Episode Transcript
[00:00:04] Good morning, church. There it is. There it is.
[00:00:08] What a joy to be together with you guys today. Man. I am excited for what God has for us. We are continuing this series today that we're calling the Passion of Jesus, where we are walking through these last days of Jesus's life, the last few hours leading up to his betrayal and his death on the cross. If you guys have been with us, we. Last week we, we looked at this really heavy text. We, we talked about the betrayal of Judas, right? We talked about, we looked about, by the way, through the lens of this idea that we're all Judas, that all of us are traitors, that we participate in this inversion of trust and connection, but that Jesus chooses the way of the cross anyway.
[00:00:59] The Passion narrative shows to us, reveals to us that we follow a Jesus who chooses the cross, who chooses salvation, who chooses forgiveness in the face of the fact that we are all sinners and traitors.
[00:01:13] And today we're going to lean into that same idea from a little bit of a different perspective because we're actually going to take a little bit of a turn today in this overarching Passion narrative. These texts are going to be really just hard hitting one after the other from this point to the point of the cross. But today is a little bit of a diversion because we're going to talk about Christ's kind of setting up and instituting the Lord's Supper or what we call communion. And listen, there's some really interesting history and context here. And this will probably be a little more teachy in some ways as we talk about doctrine and the way we practice it here in the church.
[00:01:52] But really this is such an appropriate place to talk about this facet of the Christian life. Not just because it's where we are in the narrative. It is where we are in the narrative. Right. So we'd have to skip over it to not talk about it. But also because communion has such power to draw us to the truth of the cross.
[00:02:13] Communion is this thing that Christ gave us as a gift, which really does bring the cross and the power of the Gospel into sharp relief for us today. And so ultimately, what we're going to see today, even though we are going to get. I am going to get a little teachy for a few minutes, really what we're going to see today is the truth that Jesus is the bread and the wine, that he truly is, that he is our life.
[00:02:37] We spent a lot of time as pastors digging through this doctrinally over the last few months that there was kind of a discussion that came up for us as the elders where we were digging through and going, man, what are our convictions around communion? And so we don't do this super often, but part of the role of pastors in the local church is to defend doctrine, right? And to define it when it needs to be done. And so we spent time digging through and working through our convictions. And I got to tell you guys, you know, most of the time, most of the time, our four pastors, when we dig in on some area of doctrine and come together, we just kind of come together. Like that's, it's just, it's just a really beautiful thing about how God has built unity in this church. This was a harder one. We were digging through some nuances and caveats and details and it took a while to get to a place of unity together as pastors. But I really, I'm really excited to bring to you what we're talking about today because there is a unity amongst our pastors in terms of our conviction in this area.
[00:03:41] It essentially comes down like this.
[00:03:43] Communion is a gift from God.
[00:03:46] It is a gift from God to us. It's commanded for believers and we're going to talk about some practicalities of it or hopefully demystify it for us. But ultimately the important thing to remember is that communion is given to us by Jesus as a gift.
[00:04:03] It connects us to other Christians across space and time. It reminds us of God's redemptive story throughout history and into the future in our own lives and in Christ's ultimate return. But more than that, communion helps us to connect with our Savior in a unique and I think, life giving way. So pray with me. We're going to jump into this text. Jesus, we thank you so much for the gift of this morning.
[00:04:29] Lord, thank you for time to be together with brothers and sisters, to sing beautiful songs, to come to you in prayer, to read your word. Lord, we pray that in all of this today and every facet of this gathering that you would be glorified, that your presence would be known, that we would feel you in our midst, that we would connect with you in the way our hearts need. Lord, for those of us who need to today to be a day of confession and repentance and drawing to you. Lord, I pray that you would do that. For those of us who need today to be a day of refreshment and encouragement. I pray that you would do that, Lord, out of whatever's going on in our lives. I pray that you would do the work, Holy Spirit, of drawing us to deeper intimacy with you today and that we would leave today in a place of worship and joy and connection.
[00:05:13] God, we need you for this work. So we pray it in your name, Jesus. Amen.
[00:05:19] Okay, we're going to be in Matthew 26 today. If you want to go ahead and turn there. If you don't have a Bible with you, we have house Bibles around the room. Go ahead and snag one. We really believe in the importance of access to God's word here. And so if you don't own one, I'd strongly encourage you to just take one home or talk to one of the pastors. We'll get you one that's nicer. We're in Matthew 26.
[00:05:39] Starting in the 26th verse, we read this.
[00:05:43] As they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, gave it and gave it to the disciples and said, take and eat, this is my body.
[00:05:53] Then he took a cup, and after giving thanks, he gave it to them and said, drink from it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. But I tell you, I will not drink from this fruit of the vine from now until the day when I drink it. New with you in my Father's kingdom. And after singing a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.
[00:06:17] Okay, so this is a relatively well known text. At least it should be in this room, right? Like, we at least reference this story every time we gather in Emmanuel. But it's very simple.
[00:06:30] Jesus is going through a Passover Seder dinner with his friends, and he takes them through the Lord's Supper, right? The bread and the wine. We know that bit. He tells them that he won't take of it again until his resurrection. This is because of his coming death.
[00:06:45] And then they sing a song and they eat. Like that's the whole story, right? Like it's very. A very simple thing. They eat dinner, they go through the ceremony. Jesus tells him stuff, they sing a song, and then we leave. But let's dig into this a little bit and look at a little bit of the history in context. I think this will really help us better understand this text. We had to start first with the whole idea of Passover. Now, I'm sure several of you have actually at some point participated in what's called a Seder dinner. That's the name for the special dinner and ceremony that Jews have observed at Passover time for literal thousands of years. It has its origins in Exodus 12. This is the story when Israel was sitting in bondage. They were enslaved by Egypt. And God freed the Israelites from their slavery. He closed out their oppression, right? And he did that through these terrible plagues upon the Egyptians. And the whole story, it ends with this incredibly haunting and memorable night that God commands the Israelites to commemorate.
[00:07:55] So if you remember the story, the very last plague that God visits upon the Egyptians is a plague of the death of the firstborn.
[00:08:04] Tells Egypt, I will send my angel of death through your midst. And every firstborn, from the son of Pharaoh down to the slaves and the servants will die.
[00:08:15] And then he tells Israel to set them apart.
[00:08:19] Get ready. Because once this happens, they're going to want you to leave. They're going to be mad and upset. They're going to make you leave very quick. So pack your stuff and get ready. And to save yourself from this coming wrath, this judgment, you will slaughter a lamb and spread its blood across your doorpost. And when the angel of death sees the blood of the lamb on the doorpost, he will pass over your home and will go just to the homes of the Egyptians. And that's what happens. They pack up their stuff, they eat their dinner in haste. They don't even have time to let their bread sit and rise. So they eat flat bread with dinner. They roast the lamb. They eat it. They literally eat it with their clothes packed, their bags next to them at the table.
[00:09:06] And the angel of death goes through Egypt and passes over every home with blood, and every home without blood. The firstborn dies.
[00:09:14] It's a really intense story.
[00:09:19] This final moment of judgment on Egypt was a moment of redemption and freedom for Israel.
[00:09:27] God had moved in supernatural power. He had injected himself into human history to redeem his people and give them freedom. This is, guys, a picture of the larger Gospel narrative of the whole of scripture.
[00:09:42] This idea that we are in need and God redeems us. Man has sinned, and God intervenes to bring about redemption. God wove this into the very culture of Israel through the observance of Passover. Because immediately at this story, like in the moment when they're fleeing, he commands them to annually commemorate this experience of being redeemed out of Egypt. And Jews celebrate and observe this up until today.
[00:10:11] And God commanded and described a special dinner.
[00:10:14] Think of Thanksgiving with all the theological significance of Egypt or Egypt of Easter. Think of those mixed together, right? Here's a picture of a Seder dinner plate. If you've never seen or been a part of a modern Seder, it's full of all these specific recipes and rituals and specific blessings. It's beautiful, by the way. You should do it like it points to Christ in a really beautiful and specific, powerful way. If you've never been a part of one, you should. But. But it's this very. Like today, at least, it's this very structured ritual mixed with a big family dinner right in the middle of it right now. In Jesus's day, we know that the Seder, the Passover dinner, wasn't as regimented as it is today.
[00:10:58] And we know that, like, pretty positively in history. After the destruction of the temple in 70 AD, Jewish culture really rallied around some of these specific ceremonies like Passover, and gave them added layers of ritual to help keep their people drawn together when they had lost access to the temple. But even in Jesus's day, we know the skeleton of the ritual is there. The main elements, the cups of wine, the unleavened bed, the unleavened bread, the blessings, they're all there.
[00:11:29] And I say that all as a whole lot of setup.
[00:11:33] I say that all because it's important to understand this scene. When we think of the Lord's Supper, when we think of our partaking in communion, really, we are partaking in an incredibly abbreviated experience of what is a much larger ceremony.
[00:11:51] Now, we know that early Christians didn't observe a whole Passover Seder every time they took communion. In fact, there's strong historical evidence to believe that the earliest Christians took communion every single time they gathered.
[00:12:05] But for the purpose of our text, it's important to note that Jesus was taking this existing religious experience, the Passover Seder dinner, and he was infusing it with all sorts of new meaning. But this dinner already had tons of meaning. It was already talking about these deep connections in the larger biblical narrative of God's redemption. But Jesus is taking this redemption motif of Passover, Passover, and connecting it to himself, to his own ministry. And there's all sorts of little bits of the. The Passion story, especially this part where you go, oh, yeah, that's a Seder thing. Like, if you remember last week when Jesus talks about the betrayal of Judas, he says, oh, the one who has dipped his hand in the bowl with me. And we kind of go, that's weird. What do you. What do you. That's part of a Passover Seder. That's part of the ceremony near the beginning is to dip in salt water and to do it as a reminder of the bitter tears of slavery, the reality of the curse and sin. Jesus is saying he's. He's taking his bit and connecting the betrayal of Judas to the larger reality of the curse and sin.
[00:13:21] There are four specific cups of wine that are shared during a Seder dinner. Each one's connected to a specific part of the story of Exodus. And each one has its own meaning and its own blessing. The first cup they would drink is the cup of sanctification, or the cup of promise. It's connected to God seeing the Israelites in their bondage and slavery. The second cup is the cup of deliverance. It's connected to the 10 plagues. And after the second cup, there's this break for the people to kind of eat the main dinner, like to go into Thanksgiving mode. And this is where our text picks up from last week and this week. It's while they're eating the dinner, Jesus has handed out the unleavened bread. And there's this very specific part of the Passover Seder that's connected to the bread. And we don't know how much like this is part that actually isn't recorded in history. There's a whole lot of ritual around the handing out of the bread in the middle of the dinner now. And we don't know how much of that existed in Jesus's day, but we know that some of it was there, the unleavened bread and this blessing that God has given us bread, he provides for us. He's the one who caretakes for us. And then there is this cup.
[00:14:32] It isn't just about God's provision in the face of uncertainty. God gives us food when we're hungry. It's about God's specific provision for the reality of sin. And this is where Jesus invests this new meaning here. When he breaks the bread, he says, this is my body broken free.
[00:14:52] Take and eat. Right? It's not just about manna in the desert. It's not just about blessed be the Lord who brings bread from the ground to feed us. No, no, no, no, no.
[00:15:02] There's something here in your need because of sin that I'm providing with myself. This is my body. Take and eat.
[00:15:10] And then he goes through another cup.
[00:15:14] This would have been the third cup in the Passover called the cup of redemption.
[00:15:21] And it called back to God's promise, his promise to redeem Israel from Egypt.
[00:15:27] And the text in Exodus tells us that God remembered his promise to Abraham, remembered his people.
[00:15:34] This is where the cup of redemption comes in. In Jesus day, this cup was already dripping with meaning. Dripping with meaning.
[00:15:43] Remember, they're. They're actively being oppressed. They've been conquered by the Roman Empire. These people were longing for God to send a Messiah to redeem Israel. Away from Rome, they were eagerly awaiting a promised redemption.
[00:16:00] And so Jesus grabs a hold of that energy and takes it and injects new meaning. This cup is my blood poured out for you, the blood of the new covenant.
[00:16:15] Now this is really striking at the root of the whole new meaning that Jesus is injecting into the Passover Seder.
[00:16:24] Guys, they were already his followers. They were already familiar with all of these practices.
[00:16:32] And at its heart, Passover was designed to draw these first century Jews back to the covenant promises of the Old Testament. The story of the Old Testament is a story of these covenants where God makes connections and promises and builds relationship with his people. I will be your God, you will be my people. That's the story of the Older Testament. There's only one problem with this, and if you've read the Old Testament, you already know what it is.
[00:17:01] This old covenant didn't work.
[00:17:04] It didn't work because this is the story of the Older Testament. God made man for deep and intimate connection with him, but man keeps sinning.
[00:17:15] There's this continual cycle of God interjecting himself in human history and making promises to restore things and forgiving people for their sin and providing for them. And then man turning around and breaking covenant and sinning and falling away from God and experiencing all the effects of the curse just over and over and over and over and over. The covenant was beautiful.
[00:17:38] It was God's provision of grace for his people. But they could never live up to it.
[00:17:45] They could never hold their end. He had given them his commands and his instructions, but time and time again, generation after generation, God's people simply couldn't find it in themselves to actually obey the covenant.
[00:18:02] They just couldn't do it. They couldn't keep God's law. They kept turning back to sin.
[00:18:10] And this is the story of the Old Testament.
[00:18:13] You can go read Judges and it gets like encapsulated down into like a chapter at a time.
[00:18:19] God. God saves them. They go, oh God, so awesome. We're going to turn to him. We're going to be faithful. And then a couple months later, they're like, yeah, but Baal's pretty cool too. And then they turn away and then they just repeat the cycle over and over and over.
[00:18:32] It's prompted several of the prophets to look forward to a new covenant.
[00:18:39] We need something new. We need a new covenant where God might pour out even more grace to overcome our sin. And Our disobedience.
[00:18:49] In Jeremiah 31, the prophet says it like this.
[00:18:52] Look, the days are coming. This is the Lord's declaration when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. This one will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors in the day I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, Passover, my covenant that they broke, even though I am their master. The Lord's declaration instead, this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel. After those days, I will be their God and they will be my people. Or the Lord's declaration, I will. I will put my teaching with them and write it on their hearts. I will be their God and they will be my people. No longer will one teach his neighbor or brother, saying, know the Lord, for they will all know me, from the least to the greatest of them. This is the Lord's declaration, for I will forgive their iniquity and never again remember their sin.
[00:19:47] The prophet points forward and says, the old covenant of law keeping isn't working. And it's not a God issue, it's an us issue.
[00:19:57] We keep breaking covenant. We need something new where God takes the whole thing and puts it on his shoulders.
[00:20:07] And God says, yeah, I can do that.
[00:20:10] I can do that.
[00:20:11] In fact, that day is coming when I will make a new covenant, not like the old one.
[00:20:18] And listen, it wasn't like Israel had a huge part of the load to bear in the old one.
[00:20:23] God says, I took them by the hand and led them out of Egypt. I intervened in history. I was their grace, their protector, their master, their father, their God. And they still couldn't do it.
[00:20:36] So we'll do a new one.
[00:20:38] And in this one, instead of me giving you my law written on tablets of stone, and you have to teach one another and you got to figure out how to obey it, I'm going to put the law into your heart.
[00:20:48] I love this line. No one will have to teach anyone about God because they'll already know him.
[00:20:55] Already know Him.
[00:20:56] His law will be in their hearts.
[00:20:59] Then he says, and I'm gonna forgive their sin. And I won't even remember it anymore.
[00:21:05] I won't even remember it. It will go out of my mind.
[00:21:10] This is a covenant where God takes all of it upon himself.
[00:21:14] I'll do the work.
[00:21:15] I'll set up the covenant. I'll build relationship. I'll forgive your sin. I'll connect. I'll do the work of connecting you with me. I'll Put my spirit within you so that you already know me. You'll have. I will do all of it. Your only role in it will be to receive it.
[00:21:33] That's a covenant I can get behind, right?
[00:21:37] Oh, my goodness.
[00:21:39] In this, Jesus tells us, is what he is doing.
[00:21:45] This is the new covenant God's people were looking forward to. And this is the new covenant. Jesus tells us in this moment that he is inaugurating his body broken, his blood poured out. It's the blood of the new covenant.
[00:21:59] No longer will God's blessing be dependent on whether or not people can keep the law. No longer will God's blessing be dependent on whether people learn enough about God. No longer will the sting of death be the defining feature of people's lives. Instead, God will write the law on their hearts. He will dwell within them. They will know him personally and he will forgive their sins.
[00:22:24] Remember them no more.
[00:22:26] Come on, church.
[00:22:28] This is what Jesus is telling us his death will accomplish. A new covenant, a new world.
[00:22:36] This is what Christ is doing. It's a fundamental change in how this earth works.
[00:22:42] And so Jesus wants us to remember this, remember this.
[00:22:49] In his telling of it, Luke reminds us that Jesus leads out on this experience by telling his followers to do this in remembrance of him, in memorial of him.
[00:23:02] It's important to note here, by the way, that the experience he's leading them through, the things he's telling them to do, to remember, points to his death.
[00:23:11] Right. My body broken, my blood poured out. Vats what he wants you to remember his death.
[00:23:18] There's something about communion specifically designed to draw us back to the cross.
[00:23:25] Jesus's life was amazing. His miracles were faith building, his teaching, his life changing, his resurrection is the linchpin of Christian belief. His ascension and eventual return, those are our expectation, our joy, our compassion. But communion brings us back to the body broken and the blood poured out.
[00:23:45] It memorializes the death of Jesus and beloved. This death has power.
[00:23:54] Now, it's important to stop here for a moment and talk about Jesus's specific language. This is a little bit of a caveat, but this has caused no end of controversy and infighting in the church over the last 2000 years.
[00:24:05] Note in our text, Jesus very literally says, this is my body, this is my blood.
[00:24:13] Note that. Right?
[00:24:14] Also note he is literally holding physical bread and physical wine, notably not his body and blood. Right? This has led many Christians over the years to read some pretty wild interpretations into communion, some pretty intense beliefs. Most famously, our Roman Catholic brothers and sisters believe that the blessing of the Priest causes a little transformation to happen. The Holy Spirit works through communion. The bread and the wine become the literal body of Christ as they are ingested. This idea developed five to 800 years after Christ's death.
[00:24:50] And we get why they would come to that. He's speaking in very plain terms. This is my body, this is my blood. During the Reformation, Martin Luther became convinced of a similar but distinct idea that Jesus literal body is somehow present in the elements, but not with them actually losing their current physicality.
[00:25:14] So there is a literal, physical presence of the body and blood of Christ, but you experience a literal presence of bread and wine.
[00:25:22] And then some of our brothers and sisters in the reformed traditions, they say, no, no, no. Jesus presence in the elements is literal, but it isn't physical. It's a spiritual presence. They're physically bread and wine, but spiritually they are Christ's body and blood. And I'll tell you guys, none of these convictions, none of these passions or these statements that people take on this, it's not like any of this is inherently sinful. And so I don't want you to hear me making fun of or making light of our brothers and sisters and their convictions on this stuff.
[00:25:54] But I do think the Bible itself points us to a significantly simpler explanation.
[00:26:01] And I think the weight of the biblical evidence points to the simpler explanation, which is this.
[00:26:08] Jesus is speaking in metaphor.
[00:26:12] Jesus famously spoke in metaphor a lot over the course of his ministry when he was trying to teach on some of the more abstract and glorious aspects of the gospel reality. Things about the nature of God and things about the nature of the gospel that were simply too complex for human experience in human minds. He used metaphors where he said things like, I am the living water, I am the true shepherd, I am the vine, I am the gate.
[00:26:44] These are moments where Jesus is imparting facets of the gospel that are simply beyond human language.
[00:26:52] And so he uses metaphors and just really quick to bring us back to like 9th grade English class, right?
[00:27:01] Metaphors and similes are ways of injecting meaning into our language. Similes are when you use like or as.
[00:27:09] And Jesus did those a lot too. The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, right? He used similes. But metaphors are a powerful way of speaking, and we all use them.
[00:27:21] Oh, my gosh. The sunset was just like burning into the evening tonight.
[00:27:27] It was washing over my backyard. Washing over me is beautiful. Sunset wasn't washing over you. That's metaphoric language. It's beautiful language. We know what you mean. When you say that, right?
[00:27:37] You're going, oh, is this beautiful, wonderful, experiential thing was happening. That kind of, My language kind of falls short of it. So I'm going to give you a metaphor because I, I think it just makes more sense here when we look at the biblical evidence on its own, not trying to inject our own interpretations or church history into it.
[00:27:59] I think it just makes sense that Jesus is doing the same thing here that he's done a lot of times in his ministry.
[00:28:07] He says, this is my body, but his body is very obviously sitting in front of them.
[00:28:14] He says, this is my blood. But at that moment, his blood was very much inside of his body.
[00:28:21] And when we say this is his body and this is his blood, in this context, I'll just tell you guys, we don't mean that literally.
[00:28:31] Jesus resurrected from the dead, his blood is currently in his resurrected, glorified body, which is currently sitting at the right hand of God in heaven, awaiting his return.
[00:28:43] And so we don't believe in our context that there is a literal thing happening here. There's a literal thing, but not a physical change.
[00:28:52] And guys, it's understand, acknowledging that Jesus's commanded communion is a memorial, is a remembrance. It doesn't downplay the importance of communion.
[00:29:04] It doesn't make it somehow less beautiful or less impactful. I'm confident that most of you who are followers of Christ, that you can attest to the truth that communion has power, has power to connect us, to connect us to the redemption story. When we partake in communion, we're doing several things all at once. Let me walk through a couple of these. When we partake in communion, we are stepping into this whole biblical narrative about redemption.
[00:29:32] We're connecting back to the same thing Passover connected back to. We're partaking in this tradition that began all the way back then and culminated in communion.
[00:29:42] Creation, sin, promise, Jesus, new creation. The whole story of the Bible is a story of redemption. It's been playing out ever since the garden. And God has been moving humanity towards this through all of time.
[00:29:56] When we take communion, we're looking back to God's redemptive acts throughout history, culminating in the cross. And we're also looking forward to God's ultimate redemptive act, when Christ returns and judges all things and restores everything to perfection and intimacy with Him.
[00:30:16] We say this a lot at ifc, but communion reminds us of this already, but not yet, right?
[00:30:24] We're proclaiming Christ's death until his return.
[00:30:28] We're saved in Jesus. But we're still awaiting his return and the wonderful restoration.
[00:30:35] But communion isn't just about thinking about the past or looking forward to the future. Communion is an incredibly present experience.
[00:30:43] Beloved, Jesus is your redeemer, here now, in this moment, today. By rightly taking communion, you draw your spirit back to the immediate and present reality of Christ in you. Jesus died for you, beloved.
[00:31:03] He forgave you. He indwells you. He is your Redeemer today, no matter what you have done, no matter what your week looked like leading up today, no matter what sin is in your heart, Christ is the Redeemer. And the new covenant overcomes your sin and your failure.
[00:31:22] We need to be drawn back to that truth regularly. Amen.
[00:31:26] Communion connects us to the redemption story, but it also connects us to one another.
[00:31:31] Communion connects us to the church across space and time.
[00:31:36] Beloved, you need to hear this.
[00:31:38] With very few exceptions, very, very few exceptions, every Christian throughout history has seen communion as the common connecting bond alongside baptism.
[00:31:51] All of us take communion quite literally. When you take communion at ifc, we gather and we take it. You are doing at the exact moment that millions of Christians around the globe are taking communion.
[00:32:06] But even, even take the moment out of it, every Sunday, millions of Christians around the globe, millions upon millions, are taking communion.
[00:32:18] Take Sunday out of it. When you take communion, you're jumping into the history of the church.
[00:32:24] With very few exceptions, very few exceptions, every Christian for the last 2000 years has partook in community.
[00:32:33] You're stepping into this ceremony alongside brothers and sisters throughout time, connects you to Timothy the APostle Paul, to St. Augustine, to John Calvin, to Abba Anthony the Great, to CS Lewis and Corrie Ten Boom and Tim Tebow and Jelly Roll.
[00:32:51] Across the spectrum, believers throughout space and history, we are all of us equal at the table of Christ.
[00:33:01] All of us are beggars who can't afford the bill and are invited to dine with the King.
[00:33:07] But beloved, communion isn't just a mental exercise. We remember and think of redemption where we remember and think of other believers. It doesn't just remind us of the gospel and the church. Communion connects us to Christ.
[00:33:21] Now, it's important to take a little caveat here because communion isn't salvific.
[00:33:25] It doesn't have some unique supernatural power to increase your salvation, to forgive your sins, or even to create a connection with Christ.
[00:33:34] Let me nuance here, because I know I just said communion connects us with Christ, but let me. Let me say why, if you were saved, if you've submitted to Jesus as your Lord and Savior, for the forgiveness of your sins.
[00:33:48] You are always connected to Christ.
[00:33:51] The Holy Spirit of God dwells within you. You have been adopted into his family. You are the temple of the living God. And if you are in Christ, that is always, always true of you.
[00:34:04] But it could and should be said that partaking in communion helps give us a unique and special awareness of that connection.
[00:34:13] Let me give an analogy here. For those of you who are married, you're always married, right?
[00:34:21] You don't have like on and off moments. You don't clock into marriage and clock out of marriage. You are always married.
[00:34:28] You're always in love with your spouse. But your anniversary dinner, that's a special moment. Yeah.
[00:34:35] It reminds you of what you love about your connection. It raises your awareness. It is unique amongst other dates and other dinners, has the power to connect you to your spouse to whom you are already connected. Right.
[00:34:50] There's something beautiful and sacred about that. Now, we need to be very careful here. Our Catholic, Orthodox and Lutheran friends, and even our Reformed friends, but they use it a little differently. They use this term called the means of grace. You ever heard that term they used in church world, the means of grace? But when our Catholic and Orthodox and Lutheran friends use this term, by it, they mean that your participation in communion is one of the means by which God bestows grace and forgiveness and salvation upon you.
[00:35:21] The partaking in the means of grace is how you participate, how you experience how you receive your salvation.
[00:35:30] Our Reformed friends, our Presbyterian friends, and things like that use the same term, means of grace.
[00:35:36] But by it they mean that it is one of the experiences that helps us personally recognize the grace we've been given through the cross.
[00:35:44] So it doesn't give you your salvation, but it helps you experience your salvation.
[00:35:49] To be totally honest, I'm hesitant to use the term because I think that's confusing to have different traditions use it to mean wildly different things. I actually agree with that latter reform definition that by it we experience the grace we've been given on the cross.
[00:36:07] But, man, if you use that term with a friend, they might think you mean something different by it.
[00:36:13] At the end of the day. I know I'm getting into a lot of the weeds here. At the end of the day, the experience of communion is very obviously sacred. It's very obviously a unique experience that helps grow our faith and connect us to Christ.
[00:36:28] So why is that then? If it's not this supernatural thing that saves us, if it's not literally the body and blood, what is it about it that is so powerful I think it's because it is a specific and commanded, acted out parable.
[00:36:44] What does that parable show us?
[00:36:47] Well, we partake, we take in a meal, we take bread and we take juice and we eat it and we drink it. And we know that eating and drinking, taking in food, is how we live and survive in this world, right?
[00:36:59] And so when we take communion, this parable reminds us that we are dependent on God for life, that we must receive the meal, that Jesus must give it to us.
[00:37:10] And it also points us to the cross.
[00:37:13] It is through Jesus's death, given that we find the life we're seeking.
[00:37:20] Our partaking in communion is a choice to obey Jesus and to proclaim the sufficiency of Jesus's work for not just your sin, but the sin of the world.
[00:37:30] And this is because, beloved, the truth is that Jesus is the bread and the wine in all the ways that matter, in all the ways that actually mean something. He is our life, he is our salvation. He gives Himself and we receive. And what we receive from him, beloved, is life.
[00:37:53] It's forgiveness, acceptance, connection, life.
[00:37:59] So what do we do with a text like this today? And I'm sorry, I've been in doctrine mode for most of them. Let me give us three specific applications and then we're going to practice.
[00:38:09] So three quick thoughts. The first one is this.
[00:38:12] I think what we see here is that communion is for believers.
[00:38:15] The spiritual reality of communion makes it impossible for non believers to engage in. I want you to hear that. I think the spiritual reality of communion makes it impossible for non believers to engage in.
[00:38:26] There is no spiritual reality happening in this experience if you don't have the Holy Spirit when dwelling within you.
[00:38:33] So if you're in this room and you're not a believer, you shouldn't take communion. Sorry.
[00:38:39] But I also want you to know, if you do, if you're like, I'm not letting them people know and I'm gonna go eat stuff. If you do, I have bad news.
[00:38:47] It's just going to be bread and juice. Nothing's going to happen to you because you can't partake in communion without the indwelling Holy Spirit.
[00:38:55] Now, there's still a wonderful invitation for you there.
[00:38:58] And the invitation is this.
[00:39:00] No one in this room has to take communion. When we take communion, it's an option. It's available. You never have to. And so if you're in this room and we take communion, you hang out with us. You're kicking the tires of Christianity. Please hang out.
[00:39:13] Don't feel pressured. To do this. In fact, I would encourage you to take that time when we're thinking through communion to reflect on the claims of the gospel.
[00:39:22] You're still considering them.
[00:39:24] So consider them afresh.
[00:39:26] Because what the people around you are doing is they're saying, christ's sacrifice, we believe, is sufficient.
[00:39:32] He sacrificed himself on the cross for our sin. That is the claim of the gospel.
[00:39:37] And so if you're in the room and you're not a believer and we begin to take communion, I would invite you to take a moment and reflect on that and reflect afresh on whether or not you believe it to be true.
[00:39:47] Because there's an invitation for you there to believe that truth, to trust in Christ, and then to receive.
[00:39:55] Number two, we should take communion often.
[00:39:58] We already do this pretty much every time we gather at ifc. But I know some of you come from church traditions where communion was monthly or quarterly or even less.
[00:40:07] I really believe the biblical evidence points us toward centering our gathering around communion.
[00:40:13] This is why we usually take communion as sort of a responsive culmination to the gathering here at ifc. We do it after we've had time to contemplate the gospel and to respond to what God is telling us.
[00:40:24] But if we're to take communion, often that raises another question for us. Can you take communion at other times?
[00:40:30] Right. Some of our brothers and sisters would argue that communion is only appropriate in a formal gathering of the church when led by an ordained pastor.
[00:40:39] And the truth is, guys, simply speaking, I just disagree with that.
[00:40:43] I would say that, yes, you can take communion in other settings besides a church gathering with a pastor. And I would say that because of this idea we call the priesthood of all believers, that the Holy Spirit dwells within all of us.
[00:40:54] Ordination is beautiful. We ordain our pastors as a way of accountability, as a way of protection for the church. But you have to know something. Ordination is something we made up.
[00:41:03] That's not a biblical idea.
[00:41:05] We view that as a way to protect the church, and I think it's important.
[00:41:08] But it's not a biblical standard. The biblical standard is that if you are in Christ, the Holy Spirit dwells within you. You are the temple, you are the priest.
[00:41:16] And I believe that gives you authority to lead communion. When you're gathered together with brothers and sisters in Christ, you can take it on a retreat, at a small group, take it wherever Christians are gathered together and are celebrating the gospel. You can take it in a hospital room with someone who's on hospice.
[00:41:34] Now, here's the caveat to that. Right.
[00:41:39] It's just because there's freedom doesn't mean there's flippancy.
[00:41:43] This is my third point. We should not take communion lightly.
[00:41:48] You should be very careful about it. Outside of the Gospel accounts, there's only one text that speaks directly to communion. It's in First Corinthians 11. It's interesting because Paul actually likely wrote 1 Corinthians 11 before the Gospels were actually written down. And it's interesting how unified it is with what we read in the Gospels.
[00:42:08] And so there's a part of this that we actually read verbatim really often, our church. It goes like this. For I received from the Lord what I passed on to you. On the night that he was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took bread when he had given thanks, broke it, and said, this is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. In the same way he took that cup after supper and said, this cup of the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink of it, in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. That sounds kind of familiar, right? We quote or reference that scription. Often Paul zones in on the same language, the same details that we read in Matthew, the Last Supper. The bread, the wine, it's all very synced up. But Paul adds a detail to the teaching because of his concern for this particular church.
[00:42:51] We skip this part usually, but the text goes on to say, so then whoever eats the bread and drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sin against the body and blood of the Lord.
[00:43:04] Let a person examine himself in this way. Let him eat the bread and drink the cup. For whoever eats and drinks without recognizing the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. This is why many are sick and ill among you and many have fallen asleep. If we were properly judging ourselves, we would not be judged. When we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined.
[00:43:25] Paul challenges the church in Corinth to take communion seriously, that it's a mixture of joy and celebration, but also self reflection on the reality of the cross, that your sin is what drove Christ to the cross.
[00:43:42] Paul warns that God takes communion seriously. We don't get those kind of warnings with other spiritual practices.
[00:43:49] There's something important about what communion represents, so important that we need to be careful to not take it lightly.
[00:43:55] So it is appropriate and good for believers to take communion when they gather. But because of the scriptural weightiness of this, we should encourage each other to be careful with this act.
[00:44:06] Similar to the biblical warning. Right? You shouldn't teach lightly. If you're in the space and you want to lead communion with our context, whether in our church or whatever, I'd strongly encourage you talk to one of the pastors, like let's, let's meet with you and talk about how to lead the church in communion in a way that leads to this right Biblical balance of joy and reflection. Man, if you want to come back up.
[00:44:30] Because at the end of the day, I've talked for way too long, but it goes like this.
[00:44:35] Communion matters.
[00:44:37] It's a big deal.
[00:44:39] Communion and baptism are the centerpiece of Christian worship. We sing songs, we read scripture, we have sermons. And those are all important and wonderful aspects of the Christian life that grow our faith. But these specific practices weren't commanded by Jesus. Communion and baptism were commanded.
[00:44:58] These beautiful acted out parables that Jesus ordered his followers to engage in to better remember him and connect with him. And here's the thing, guys, baptism is wonderful. We had one last week. It's the best.
[00:45:11] But we only baptize when people accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior and are giving themselves over to the life of the church. Baptism is wonderful, but it only happens when it happens.
[00:45:20] Communion, however, we can engage in. Every time we gather, every time we step in this space, we have an excuse to remember the gospel, to remember the cross, to bring ourselves fresh to the table and receive care and life from our loving Savior. Beloved, you could never afford this table.
[00:45:42] You could not foot the bill.
[00:45:44] But Christ invites you anyway.
[00:45:48] So we're going to do something a little different for communion today.
[00:45:53] Normally when we gather, we take time of quiet reflection. At the end of it, someone comes up and leads us through communion. We encourage you guys to grab elements on the way in. We have people passing out. We're going to do something a little different today and we're going to sit in our time of reflection. And I want you to aim your time of reflection toward communion.
[00:46:13] For those of you who are in the room, who are believers, I want you to take a minute to prepare your heart for this act.
[00:46:19] To consider the cross, consider redemption, consider your own sin, consider your own participation in what led to the cross.
[00:46:29] To think of yourself at the meal, all of us are Judas.
[00:46:34] To think of Christ who loves you, breaking the bread and handing it to you, saying, this is my body broken for you.
[00:46:41] I think of Jesus handing you the cup, saying, this is my blood poured out for you. The cup of the New covenant, a covenant of grace, covenant of forgiveness, where your sin doesn't get the final word, but the love and grace of Jesus does.
[00:46:56] And when you're ready, those of you who are able, I'm going to invite you to come out and receive communion.
[00:47:03] And so what I'm going to ask you to do when you're ready to take communion is to come up here quietly.
[00:47:08] We have hand sanitizer.
[00:47:11] It's helpful.
[00:47:13] We have prepackaged things if you're more comfortable with that.
[00:47:16] But if you don't, if you want to do something a little more visceral, I'd invite you to take the hand sanitizer, grab a piece of bread and dip it in a cup and go and take communion. I'm going to ask you guys to come up the center aisle and to go around the wings on your way out to organize it a little bit. If you're in this space and you're like, I can't walk up the aisle. It's not going to work for me today, that's fine. Just raise your hand. Jeremy will bring you elements whenever you're ready for him.
[00:47:41] We don't need to do this all at once. I'm gonna pray for us.
[00:47:45] We're gonna do that thing where the band kinda like ding, ding, ding. You know how they do when you're supposed to connect with the Holy Spirit. You know how it is.
[00:47:51] We're gonna sit in that, and I want you to reflect and connect with the Lord. When your heart is ready, come up the aisle, take the elements, and let's celebrate the gospel together. Jesus, we thank you for the table.
