The Lord’s Table: The Ordinance
Practical Church (1 Corinthians) • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
0 ratings
· 73 viewsNotes
Transcript
Announcements
Good morning. Welcome to Southern Hills Baptist Church. Thank you for joining us today.
If you are a first-time guest with us, you will find a Connection Card in the pew rack in front of you. We would appreciate it if you would fill that out and place it in the offering plate. That gives us a record of your visit and allows us the opportunity of reaching out to you this week to answer any questions that you might have.
Online giving is available at our website, southernhillsbc.com. By clicking on GIVE, it will take you to our giving page where you can easily give by electronic check or credit card. You can also give during our offertory time or in the box at the info table. If you are a guest, please know that we do not expect you to give. Our members and regular attenders provide for the ministry of the church.
The mission of SHBC “is to seek holiness as we covenant together as a faithful local body of Christ and to engage in the Great Commission by making disciples in our homes, our communities, and around the world.”
See bulletin for Calendar Updates
If you are a guest with us, know that this is our weekly Family Worship service. Our children will remain with us for the entire service. We do have a nursery available for children under 4 just down the hall if you would like to use it.
Please stand as I read our Call to Worship.
Call To Worship
Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Opening Hymn
Scripture & Prayer: Pastor Atreju Psalm 16
Song #1
Missions Minute: Her Health
Today, our Missions Minute is about Her Health. Yesterday, they had their Diaper Dash, which is their Fall fundraiser. I do not know yet how it went, but I have it on good authority that they raised enough money to fully furnish their new Westside office with equipment, including a new ultrasound machine. I will get you more information about the results when I can.
Each month, we—as a church—donate $100 to Her Health. I am happy to announce that the Baptist Convention of Iowa has given us a matching grant for 2026, which means that the BCI is also donating $1200 to Her Health this year in our name.
Also, Her Health is in need of a couple of full-time nurses. If you know someone who might be interested in working there to help women in need, please reach out to Kristi directly.
We try to closely partner with Her Health, apart from our monthly donation. Roxann Anger is our Her Health champion. She volunteers over there every week. If you are interested in getting more involved, please reach out to Roxann or to me.
Offering & Prayer
Song #2
Song #3 (Song of the Saints)
Pastoral Prayer
World -
Country-
State-
City-
SHBC-
Introduction
If you have your bibles with you this morning, please turn with me to 1 Corinthians chapter 11.
Two weeks ago, we entered a new section of Paul’s letter to the church at Corinth, where he began to rebuke the Corinthian believers for the chaos that they willingly allowed to flourish in their weekly gatherings. He started by addressing the allowance of individuals in open rebellion to God leading portions of the worship service. And last week, he began to discuss the proper approach to the Lord’s table in their time of communion.
He explained that the church members must fight for unity by building a culture where chaos and dissension is not welcome. They should be an unselfish people willing to sacrifice their own desires for the betterment of their brothers and sisters in Christ. And they should seek to build each other up. In doing so, they will find unity in their outward focus and they will bear one another’s burdens after they seek to follow after King Jesus.
This week, Paul will address the tradition of the Supper itself.
[TITLE SLIDE]
We will begin this morning by asking the question, “What is an ordinance?”
From there, we will explore the instructions that Jesus has given to His church and how that church has understood the Lord’s Supper over the last 2000 years. We may get a little deep into historical theology, but I will do my best to keep it to an overview. If you enjoy taking notes, today would be a good day to have your pen ready.
And as we endeavor to explore the church’s practice of communion this morning, I think that we will find that the sharing of the Lord’s Supper is more important to the church than we have ever considered it before.
Look with me to our passage. 1 Corinthians chapter 11, starting in verse 23:
[MAIN PASSAGE SLIDE x3]
For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” (/) In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” (/) For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.
This passage should feel very familiar to us. Not only do we read it at least once a month during our time of communion, but it has almost a 90% overlap with Jesus’ words as recorded in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. But, as we jump in, we will notice that Paul’s story is more similar to the twelve apostles than we would have expected.
First, let us look at the authority behind the Lord’s Supper.
[POINT 1 SLIDE]
The Authority (v 23a)
In the past, we have made the case that all authority for anything on earth ultimately comes from the Creator of all things. He holds every bit of creative and sustaining power in the cosmos. And yet, He shares His authority with His imagers, both human and divine. And that authority flows through Jesus—our intercessor—and to us. He is the only mediator of God’s power and authority and He shares it with us as He wills through His Holy Spirit.
He has shared authority with humankind through the mandate to order creation and have dominion over it. Thus, human government has been given to us for our own good. Human government has been given the authority of law and order and the authority to punish with the sword. But, as we have seen throughout history, that authority is often weaponized and abused by sinful human beings.
But Jesus shared a greater authority with His followers—to work with His Holy Spirit in growing the kingdom of God on earth; to make disciples and build the church. And for the purpose of building His church, He has shared with us “holy tools” to initiate new members and to grow them from individuals and into a family. One of those tools is a practice that we call the Lord’s Supper.
Look back with me to the first half of verse 23 and let’s look at the words that Paul uses.
[PASSAGE SLIDE]
For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you,
Paul says that He received the instruction of the Lord’s Supper from who?…
Not from the apostles, who at this point, he knew well. But he says that he received instruction from the Lord—from Jesus himself…
(beat)
Well, if we know Paul’s story, we get the idea that He never met Jesus before the crucifixion. While he was a disciple of the Rabbi Gamaliel, there is no evidence that Paul was anywhere near Jesus. In fact, based on the pharisaical teaching, Paul probably would have purposely avoided Jesus if he happened to be in Jerusalem at the same time.
In fact, it seems that Paul wasn’t becoming well known in Jewish circles until the stoning of Stephen a year or more after Jesus’ death. This is how Paul cuts his teeth as a mature and practicing Pharisee, likely around the age of 20. And it seems that His zealousness to persecute the church of Jesus is what propelled him into the Jewish spotlight. Acts 8:3 says that “Saul was ravaging the church, and entering house after house, he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison.”
His clout among the Pharisees is rising with every arrest. It seems that he has stepped out from the shadow of the wise Gamaliel and is determined to make a name for himself as the most zealous Pharisee in Jerusalem. He was primed to become a famous rabbi in his own right, a rockstar if you will. But then something happened.
On his way to Damascus to persecute more Christians, he encountered the resurrected Jesus on the road.
There, they have a brief encounter, and Jesus instructed him to go into town and wait on a believer named Ananias. Now, while Paul stays and preaches Jesus as Messiah in Damascus for many days, Acts 9 does not reveal to us that Paul spent additional time with the risen Jesus.
However, it seems as if Paul had more interaction with Jesus later. Acts 22 reveals that Paul had a vision of Jesus and Acts 23 says that Jesus stood by him to encourage him when he was in prison, saying that Paul “must testify also in Rome.”
But there are also several years in Paul’s life that are unrecorded by the book of Acts. The church in Jerusalem sent him home to Tarsus, where he stayed for 9 years or so before Barnabas brought him to the church in Antioch. And Paul also tells the Galatians that he spent some time in Arabia. This provides almost a decade of time where Jesus could have met with Paul and instructed him further on his mission to proclaim the gospel to the nations.
In fact, Paul likely mentions one of these encounters in 2 Corinthians 12, where Paul recounts this:
[SCRIPTURE SLIDE x7]
I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows. (/) And I know that this man was caught up into paradise—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows— and he heard things that cannot be told, which man may not utter. (/) On behalf of this man I will boast, but on my own behalf I will not boast, except of my weaknesses (/) — though if I should wish to boast, I would not be a fool, for I would be speaking the truth; but I refrain from it, so that no one may think more of me than he sees in me or hears from me. (/) So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. (/) Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. (/) But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
Though Paul discusses this “man” that he knows, it is clearly himself that he speaks of. He has spent time in the presence of the risen Jesus, and more than just a short interaction on the road to Damascus. And during this time, he has become a disciple of Jesus Himself. Barnabas is his greatest ally in the church, but it was not Barnabas who disciples him. It was Jesus.
The risen and glorified Jesus has taken time to shape and instruct Paul for the mission which has been set before him—to bless the nations with the gospel of Jesus, the fulfillment of the promise given to Abraham.
[PASSAGE SLIDE]
And so, it seems by his wording that Paul has been personally instructed in the church practice of the Lord’s Supper in the same way that it was given to the 12—from the mouth of the King.
The word that Paul uses for “recieved” here in Greek means to take, receive, or be taught by another person. The verb form used indicates that this is a snapshot of a historical event that happened between him and Jesus—that he believes that he was given this first-hand account of the last supper from the Lord Himself.
(beat)
This statement now brings us back to the question that we began with. The practice of the church taking the Lord’s Supper is not just a tradition, it is an ordinance. So, what then is an ordinance?
The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines an ordinance as “an authoritative decree or direction.”
We can see how that applies here, as the distributor of God’s authority has given direction to His people as to how to observe this Supper. In the theological sense, we would take ordinance a step further. The church would define an ordinance as “a ceremonial ritual prescribed by Christ for His faithful church to follow.” The observance of such an ordinance would serve as an outward sign of the inward transformation within God’s holy family.
Protestants agree that there are only 2 ceremonial rituals commanded by Christ for His church to follow: baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Each of these have been ordained by Jesus, thus the word that we use: ordination.
(beat)
Many of you, especially those from Roman Catholic backgrounds, may have heard these both be called sacraments—that the Lord’s Supper is a sacrament of the church. A lot of Christians don’t know the difference. So, let us examine what a sacrament is and whether the Lord’s Supper is a sacrament, or simply an ordinance.
The word sacrament in English comes from the Latin root word sacro, which is also where we get the word sacred. Something sacred has been dedicated to a god for religious purposes. In this sense, baptism and the Lord’s Supper would both be sacred acts, and thus a sacrament.
However, those who study language understand that the definitions of words change over time. For those of you who have been alive for more than two decades, we have seen the way that words change in modern lingo. Words like cool, hot, fat, bad, rad, sick, and epic have all meant different things depending on what decade you were in.
The word “awesome” used to mean terrifying, but now means the exact opposite. And the word “trash” used to mean literal garbage—refuse that you would put out on the curb for the “trash man.” But today, a “trash” man means something totally different. If you don’t know, ask one of our youth.
It used to be that if you said that something is “bussin,” it meant that someone was driving a bus. Now, it just means that something is cool or top-notch.
(beat)
And the word sacrament is no different. As Roman Catholic theology was being worked out over a thousand years, their understanding of sacrament shifted as well. Heavily influenced by the writings of Thomas Aquinas, Roman Catholic theologians began to teach that the merits of Christ were being shared through the ordinances. In other words, that in the practice of the ordinances, God was bestowing more sanctifying grace upon the participant.
In the 1500’s, Martin Luther and the reformers fiercely disagreed. They stood on scripture to prove that the sacrifice of Jesus was enough—that believers do not need additional grace through the sacraments to move their sanctification forward toward holiness and salvation. The grace of God given to us at Calvary was enough.
They agreed that we are saved by that grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone.
And while God may bestow more grace to us throughout our lives and in our participation in the life of the church, it is not for the purpose of saving us.
Salvation comes only by belief in and loyalty to King Jesus.
(beat)
I think that there is something to the idea that God bestows additional grace to His church during their participation in the Lord’s Supper. But, if so, it is there for the purpose of growing the church body in unity with each other and with Jesus—our head. It is not imparted so that we may be more holy and approach a little closer to the throne. The blood of Jesus has covered us completely, and we are seen as perfectly holy in the eyes of the Father. This is called justification. We have been justified—that it, rendered innocent in God’s courtroom because of what Jesus has done. And because of that, we can run straight to the throne and into the arms of our loving Father.
We are full participants at His table because the paschal lamb has been slaughtered, our sin has been atoned for, we have been adopted as sons and daughters, and our God has invited us to feast with Him and celebrate Jesus’ victory over sin.
Before, we were a people contaminated by sin. But now, Jesus has decontaminated us by His blood and brought us into the feasting tent of the King. We now stand—as His holy people—before His table. A feast has been laid before us. And He invites us to sit and eat with Him.
[POINT 2 SLIDE]
The Practice (vv 23b-25)
To practice something is to apply an idea or a method rather than it staying as head knowledge. We engage in the practice of the Lord’s Supper for the purpose of resting in communion with our Heavenly Father. It is a taste of paradise, where we will walk and talk with Him as Adam did. In that way, we practice now on Sundays what we will do forever in the kingdom: resting eternally in His presence. And we practice the Supper not only out of a desire to be close to Him, but also out of obedience to Jesus.
Paul continues in verse 23:
[PASSAGE SLIDE x2]
that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” (/) In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”
Just as with baptism, the rite of communion with God through the Lord’s Supper is highly symbolic. It is a literal replaying of the passover meal with new meaning.
The lamb has been slaughtered to atone for the sins of the people. It’s blood has been applied to cover their profaneness and allow them to enter into God’s presence. Those covered in the blood of the lamb now get the privilege of approaching the table of God to commune with Him. There, we share fellowship through relationship and through the intimacy of having a meal together. The face of the Father shines upon us as His forgiven people and we feel His joy to have us as His children.
Before us are laid the elements of the Supper. The bread must remain unleavened for their has been no time to let it rise. Time is a precious commodity when the Lord has called us to go. And as the bread was shared in Exodus, so we share it at the time of communion.
Paul says that when the time came for the last supper, Jesus took the bread and broke it.
He tore it before their eyes as a visual representation of what was about to happen to His body. In Exodus chapter 12, God describes what is to happen during the sacrifice of the lamb. They were to take an unblemished yearling and to slaughter it at twilight. Jesus knew that this was about to happen to Him. He was the lamb, unblemished by sin, who would be sacrificed as an offering for the people.
I want you to imagine being in this dimly lit room with Jesus as He tears the bread. In just a few hours, His anxiety over drinking from God’s cup of wrath would cause Him to sweat blood. And, in His glistening eyes now—as He begins to rip the bread into pieces—you can see both pain and love, for He knows what He must endure for the sake of His brothers.
As He passes the bread around the table, He says, “this is my body, which is for you.”
Then, Paul tells us that at the end of the meal, Jesus took up a single cup filled with wine. He then explains that the juice from the grape stained red represents His blood. But it is not His blood that they celebrate as they drink from the cup. Instead, they celebrate the new covenant that comes by the shedding of the blood of the unblemished lamb.
As He passes the cup and each disciple drinks from it, He says, “do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”
The word “do” that Jesus uses in a plural active imperative verb in Greek. What that means is that Jesus is actively addressing all of the disciples (plural) with an imperative—in other words, He is giving them all a command that is to be followed. “You must do this. And when you do, do it in my memory,” He says.
(beat)
The Lord’s Supper is full of symbolism. But the symbols are not just there to hang out in the back of our heads.
The symbols are all over the table for the purpose of leading us to worship the One who has paid the price for our seat at that table…
The spotless lamb has been sacrificed.
His holy blood has been applied to you and to me.
God’s wrath has been satisfied.
You have been made holy.
And the curtain to the most holy place has been torn, allowing you access to God’s throne—to His holy table.
And He invites you to sit and visit with Him and eat from His bounty of blessings.
This is the overwhelming grace of God!
(beat)
And all of this should lead us to respond to Him in worship…
(beat)
To sit in awe of Him as we bask in His glory…
(beat)
And we get to do this every week when we come together as His family…
(beat)
Church, if you truly understood this mystical communion that we have the privilege to be a part of each week, you’d never want to miss church ever again.
(beat)
The Lord’s Supper is highly symbolic and we should practice it regularly out of both desire for fellowship with God and obedience to King Jesus.
But our time of communion is more than just symbols. For decades, much of the Protestant church has lost their way, thinking that the Supper is an ordinance of symbols, but that they “can’t do it too often or it will become less meaningful…”
Church, if you think that communion with your God will become less special if you do it more often, your thinking has been corrupted by the world…
Jesus hid from everyone as often as He could to have more communion with God.
Do you think that if you only participate in your marriage bed once a year, that it would be more special?—that your relationship with your spouse would be better???
(beat)
For every church that practices communion semi-annually: would not also your church-member giving become more special if you only took offering once a quarter?
Which church is going to offer to do that???
(beat)
The offering and the Lord’s Supper are meaningful practices of worship, not just traditions that we follow.
We should not practice the Lord’s Supper simply out of obedience, but out of desire to commune with our loving and gracious Father, who saved us from our sin by the body and blood of His Son Jesus…
We should desire to be at His table, filled with thankfulness, whenever we have a chance.
(beat)
I grew up in a church that saw the Supper as merely symbolic. And that led them to wrong conclusions. Maybe you did too.
I want us to explore that a little more, this morning.
Throughout the history of the church, there have been several different understandings of the mystery of our communion with God within the Lord’s Supper.
First, we have already talked about the symbolic view, which is also called the “memorial view”. That is, that the Supper is only symbols calling our memories back to what Jesus did for us on the cross. This view was first postulated in the 1500’s with Ulrich Zwingli and has become the most popular view in Protestantism, especially in Baptists.
But Zwingli was attempting to correct another position, which I think may have been an overcorrection on his part. He was pushing back against Roman Catholic theology who had been teaching “transubstantiation” for at least 300 years. Transubstantiation is the understanding that after the elements have been consecrated by the priest, they literally turn into the body and blood of Christ.
This is an extrabiblical view that was first proposed by a French monk named Paschasius Ratbertus in the year 831. It was initially rejected by the church, but later formalized as Roman Catholic doctrine in 1215 at the Fourth Lateran Council. Roman Catholicism is the only branch of the church to take this view seriously, and all other branches have vehemently denied it.
Beyond failing to have any biblical support, the idea that Jesus’ un-glorified human body would return to us as food appears to convey that His sacrifice as the paschal lamb at Calvary was not sufficient enough to save His church.
Martin Luther also pushed back against this ridiculous view of the Supper. In its place, he put forth His own theory, which is called “consubstantiation.” Consubstantiation is the view that the elements do not turn into Jesus’ body and blood, but that Christ’s body and blood are in and around the elements. Lutherans are the only church tradition who believe in consubstantiation. Today, they would describe this as a mysterious sacramental union between the elements and the literal blood and body of Jesus.
John Calvin attempted to mediate the reforming positions of Zwingli and Luther on the Supper, in what would become called the “real presence” view. Simply, his understanding is that the physical body and blood of Christ do not participate at all in the Supper, nor is the Supper simply symbols and nothing else. Instead, the spiritual “real presence” of Jesus is actively participating with His church in the Supper.
The Eastern Orthodox church has believed and taught this view for 2000 years. They would describe the Lord’s Supper as a mystery in which Jesus is wholly present, without trying to explain how that happens metaphysically.
I think that the “real presence” view is most consistent with scripture. When we approach the table of the Lord as the church, the Holy Spirit is present. Paul sometimes refers to the Holy Spirit as the “Spirit of Jesus” in his letters. So, if Jesus the Son and the Holy Spirit are part of the triune God-head, and believers are united with Christ through the Holy Spirit, then it follows that Jesus would be present at the table when the church sit in the presence of the Father.
That, each Sunday, as the faithful local church participates in the Lord’s Supper, we spiritually commune with God through the Holy Spirit and in the presence of Jesus our Savior.
That, as we take the elements and reflect on their symbolism, Jesus participates in drawing each individual into one spiritual body—bringing us closer in unity and working to conform each of us to His own image.
And, if all of this is true, then the way that we worship through our participation in the Supper is just as important as the fact that we are being obedient to participate.
The symbols present on the table should move us to a place of humility and gratefulness. And the corporate taking of the elements should never become rote and boring for we are resting in the presence of our gracious Father, who shines His face upon us and warms our hearts with joy.
We must remember not only what Christ has done for us, but also what He is continuing to do for us. He is drawing us together in unity through the Supper and He is shaping each one of us through the Holy Spirit to become more like Him—more holy, more loving, more compassionate, more gracious, more hospitable, more sacrificial.
(beat)
If Jesus is really present, it should bring a smile to our face and joy to our hearts. And it should lead us to shine our faces on each other and share joy and fellowship as we encourage one another to go and be faithful missionaries in the community for another week…
It should make us zealous for the Lord and excited to go out and proclaim the reign of King Jesus to the world.
[POINT 3 SLIDE]
The Proclamation (v 26)
The gospel is the good news from beginning to end. God has created every human imager for a purpose. And while sin has separated us from God, that purpose remains. God wants each of us to fulfill that purpose and desires us to be part of His family. And to that end, He sent His Son Jesus to redeem us and to reconcile us for Himself in relationship and so that we could get back to work fulfilling the purpose for which He created us.
Paul closes his instruction on the practice of the Lord’s Supper by giving us the “why.”
Why do we participate in the Supper? Verse 26:
[PASSAGE SLIDE]
For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.
As followers of Christ, we proclaim the good news to the world. But in our holy assembly—in our local body of Christ, we also proclaim Jesus to each other. The Lord’s Supper is a time each week where we get to proclaim Jesus’ victory over sin to each other. And then we get to celebrate that victory by seeing the fruit of His work—for we are reconciled in relationship with God and invited to our Father’s table.
Do you proclaim this reconciliation to each other?
Do you remind your brothers and sisters that even though life sucks sometimes—even though we have hard days and hard weeks and hard years—that their sin has been paid for? That Jesus gave all for us so that we could approach the King’s table and feast with our loving Almighty Creator God?
As we close, I want you to think about that this morning.
But I also want you to think missionally.
After we have feasted at the table of the Lord and been refreshed by the joy of His presence and been encouraged by our church family, how will we live out in the community this week?
Do you regularly proclaim the Lord’s death in the way you live your life?
Application
God has created you for close communion with Him, but He has also created you for fellowship with your fellow human imagers. Are you satisfied to share joy and encouragement with your brothers and sisters on Sundays at the table of the King?
Or, is God calling you to mission—to proclaim the death and resurrection of Jesus to those around you; to share King Jesus with the world?
Go and make disciples this week and bring them back with you to His table.
[COMMUNION SLIDE]
With that, we are now going to transition into our time of communion. As Pastor Atreju comes to lead us in the Lord’s Supper, please take a moment to prepare your heart as we approach the Lord’s table together.
Lord’s Supper: Pastor Atreju
CLOSING HYMN
Invitation
Gospel presentation and call to belief
CONGREGATIONAL BLESSING
