"Thinking Eternally, Acting Locally." - Neal August
A reply to a very good friend concerning my article on the Lord's Supper.
Some things to ponder...when the Corinthian passage says examine yourself...in context, what or who is this referring to? It seems that one could surmise that Paul is saying "examine yourself to see if you have waited for everyone to arrive and eat/drink" In other words, does the "examine yourself" really refer to any sin? Shouldn't we examine ourself everyday for sin? Why is it tantmount that we examine ourself for any sin before eating bread and drinking wine? It's almost like we need to be perfect before partaking. I'm wondering if Paul is just saying, "Make sure you don't chow down and get drunk before everyone can participate?" In other words, what does "unworthily" mean? Are any of us worthy of drinking the cup and eating the bread? Aren't we only made worthy b/c of what Jesus has done? And are we made worthy by thinking about any recent sin and confessing it? If an unbeliever happens to eat the bread and drink the cup, is he condemned because he did this? Or is he condemned because He does not know Christ?
I went back to re-exegete this passage about the Lord’s Supper (1 Cor 11:17-34) in light of your comments and with reference to church discipline (1 Cor 5).
This passage (1 Cor 11:17-34) is very difficult to understand and it did take me a long time to get my mind around the theme of the passage and then to understand all of its various parts.
Again, this passage is about communion and the coming together as a body without divisions. Of course, it is well known that the Corinthian church had numerous factions within it which Paul is addressing in this particular letter. In 1 Cor 11:17-34, Paul is addressing problems that have occurred in communion because of these divisions and is doing so by teaching what is proper in light of the revelation of Christ.
In Corinth, sins of gluttony, drunkenness and abuse of the poor are causing divisions within the Lord’s Supper (or communion). Such divisions are bad enough in of themselves, but they are worse because such divisions are occurring during communion – THE RITUAL WHOSE VERY PURPOSE IS TO COMBAT DIVISIONS. That such church divisions are occurring during the Lord’s Supper is shocking to Paul.
It’s like the organizers of a charity for the poor using that time to rob the poor.
It’s like a bride flirting with the best man as she’s marrying the groom.
It’s like firing a secretary on Secretary Appreciation Day.
And so on …
Paul recounts the purpose of the Lord’s Supper and all that it means in light of Christ’s sacrifice. Paul even refers to His betrayal (possibly a reference to Judas who betrayed Christ and the disciples after having a fellowship meal with them).
Thus the one who attends the Lord’s Supper and does so not out of love, fellowship and COMMUNION but in a spirit of factions, divisions and EXCLUSION, this one does so in an unworthy manner.
Thus, to deny communion with other believers is, in fact, to commit the very error for which Paul seeks to address in 1 Cor 11:17-34.
Therefore, those who are unworthy to attend communion are sinners, but sinners with a specific sin: the sin of division and exclusion.
Of course, in this passage, Paul is not telling the church to exclude those who exclude; he tells each of them to examine themselves.
If the church is disciplining a divider or an excluder and that person fails to repent, then the person should not be at the Lord’s Supper to begin with. He or she should be exiled until they repent. Now if the unrepentant sinner is attending the Lord’s Supper because the church fails discipline then unrepentant sinners attending communion is the least of that church’s worries.
There are only two Scriptural reasons to justify any particular closed communion:
1) Unbelief
2) Unrepentant Sin (1 Cor 5)
Thus, to deny another believer’s access to communion because he is not a member of your local church or is not a member of your particular Christian tradition is to assert that the other believer, because he is not of your local church or Christian tradition, is either an unbeliever or a sinner of it. And because it is not our table and because it is the Lord’s Table, anyone who denies another believer’s access to communion appropriates for themselves the prerogatives of God and Christ.
So I think we need to take “unworthily” within the context of this passage. It is true that because all our sinners then no one is really worthy of communion with God in Christ. However, matters are only worsened by divisions and exclusions in the Lord’s Supper. To divide and exclude during communion is to directly and explicitly go against the explicit and direct purpose of communion.
This is why I consider it blasphemous on so many different levels to practice closed communion. Such an act is as about as bad a sacrificing a pig on the altar of the Lord in the Temple. Communion is at the very heart of the Christian Faith. It is its center. It is the most important ritual and sacrament. It is far more important than Baptism. Perhaps those from Christian traditions that understand the Lord’s Supper as symbolic presence and not transubstantiationary tend to lessen its importance. A fair criticism in my experience. In fact, even though we all know how important the Lord’s Supper is to Roman Catholics, I really do not think that they take it serious enough. I really do not believe that they properly understand it, but perhaps they do so more than Southern Baptists.
Yes, communion is symbolic but its symbolic meaning is the most important meaning that man has yet understood. Its meaning is the center of our Faith. Its meaning sums up the entirely of Scripture from Adam to Christ, from Genesis to Revelation. Its meaning sums up the problems of Man and the answer to his salvation. It sums up the two greatest commandments, it sums up the Ten Commandments, it sums up the Sermon on the Mount, and it sums up the whole of the Law. All of the Faith can be summed up in it.
This is why Paul and the other apostles took this issue so seriously. This is why meal fellowship among Jews and Gentiles was such an important issue in the early Church (Luke-Acts, Galatians, Romans, etc.). This is why Jesus time and again broke down the barriers which separated Man from Man and Man from God. Not only did He break down those barriers, He provided the mediation between such relationships: Man to Man and Man to God. Such mediation provides our salvation and is thus the symbolical meaning of the Lord’s Supper. Thus to deny another believer access to communion is to say that they are either not a believer or are sinning by not being like they are (the latter excuse was the sin of the Jews who did not want to fellowship with Gentiles because they were Gentiles).
This issue cannot be taken seriously enough.
4 comments:
Panis,
A scenario to consider...you are in a church that happens to meet in a house and they happen to practice the Lord's Supper as a meal at every weekly gathering...the "elements" are part of a meal. An unbelieving neighbor happens to come to the meeting at the house and is greeted warmly. The unbeliever is invited to eat and drink and happens to grab the bread and "juice" to eat with their meal. You have a few options: 1) You tell them to put the peice of bread and juice back, that those are only for "the church"....you offer lemonade and tortilla's instead 2) You do #1 and then expain why you think they can't eat the bread and "juice," maybe even sharing the gospel. 3) You ignore that they are eating bread and "juice" b/c it has no meaning to them b/c they aren't believers yet...you accept the fact that they are hungry and thirsty and decided that bread and juice would fill them up...when they do accept Christ, you can explain the meaning to them. 4) Another option would be to hide the bread and juice and only tell the believers of the church where you hid them that way only the believers would eat the bread and juice.
There might be other options, what would you do?
#3 is the best option. No doubt in my mind.
You're right; for an unbeliever it has no real meaning and is just bread and juice.
Also, there were times in the NT where either Paul or Jesus performed a communion meal which included hungry people who were not believers (see John 6 and Acts 27). Such actions by them conform to their own teachings on the matter.
1) 1 Cor 8:4-13: “As concerning therefore the eating of those things that are offered in sacrifice unto idols, we know that an idol [is] nothing in the world, and that [there is] none other God but one. For though there be that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth, (as there be gods many, and lords many,) But to us [there is but] one God, the Father, of whom [are] all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom [are] all things, and we by him. Howbeit [there is] not in every man that knowledge: for some with conscience of the idol unto this hour eat [it] as a thing offered unto an idol; and their conscience being weak is defiled. But meat commendeth us not to God: for neither, if we eat, are we the better; neither, if we eat not, are we the worse. But take heed lest by any means this liberty of yours become a stumblingblock to them that are weak. For if any man see thee which hast knowledge sit at meat in the idol's temple, shall not the conscience of him which is weak be emboldened to eat those things which are offered to idols; And through thy knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died? But when ye sin so against the brethren, and wound their weak conscience, ye sin against Christ. Wherefore, if meat make my brother to offend, I will eat no flesh while the world standeth, lest I make my brother to offend.”
In addressing food sacrificed to idols, Paul basically states that food is food. It means nothing in of itself except as the cure for hunger. However, while food is neither one thing nor the other, Paul here is concerned about offending others.
2) Matt 12:1-8: “At that time Jesus went on the sabbath day through the corn; and his disciples were an hungred, and began to pluck the ears of corn, and to eat. But when the Pharisees saw [it], they said unto him, Behold, thy disciples do that which is not lawful to do upon the sabbath day. But he said unto them, Have ye not read what David did, when he was an hungry, and they that were with him; How he entered into the house of God, and did eat the shewbread, which was not lawful for him to eat, neither for them which were with him, but only for the priests? Or have ye not read in the law, how that on the sabbath days the priests in the temple profane the sabbath, and are blameless? But I say unto you, That in this place is [one] greater than the temple. But if ye had known what [this] meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the guiltless. For the Son of man is Lord even of the sabbath day.”
It isn’t the bread or juice that is important but what it signifies. If someone is hungry or would like to join a meal, let them join and eat. Perhaps such fellowship will lead to their belief and recognition of what this supper really means.
I think that allowing them to eat the bread and juice causes no harm. In fact, I think it would cause harm by offending and not meeting their hunger needs - by not providing a welcome fellowship.
For what it's worth...
I read your blog (or at least, subscribe on bloglines), and agree with some of what you say, and not so much with other things. (What's new? If we agreed on everything, we'd be clones, wouldn't we?)
In any case, I agree so much with what you have written on this post, I just had to write in and let you know. It is hard to for me to figure out why more people don't see the clear biblical implications of what you are saying here.
Thank you.
My running theory on why people do not take the Biblical implications of such things seriously is that they think they are.
I believe they hold to the beliefs they first encountered and, because it is their first beliefs, hold it to be fundamental to their understanding of what is most important to them: the Faith.
They read the Scriptures but do so with a particular assumption of what particular passages mean. They read 1 Cor 11:17-34 with a particular interpretation becaus that is the only interpretation they believe is possibly true. So when someone comes along with a different interpretation, they believe that the someone is not simply incorrect (if they in fact are) but that they are deliberately denying what the Scriptures say.
There is really nothing one can do to convince them otherwise. It is an issue of pride and insecurity. People do not want to believe that they are wrong or that they were told wrong as a child. No amount of Scriptural evidence will convince them otherwise because Scriptural evidence was not the basis by which they accepted the belief.
I always recommend a good Scriptural basis for each argued belief. However, I do not think that such evidence will convince. I have found that it's best to just simply convince them that one can hold a different belief and still be a good Christian. I think that this is the best method of achieving ecumenical fellowship anyway.
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