Communion: One, One, One

So today, I begin my reexamination of Communion, interacting with some of the things that Mr. Spencer said. I’m most concerned with the Theology of Communion. I’ve gone back and re-read most of the passages that deal with communion, and spent some time this morning seriously pondering them. One concept immediately jumps out at me: oneness, unity, singularity. In short Communion is about the oneness of the church, the oneness of God, the oneness that church should have with God, and the individual believer’s oneness with other believers forming the church. Communion is all about one, one, one. One God, one Savior, one Faith, one baptism, one Lord, and a communion that celebrates One.

As I sit down to seriously begin considering the theological concepts of Communion, I thought it would be wise to consider what I’ve already written on the topic. After all, I worried that I may have to revise my comments from previous posts. I’ve discussed communion in my blog post here:

http://thebridgekamloops.com/http:/thebridgekamloops.com/how-do-we-%e2%80%9cdo%e2%80%9d-church-a-proper-ecclesiology

And here’s what I said about it:

(6) The Lord’s Supper is to be regularly observed by the church membership and understood as a time of introspection and recommitment to progressive sanctification and as a remembrance of the atoning death of Jesus Christ. Progressive Sanctification involves the Christian’s continuous progression in the Christian life advancing towards Spiritual maturity through the assistance of the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit. The Christian who participates in the Lord’s Supper signifies their commitment to a walk which will result in progressive and continuous sanctification. The Lord’s Supper, also known as communion, is the church’s opportunity to come together for the purposes of “discerning the body,” to evaluate the growth and maturity of the body into the likeness of Christ’s image. The Lord’s Supper is a public visual portrayal of the church’s union with Christ. It is to be denied to anyone who is not thus united with Christ, and in this way it serves as the Church’s public declarative function of “loosing that which has already been lost in heaven.” (Matthew 18:19)

In terms of practicality, Communion is a time of self-reflection and introspection. Believers who participate are compelled through the ceremony to evaluate their life to see if they are truly growing in their spirituality, i.e. their lives are marked by increasing holiness and the decreasing frequency of sin. It is a time for the church to, “discern” the body. (1 Corinthians 11:29). In this passage Paul’s comments refer to believers examining their lives to see if their “works” (Galatians 6:4), and their beliefs (2 Corinthians 13:5) line up with the truth of God. It seems that the introspection is most concerned with unity being attained through the indivdual efforts of the individuals who comprise the oneness of the church examining their beliefs and their works to insure that they coincide with others who comprise the church.

I think Gordon Fee makes some astute comments as he examines 1 Corinthians 11:29:

“The Lord’s Supper is not just any meal; it is the meal, in which at a common table with one loaf and a common cup they proclaimed that through the death of Christ they were one body, the body of Christ, of which they were all parts and in which they are all gifts to one another. To fail to discern the body in this way, by abusing certain members of the church of lesser sociological status, is to incur God’s judgment.”[1]

I’ve carefully considered Fee’s remarks during my study time this morning, and I agree with his remarks. I completely agree. I find his interpretation to line up with the plane and simple meaning of 1 Corinthians 11:29 when that verse is read in the context of the entire passage of chapter 11 and the following chapters of 12-14. Communion is a time of recognizing each other as belonging to each other as gifts from God, and this belonging to each other for all eternity is made possible only through what Christ accomplished on the cross.

Some of you may say, “That sounds great, Joshua. So what?”

Let me spell out some of the possible implications which will have to be examined in the weeks ahead:

1. Baptists generally practice a form of Open Communion in which anyone who is a Christian can celebrate communion with them regardless of their church membership, so long as they are genuinely born again believers. If we read 1 Corinthians 11 carefully, one begins to suspect that Paul was urging the Corinthian Christians to a form of closed communion in which only the committed members of the church should be celebrating communion as a time of introspection over their “works” and “faith,” and their participation with others in the body of Christ. This makes sense also when one reads the following chapter 12 which speaks of Christian service and devotion to each other and leads into a discussion of Spiritual Gifts. The flow of thought of from chapter 11 to chapter 12 strongly favors the argument that only individuals who were committed to loving each other, serving each other, and belonging to each other should participate in Communion. In short, Paul may be indicating that Communion may be a celebration of regenerate official church membership in his letter to the Corinthians, and not an open meal to anyone who may consider themselves a ‘Christian.’
2. This business of one loaf and one cup keeps rearing its head in our faces. It’s getting painfully hard to ignore at this point. (1 Corinthians 10:17) Lots of Baptist scholars are using this language, yet Baptists never drink from one cup. And Baptists usually pass a plate of crackers rather than tear a piece off of a loaf of bread. Imagery may be important to communicating the unity that is intended to be had in Communion. Paul makes veiled references to this in 1 Corinthians 10:17.

It’s gross to drink from one cup. The germ factor must shoot through the roof at this point. I’m okay with passing one loaf of bread. That concept doesn’t offend my sensibilities that much. But it might offend others. The real issue, however, is what does God want us to do. This, my first initial inquiry, indicates that perhaps current practices of communion need to be changed in advance of our next communion date which is tentatively scheduled for December 20. Two issues which need to quickly be determined prior to our next communion celebration is Open vs. Closed Communion, and do we really need to pass one cup in obedience to Christ? Perhaps there might be some other way to retain the Biblical imagery indicated in 1 Corinthians yet embrace a more precautionary (read ‘anti-swine-flu’) technique.

[1] Fee, Gordon. The First Epistle to the Corinthians, New International Commentary on the New Testament. (Eerdmans Publishing, Grand Rapids, MI: 1987), pg. 564.