16 Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a
participation in the blood of Christ?
And is not the bread we break a participation in the body of
Christ? 17 Because there is one loaf,
we, who are many, are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf.
What if you wanted to squeeze
together the words “common” and “union?”
You’d have the word, “common-union.”
But “common-union” is too hard to say, so we dropped a couple letters
and made the new word “communion.” A communion,
or common union, is two or more separate things joining together as one. A loving husband and wife are a good example
of a loving communion – two separate people joining as one. A well-oiled baseball team plays in communion
with one another. Many parts and one
team, all working together for the same goal.
In the church, we use the
term “communion” too. We have something
called Holy Communion. We use it to
describe the Lord’s Supper. Tonight is
Maundy Thursday, the night Jesus instituted Holy Communion. It is a good time to walk you through the three
different common unions, or “communions” that are present in Holy Communion.
1.
The common union between the elements.
The first common union is the
union that exists between the elements.
The bread is in union with the body; the wine is in union with the
blood. Why would we believe such a crazy
thing? Why would we decide that the
bread we eat is also Christ’s body? Why
would we decide that the sip of wine is also a sip of the blood of Jesus? We decided that because Jesus decided
that. We believe in this common union
because Jesus said, “This bread is my body; this cup is my blood.”
I Corinthians
2.
The common union between us and God.
That leads us to the second
common union present in Holy Communion. The
second common union is the communion between the individual and God. This is a union that has taken place only
because Jesus has decided to make unity with us. We have done a lot of things to ruin unity
with God. We have rebelled against his
ideas. We have disobeyed his commands. We have not listened to his advice. We have rejected his invitation for
unity. We have pushed him out of our
hearts and said, “Stay out! Then I can
do what I want.”
If things were left up to us,
there would never be a common unity between us and God. We would never have a common unity with God because
we simply would not have anything in common.
He would love Jesus and we would not.
He would encourage us to trust him and we would say, “Forget it, I’m in
control.” If it were not for God
intervening into our lives, we would never have anything in common with him.
But God has intervened and he
has restored the unity between us and him.
He has sent Jesus to take away our sins.
He has sent the Holy Spirit to cause us to believe this precious message
of forgiveness. We believe in Jesus as
Savior and that is what we have in common with God. God said, “I need to send Jesus to be your
Savior” and we now say, “Yes, Lord, you did need to send Jesus to be our
Savior.” God says, “There is no
condemnation for those who believe in Jesus” and we now say, “Yes, LORD, there
is no condemnation for us because we believe in Jesus.” God says, “You are my child and I will bring
you to heaven.” We now say, “Yes, Lord,
we are going to heaven and we cannot wait.”
When God sent Jesus to win our forgiveness and when God sent the Holy
Spirit to cause us to believe this message, now we have something in common
with God. He loves us and we love him.
Not only that, in Holy
Communion, God gives us the assurance that he has a common unity with us in a
concrete and personal way. When we
receive the body and blood of the LORD, we are receiving the unmistakable
assurance that we no longer are at odds with God. As the body/bread moves into our stomach; as
the wine/blood slides down our throats; as we hear the words, “This body and
blood of Jesus will strengthen you until you reach heaven - Jesus promises you
today that your sins are forgiven” we rejoice for two reasons. We rejoice because a) we have something in
common with God now and b) because we will always have something in common with
God. We are perfect in his eyes today
and we always will be perfect in Christ!
3.
The common union between fellow believers
So there are two common
unions in communion; the common union between the bread, body, wine and blood;
and the common union between God and us.
But there is more. Look at verse
17 that describes the third common union of Holy Communion. Because there is one loaf, we, who are many,
are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf.
The third common union is the
common union of faith between all of the believers who are receiving Holy
Communion. Jesus did not make any Lone
Ranger Christians. There is nobody
around who can say, “I never need encouragement for my faith.” We all have difficult days of trials and
troubles and we all need to be encouraged at times. Nobody can say, “I have no gifts to offer the
group.” No, God has given us all gifts
to use and share for the benefit of the common union. Why do we get together for worship and Bible
study on a regular basis? Why don’t we
all just stay home and read the Bible individually? It’s because we are a common union. We are together. We can console as we are being consoled; we
can encourage as we are being encouraged.
Holy Communion is a way to
strengthen and encourage one another in what we believe. As we all take in the one loaf; we, who are
many, with varying gifts and varying strengths, become one in a common
union. We are together with Jesus and we
are together with one another. We have a
common union and we are working together for his kingdom.
So what about a person from
another church body who comes into VOTL and desires to take communion? Is it mean to ask them to wait to take
communion? Is it arrogant? And when we ask them to wait to take
communion until they finish a basic Bible instruction course, are we
communicating to them that they have no communion with God and that they are
not good enough Christians?
Definitely not. No way.
When we ask people to wait to take communion, we aren’t saying they
don’t have a common union with God. We
don’t know that. They may not be in
common union with God, since they may have never heard the Word. However, they may very well have been exposed
to God’s Word in another church or in personal Bible study. They may have learned about trusting in their
one and only Savior there, and if they have they are in common union with
God. We rejoice in that.
When we ask new guests to our
church to wait before sharing communion with us, all we are saying is that they
don’t have a common union with us yet. We’re
not being mean; we’re looking out for them.
If we would allow them to take communion, they would be publicly
declaring, “I am in common union with everything this church teaches” – and the
truth is that they wouldn’t have any idea if they were in common union with everything
this church teaches. We don’t want to
put them into the uncomfortable position of declaring, “I am in a common union
with you and what you teach” when they don’t know if that is true. So we ask them to wait.
Maybe this is worth
mentioning as well. When we ask new
folks to kindly wait to take communion, our attitude is not, “You can’t take
communion!” as though we were a military sergeant barking out the commands and
rules. Our attitude is, “Please wait for
today – but you need to know that I can’t wait to share communion with
you. I am sitting on the edge of my
seat, eagerly looking forward to that day.
Every time I think about that day when we get to share communion with
one another, it brings me great joy. What
an exciting day that will be!” In the meantime,
let’s open the Scriptures together and share all the wonderful promises God
offers us. God will communicate loads of
comfort to you through the Scriptures and before long, he will communicate
loads of comfort to you through both the Scriptures and the Lord’s Supper.
Cherish the common unions
that are a part of your worship life – the miraculous common union with the
elements; your gift of common union with God; and your joy in common union with
your brothers and sisters in Christ.
Amen.