Two Years at the Table: A Reflection

Two years ago this week, The Glorious Table was a newborn site. We had no idea how long it would live, where it would lead, who it might impact. All we had was a shared vision for encouraging women to embrace the life God has for them–a life of abundance, joy, growth, and confidence in their identity as daughters of the King. All we had was a whisper telling us we needed to set the table, issue the invitations, open the wine.

These two years seem both long and short. We’ve seen the staff of The Glorious Table evolve through two creative directors and three social media managers. We’ve seen our number of regular contributors grow and shrink and grow again. We’ve seen months wherein we didn’t know how we’d fill the calendar and then watched in awe as God sent new writers to fill the gaps. Since we’re purely a ministry, the sixty-some women who serve at The Glorious Table do so out of love and generosity and a sense of calling. The only profit is in the blessing of obedience to God’s call and the occasional comments we receive that tell us how our words came at the right time, just when one of you needed them.

It’s not all sunshine and roses, keeping a website going. There have been late nights and missed deadlines, miscommunications and misunderstandings. There have been theological debates and plenty of rewrites. We’re a big group of imperfect women who have one thing in common: a desire to follow Jesus. We’ve been privileged during these two years to share our respective journeys with you. We still believe just as strongly as we did at the beginning that the table is a place God calls us to.

Last fall, we launched The Glorious Table Community on Facebook, a secure online group that’s intended to be a safe place for you to share with us, a place we hope will continue to grow. If you haven’t joined us there, please take this invitation to do so. We’d love to get to know you better, to pray for you, to encourage you, to provide you with the opportunity to meet some of the other women who share the table with you. We’d also love it if you’d share The Glorious Table with your friends, family, neighbors, and colleagues. The more women we can welcome to the table, the more women we can serve in the name of Jesus.

We have no idea what the future holds. There are wisps of dreams about what The Glorious Table could become if God wills it, but this week we’re content simply to celebrate what he has already done, in each of you and in each of us. Our prayer has been and will continue to be that both you and our Lord are blessed by what we share here. Thank you for being a part of our first two years.

Harmony Harkema has loved the written word for as long as she can remember. A former English teacher turned editor, she has spent the past nine years in the publishing industry. A novelist and blogger in the fringe hours of her working mom life, Harmony also has a heart for leading and coaching aspiring writers. Harmony lives in Memphis with her husband and two small daughters. She blogs at harmonyharkema.com.

Photograph © Nils Stahl, used with permission