God willing, on March 4 we will celebrate Communion in that “new-old” way we spoke about last Sunday. The point is not merely change for the sake of novelty. Instead, as we lift our observance of the Lord’s Supper out of the rut of tradition, let’s listen for a fresh hearing of the Spirit’s quiet voice.
Originally, the bread and the cup were part of a real meal. That’s reflected in Paul’s words to the Corinthian believers: “For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night 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, after supper he took the cup, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me.’ For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes” (I Cor. 11:23-26).
We will eat our meal on Sunday after breaking bread and before drinking from the cup. So the meal, enclosed by those powerful reminders, should stir us to recall that Jesus laid down his very life for each member of his body, the church. The Corinthians, when they ate the meal, should have seen the life application. But they missed it. Their self-centered actions showed a disconnect between Jesus’ self-giving love for members of his body and their own call to self-giving love for fellow-members of that same body.
As we share the Communion meal this Sunday, let the bread and the cup remind you that you are sitting beside and across from other members of Christ’s body. Let them remind you that Jesus loved (and still loves) them enough to be beaten, to be broken and to bleed for them. And then, reminded of their value in his sight, listen and speak in self-giving ways that will encourage them and build them up.
Let’s not waste this change in the outward form of how we celebrate Communion. The way we do it–even the new way–will have spiritual value only as we direct our hearts to love the other members of Christ’s body with his own kind of self-sacrificing love. Don’t just eat to eliminate those hunger pangs. Eat and listen and talk–perhaps even pray for those at your table–as a body-member who is there to build other body-members up in Christ.