Full Transcript

Welcome to Share the Word. Chapter 11, Part 2 focuses on the Lord’s Supper, its purpose, importance, and meaning. In the church of Corinth, Paul needs to refocus those who’ve lost sight of the reason they sit at this table, that they drink and eat. And Pastor Paul brings great insight into this podcast today. Let’s listen in. First Corinthians 11, Part 2.

Disorder at the Lord’s Supper? This past summer’s Olympic Games in Paris got off to quite a controversial start. In the very opening ceremony, with the whole world watching, for some reason the artistic director included a tableau, as he called it, of cross-dressing or transvestite dancers posing at one point in apparent parody of Leonardo da Vinci’s famous painting of The Last Supper. You probably heard about this or read about this. Christians around the world immediately recognized the mocking intent and saw it as an intentional sacrilege. After the backlash, of course, those involved protested, No, no, no, it was just artistic freedom being displayed and not meant to insult anyone.

Uh-huh. We were talking last time about rebellion against God and God’s ways as it shows up in society and in popular culture. Hard to even imagine a more blatant example than taking the disorder and rebellion inherent in transvestism, cross-dressing, and so on, and using it to mock Christ in The Last Supper. Yikes. We’re in a section of First Corinthians’ letter now where Paul is directly addressing several things that were improper, out of order, happening right during that church’s worship services. You know, I have seen what we talked about last podcast unfortunately displayed in services I’ve attended, and I’ve seen what Paul is going to get to in the following chapters about the misuse of spiritual gifts happening in services I’ve attended.

But I’ve never seen anything quite like what he is describing in the second half of chapter 11 happening in a church service. My word. Listen. But in the following instructions, I can’t commend you because when you come together, it’s not for the better; it’s for the worse. For in the first place, when you come together as a church, there are those divisions among you, and I believe it in part, for there must be factions among you so that those who are genuine can be recognized. But when you come together, it’s not for the Lord’s Supper that you’re eating, for in eating each one is going ahead with his own meal, Paul has heard this.

One goes hungry, another gets drunk. What? Don’t you have houses to eat and drink in, or do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who come and have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I commend you in this? No, I will not.

He’s talking, of course, about services of the Corinthian church where communion, as we call it, was observed by the members. Paul calls it here the Lord’s Supper because it’s supposed to be something of a solemn recreation of Jesus’ last Passover meal with his disciples the night he was betrayed and arrested. From the beginning, this was the special way that Jesus instructed his followers to perpetually remember what he ultimately did for us on the cross to become our Savior. It sounds like the circumstances communion was being observed in the Corinthian church was in connection with what we might think of as a kind of church potluck supper. People brought food and drinks from home, and everybody ate supper at church, and then at some point observed communion together as part of that meal. There’s certainly nothing wrong with that in concept.

I’ve been in church families where we’ve observed communion after having dinner together. Usually, each family brought something to share, and we set up a buffet of sorts. Everyone tried everybody else’s dishes and desserts. Eating together as a church family actually fosters some kind of communion, which is what it’s all about: the spirit of togetherness, oneness. That’s appropriate. And then to share the Lord’s Supper in that environment, that’s good.

That’s what communion means: sharing in common or mutual participation. I’ve enjoyed that way of sharing communion in the past, rather than just a tag on to the end of a service, which is the way it often happens. But Paul says the Corinthians’ get-togethers for this purpose were doing far more harm than good. In fact, he says, You’re not even celebrating the Lord’s Supper at all. Apparently, people were bringing food all right, but only for themselves and for their clique. The I am of Paul clique sitting in one area, the I am of Apollos faction in another area, the exact opposite of the idea of communion.

And worse, remember, many of the people in these early churches were slaves. Can you imagine the well-to-do families bringing all kinds of dishes for a nice spread, while others there had little or nothing, and eating right in front of them, humiliating them? Others were treating the occasion like a Saturday night out with friends, getting drunk, acting foolish, like they were at an office party. What in the world is going on there? Paul wonders. You are despising the church of God like this?

What’s wrong with you people? Christians should see the Lord’s Supper as a solemn time to reflect and remember the sufferings of Christ for us. It commemorates the most awful but most wonderful thing that’s ever happened, when the Lord of glory willingly laid down His life as an atonement for our sins, when He was crucified on Calvary for us. The elements of bread and wine represent His body broken and His blood shed, which make a way of salvation available for us. Ignorant non-Christians doing something as tasteless as that spectacle at the Olympic ceremony, that’s one thing. But how in the world could Christians be doing the things apparently that were happening in the churches of the Corinthians?

Paul wanted to know. You think I should commend you for this? he says. I certainly will not. Then he deliberately reminds them of what the Lord’s Supper is about, what purposes it should serve. For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus, on the night when He was betrayed, took bread and 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 also He took the cup after supper, saying, The cup is the new covenant in My blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of Me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes again. This is an aside, but First Corinthians was probably written before any of the Gospel accounts. Most scholars agree with that, conservatives anyway.

Paul is not quoting from one of the Gospels about what happened the night Jesus was in the upper room with His disciples when He instituted the Lord’s Supper. He says, I received from the Lord what I am delivering to you. This supports what Paul wrote in Galatians about his time in Arabia after his conversion when he was taught and prepared by Jesus personally and called to be an apostle. Jesus had, among other things, apparently, explained to Paul the meaning and importance of observing communion among believers in a church. He told him about that night, the night before his crucifixion, about how he was with his twelve closest disciples in the upper room, that apartment in Jerusalem, how they observed the Passover meal together there, and how he amended it in course as the evening was going on to mean something different for his followers going forward.

The Passover was one of the most important annual religious holidays the Jews observed. It commemorated their deliverance from bondage in Egypt, the formation of their new nation under Moses’ leadership centuries and centuries before. The historical account that describes the origins is found in Exodus chapter 12. After 400 years in Egypt, much of it spent in slavery, God was ready to free the people of Israel and take them back to their promised land. He prepared and called Moses, a Jewish adopted son of the Pharaoh’s daughter, to be their leader. Moses and his brother Aaron got an audience with the Egyptian ruler and told them that God said it was time to let his people go.

Of course, Pharaoh found the idea preposterous and refused. Why would he let his huge free workforce just walk away? But the Egyptians learned that God was serious as he began unleashing one plague after another on them and on their land, continually ramping up the pressure. A few times, Pharaoh relented and said, Okay, okay, Moses, Israel can go. But each time, he later hardened his heart, changed his mind. He must have been able to rationalize the phenomena somehow.

Just uncanny circumstances, coincidences, natural disasters. He’d harden his heart and say, No, I’ve changed my mind. Your people aren’t going anywhere. But finally, God brought a judgment on Egypt that brought the proud Pharaoh to his knees. He sent the destroyer, a death angel, over the land of Egypt one night, claiming the lives of every firstborn male child, including the Pharaoh’s own son. Exodus 13:30 says, Then Pharaoh and all his officials and all the Egyptians got up during that night, and there was a loud wailing throughout all of Egypt, for there was not a house without someone dead.

This was something Pharaoh could not explain away and a catastrophe that he could not withstand. So he called for Moses and then begged him, Get your people out of here. Leave the land of Egypt as soon as possible. As for the people of Israel, Moses had spread word among them throughout their settlements that God was going to deliver them on that night, and they were told each family was to select the best lamb from among their flocks, slaughter it, roast it for a meal that evening, but importantly, save some of its blood and spread that blood over the tops of their doors and down the lintels, down the side posts of their doors. So they were to roast the lambs along with certain herbs and unleavened bread, and Moses said, After that, be ready to depart the land of Egypt in a hurry. Eat in haste, he said.

It’s the Lord’s Passover. I’m sure the Israelites didn’t know exactly what that meant. But the word was that night God would send this angel over the land and take the life of every firstborn male to break the will of Pharaoh and finally secure their freedom. That’s why it was so important they visibly mark their homes with the lamb’s blood. The destroyer would not touch anyone’s homes where he saw the blood, God promised. When I see the blood, I will pass over you.

And so this is how the nation of Israel came into being. Moses told them, This is the day you are to commemorate throughout your generations to come. You shall celebrate this day as a festival to the Lord, a lasting ordinance. When your children ask you, ‘What does all of this mean?’ tell them, ‘It’s the Passover sacrifice of the Lord, who passed over our homes in the land of Egypt.’ This solemn ordinance of remembrance was exactly what Jesus and his disciples were observing that night in Jerusalem.

They were eating the Passover lamb together, the bitter herbs, the unleavened bread. They were passing around the cups that the Jews called the cup of deliverance, and then in the middle of the meal, the cup of redemption, and then at the end of the meal, the cup of praise. Don’t miss the vital connection between the Lord’s Supper, as we call it, and the Passover meal. It was not a coincidence that Jesus instituted the Christian ordinance we call communion in this way and on that special holy occasion. The timing was no coincidence for sure. He fully knew that only a few hours, several hours from the time they celebrated the Passover, his own body and blood would become the sacrifice to deliver his people from bondage to sin and death.

He fully knew he was the Lamb of God who would be slaughtered, who alone could take away the world’s sin. That’s why he changed up the ceremony that night, no doubt to his disciples’ surprise, by taking the unleavened bread from the table and saying, This is my body that’s broken for you. Eat some of it, all of you, in remembrance of me. And then at the end of the meal, took the cup of praise and said, This is the blood of the new covenant shed for you. As often as you drink it, do it in remembrance of me. The new covenant, that was the situation that he was inaugurating by his death on the cross, on the morrow.

From then on, all who would put their faith in him, not just Jews, would be God’s people, but all who would put their faith in him during the church age, as we call it, would become part of the family of God. As they passed around the cup from man to man, Jesus added, As often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes again. When Jesus comes again, that’s when this age will end. That’s sounding almost like a toast to me, doesn’t it? To Jesus, till he comes again. It honors him for the amazing thing he did for us on Calvary, and it looks forward to his return and our ultimate deliverance and salvation, and when we will sit down with him again in glory.

Can you see how wrong the Corinthians were getting it? My word. Taking something so special about Jesus and making it about them. Taking something intended to demonstrate and underscore believers’ oneness and instead displaying their factions and divisions. Taking something solemn and holy and turning it into kind of a common party, it sounds like. What a blatant example of disorder and impropriety from these very carnal Christians.

In the final paragraph of this chapter, Paul tries to sober them up with these words: Whoever therefore eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For if anyone who does so without discerning the body properly eats and drinks judgment to himself. This is why many of you are weak and ill, and some of you have even died, he said. But if we judge ourselves rightly, we won’t have to be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, it’s for discipline so that we might be condemned with the world.

So then, my brothers, when you come together to eat, wait for each other. If anybody’s hungry, eat at home, so that when you come together, you will not bring down judgment. Paul’s warning them that they are so out of line about this whole communion thing that they are in danger of calling down judgment on their church, on themselves. What does he mean by, Whoever therefore eats the bread and drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of Christ? I sometimes hear pastors make the point that communion is not for unbelievers. That’s true, because they have never personally received what Jesus did for them on the cross.

But that’s not what Paul means here about partaking in the Lord’s Supper unworthily. He’s clearly addressing the Corinthian Christians who were out of order in the way they were demeaning this solemn ordinance. He’s not only warning them to change drastically the manner they are observing communion, but to realize that communion service itself was a time to examine their own hearts. You’re not taking seriously the most serious thing in the world, he’s saying. Let a person examine himself, and then eat of the bread and drink of the cup. The communion service should be a time for Christians to look inside, to take inventory, to remember it was for our sins that Jesus’ body was broken and blood shed.

It should be a time of worship, a time of introspection, a time for confession, never entered into unseriously or callously disregarding our own spiritual condition. Just how serious an event is this? Paul said, and this surprises us, this is why many of you are weak and ill and some have died. But if we judge ourselves rightly, that is honestly, soberly, then we would not have to be judged by God. Another example of the truth that God is not to be trifled with. It’d be kind of hard to overstate how important an event and experience a communion service should be for a body of believers.

It should show our unity as a spiritual family. If there are factions or hard feelings or broken relationships between people in a church, these are directly in contradiction to what communion is all about. It’d be the perfect time and place for those to be challenged to repair those relationships because Christ cannot be divided. It’s also a perfect time for a pastor presiding to make the point: to partake with a bad heart toward another member is an example of partaking unworthily. When we partake of the bread and wine together, we’re saying we’re all beneficiaries here of Christ’s sacrifice together. We’re all sinners saved by grace alone.

We’re all equal at the foot of the cross. We’re all one body in Christ. In doing this together is a symbol of our union. It’s also a perfect time, as I said, to examine ourselves, and Paul is urging us to do that, to remember Christ died to save us from our sin. Are we cherishing things in our lives that we know do not honor and please God, sins we do not want to give up? Are the things we are very aware of in our lives that we have not confessed?

If that’s true, we should not partake. If that’s the case and we partake, Paul says we are taking communion unworthily. But if we judge ourselves rightly, we should be confessing our sins, using that time to get ourselves right with God so that He will not have to chastise and judge us. So always take the quiet moments as you hold the bread and then the cup in your hands. They represent Jesus’ sacrifice for your sins. Search your heart, confess known sins, and ask for God’s grace to do better going forward.

A final word, as I mentioned, the Lord’s Supper is an ordinance for believers. It really does not have any purpose for unbelievers. Bible-believing churches practice two ordinances that Jesus instituted. Both are remembrances. Both are symbolic. Baptism remembers Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection for us.

It’s a public testimony of our personal appropriation of His death’s benefits by faith. Similarly, communion is also a remembrance. It reminds us of what Jesus accomplished for us, the price He paid on Calvary to deliver us from sin and death, the bread representing His body broken, the wine representing His blood shed. When we eat them, it’s in remembrance of Jesus and symbolically represents the fact we have personally received Him by faith. One’s a celebration of our union with Christ and His people, baptism. The other, a time of solemn remembrance of the sufferings of Christ for His people.

Both should be special events every healthy church family experiences together in unity. This is Paul for Share the Word. Thanks, Paul. Great insight into the Lord’s Supper. Once again, have you noticed that the issues that the Apostle Paul speaks to the members of the church of Corinth seems to be resonating in the churches today in so many ways? When we lose focus on the true purpose of this table, or we come to the table in a cavalier way, we’re not honoring the sacrifice of Christ in the manner that we should.

Think of the last time that you celebrated communion in your church. How does it compare with what you just heard in this podcast? We have to make sure that we don’t get caught up in the trappings of this world. Keep listening. Keep thinking. Keep studying.

Keep growing in God’s Word. From all of us at Share the Word, our blessings and prayers go out to all of you.