Meditations on Holy Communion - Part 1 of 4 - Whenever you eat

For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes. – 1 Corinthians 11:26 (NIV)

In our congregation, we take Holy Communion every Sunday. We do this primarily because we deliberately want to keep the centrality of the Cross at the forefront of our gatherings. We only exist as followers of Jesus and as a congregation of believers because of the events of that fateful weekend 2000 years ago.

We are also in the midst of a 40-day Communion Challenge: we are taking communion every morning for 40 days between 6:30 and 6:45am EST. One of our congregants leads this segment over Facebook live. We remember Jesus’ sacrifice for us and the glorious benefits he made available to us who believe. We then pray for specific needs that exist among our congregation.

With this impetus, I plan to do a four-part series on Meditations on Holy Communion based on Paul’s instruction to the Corinthian church in his first letter – Chapter 11, verses 23-34.

Every moment in time is fused with the history changing event of the Cross

I first heard Ravi Zacharias, the Christian apologist, mention this idea several years ago and it has remained with me. “For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup (present action), you proclaim the Lord’s death (past event) until he comes (future promise).” In that one sentence all of history – past, present and future – hangs on the central event of the death and resurrection of Jesus! All of history is meant to find its meaning in that fateful weekend 2000 years ago! This is a fitting observation because he is the Eternal One and therefore is the Lord of time.

Three applications

There is nothing in your past – no sin, no trauma, no regret – that you cannot bring to Jesus that the power of the Cross cannot redeem. He has paid the dearest price for all your bad choices, all your pain, all your misgivings. Every penalty, every consequence, that you justly deserve because of your past, can be exchanged for God’s mercy, grace and forgiveness. He will take your pain, your brokenness and your shame and he will give you incredible joy, limitless love and internal peace that defies logic! Stop trying to make it on your own. Invite Jesus, the one who proves that he is capable by rising from the dead, to take the lead in your life. Put your trust in him and he will show you how good he is. You can do this – today.
One of Jesus’ promises to those who choose to trust him is that he will be with us – right now in the present. He will never leave us nor forsake us. Because he is with us we have access to everything we need to navigate this crazy life that we get to live in this topsy-turvy world! He is our ever-present help in time of need. Ask Jesus to help you with whatever problem your are facing – today.
Finally, what hope we have for a glorious future! On more than one occasion Jesus predicted that he was going to die – and then rise again from the dead. He did it! This has been borne out by sound historical research. Because he did what he said he would do; because he did the literally impossible thing, we can fully trust him when he promised that he is going to return in bodily form and put everything right. He is going to come back, pull the plug on this seemingly out of control machine we call life, establish his Kingdom of righteousness, love, peace and joy on this renewed earth He will put every thing right. Furthermore, his awesome promise for every individual who believes is that we get to live forever with him. Even when we physically die, we get to be reborn to live in God’s presence forever! We can live in that glorious hope – today!