And as they were eating, he took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to them, and said, “Take; this is my body.” And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, and they all drank of it. And he said to them, “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many. Truly, I say to you, I will not drink again of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.” | Mark 14:22–25
This Sunday, we looked at the Last Supper and Jesus introducing the sacrament of Communion. In the same way that Jesus reorients the Passover meal in the Upper Room, Communion is a means of reorienting us to God’s story. As we take the elements, we are inviting God to shock our lives back into alignment with Him. We are asking Him to help us remember the grand narrative that we are a part of.
This is not something that we need occasionally. We are continually getting lost in the chaos of this world and in the idolatry of our own hearts. At Communion Church, we take Communion every week (it would be false advertising if we didn’t). We do this because we need to be filled by Jesus, or we will be filled by something else.
As we prepare every week, it is worth thinking through the 4 ways that Jesus attaches Himself to our lives and gives us assurance by reminding us of the story we are part of :
NEW LIFE – It reminds us of our REDEMPTION from slavery to sin. It is a declaration of the eternal truth of the gospel—of the fact that Jesus died in our place for our sins, and He was raised to give us a new life. Jesus is not crucified every time we take Communion; rather, we remember the work is finished. The shame has been taken, the guilt removed, you are free (Romans 8:1-2)! He suffered once for all, for your sins past, present, and future. We have been freed from our sin, saved from God’s wrath, and adopted into the family of the King who is now reigning in victory.
RENEWED LIFE – And now only is it participating in what God has done, but in what he is doing. It is the very place where we recognize our SANCTIFICATION—that we are in a redeemed work in progress. We do not repent once and then we are done; we confess and repent all of the time. As Martin Liuther stated in the first of his 95 theses:
When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said, “Repent” (Mt 4:17), he willed the entire life of believers to be one of repentance.
The act of Communion compels us to examine ourselves and repent before partaking; giving us a place to repent, confess, and be renewed.
SHARED LIFE –This is a meal where we share in our UNITY. We participate together in Christ’s death for the church—for us. We see our life born together, as our life growing together, as our sin affecting each other, our faith working itself out together. This is the beauty of the gospel, the unity of God’s people. We worship together with our voices in song; we worship together through hearing the Word of God proclaimed; we worship together through giving of our offerings; and we worship together through taking of communion—Jesus dying for the church, forgiving the church, caring for the church.
ETERNAL LIFE – Finally, Jesus told his disciples to do this until we drink with Him in the Father’s Kingdom. Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 11.26 For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes. It is not only our life, our growth, our unity, it is our HOPE. This one meal points us toward the future marriage supper where we will sit with Jesus and feast with him.
As we navigate this life, we do it with an eye toward the future. Our hope is not in earthly perfection, but in the New Heavens and the New Earth. As we partake in Communion, we are being reminded that our citizenship is in heaven as we are being encouraged by the fact that Jesus will come again to restore all things.
In connecting us to our NEW LIFE, RENEWED LIFE, SHARED LIFE, and ETERNAL LIFE, Communion fills our lives with meaning and hope. It gives us the strength that we need when life is hard. It gives us the correction we need when we fall into sin. It gives us the assurance that we need that everything is in God’s hands.