Holy Communion 101 (1 Corinthians 11)
Introduction
Hello, Happy New Year, and welcome to the Will Preach for Food podcast. I’m Doug, a pastor here at Faith Lutheran Church, based out of Shelton, Washington, a congregation of the ELCA. You can learn more about Faith at our website, www.faithshelton.org. This is the beginning of my fourth year of this Will Preach for Food podcast. I started this back in March of 2020, just as the pandemic was shutting things down. One hundred and some podcasts later, over 8200 downloads later, we’re still reading the Bible every week. We’re still talking about Jesus every week. And we’re still talking about 20 minutes every week. Thanks to all you who listen to and share this podcast. Thank you, Chas and Nadia, for your production help every week.
We are beginning 2023 at Faith with a shift in our Sunday morning schedule. A single, 10am worship service, with an education hour following at 11:15am. The 9am hour is slotted for our worship teams, including, we hope a reboot of our traditional adult choir. Nobody likes change. I want to thank you for your patience and trust that this change is not something being done lightly or on a whim.
And I want to assure you that Faith is committed to a variety and range of worship styles. One size does not fit all. Two sizes, in fact, do not fit all. During this season we want to broaden and expand the ways the people of Faith can gather for worship and experience the presence of God. That Faith is committed to utilizing the many and diverse musical gifts and teaching gifts of this congregation, finding ways to invite and include more people in worship and music, in our Faith Moment ministry, in hospitality and evangelism, in our Children’s Message and Sunday School ministries.
I am confident in the good will and maturity of this congregation to “go with the flow,” to trust the staff and leadership of Faith, and to engage in thoughtful and prayerful discernment about Sunday mornings at Faith. I am committed to meeting the needs and expectations of existing worshipers and members. I am committed to experimenting with ways to shape Sunday mornings in such a way as to welcome and inspire more and future worshiping families, especially those who are often not here, that is, our younger families.
It is also just so important for us to be together as one congregation. Everyone I talk to is experiencing profound loss, disruption, and often loneliness. Sunday mornings are a unique opportunity in our world today for the people of Faith to simply enjoy the company, companionship, and friendship of one another. Welcome Home! We say, because it really is GOOD to be home.
A central element of our worship life together is the sacrament of Holy Communion. When the pandemic hit back in 2020, everyone else was rushing out to buy toilet paper. We rushed out to buy a couple thousand of those little pre-filled, pre-sealed communion cups filled with grape juice and a communion wafer. All that spring, Pastor Mary and a handful of volunteers stood outside the sanctuary to offer drive thru communion. A wafer of bread. A sterile cup of grape juice. And substantive human interaction. Smiles. Kind words. Encouragement. A sense of community. Continuity. Belonging. Connection with God and each other.
In today’s Bible reading, the apostle Paul is writing to a congregation about its practice of holy communion in the earliest stages of the church. Today I want to spend some time learning from the Bible itself what Holy Communion is—and isn’t. You might be surprised to know that the Bible uses several images and metaphors for describing the meaning and power of this bread and wine: “given and shed for you.” I hope today’s message leads to some good conversations in your household about what communion means to you. I hope it helps OUR congregation wonder together about why and how we want to share this sacrament on Sunday mornings in worship. And I hope this message brings you to a deeper experience of Christ himself at the table of the Lord, in the eating and drinking, in your participation in the Lord’s Supper. Open your Bible to 1 Corinthians 11:17-34.
1 Corinthians 11:17-34
17 In the following directives I have no praise for you, for your meetings do more harm than good. 18 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. 19 No doubt there have to be differences among you to show which of you have God’s approval. 20 So then, when you come together, it is not the Lord’s Supper you eat, 21 for when you are eating, some of you go ahead with your own private suppers. As a result, one person remains hungry and another gets drunk. 22 Don’t you have homes to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the church of God by humiliating those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you? Certainly not in this matter!
23 For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, 24 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.” 25 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.” 26 For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.
27 So then, 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. 28 Everyone ought to examine themselves before they eat of the bread and drink from the cup. 29 For those who eat and drink without discerning the body of Christ eat and drink judgment on themselves. 30 That is why many among you are weak and sick, and a number of you have fallen asleep. 31 But if we were more discerning with regard to ourselves, we would not come under such judgment. 32 Nevertheless, when we are judged in this way by the Lord, we are being disciplined so that we will not be finally condemned with the world.
33 So then, my brothers and sisters, when you gather to eat, you should all eat together. 34 Anyone who is hungry should eat something at home, so that when you meet together it may not result in judgment.
The Words of Institution
“In the night in which he was betrayed…” Do you recognize that phrase? It is the beginning of what the church calls the “Words of Institution,” recalling the Last Supper Jesus ate with his disciples, when he declared the bread and wine of the Passover meal to be his own body and blood: “given and shed for you.” Do this, he says, in remembrance of me, thereby “instituting” what we call the Lord’s Supper, the Eucharist, or, around here, Holy Communion.
“What I received from the Lord, I passed onto you.” Paul wasn’t at the Last Supper, but he had spent several years hanging out with Peter, Luke, Priscilla, Barnabas, and a bunch of the first generation followers. What they had received from the Lord, they passed on to Paul and others, who in turn passed on what they learned to all the churches, including the one Paul started at Corinth.
I guess it is just worth noticing, I think, that the why and the how we share Holy Communion, this meal “in remembrance of Jesus” has always been something learned, practiced, experienced, taught, and handed down.
This means that Communion isn’t optional—Jesus commands it! But it isn’t uniform. EVERY single congregation I’ve been a part of practices and thinks about communion a little bit differently. And that’s okay. That’s how it is in the Bible. The words of institution show up four times in the Bible.
· Here in 1 Corinthians, Jesus says: “This cup is the new covenant in my blood” (1 Corinthians 11:25).
· The Gospel of Luke has Jesus saying this: “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you” (Luke 22:20).
· Mark records that Jesus says: “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many” (Mark 14:24).
· And in Matthew’s account Jesus says: “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins” (Matthew 26:27b-28).
While all four connect the wine of the Jewish Passover meal with the blood of Jesus, only Matthew’s gospel connects it specifically to the forgiveness of sins. And if, by the way, you are wondering if the gospel of John is silent on this topic, HE connects communion to manna—the bread from heaven—in the Exodus wilderness. John recalls that Jesus “instituted” the eating and drinking of his body and blood, not at the Last Supper, but at the feeding of the 5000 in John 6. “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life,” Jesus says, then doubles down, saying that “whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in them” (John 6:54, 56).
Three Images for Holy Communion
It turns out that, in the Bible, there are at least three ways to understand and experience Holy Communion. I want to tell you about all three, and invite you to reflect on the imagery that is meaningful for you. Visually, the Bible gives us an ALTAR, a TABLE, and a WILDERNESS. At the altar, we experience what Christ has done FOR us for the forgiveness of sins. At the table, we experience Christ WITH us: friendship with God and fellowship with one another. And in the wilderness, we experience Christ IN us: we receive God’s provision, the living bread from heaven, food for the journey. All three of these are reflected in our worship space, in our language around communion, and in the songs we sing.
Christ FOR Us
Let’s start at the altar. An altar is the location of a sacrifice. Christ sacrificed his life on the cross FOR us. In the Exodus story it is the households of the Israelite slaves that were marked with the blood of a sacrificed lamb—those households were “passed over” by the angel of death. Throughout the Old Testament, the blood of the lamb was a sign of God’s covenant, God’s promise to bless Israel to be a blessing to the world. As a sign of the new covenant, it is the blood of Jesus by which our sins are forgiven and we are washed clean. This is what Christ Jesus has done FOR us. This is the Sacrament of the Altar. We come humbly, reverently, mindful of the great cost Jesus paid for our freedom.
I was raised with the image of the altar. The altar was up, against the wall. It was holy ground, unapproachable. In fact, I couldn’t receive communion until I was in 9th grade! Most of us, and most western Christians, from Roman Catholics to Lutherans to Baptists have been raised in this imagery. The blood of Christ, shed for us. The forgiveness of sins. The Sacrament of the Altar. So much of our hymnary and modern worship songs reflect this emphasis:
How deep the Father's love for us, how vast beyond all measure
That He should give His only Son, to make a wretch His treasure…
…Why should I gain from His reward? I cannot give an answer
But this I know with all my heart: His wounds have paid my ransom
So, if you are new to the church thing, language around the “blood of Christ” is a sort of shorthand for talking about the promise of the forgiveness of sins demonstrated and won through the death and resurrection of Jesus, recalled in this sacrament: Whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim Christ’s death until her comes again.
Christ WITH us
But it is not the only image and experience of communion that has been received and passed on. Those who critique of the Christian church today wonder why we fixate on sin—and how in the world we can argue that a human sacrifice could possibly solve anything!
So think about a table instead. A wedding banquet hall. And that communion is about Christ WITH us. Come, the table is ready. Take, and eat! There is room at the table for everyone! Followers of Jesus gather for this meal, Jesus is there, his presence revealed as the gifts of God are passed around. The bread is shared, not broken. The emphasis is the shared cup, not the blood sacrifice. The cup is the new wine of the Holy Spirit passed around and poured freely.
The sanctuary of Faith was originally designed to reflect the image of the table. The altar table was in the middle of the room. The congregation came forward, gathered around, and shared the bread and the wine, then sent off with a blessing. Communion is a foretaste of the feast to come: a bunch of forgiven sinners eating a meal with Jesus. If the tragedy of the garden of Eden is that the friendship between Adam, Eve, and God is fractured, then the communion table is where the relationship is reconciled, renewed. Come to the table.
Let us build a house where love is found in water, wine, and wheat: a banquet hall on holy ground where peace and justice meet. Here the love of God, through Jesus, is revealed in time and space; as we share in Christ the feast that frees us: All are welcome, all are welcome, all are welcome in this place!
Christ IN us
The Altar. Christ FOR us. The forgiveness of sins.
The Table. Christ WITH us. A Foretaste of the Feast to Come.
And the Wilderness. Christ IN us. Food for the journey. Manna from heaven. We ARE what we eat.
In the Exodus wilderness God provided the people with manna from heaven as their daily bread. Food for their wilderness journey, freely given. No one had too little. No one had too much.
John 6 tells about how Jesus feeds 5000 people, blessing, multiplying, and distributing the loaves and fish. Everyone has enough to eat, we are told, with 12 baskets left over! As in the Exodus wilderness, God provides bread from heaven, daily bread, food for the journey. But Jesus takes it one step further. I am the living bread from heaven, he declares. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, for I am in them, and they are in me. We are, after all, what we eat. So as Christ’s flesh nourishes our flesh, and as the blood of Christ begins to course through our veins, the Church becomes the BODY of Christ. We are IN Christ. Christ is IN us.
I think during COVID we learned to embrace this imagery. Church wasn’t something we could go TO. Church became something that we had to embody. Those little pre-sealed packages of wafer and juice were manna from heaven. Reminders of God’s provision and presence, yes, and also food that equipped us to be Christ to one another and to the world during a pandemic.
O bread of life from heaven, O food to pilgrims given, O manna from above: feed with the blessed sweetness of your divine completeness the souls that want and need your love. (ELW 480)
Conclusion
So come to the Altar of the Lord: here is the forgiveness of sins. Or come to the Table of the Lord: Christ is with us. Or come to the wilderness. here is the Living Bread from Heaven.
Amen. Next week we are going to take a closer look a little closer at our practice of Holy Communion—our manners, our habits, how we set the table and clean up. How old should a person be? Kneeling or standing? Gluten-free? Open or closed communion? We will come back to this passage from 1 Corinthians 11—the apostle Paul has a few things to say about what he sees happening on Sunday mornings in their worship and communion practices! My hope is that by thinking about this, talking about it, discerning together as God’s people—wherever you are—our communion practices will both honor God and nourish our faith.
May the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ strengthen you, nourish you, comfort you, and give you peace. Amen.
Thanks for listening, everyone. To learn more about Faith, go to our website, www.faithshelton.org. While you are there, like us, subscribe, donate, or sign-up for our newsletter. You can subscribe to this podcast on most podcast platforms, including Spotify, Apple, and Google.
Pour out upon us the Spirit of your love, O Lord, and unite the wills of those whom you have fed with this one heavenly food, for the sake of Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.