Feasting Backward, Fasting Forward

Interesting comments on the connection between fasting and the Lord's Supper by Sam Storms by way of Rick Ianniello. I've never heard this before.

For 7+ years I've been fortunate enough to be part of a christian community that practices the Lord's Supper weekly. Sam Storm's wrote the following post which encourages me to look at the other end of that spectrum.

"There is a profoundly important connection between the spiritual discipline of fasting and our celebration of the Lord’s Supper. The Lord’s Supper is a feasting that looks backward in time, whereas fasting is a feasting that looks forward in time. The breaking of bread and drinking the cup is done “in remembrance” of our Lord’s historic, and therefore past, act of sacrifice. Thus by eating and drinking we celebrate the finality and sufficiency of that atoning death and that glorious resurrection. We should never fast from the supper of the Lord, even when we are fasting from other ordinary “suppers”. On the other hand, as John Piper explains,

When we sit at Christ’s table with other believers we gratefully, fearfully, joyfully feast upon that food and drink that remind us of what has happened. And when we, in a time of fasting, turn away from the table where otherwise daily meals are served we declare our deep yearning for what has not yet happened.

“by not eating—by fasting—we look to the future with an aching in our hearts saying: ‘Yes, he came. And yes, what he did for us is glorious. But precisely because of what we have seen and what we have tasted, we feel keenly his absence as well as his presence. . . . we can eat and even celebrate with feasting because he has come. But this we also know: he is not here the way he once was. . . . And his [physical] absence is painful. The sin and misery of the world is painful. . . . We long for him to come again and take up his throne and reign in our midst and vindicate his people and his truth and his glory” (A Hunger for God, 84).

Invitation to the Table

Love this communion invitation! From @BrianZahnd who got it from @RenovatusPastor

Real Food

"Everything else we eat is a shadow compared to Christ" (John 6:53-54)

            - Matthew Henry

The Communion of the Broken

"When Jesus offered up His own body and blood for the world, He spread a table for the outcast and the broken. We come to the table not because we are holy, but because we are in need of His holiness. We come to the table not because we are strong, but because we are weak and in need of His strength."

- Jonathan Martin in Prototype: What Happens When You Discover That You Are More Like Jesus Than You Think, page 165
  

Sunday Extravaganza

From The Sacred Sandwich

More Than A Symbol

Interesting - a strong case for the regular, weekly celebration of communion, made by a Pentecostal preacher! Check out this great article by Jonathan Martin, pastor of Renovatus Church in North Carolina.

Yesterday, I announced formally that we would be celebrating the Lord’s Supper weekly at Renovatus.

I have been moving in that direction for many years, and have even ironically claimed it to be the best way to orient a weekly worship gathering. Why precisely I have been so reluctant to pull the trigger, I do not know. We just wrapped up our Love Feast series, which was intended to be about Christian community. And indeed it was, but to my surprise it became as much about communion—or to be more precise, the way that communion must be the basis of our community. We came to the Lord’s table weekly during the series. And as God continued to confirm so much of what we had been sensing for years-that much of our destiny and calling as a church is wrapped up in this path of sacramental Pentecostalism, the time was right to make it our ongoing practice......

....There are many reasons I am compelled to lead our congregation to the table weekly: from Scripture, from early church tradition, from following my own Pentecostal tradition back up the line to Wesley, from the simple prompting of the Holy Spirit. But today I want to focus only on one. When Chris and I tag-teamed the message a few weeks ago, he shared something of his own journey to discover the power of the Lord’s Supper as a Pentecostal. He said it all started with a simple remark from a mentor who said that grounding the worship service in the sacrament is the only way to keep it from being too oriented around the personality of the preacher. That stung me. I do feel powerfully compelled and even used by God to preach, and there are many ways/forms that people respond to the preached word in our church. Perhaps this still seemed to be enough before now. Perhaps some of it is the blind optimism of youth, thinking that while I’m far from perfect, the work of the Spirit in the preaching is enough to sustain the congregation.

I have continued to ponder those words. Lord knows I have a big personality, so big it scares me. Thus I have no desire for anybody to ground their faith or their life in me. But when the preaching gets more press (and more space) in the worship experience, perhaps this is still what we invite people to do. I know for my part, I am feeling my fragility these days. I have as great a confidence in God than ever to change lives, but a much a more sober estimation about the value of my own life to the church....

Love his phrase "sacramental Pentecostalism"!

What do you think?

Looking Through the Symbols

From The Master's Table  comes this reminder to look through the symbols to the underlying realities::

We wear crosses of gold and silver about the neck, carve them into our church pews, paint them in our artwork and place them above our church buildings.  As an icon, the cross represents Christianity.  But our images have no splinters, rusty nails, nor do they drip with the blood of the slain.  The image of the cross is meant to remind us that the broken body of Christ was hung on the tree.  Our communion wafers are perfect little squares, and the wine/juice tastes sweet, but the body of the Lord was broken and his blood poured out.  Flesh was ripped away by the whip.  Blood and sweat mingled and dripped to the ground.  The air was ripe with the smell of blood and the stench of death.  The cross was an instrument of torture and execution.

I’m not suggesting we do away with the symbols.  It is our nature to forget, and we must be reminded of what God has done.  Rainbows actually are beautiful, but they remind us of mercy in the face of judgment.  Baptism represents death of the old man and rebirth of the new.  Passover reminded the Jews of what God had done for them, just as communion does for us today.  Our hope is in the resurrection, made possible by the crucifixion.  We must remember what God has done.  But remember as well… it wasn’t pretty.

Awaiting the Marriage Feast

I am looking forward to our church's baptism & communion service tonight!

"Every time we celebrate the Lord's Supper, we celebrate not only the redeeming purchase price paid by the Bridegroom but symbolically the marriage feast of the Lamb to which every believer is called."

- R.C. Sproul

Hat Tip: Becoming Part of the Bride | Ligonier Ministries:

A Bigger Miracle of Grace

One New Year, a large, affluent church invited some mission churches to join them for a Communion service. They came, mostly from the slums. One man who came was a thief who had served seven years in jail. By coincidence he ended up kneeling for Communion beside the judge who had sentenced him. Neither seemed to notice.

After the service, the judge asked the pastor, "Did you notice who was kneeling beside me?" "Yes," the pastor said, "but I didn't think you noticed."

"What a miracle of grace," the judge said. "An amazing miracle of grace." The pastor nodded.

"You think I'm talking about him, don't you?" said the judge. "I'm talking about me. He has a history of crime. It makes sense that a criminal would recognize his need for grace."

"But I went to private school. I have a good career. I've been going to church my entire life. I pray every night. I used to look down on people like that. It's only by grace that I've seen that I'm just as big a sinner as he is. In fact, I'm probably worse because I think I'm better."

"Kneeling beside him this morning I realized: I am a bigger miracle of grace."

(adapted from Kent Hughes, Ephesians: The Mystery of the Body of Christ)

Me too, sayeth the Journeyman- I am a BIG miracle of grace!

Hat Tip: A Bigger Miracle of Grace - Darryl's Blog

Chalcedon and the Real Presence

For any readers who are Theology or Church History geeks (like me), C. Michael Patton has an interesting post on how the Chalcedonian definition on the nature of Christ interacts with beliefs on the real presence in the bread and wine of Communion.

See Parchment and Pen » Do Catholics Deny Chalcedon in their View of Mass?