The tables are set, and you’re sitting at one.
Every day, in every room, we reenact the same quiet sorting: who belongs, who doesn’t, who gets welcomed, who gets ignored. It’s not just middle school lunchrooms anymore. It’s our churches, our neighborhoods, our social feeds.
And if you think you’re above it, ask yourself: when was the last time you crossed a line to include someone who made you uncomfortable? This isn’t just a social issue. It’s a spiritual one.
The gospel demands more than comfort; it requires courage. And if you’re serious about following Jesus, then you must know: staying seated isn’t neutral. It’s disobedience.
Middle school lunch tables teach us early how belonging works: we sit with our “kind.” Popular with popular, athletes with athletes, scholars with scholars. When someone dares to cross those invisible lines, the room notices. Whispers follow.
“What are they doing?” We learn quickly: don’t risk your place.
Those same tables follow us into adulthood, into neighborhoods, workplaces and churches. We cluster where we feel safe and assume those outside our circle are different, lesser, risky. It takes courage to stand, walk to another table, and simply sit. The Bible asks us to be that somebody. In Acts 10, Peter becomes the one who crosses the line.
Jewish custom kept Gentiles distant—unclean, outside the fellowship. Cornelius, a God‑fearing Gentile, received a vision that sent him searching for Peter. Peter received a vision too, one that upended his assumptions: “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.” He heard it three times. Cornelius didn’t hesitate; Peter did.
That moment is more than a conversion story for Cornelius. It is Peter’s turning point. He must choose whether to preserve status, safety, and tradition or obey a God who refuses human boundaries.
He chooses inclusion. He called out, “Who can withhold the water?” and Gentiles were welcomed into the church. The lunch tables were broken apart.
This pattern repeats across the scriptures. Jonah resists God’s call to preach to Nineveh because the people are other; his reluctance almost keeps them from repentance.
Jesus repeatedly sat with the outsiders—women, Samaritans, the marginalized—teaching that the kingdom of God breaks social fences. Time and again, God presses God’s people to risk comfort and custom to bring others in.
Practical pressure pushes in the other direction. Society rewards safety and sameness. Welcoming unfamiliar faces threatens reputation, creates uncertainty, and risks being labeled.
It is easier to stay seated. Yet community, by its nature, is wider than our fears.
But, church, we are one body and one spirit. When someone is excluded, the whole is diminished. Everyone suffers.
The call to be that somebody starts small: sit by someone new, start a conversation, invite the outsider. Sometimes it will cost more—friendship, reputation or approval. Sometimes it will make people uncomfortable.
That discomfort is the point. Temporary unease opens space for real belonging and transformation.
When Peter rose above his hesitation, the Holy Spirit moved beyond Jerusalem and opened the church to the nations. When Jonah finally went, a city repented. When Jesus crossed boundaries, lives were changed and entire communities were redeemed.
The consequences of refusing are not merely missed opportunities; they are missed opportunities to align with God’s mission. We aren’t called to follow society’s idols. We are called to follow the God who dwelt in the veins of Jesus.
We will justify staying seated. We will make theology into exclusion, custom into virtue, fear into prudence. But God’s pattern is not to preserve fences; it is to break them down.
Inclusion is not a sentimental add‑on. It is the shape of the gospel doing its work in the world.
So here’s the test: when God places a Cornelius in your path—a neighbor, a coworker, a person at the edge of your congregation—will you stand? Will you risk discomfort to welcome them? Will you refuse to let status or custom define who belongs at the table?
Being that somebody does not require perfection or grand gestures. It requires attention, humility, and courage. It asks us to set aside our assumptions and to see the image of God in the person who looks different. It asks us to choose relationship over reputation.
If you’re waiting to be Cornelius—ready, eager, evident in your faith—then God can use that zeal. But more often God calls us into Peter’s hard work: the internal turning, the decision to cross a boundary we have treasured.
Those are the turning points that change the course of history, churches, and communities.
Today, get up. Sit with someone you wouldn’t usually sit beside. Say a name aloud. Listen. Baptize action with hospitality. Let the small, awkward steps be the ones that break groups of exclusion.
If Peter had stayed seated, then the story of the church would have died out. The Jesus movement would have become another sect of Judaism.
If we stay seated, then our witness will be too.
- About the Author
- Latest Posts
Chaplain Resident, an ordained Baptist minister, graduate of Campbell Divinity School, and a neurodivergent advocate. (Views expressed are those of Delaney and not intended to reflect those of her employer or other associates.)
