginning of the movie, Shenandoah?...

"Lord-- we cleared this land. We plowed it, sowed it, harvested it. We cooked the harvest. It wouldn't be here and we wouldn't be eatin' it if we hadn't done it all ourselves. We worked dogbone hard for every crumb and morsel. But we thank you just the same anyway, Lord, for this food we're about to eat.Amen."

In case you don't know, Charlie Anderson, played by Jimmy Stewart, is a widowed Virginia farmer with 6 sons, a daughter, and a daughter-in-law, who refuses to take sides in the Civil War; both opposed to slavery and against a war that doesn't 'concern him.' Inevitably the war 'touches' him and his family and his big farm, where they live almost self-sufficiently, 'not asking anything from the state nor expecting anything.' So why should they be concerned about "somebody else's fightin'?"

 

To say we should pray before meals as a rite is in error. For gratitude, yes.

 

Sometimes it the value of the food. In Bible college if the snack cost more than a quarter we prayed for it

 

Yes, our food wouldn't be here in its current forms unless some plowed the ground, planted & watered the seeds, fed the cattle and pigs, processed it in a factory. BUT GOD MADE IT GROW. Without that, none of the man-made foodmaking efforts would be of any avail. So therefore I thank Him(in thought if not verbal prayer every time I so much as take a drink of clean water. And I DO thank Him aloud at the dinner table, whether at home, at a football game, at Mickey Dee's or wherever. Since I had intestinal surgery in 1986, I've been on a bland diet, and that's something special for which I give thanks...the availability at an affordable price of the things I can safely eat.

I believe the issue of praying aloud before a meal is a personal one, with no wrong way to do it, long as one DOES thank God for his/her "daily bread".