Dakota Community Church
November 9, 2008
Broken for You
Communion Sunday Again – What’s it really all about?
A preacher’s son was a little concerned when his father didn’t come home by the time he usually did, and the boy asked his mother, “Is Dad going around visiting all the sick people?”
His mother replied, “No honey, he’s giving blood.”
He paused in thought for a moment and then said: “But we know it’s really grape juice, don’t we Mom?”
What’s It All About?
1 Corinthians 11:23-27
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.
Therefore, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner, will be guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord.
1. Commemoration.
“…Whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me”
Until now the observation of the "Passover Supper", was done in remembrance of what God did to deliver Israel from the captivity of Egypt.
Read Exodus 12
Exodus 12:14
14 "This is a day you are to commemorate; for the generations to come you shall celebrate it as a festival to the LORD -a lasting ordinance.
Now we observe communion to remember His death as deliverance from eternal captivity to eternal life.
It is essential that we not lose sight of this Christ centered faith; we must not forget and slip into a works based righteousness depending on our own conduct for salvation.
Look at this passage where Paul argues with Peter over his “memory” problems:
Galatians 2:11-21
When Peter came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he was clearly in the wrong. Before certain men came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But when they arrived, he began to draw back and separate himself from the Gentiles because he was afraid of those who belonged to the circumcision group. The other Jews joined him in his hypocrisy, so that by their hypocrisy even Barnabas was led astray.
When I saw that they were not acting in line with the truth of the gospel, I said to Peter in front of them all, "You are a Jew, yet you live like a Gentile and not like a Jew. How is it, then, that you force Gentiles to follow Jewish customs?
"We who are Jews by birth and not ’Gentile sinners’ know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified.
"If, while we seek to be justified in Christ, it becomes evident that we ourselves are sinners, does that mean that Christ promotes sin? Absolutely not! If I rebuild what I destroyed, I prove that I am a lawbreaker. For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God. I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!"
So first of all Communion is about COMMEMORATION
2. Proclamation.
“For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death”
About 1930, a Communist leader named Bukharin journeyed from Moscow to Kiev. His mission was to address a huge assembly. His subject, atheism. For a solid hour he aimed his heavy verbal artillery at Christianity, hurling argument and ridicule. At last he was finished and viewed what seemed to be the smoldering ashes of men’s faith. "Are there any questions?" Bukharin demanded. A solitary man arose and asked permission to speak. He mounted the platform and moved close to the Communist. For a while he slowly scanned the audience. At last he shouted the ancient Orthodox greeting, "CHRIST IS RISEN!" The vast assembly arose as one man and the response came crashing like the sound of an avalanche, "HE IS RISEN INDEED!"
When we partake in communion we are declaring ourselves to be covenant children of God.
We are proclaiming the gospel, that we cannot earn God’s favor, that we are saved by faith in Jesus and his sacrifice on our behalf.
Hebrews 8:1-6
The point of what we are saying is this: We do have such a high priest, who sat down at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven, and who serves in the sanctuary, the true tabernacle set up by the Lord, not by man.
Every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices, and so it was necessary for this one also to have something to offer. If he were on earth, he would not be a priest, for there are already men who offer the gifts prescribed by the law. They serve at a sanctuary that is a copy and shadow of what is in heaven. This is why Moses was warned when he was about to build the tabernacle: "See to it that you make everything according to the pattern shown you on the mountain." But the ministry Jesus has received is as superior to theirs as the covenant of which he is mediator is superior to the old one, and it is founded on better promises.
What makes the new covenant better?
What is the difference between the two?
Faith or observance of the law.
Remember the Lord’s death?
Remember what happened in that moment?
Mark 15:37-39
With a loud cry, Jesus breathed his last.
The curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. And when the centurion, who stood there in front of Jesus, heard his cry and saw how he died, he said, "Surely this man was the Son of God!"
This is what we are proclaiming – GOOD NEWS!
COMMEMORATION – PROCLAMATION - …
3. Anticipation.
“…You proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes”
Acts 1:6-11
So when they met together, they asked him, "Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?"
He said to them: "It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."
After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight.
They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. "Men of Galilee," they said, "why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven."
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18
Brothers, we do not want you to be ignorant about those who fall asleep, or to grieve like the rest of men, who have no hope. We believe that Jesus died and rose again and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. According to the Lord’s own word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left till the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage each other with these words.
We’re like the little boy who was sitting in church one day.
Conclusion:
Not Hocus Pocus!
The people coming to mass could not have spoken Latin, much less read it. But, they knew the priest taught them something magical happened to the bread and cup when he prayed and said the words, "Hoc est corpus meum," meaning "this is my body."
The people couldn’t explain it, but they knew that when the priest prayed, he said that the bread and cup changed into the body and blood of Christ Himself. They still tasted like bread and wine; they couldn’t tell the difference. Since they couldn’t really understand the words the priest said when he made the "magical" change take place, the words became corrupted when they spoke of it.
Today, we too speak of something that’s "hocus pocus" if it is supposed to be magical, but we’re suspicious about what really happened.
