10/2/60

Scripture: I Corinthians 10: 12-17

Text: I Corinthians 10: 16-17; “The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one loaf, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the same loaf.”

These words which Paul wrote to the Christians at Corinth are full of persuasive meaning for them. They were familiar with the feeling, which most of us appreciate, that to break bread together is a special form of fellowship. Those who had been familiar with Jewish rites knew that when the Hebrew folk celebrated the Passover, they drank wine in a ceremonial way. The third cup was called the “cup of blessing.”

Paul was probably not, in any way, trying to get his hearers to think of the Eucharist, or Lord’s Supper, as a Jewish rite. But he was using an expression which many of his readers knew and appreciated. To take the cup was to receive a particular blessing. To the Hebrew, the wine might suggest the lamb’s blood which, sprinkled on the door post, had meant that the Angel of death passed over that household and spared the Hebrew first-born, while all of the first born of Egypt were taken in a single night. But to the new Christian, it meant a sharing in the blood of Christ shed for each one and for all, poured out in an act of redemption for each disciple; for you and me in the continuing line of disciples.

Then Paul speaks of the bread, reminding his Corinthian readers that as it is broken and served and received, it may be regarded as a symbol of the body of Christ, broken for many and, as such a gift, nourishing the penitent and dedicated Christian.

This rite of the Lord’s Supper, which we often call a sacrament, -- an outward sign of an inward and spiritual grace -- is beautiful and precious. As we contemplate it, and share in it from time to time, it has many facets of understanding. And it depends on one’s point of view, which facet one sees at the moment.

(1) From one point of view, one may think, while receiving this sacrament, of the precious mystery of God’s redeeming grace. There have been times when people have scoffed at the idea of sin. But our times and our consciences have sternly led us back to a recognition of sinful estate and of the wrongs to which we persons are prone. The Lord’s Supper reminds us of Jesus Christ who, as God’s Son, does everything necessary for the divine forgiveness and redemption of penitent people.

(2) From another point of view, we may think of God’s sustaining love, sufficient to meet our every need. Just as we feed our bodies on these elements of food and drink in mortal life, so we feed our souls on Jesus Christ who is unceasingly available to us.

(3) From yet a different point of view, we see in this sacrament the life-transforming reality of personal fellowship with the living, loving, life-giving Lord. As we sit at this table of the Christian family, spread with provision for our needs, we are assured of his unfailing Presence and continuing fellowship through all the sorrows, troubles and joys of living.

(4) From still another viewpoint, we may see in this same sacrament the glory of a universal fellowship in the One Christ Jesus our Lord. For this sacred feast gathers into “one great fellowship of love” all the saints and apostles of the ages, as well as our brothers and sisters of all nations, classes, colors and creeds across the world. For, at the Lord’s Supper, we are not only in fellowship with Him but with one another, and with all who partake of this common symbol.

“The bread which we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one loaf, we who are many are one body; for we all partake of the same loaf,” says Paul.

Now it is true that there are over 200 different families, or denominations, of the Christian faith. The splintering is not quite as bad as that, for a major portion of Christian folk are represented in fewer than 15 major denominations. Nevertheless we greatly need a reminder of our spiritual oneness in Christ. For he evidently intended to establish his “church,” and not a great diversity of separated and sometimes warring, “churches.”

Back in the year 1938, there began the observance of World-wide Communion on the first Sunday of October each year. Since that time, on this particular Sunday, Christians have stressed, in World-wide Communion, their spiritual oneness at His Table. This is but one of the ways in which the ecumenical movement has grown toward the conviction that a broken and divided church must find a way to be one in Christ. Since we are not yet prepared to celebrate the Eucharist, or receive the communion according to a common rite or pattern, we people of the Christian churches commune, each in our own way, but with the knowledge that Christian folk of almost every nation under the sun are communing with Christ and with each other on the same day. And this may, perhaps, be one long step toward the unity of spirit which it would seem must be the purpose of our Lord for us.

We have let the English word, “communion,” come to have a somewhat technical, or at least specific, meaning. We think of it as referring to this specific rite of the church. And yet this English word itself has a far more meaningful usage in our ordinary conversation, where it describes a very intimate personal interchange of thought and affection and common purpose. Scholars tell us that the Greek word which is most commonly translated by our word communion, especially in the Authorized of King James version of the Bible, is a very common, ordinary expression indicating a fellowship, or a sharing of life experience. When that Greek word is used in the New Testament in connection with this sacrament, it points in two directions: vertically, as it indicates fellowship with Christ; and horizontally, as it indicates fellowship with one another.

This, we may take it, is the significance of Paul’s expression, “a participation in the blood (and body) of Christ.” This is a true meaning of our World-wide Communion. As we gather about this table in holy communion, each individual who participates in this simple, sacred feast is brought into intimate spiritual fellowship with our living, self-giving Christ. But it follows that if each one is linked with the one Lord, we are, in Him, linked with one another in a fellowship that is deeper than the artificial divisions of race, nationality, class or creed; political allegiance, or denominational affiliation.

Our generation sees, for the first time in hundreds of years of history, that this fellowship in Christ is truly world-wide. We think, with affection, of fellow Christians in Scandinavia, England, West Germany, Africa, South America, the islands of the Pacific. We remember with Christian concern, the faithful remnant in East Germany, Russia, China. We are conscious that the prayers of penitence and rededication are said in English, in Spanish, in French and German and Russian and Japanese and Korean and Chinese, and in the Malayan and Polynesian and African and Indian tongues. We are joined together in the Christian fellowship of remembering.

While it is true that this Sacrament will be observed in many ways, in many tongues, and in as many nations as there are countries on the surface of the globe, wherever and whatever is the observance, as Paul says: “The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one loaf, we who are many are one body; for we all partake of the same loaf.”

May our Heavenly Father, through His Holy Spirit, thus enable every one of His children to participate with Christ and with one another in a truly world-wide communion.

As we eat from this loaf, and drink from this cup, let us first turn our thoughts and hearts to the Lord in whose life we participate by faith. And let us then reach out in love and prayers to all those, of every church and land, who partake with us as one body, in this Supper of the Lord.

Amen.

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Delivered in Wisconsin Rapids, October 2, 1960