All in Communion
There is something very special about having a meal with someone. When we sit down together and eat it joins us in a very basic way, and this understanding doesn’t escape us... we have business dinners, festival dinners, banquets to honor each other, and so many other celebratory meals that bring us together, but beyond that... we dine at the Lord’s table. When was the last time you dined with Jesus?
When Communion is offered in your church do you examine yourself to determine whether you are a believer before you participate? Do you look inward and find that you can take the bread, and the wine, while understanding it to be the body and blood of Christ... a reminder to you? There are those who believe that taking Communion improperly is an innocent attempt to go along with the crowd, while others view it to be sacrilege or sin, and there are even those who see it as a pretense designed to fool the Church. How do you approach Communion?
Jesus, is our sole path to eternity, and the bearer of God’s holiness, who, in dwelling in us brings that holiness to us. Are we ready to accept Him into ourselves? Are we prepared to allow Him to abide in us, and to take His body, and His blood as our sustenance? Many have not been, and have walked away; thus the question becomes this... “Who are we?”, and not “Who is He?”
Are we ready for the Lord’s table when we take Communion? Have we prepared ourselves body, soul, and mind to receive Him? Do we take this meal lightly or is it a moment of intense spiritual fulfillment? Of all the sacraments that we as Christians are involved in, consuming this meal should be our most spiritually anticipated... Baptism, Confirmation, Penance, Anointing the Sick, Ordination, and Matrimony, are all for not without the body and blood of Jesus offered in sacrifice for us. Are we ready to receive Him? Are we ready to take Him into our bodies?
I am writing to you today in English, but what is your native tongue? From what country, race, or people do you hail? There are those of so many different nationalities who will read this today, and even into the future; this is truly a missionary outreach to all the world. As Christians we know no borders, and there is no limiting language. The blood of Jesus Christ has made us as one, and brought us together by that common calling of which Revelation speaks... into the people and priests of one Holy Kingdom!
This morning I contemplate the body of Christ as taken at Communion. This gift that is more than a passing thought, but something which becomes part and parcel of us mentally, spiritually, and yes, physically. When at the Lord’s Table, do you realize how perfect the remembrance of Christ should be to you? This is an act in which our being is joined perfectly with His through His blessing, and by His hand.
There is great mystery in the blood of Jesus, a newness that isn’t seen anywhere else in the Bible. The symbolism in the blood of communion is beyond rich, and gives us more than purification and forgiveness... it changes our lives completely, and cuts us off from the old life we were once living. The blood of Jesus requires that we make a choice... to continue on as we have been, or to drink of it and be called out... made other.
Do you have sacrificial blood on your clothing? How about on the door of your household? No? Maybe you have it on the ground around you, in your prayer closet, or sprinkled on your Bible? Is the answer still no? Well there was a time when this would have been the case, but now that is no longer necessary because of the New Covenant we have with God in Jesus Christ. Today we consume the blood in Holy Communion in remembrance, and it is in each of us.
Are you purified as a Heavenly thing? Do you acknowledge in communion that the blood of Jesus Christ has cleansed you of sin, but also that it purified you in preparation for a heavenly existence? How often do we take communion and casually remember Jesus? Even worse, how many times do we take communion without thinking at all? This is the danger of repetition, but if repetition is performed with the proper preparation, it strengthens our memory, and makes an act so natural to us that we can perform it, believe it, perfectly each time.
What do you think of during communion? What was happening on that day of the first communion in which Jesus offered the bread of His body and the cup of His blood to the disciples? On that day they were celebrating the Passover feast, eating the Seder meal, and it has a certain order and meaning to all of its parts. Every movement, every food, each cup of wine has meaning and timing. When did Jesus offer Himself to His disciples? What did it imply?
Do you dwell on who Jesus Christ is? When asked about Him do you tell of what He did, how He redeemed you, and taught you things like loving your neighbor as yourself? These things are all true, but do you also tell them that He is the jar that holds the essence of your life, the container in which you dwell? Do you reveal to them that He has so changed you that He has become engrained in your very DNA; so completely intertwined that to extract Him would certainly certainly destroy you? If you can tell them this, then your faith has become the fullness of Christ, and you are no longer about Christ, but in Him.
What nourishes your faith? What does you Spirit consume for strength? When we go to the Lord’s table we are feeding our souls His flesh and blood, and this sustenance bring us life, eternal life. To consume the body of Christ is to bring Him inside us... to allow Him to dwell within us. Communion, it is the life giving force of the Christian experience.