Communion
What are the most significant meals
you have shared in throughout your life so far? Who were you with? What did you
eat? Why was the occasion significant? For me personally, my two most favorite meals
are Chinese New Year and Korean Thanksgiving. When I was young, during those
holidays all of my family got together, made traditional food together, ate together.
There was a lot of laugher and love.
For some reason, when we mark
special occasions, such as a baby’s 1st birthday, graduation, wedding,
and funeral, we get together and share special meals. Eating together is
crucial because, as we share food, our relationships flourish and our
communities are strengthened. That’s why the early church practiced the Love
Feast. And that’s why our church continues this beautiful practice today. The
word Communion means sharing with God
and with each other. The emphasis is on community and fellowship. It’s a family
meal. Then, why is it so important to
celebrate Holy Communion? There are three reasons for that, and we will explore
past, present, and future dimensions.
Remember: Past Dimension
The first reason why we should celebrate
Communion is because Jesus commands us to
do this. At the last supper, Jesus took bread and said, “This is my body
given for you. Do this in remembrance of
me” (Luke 22:19). There is power in remembering. When we remember, the
power of the past comes into the present.
Pat Summitt retired in 2012 from
coaching women’s basketball at the University of Tennessee. During her tenure
as coach, she won over 1,000 games and 8 national championships. She wanted to
keep coaching, but she had to retire because of early-onset Alzheimer’s
disease. In her recent autobiography, Pat tells us about the power of remembering. She claims, “What better way to kick a
memory-wasting disease in the teeth—to keep my mind sharp and my heart engaged
and my life in perspective—than with a
memoir?” As she deals with the new reality of life with Alzheimer’s, she is
still certain of this: “God doesn’t take things away to be cruel. He takes
things away to make room for other things. He takes things away to lighten us.
He takes things away so we can fly.”[1]
The power of remembering. Even as her memory begins to fade, these truths
remain etched in her mind.
Every time we come to the Lord’s Supper,
we hear and remember God’s salvation story
– How God made us in his image; how we turned away; how God delivered us from
the power of sin and death. Every time we partake of Communion, we see bread is
taken, blessed, broken, and given. And we remember
Jesus’ body (life) was taken, blessed, broken, and given for us. And we also remember we are called to be “bread,”
which is taken, blessed, broken, and given for the world. Every time we come to
the Table, we remember who God is and
remember who we are.
Celebrate: Present Dimension
The second reason why we should celebrate
Communion is because the benefits of
doing it are so great. In John 6 Jesus fed the five thousand. But it was
not a normal meal. It was Communion. Jesus used four eucharistic (communion) verbs:
He took the five loaves, blessed (gave thanks) and broke the loaves, and gave them to the people.[2]
After this, Jesus said to them, “I am the
bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever
believes in me will never be thirsty” (35). Then, he continued, “Unless you eat
the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you… Those
who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them” (53, 56). As
our bodies are strengthened by bread and wine, so are our souls by these tokens
of the body and blood of Christ. Communion is the food for our souls. Our sins
are washed away by the blood of Jesus, and our souls are refreshed and strengthened
by the bread of life. Some of us avoid Communion for different reasons, but we
need to realize what we are missing. John Wesley states plainly what is at
stake:
If . . . we have
any regard for the plain command of Christ, if we desire the pardon of our
sins, if we wish for strength to believe, to love and obey God, then we should
neglect no opportunity of receiving the Lord’s Supper. Then we must never turn
our backs on the feast which our Lord has prepared for us. We must neglect no
occasion which the good providence of God affords us for this purpose. This is
the true rule—so often are we to receive as God gives us opportunity. Whoever
therefore does not receive, but goes from the holy table when all things are
prepared, either does not understand his duty or does not care for the dying
command of his Savior, the forgiveness of his sins, the strengthening of his
soul, and the refreshing it with the hope of glory.[3]
Every time we come to the Lord’s
Supper, God feeds our souls. And we celebrate
Jesus, the bread of life given for all of us. We celebrate the risen Christ. We celebrate
the presence of Jesus among us today!
Anticipate: Future Dimension
The third reason why we should
celebrate Holy Communion is because it
gives us a foretaste of what is to come – the heavenly banquet! In Revelation 19 believers are invited to the
wedding feast of the Lamb. And in Isaiah 25 the Prophet Isaiah describes what
the feast would look like: “He will remove the cloud of gloom, the shadow of
death that hangs over the earth. He will swallow up death forever! The
Sovereign Lord will wipe away all tears. He will remove forever all insults and
mockery against his land and people” (7-8). The feast will be a celebration of reconciliation
and the defeat of death. So in Communion we anticipate what is yet to come. We
anticipate our own invitation. We anticipate great reunion.
Yesterday morning I’ve got an email
from a beloved Christian sister, who was one of the pillars of the previous
church. She wrote:
“In February my husband broke his
right hip and has had surgery and rehab but has reached his ability for getting
from chair to bed or bathroom. At 96 it is pretty sure that he will not recover
enough to come home and be safe. Even with 24 hour care I cannot be safe also. Because
of our love for you I want to keep in touch as we journey toward the Heavenly
Place that God has prepared for us. Sometimes the trip has us on bumpy and winding
paths but God has the GPS!”
Joyce and I used to eat together
with this beautiful couple when we had a monthly church supper. We may not have
another chance to do it here on earth. But every time I come to the Lord’s
Table, I am reminded of this truth: I will be eternally united to the loved ones
in Jesus Christ, and we will celebrate the heavenly banquet together. We will
see Jesus face to face. In Communion we foretaste what is to come.
Come and Eat!
When we come to the Lord’s Table,
we remember God’s gift of salvation for us through the death of Jesus. We
celebrate Jesus as true food for our souls. We anticipate the heavenly banquet.
But some of us may not have felt or experienced any benefit of receiving
Communion so far. Some may say, “I have received Communion so long, but I have
not found the benefit I expected.” Then, I exhort you to remember the bronze
serpent in Numbers 21. When the Israelites spoke against God and against Moses,
God sent poisonous serpents, and they bit the people and many died. But then,
the people came to Moses and confessed their sins. So Moses prayed for the
people. Then the Lord said to Moses, “Make a snake and set it on a pole.
Whoever is bitten and looks at it will live.” There was no intrinsic power in
the bronze serpent. Nothing special about it. But because God said so, anyone bitten by a snake who then looked at
the bronze serpent lived.
In the same way, there is no power
in bread. Apart from God, it is just a shadow. It is in itself dead, empty
thing. But because Jesus says, “Do this in remembrance of me,” we celebrate
Communion. Because Jesus says, “I am the bread of life. Unless you eat my flesh
and drink my blood, you have no life in you,” we celebrate Communion. Because
the Bible says, “There will be the wedding feast of the Lamb, and you are
invited,” we celebrate Communion. We may not feel the satisfying effects right
away, but surely we will find benefit sooner or later, because God promised to do so. Brothers and sisters in Christ, let
us keep celebrating Communion as often as we can in the obedience of faith. Let us keep on doing this “until Christ
comes in final victory and we feast at his heavenly banquet.” Amen.
[1] Pat Summitt with Sally
Jenkins, Sum It Up: 1,098 Victories, a
Couple of Irrelevant Losses, and a Life in Perspective (New York: Crown
Archetype, 2013), 376. Quoted in Kenneth M. Loyer, Holy Communion (Abingdon Press, 2014), Kindle Locations 834-836.
[2] In John
6 the verb “break” was omitted, but the other Gospels have all four verbs (cf. Matthew
14:19, Mark 6:41, Luke 9:16)
[3] Albert
C. Outler and Richard P. Heitzenrater, John
Wesley’s Sermons: An Anthology (Abingdon, 1991), 503.
No comments:
Post a Comment