OPEN: Author Max Lucado tells of an episode from his youth. He was part of a group of young people from his church who, as a service ministry, took the Lord’s Supper to homebound or hospitalized members of the church. He and his friends visited one elderly gentleman in particular who was in the hospital--nothing serious, just a minor illness--and these young people were disappointed to find that the gentleman was fast asleep. Nothing they did, it seemed, could stir him from his sleep.
Well, they were crestfallen; they hated to leave without performing their duty. So, one of the eleven-year-olds pointed out that the gentleman’s mouth was open. The young boys looked at each other, as if to say, "Why not?" and they broke off a tiny little piece of a wafer, and placed it in the elderly gentleman’s mouth, and poured in a tiny sip of grape juice; and sure enough, the man swallowed.
He never woke up. Max Lucado goes on to write: "Neither do many people today."
APPLY: The church at Corinth was a congregation that was asleep to the meaning of the “Lord’s Supper.” So, Paul starts out writing to them about Communion. His 1st words are:
"In the following directives I have no praise for you, for your meetings do more harm than good." 1Co 11:17
The early church at Corinth worshipped much like we do today. They met every Sunday, they read and discussed Scripture, they prayed… and they took communion together. But there was one thing Corinth did that was slightly different. Every Sunday they’d have a fellowship meal before the Lord’s Supper. I suspect they had this fellowship meal as part of each Sunday worship because on the night Jesus betrayed, Jesus and His disciples were eating the Passover meal. At the end of that meal, Jesus passed the loaf & cup to His friends and told them "this do in remembrance of me!"
AND SO Corinth had a potluck dinner every Sunday. You like potluck dinners? I do. It’s a good time for fellowship, there’s always good food and they are far better than any meal you can get at Ponderosa or KFC. I love those meals.
BUT there was something wrong at Corinth. Paul writes: "When you come together, it is not the Lord’s Supper you eat, for as you eat, each of you goes ahead without waiting for anybody else. One remains hungry, another gets drunk. Don’t you have homes to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you for this? Certainly not!" 1Co 11:20-22
The gist I get from this is that at Corinth’s Potluck Dinners, if you didn’t bring a pot – you were out of luck. Some people would bring steak, others potato soup. BUT they didn’t share with each other. The rich and well off showed no love or concern for those who were poor and hungry in midst.
Well we don’t have that problem do we? We take communion every week, but we’ll have potluck dinners every 6 weeks or so. And when we do have carry-ins, people wait their turn, share their food & the meals have nothing to do with our worshipping at the Lord’s table.
SO, we don’t suffer from Corinth’s problem, do we? We don’t have a full scale meal before Communion, so his words couldn’t possibly have any impact on us – could they?
…WELL, YES, THEY COULD
The problem at Corinth ran deeper than “how they behaved at the dinner table.” Their rude behavior was a “symptom” of what was wrong in their church. It was the symptom. BUT it was not the sickness.
What was the sickness? In 1Co 11:17-19 Paul tells us it was divisiveness & pride.
" In the following directives I have no praise for you, for your meetings do more harm than good. In the first place, I hear that when you come together as a church, there are divisions among you, and to some extent I believe it. No doubt there have to be differences among you… to show which of you have God’s approval (pride)."
Pride & divisiveness mar more Church worship services than anything else.
ILLUS: A letter to Lookout: "Our church is split right down the middle on an issue involving financial disagreements and hurt feelings. Yet last Sunday we all shared communion in the same room, with the 2 factions seated on either side of the middle aisle. You could feel the tension."
Both sides felt they had God & the angels on their side, and they weren’t about to love anyone who didn’t agree. When people get their feelings hurt and become angry in Church, you can feel the tension. You don’t need a potluck supper to be the stage for that to play out.
ILLUS: I know of one church where a couple of sisters would wait until communion was served… and then they’d leave. They’d gotten mad years before and this was their subtle but angry way of protesting.
ILLUS: In another church I know of, one couple sat towards the front of the sanctuary, arms crossed, with stern looks on their faces. The preacher had made them mad and they wanted to continually - but they took communion.
Paul says: don’t ever let that happen to you. Don’t ever let that happen to you! Why? Because of what it says in I Cor. 11:27-30
"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. A man ought to examine himself before he eats of the bread and drinks of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without recognizing the body of the Lord eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many among you are weak and sick, and a number of you have fallen asleep."
Why should you never let divisiveness & pride & hurt & anger sit beside you when you take communion? Because, IF YOU DO, you’ll be sinning AND you will be judged. In fact, in Corinth, some of them were sick & weak & had died …because God had had enough
ILLUS: Have you ever sat down at the table with a couple of kids? I do every day. Most of the time at home, sometimes down at a restaurant. There are times they’ll get to picking at each other. They get mad at each other. And I’ll have to punish them – because there’s a certain manner of respectful behavior that I expect at the dinner table
NOW, at the Restaurant, there might be a family at another table who let their kids get away with behavior I won’t allow at my table – and I won’t do a thing about that… because they’re not my kids, and they’re not sitting at my table.
Paul rebukes Corinthians for their bad table manners and then tells them: Christians need to behave a certain way at the Lord’s Table. WHY? Because we’re God’s kids, and it’s His table.
I 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, (because it is the LORD’S supper) 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."
In other words, when you come to the Table – remember
1. It’s not your table. It’s His table
2. It’s a great honor to sit down at His Table
3. THIS IS A TIME OF WORSHIP
4. And while we’re there (at worship) you and I need to behave ourselves
How do we “behave ourselves?”
I Corinthians 11:28 "A man ought to examine himself before he eats of the bread and drinks of the cup."
Examine ourselves for what? Examine ourselves for wrong attitudes towards others in the congregation. Jesus said in Mt 5:23-24 "…if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. (don’t bother to try & offer it - He won’t take it) First go & be reconciled to your brother; then come and offer your gift.
EXAMINE YOURSELVES. In other words, don’t expect to come to God and worship Him while you have a problem with another brother or sister.
I John 4:20 "… anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen."
THIS (the loaf) is the body of Christ… and
THIS (the congregation) is the body of Christ
True worship takes place when we gratefully take of both.
Some have looked at this passage and said:
Examine myself? Unworthy manner? BUT I’m a sinner, I can’t possibly take communion. That particular response is based on two misunderstandings:
1. It’s a misunderstanding of the problem Paul was addressing at Corinth
2. And it’s a misunderstanding regarding sin in general.
Everyone in this auditorium is sinner. "All have sinned" Paul writes in Romans.
ILLUS: One author I read stated: "I want you to notice that Jesus established the Communion the very night that He was to be betrayed. Jesus knew, people! He knew that He was going to be betrayed by Judas Iscariot, knew that Judas would commit the greatest of sins by betraying Him into the hands of the Roman soldiers. Jesus knew that Peter and all the other disciples would betray Him by declaring they did not know Him - and yet Jesus forgave, and gave us the Table anyway. Jesus knew that He was shortly going to be hated of all men, spat on and beaten, nailed to a bloody tree, and yet He gave the Table anyway."
If Jesus knew all that, why did he give us the Table??? Because the Table is the one place in worship where we examine ourselves. Every time you take communion,
· it’s an opportunity to become conscious of our sins and repent of them.
· it’s an opportunity to remember that Jesus died to forgive you of those sins’
· it’s an opportunity to give thanks for the mercy.
Of all the things we do that we call “worship,” this should be the one that
· makes you and I worship God the most
· should make us the most thankful
· bring us the closest to KNOWING God and Loving Him
EVANGELISTIC SUPPER Donald A. Nash Christian Standard 1/30/00
Some congregations, I understand, have even dropped the communion service from the regular morning worship hour, just inviting those who wish to partake to go to another room for the Lord’s Supper after the service or serving it during the week. The reasoning, I’m told, is that the strange practice of taking the loaf and cup frightens away “seekers” (formerly known as sinners).
Don’t they realize that the Lord’s Supper is the greatest evangelistic tool we have? Paul says through the proper observance of the Supper “you proclaim the death of the Lord till He comes” (I Corinthians 11:26). The Communion service is certainly a greater aid to evangelism than a cross on a church building, on the baptistery wall, or on a necklace.
Robert Tinsky was reared in Judaism. Dissatisfied spiritually, he visited a Christian Church for the first time, seeking some religious truth. He was astounded by the observance of the Lord’s Supper. He didn’t understand it. He asked some young people seated near him what it meant. They faithfully told him the gospel story as portrayed in the loaf and cup. He was amazed that there was a God who loved mankind enough to give His Son to die for us and at the wisdom that originated such a living memorial. He became a Christian and a faithful preacher of the gospel.
OFFER COMMUNION
