Photo by Geda Žyvatkauskaitė on Unsplash
Jesus commands churches to come together for the Lord’s Supper/communion (1 Cor 11:17-34). In the churches I grew up in, and the church I now pastor, this happened on the first Sunday of the month. I’ve come to savour this a time of sweet fellowship with others around the table together and a time of receiving nourishment from Jesus together.
Christ commands this habit of faith because he meets us at the table and nourishes our faith. Here are four ways this happens.
We hear the gospel with sight, taste and touch.
The Lord’s Supper helps us hear the gospel with our other senses. The sight of the bread and the cup speak of Jesus’s body and blood. As the bread is crushed by our teeth, we hear the words of Isaiah:
“But he was pierced because of our rebellion, crushed because of our iniquities; punishment for our peace was on him, and we are healed by his wounds… Yet the Lord was pleased to crush him severely. When you make him a guilt offering, he will see his seed, he will prolong his days, and by his hand, the Lord’s pleasure will be accomplished” (Isaiah 53:5,10).
As bread and wine bring nourishment to our physical bodies, we are reminded that eternal life is found only in the bread from heaven, Jesus Christ. In him, we will hunger and thirst no more (John 6:35, 54). As the wine (or grape juice if you’re in a tradition like mine) runs along our tongues and down our throats, we hear the voice of scripture declare “The blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin” (1 John 1:7).
These are gospel truths we sing and we preach, but the Lord’s Supper gives us another way of experiencing and meditating on them. In communion, the gospel speaks to our other senses.
We see the gospel in different dimensions
We grow as the Supper preaches the gospel to us.
The supper preaches the gospel in past tense as we remember what Jesus has done. “Do this in remembrance of me” Jesus said.
The supper speaks to the present, as faith unites believers to Christ. So partaking of the elements is a participation in Christ (1 Cor 10:16-17). Christ’s word to us at communion is, “This is my body, this is my blood, for you.”
Finally, the Lord’s Supper eagerly longs for Jesus’s return. “For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes” (1 Cor 11:26). There is a joyful declaration of the gospel, while longer for the eventual return of Christ when sin and death will be gone forever.
The elements of the Lord’s Supper speak the gospel to us in the past, the present and the future. Beyond this, we also preach the gospel to each other every time we take communion. This vivid picture of the gospel, helps us better grasp the good news of Jesus Christ. It calls us to a thankful remembrance and a joyful proclamation that Jesus Christ is our Lord and Saviour.
It is a place of recommitment to Christ
On our wedding day, my wife and I made vows to each other. We committed to being with each other and for each other until death parts us. It’s a once-for-all commitment, but not a once-in-a-lifetime one. Throughout our marriage, we will need to restate that commitment in various ways because constant recommitment nourishes our faithfulness.
The Christian life, like a healthy marriage, requires habits of recommitment. Not from Jesus to us, he is forever faithful, but from us to him. His sacrifice is once for all time (Heb 10:10). Yet, our faith, our trust, and our commitment can run hot and cold. A regular habit of recommitting ourselves to Christ puts wind in our sails to persevere in faith.
The Lord’s Supper is where believers come together and recommit themselves to Christ regularly. Church historian Michael Haykin sums it up well.
“As a time of remembrance of Christ’s death for sinners and their sins (Matthew 26:28), it is an ideal occasion to confess sin and hear again those marvelous words of mercy, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9). The Lord’s Supper is where Christians declare their solidarity with the crucified Christ, and it is designed to foster repentance for our ongoing patterns of sin and to be the place where we recommit ourselves to Christ and his way.”
It affirms union with Christ and with each other in him.
In a warning against idolatry, Paul asks the Corinthian church, “The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a sharing in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a sharing in the body of Christ?” The elements on the table point us to the reality of our union with Christ. We share in the bread and the cup, because we have a share in Christ. The Lord's Supper affirms Jesus’s words in John 14:23, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.”
The Lord’s Supper also affirms our union with other believers. Partaking in communion states our solidarity with Christ and with our brothers and sisters in the church. That is why Paul strongly warns us not to partake without “recognizing the body.” The 19th century Methodist theologian William Burt Pope described the Lord’s supper as “the sacrament of union with Jesus the True Vine; and of union with one another in Him… The Supper therefore is the perfect badge of common discipleship: the mutual pledge of all the offices of brotherly love.”
The Lord’s Supper nourishes our faith as it makes us aware of our union with Christ and affirms our bond of love to the church.
As a teenager, I looked forward to communion Sunday because it meant a shorter sermon. Today, I look forward to the Lord's Supper for the ways it encourages and nourishes the sweet fellowship we have with Christ and with one another in him. William Burt Pope says, “All who profess faith in Christ’s atonement, who desire His salvation, and are willing to keep His laws, are invited to come, forbidden to remain absent.”