Communion meditation

One of my frustrations as a pastor, and, I suspect a frustration shared by many a pastor, is how a congregation will gather en masse for a Palm Sunday worship service and a week later gather for the celebration of the resurrection, Easter, and just skip over everything that happened in the days that intervened between the time Jesus entered Jerusalem on that donkey while people shouted “Hosanna!” (“Save us now!”) to that day the women discovered Jesus’ body was no longer in the tomb – that God had resurrected him and given him a new and glorious body. If we are to take Holy Week as not just one long celebration capped off with an Easter egg hunt and lots of chocolate, but, rather to march through the week really contemplating how those days played out as people gathered from far and wide to solemnly observe Passover and give thanks to God for saving them those many years ago, then we are missing the whole point of what it means to be a Christian.

Now I have several Jewish readers and I want to say quickly how I do honor the Jewish faith and look to my Jewish brothers and sisters as family in the faith. God has covenants with the Jewish people and God will be true to every one of those promises. That’s the God of the Jews and the God of the Christians. As you, my Jewish friends, gather for your Passover meals next month, I think of you and celebrate with you and your ancestors. I am grateful for our one God.

If I recall correctly, on the night of Jesus’ Last Supper, the Passover meal, he pointed out that one of those sitting at the table with him would betray him. We all know it was Judas. The disciples all figured out it was Judas that Jesus fingered. But when we think about it, didn’t Peter betray him when he refused three times to even admit that he knew his Lord and Savior? Didn’t the rest of the disciples betray him when they all fled for their lives and took cover for fear of what would happen to them?

It kind of makes one wonder if Jesus was a very good judge of character. After all, he chose these twelve and the assorted others who were so close to him. He called them to various tasks, just as you and I are called to various tasks in the church and outside of the church.  Did Jesus make a horrible mistake when he called these people?  Has God made a terrible mistake by calling us?

In Paul’s story in Corinthians of the Lord’s Last Supper, he has sandwiched this in as an illustration, sort of like I would use as a sermon illustration, of how people are to behave with one another in the church. So often Christians hear their pastors repeat these words of institution in the breaking of the bread and the pouring of the juice that many could probably get up and say them by heart themselves:

²³ For I received from the Lord what I also handed on to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took a loaf of bread, ²⁴ and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” ²⁵ In the same way he took the cup also, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” ²⁶ For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.

²⁷ Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be answerable for the body and blood of the Lord. ²⁸ Examine yourselves, and only then eat of the bread and drink of the cup. ²⁹ For all who eat and drink without discerning the body, eat and drink judgment against themselves. – 1 Corinthians 11:23-29

The problem, of course, is that when words are repeated by rote, we forget what they really mean. Paul makes it clear that even the young Corinthian Church (and, remember, this letter to the Corinthians was written before the gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke) has forgotten what it is they are supposed to remember when they come to the table. The church is at odds with itself. The members are fighting. Some are putting themselves above others and disputing the leadership. And when they come to the table, they are not giving thought to what they are about here. It’s just something they do in the church. They don’t remember or they put out of their minds or they figure it’s no big deal that Jesus was giving his body and his blood – real body and real blood – to become the new sacrificial lamb so that we would never again have to sacrifice animals to please God. They are pompous and self-righteous and indignant that they should approach the throne of God in humility rather than in self-serving arrogance.

But Paul, after sharing Christ’s words, the words of institution, regarding the breaking of the bread and the pouring of the cup, levels a warning to those who are coming to the table without thought of others, without thought for the unity of the church, without thought for those who do not have enough bread and juice in order to just exist. He says if we drink of the Lord’s body in such an unworthy manner, we will be answerable ourselves for the body and blood of the Lord.

In other words, Paul says, yes, we do this in remembrance of Jesus, but our remembrance is not just something of the past, but of the present. When we are at the Lord’s table, we are just as guilty as those original 12 who sat at the table with him 2,000 years ago because we are denying him, betraying him when we think we are there for our personal satisfaction. Paul goes on to say, “Examine yourselves, and only then eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For all who eat and drink without discerning the body, eat and drink judgment against themselves.”

That means all who eat and drink without discerning the unity of the body of Christ – the church – are bringing judgment against themselves.

The Corinthians were doing it then. We haven’t improved on that situation. We do come to the table for our personal satisfaction and in so doing we are corrupting the body of Christ – we are dividing it; we are truly and literally breaking the body of Christ.

Tomorrow is called Maundy Thursday. We get the word mandate or commandment from Maundy.  And the reason that word is associated with this day in particular is because of the commandment Jesus gave to his disciples at that Last Supper, that Passover meal: “I give you a new commandment,” he said, “that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.” (John 13:34)

It has long been a running joke that when we look at DaVinci’s portrait of the Last Supper that everyone seems to be posing for that portrait because they are all sitting on the same side of the table. It really makes no sense. Unless, of course, we look at that open side as our invitation to join Jesus at that table. There is plenty of room at it.

The question is whether he will finger us as ones who are betraying him. Has he used bad judgment in loving us? Or has he set an example for how we are to love one another?

The song lyrics go, “Were you there when they crucified my Lord?” For those of us who call ourselves Christians, our answer must be a resounding yes. We were there. We are there. We are bringing judgment against ourselves if we come to the table with intent to divide, to break the body of Christ, by being at the table out of a sense for our personal satisfaction.

Thank God for the Good News of Christ’s love of us.  In spite of who we are, he loves us yet, loves us still, and died to prove it – not to God, but to prove it to us by being that living example of how we are to live that new commandment to love one another as he has loved us.

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