Category Archives: Lord’s Supper

Communion meditation: Love your enemies

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These days of September are a time of remembering in the United States, remembering loss, remembering man’s inhumanity toward man. For some it’s a time of anger, for others a renewal of a call for vengeance. For most, it’s a time of wondering how things can come to such a point.
September 11 was, for many, the first real reminder since the end of the Cold War that there are people in this world who consider us as enemies. Not limiting their anger to the U.S. military or the U.S. government, they vowed to strike at the citizenry itself. Enmity became a part of our lives.
So what do we do with Jesus’ call to love our enemies? How can that be lived out? It’s not easy, but at least we had someone show us the way:
“For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.” (Romans 5:6-11) “While we were enemies,” Paul says. How would Jesus treat his enemies? He’s already shown us, by dying on the cross.
This supper is a reminder of what Jesus did for his enemies, of how God loves his enemies. It is a call to us to live out the same kind of love, to enemy and friend, to alien and brother, to all men. If any would consider us an enemy, may it not be because of anything that we have done. May we be seen as people of the reconciliation, people of peace, people of love. People of God.

Communion meditation: One loaf, one body

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“Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf.” (1 Corinthians 10:16-17)
If I were to choose a passage to read regularly before the Lord’s Supper, it would not be 1 Corinthians 11. It would be 1 Corinthians 10. Obviously we need the explanation of the meaning of the bread and the wine, but if we ever forget that the Lord’s Supper is communion, we will have forgotten the purpose of this meal. By eating and drinking together, we are bound together, in a spiritual bond every bit as real as any physical one. We are one. We eat and drink as a body. We participate in Christ’s blood and his body. We are joined to one another. We are joined to the Lord.
When I join in this meal, I am joining in an unbroken chain of Christians that goes back to the table of the Last Supper. When I join in this meal, I am joining in an unbroken chain of Christians around the world that take part in this same memorial. The languages are different, but the words they express tell the same gospel story, express the same unity around the Lord’s Table.
We, who are many, are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf. Powerful words. Powerful reality.

Communion meditation: What the law couldn’t do

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“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.” (Romans 8:1-4)
The Law given in the Old Testament was holy, righteous and good, according to Paul (Romans 7:12). In fact, it only had one weak point: man. It was our humanness, our “flesh” as the Bible states it. The Law is holy, but I am flesh, unable to do what the Law asks of me. Only through the power of the Spirit of God can I overcome that flesh, yet I still find myself falling short of perfection.
Our God knows this. As the Psalmist says “he remembers that we are dust” (Psalm 103:14). Because of that, he sent his Son, who, by power of a perfect life, was able to condemn sin through his death. Those of us that choose to accept his sacrifice are freed from the necessity of paying for our sins through our own sacrifice.
His body was given, and we remember it in the bread. His blood was shed, a covenant established, and we remember that through the cup. Freedom from condemnation was brought to us, to condemnable man, and we remember that in this memorial meal.

Communion meditation: The Crux of the Matter

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Throughout church history, men have debated the hows, whys, whens, whos and whats of the Lord’s Supper. Is it every Sunday? Is it Sunday only? Unleavened bread? Fermented or unfermented wine/grape juice? One cup or many? Closed communion or open? Can we sing or must there be silence? Can women pass out the trays? Can unbaptized boys pass out the trays? Can there also be a meal? Should there be a time of confession first?
Isn’t it interesting that what we spend so much time fighting about, the Bible says nothing about? More than twenty New Testament letters and only one has any correctives about the Lord’s Supper. And we rarely if ever talk about what Paul was actually addressing in 1 Corinthians 11.
When Paul did address the problems in Corinth, the main thing he did was to remind them of the original purpose of the Supper: remembering Jesus’ death and proclaiming its meaning until he come again. Let’s not lose sight of that as we bicker and quarrel over that which falls within the realm of the unspoken in the Bible:
“For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.” (1 Corinthians 11:23-26)

Communion meditation: Eating and drinking in the presence of God

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“Then Moses and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel went up, and they saw the God of Israel. There was under his feet as it were a pavement of sapphire stone, like the very heaven for clearness. And he did not lay his hand on the chief men of the people of Israel; they beheld God, and ate and drank.” (Exodus 24:9-11)
It’s one of those incredible moments, a mountaintop experience, if you’ll pardon the pun. Humans, mere mortals, are allowed to climb Mount Sinai and eat and drink in the presence of God. They “beheld God,” in whatever sense that phrase is meant. I don’t think they saw God’s face as it were. Not long after this Moses asks to see God’s glory and is only allowed to see God’s back, which suggests that these men did not directly look upon God. Still, it was a special moment.
Not long before, Moses had presented the book of the covenant to the people, and they had pledged to obey the covenant (a promise which didn’t even last six weeks). As a sign of the covenant going into effect, Moses sprinkled the people with blood from a sacrifice, saying “This is the blood of the covenant,” the very words which Jesus used when he established the Lord’s Supper. There is a direct and intentional connection between this passage in Exodus 24 and the memorial meal which Jesus established.
The book of Deuteronomy speaks of God’s people eating “in the presence of the Lord” (12:7, 18; 14:23, 26; 15:20). That was a key aspect of the fellowship offerings which were offered on a regular basis.
As we join together at the table of the Lord, we experience a moment of “extreme fellowship,” if you will. Eating together joins us together, but it also joins us to the Lord. He is here with us. It is his table, and we are guests at it. We eat and drink in the presence of the Lord. There is horizontal fellowship and there is vertical fellowship. We eat this covenant meal, celebrating the pact that binds us to God and him to us. We commit ourselves to fulfill our part of the covenant, knowing that God is a faithful God who will always live up to his part of the agreement. In celebration of that covenant, we now eat and drink in the presence of our God.