A Call to Remember: Do This in Remembrance

Intro:

we are wrapping up our series, A Call to Remember, and I know I’ve been challenged a lot over the course of it. I’ve learned things I didn’t know, saw things from a different perspective than I normally saw them, and I hope the same is for you. I hope this series will stick with you for a while.

Next week we will be starting a brand new series, and we’re are doing a slight change of course. Advent begins next Sunday, and that would normally mark the beginning of the Advent Conspiracy. I love the Advent Conspiracy, and everything that it teaches and stands for, but we’re going to do something a little different this year. I hope that excites you, perks your interest a little bit, and hopefully you’ll be here next Sunday to find out what we’re doing.

As we wrap up our current series, there is really only one way to bring this to a close; we’re talking about Communion this morning. We’re going to lay some foundation of why we observe communion, if you’ve grown up in church, some of this will be review, some might be new information. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, if I’ve done my job by the end, hopefully you will understand.

So to start off, communion is called a sacrament, and depending on what church you grew up in would determine how many things were considered sacraments in that tradition.

For us, as we belong to the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada, we believe that there are only two sacraments: We believe in communion, and we believe that marriage is a sacrament. That’s not to say that other churches are wrong, its just what we believe.

Sacrament is a good churchy word, what in the world does it mean? A sacrament is a visible sign of invisible divine grace.

What is grace? Grace is the free and unmerited favor of God.

Now before we dive too far into communion, lets just pause here for a moment. Marriage is the visible sign of invisible divine grace. Grace is free and unmerited favor of God. For everyone who is married, and those that are working towards marriage, what does it mean to you that your marriage is a visible sign of God’s free and unmerited favor?

Maybe you have forgotten just how much of a gift your spouse is. Maybe you have taken them for granted. I would encourage you to find a way to remind yourself that your marriage is a sacrament from God, and see how it changes things.

Which brings us to our second sacrament, communion. We base our communion practice off the Last Supper that Jesus has with his disciples before he was crucified. We actually have four different accounts of what happened at the supper, one in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and one in 1 Corinthians.

We are going to read the Corinthian account because it is the first example of communion being practiced as an act of remembrance.

1 Corinthians 11:17–22 ESV

But in the following instructions I do not commend you, because when you come together it is not for the better but for the worse. For, in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you. And I believe it in part, for there must be factions among you in order that those who are genuine among you may be recognized. When you come together, it is not the Lord’s supper that you eat. For in eating, each one goes ahead with his own meal. One goes hungry, another gets drunk. What! Do you not have houses to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I commend you in this? No, I will not.

Paul starts off by rebuking the Corinthian church. They have allowed divisions and factions to spring up within the church. Today we would say cliques. The church is cliquey and because of that it is starting to affect the celebration of communion.

In the case of the Corinthians, they were allowing money to be the dividing factor among those in the church. Those who had money were either not sharing with those who were in need, or they simply were not allowing those in need to participate in communion.

There are few intersting things about Paul highlighting this division. The first is that Paul makes allowance for divisions to happen. He talks about the genuine being separated from everyone else. This is not an intentional; he is simply pointing out that those we are genuine believers will stand out in the crowd because of how they act, how they speak. They won’t separate themselves; their devotion to God will set them apart from everyone who is not fully engaged.

The second interesting thing is the fact that disunity seems to be a theme among the Corinthian church. Just before this passage, Paul is pointing out that the people were fighting over meat sacrificed to idols. To some it was a big deal, to others it really wasn’t, and because of the difference of opinion, there was fighting and division within the church.

I can’t help but notice this same problem happening in the church. It is getting so bad that I’ve almost completely cut myself off from social media. I’m actually getting tired of seeing all the posts, people taking one side and undermining those who take an opposite side. What’s worse is watching well meaning people take scripture completely out of context to support their side. No one is getting saved because of your stance on masks. No one is experiencing the love of Jesus because of the latest conspiracy theory you’ve bought into. If you call OneChurch your home church, I beg you to be wise with your social media account. Don’t stir up quarrels, but encourage one another. The world needs more of Jesus’ light, not more fighting and arguing about meaningless topics. There are people who need to spend more time reading their bible and less time reading the latest COVID stats from other one sided social media influencers. OK I’m done

I’ve been asked a lot lately about what my line in the sand is. When do we stop listening to the gov’t? Here’s my line. When they tell me I can’t preach the word of God, when I can’t pray publicly, when I can’t worship publicly, and when I can’t freely share my faith with my neighbour in need. That’s where my line is. Why, because those are really the only things that matter in this life. You don’t get into heaven because of how many arguments you’ve won. You get in by how well you lived out this book, and I mean all of it, not just the parts we like.

There are more things that unite us then divide us, and we need to focus on those things.

One of those things is communion. This is what Paul says about the last supper.

1 Corinthians 11:23–26 ESV

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 is the signifcance of communion, the Last Supper. It is after this meal that one of Jesus’ disciples, Judas Iscariot, would lead a group of temple guards to Jesus location and have him arrested. After he is arrested, Jesus would stand a mock trial, and found guilty of false charges. He would then go before Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor at the time, and after questioning and a brutal beating, Jesus would be led away to be crucified. Jesus would die, nailed to a cross, for crimes he never committed, for sins he never did. Each and every one of us have sinned against God in our own way, and each of us deserved to punished accordingly. The penalty for sin is death, either our death or some one else’s. In the Old Testament, it was a lamb that would be killed in the place of those who sinned. But that was a broken system that was abused more then it was appreciated. There had to be a better sacrifice.

So Jesus, stripped off his divinty, and became a man. He lived a perfect life so that he could be a perfect sacrifice on our behalf. We don’t have to die in our sin. We can come to Jesus, the Savior of the world, and find grace and forgiveness. Unmerited favor is yours if you surrender your life to Christ.

Jesus’s death and resurrection unites us. It is his sacrifice that opened the door for our adoption into God’s family.

So when we come to communion, we remember that it was by his broken body, his spilt blood that we have redemption and forgiveness. It is for this reason that Paul goes on to say this:

1 Corinthians 11:27–32 ESV

Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. But if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world.

what does Paul mean about eating and drinking in an unworthy manner? He means that we should feel the weight of Jesus’ sacrifice everytime we take communion. We should feel a renewed sense of his grace in our lives. This is our act of remembering. It is so much more then eating and drinking. It is so much more then the gross juice and tasteless wafer, warning. It is everything that these items represent.

Communion should refocus us, humble us, convict us. It should draw us into deeper relationship and prayer with God. We should get lost the significance of everything this represents.

So with all that said, I invite you to take a few moments, and pray, and reflect on Jesus’ death. Allow the Holy Spirit to speak to you. Maybe it is not a humbling, maybe you need to experience the love of God, to die on a cross for you. You are loved, and you are worth the sacrifice. You have intrinsic value because the plans and purposes God has laid out for you.

After a few moments, we will take communion together. If you’ve never done this, just follow my lead.

1 Corinthians 11:23–26 CSB

For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: On the night when he was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took bread, and when he had given thanks, 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, and said, “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.

Let’s pray.