Yesterday, after speaking at The Well in Christchurch and moving everyone into a period of silence, I facilitated Holy Communion/Eucharist. I enjoy speaking and delivering sermons. It’s always a privilege to be invited to speak anywhere and it’s an important part of what I believe I’m supposed to be doing and an important part of my work with TEAR Fund, but delivering Holy Communion feels like a greater privilege even though it’s often a shorter part of the service than the sermon (in Evangelical churches). It’s the intersection, in a communal setting, of all the things of any significance to our faith. When really ‘getting’ all that it is I see how it intimately connects with the work of justice my life engages where TEAR Fund plays a central part.
In many churches the sermon slot is given to the rock stars, those accomplished at the task and who can deliver something that will grab an audience while Communion is often given to up-and-comers and is sometimes seen as a great place for people to try-out and be tested in the whole speaking arena. I used to think this was fine and participated in it in such a manner myself. At the time I had a low view of Communion. When I say ‘low’ I don’t mean it in the negative sense, rather I mean it in the theological sense.
You see, there’s a spectrum of belief around Communion, the nature of the bread and wine/juice and what happens when we participate in it. The spectrum goes from the ‘low’ view of the elements being purely symbolic and the participant just acting in remembrance of Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross, through to the very ‘high’ view of Transubstantiation, predominantly held to by the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox churches – where it is believed that the bread and wine become the actual body and blood of Jesus once the Priest has worked through the appropriate rituals. I don’t sit at either end of the spectrum, I sit somewhere around the middle. I believe Communion is an act of remembrance, but I believe it is more than that. I believe that when the believer participates in Communion in openness and honesty, we participate in the mysterious body and blood of Jesus – his active presence. I believe we unite with him in some way and I believe the elements of bread and wine/juice are the vehicle for that. I’m happy to leave the mechanics of that to mystery, hence I don’t go all the way to Transubstantiation.
Personally, moving from the purely symbolic to the place I am at now in my belief about Communion has elevated how I believe Communion should be treated in the service setting and I actually regret some of the things I have done with it in the past. Mostly because, for me, it has resulted in the belief that in Communion we have the height of communal Christian practice that brings together the most important elements of our faith and acts as a means to rejuvenate us for the ongoing work of making His kingdom a reality in the world. It is, at its heart, transforming. It is and always has been, the ultimate altar call of the Christian Church. It calls us to the cross, draws us towards life, unites us with the redemption and reconciliation of the whole of creation and sends us out into that creation to represent Christ himself and participate in His work of justice.
Ancient Israel had festivals and feasts that would occur regularly throughout the year. The purpose of all of it was to remind them of the story of God acting for them, drawing them forward. In that sense those celebrations acted as a reminder. They also acted as a model to demonstrate to them how life should be. Transcending all that, those feasts and festivals continually drew them into the reality of who God is and acted as regular times of transformation, shaping who they were as the people of God. Through them they enacted God’s story of justice – His story of how things should be and in those celebrations they saw that story of God’s will and His ‘right’ way in very obvious ways. Each celebration should have provided the vigour needed to then live that reality out in everyday life.
Christianity has its own calendar of feasts and festivals that serve the same purpose. Evangelicalism (of which I am a part) has largely lost that rhythm except for Easter and Christmas, and many of us are rediscovering things like Lent and Advent as we look to the traditions of the historical church still practiced by people like our Catholic brothers and sisters. Chief among our celebrations though, the one that Jesus himself commanded, has always been Holy Communion. In it sits everything that the feasts and festivals were designed to do.
Holy Communion is our story being told over and over and over again. That continual reminder is important. it keeps bringing us back to who we are in a world that saturates us with competing messages telling us something lesser. It works to repeatedly capture and ignite our imagination.
It draws us into a character transformation no matter how big or small it might feel, if we feel anything at all. It calls us to humility and repentance and takes us to the foot of the cross, to bow down before the feet of our Saviour. By willfully placing ourselves there we recognise God’s holiness, His grace, His mercy and ultimately, His action of incarnation and sacrificial salvation toward us. In it we see that He is for us and that the ultimate nature of His being is love. In Holy Communion we participate in that love.
In Holy Communion we unite with the universal body of Christ that transcends time, geographical barriers and cultural differences. We declare that we who are many are one body, for we all share the one bread. We put aside our differences and allow ourselves to be drawn into the new reality He has established and continues to build through His Church, against which the gates of Hades will not prevail. So while not losing our individuality, we get caught up in a greater reality.
Through participation in Holy Communion we enter into the mysterious presence of Christ and we receive His body and blood. In His own words, through these we find life – it’s one of the great paradoxes of Christianity – his death gives life. But it’s not just the new life we gain through Christ as individuals that we enter, it’s the new life that is there, active and drawing in the whole of God’s creation.
Ultimately, with all this in mind we enter into God’s story of justice – His work of drawing all of creation towards the new heavens and new earth. We see and are reminded that His kingdom has come near and it broke forth in Christ. In Holy Communion, no matter how our week has been, we allow ourselves to get caught up in that and as we do so we ask that, filled with the Spirit’s grace and power, we may be renewed for the service of His kingdom – not allowing the realities we encounter at the Communion table to end there, but understanding that it is a reality we carry into the world with us. We take the justice so profoundly active in Holy Communion into our daily routines and relationships and through us, allow its reality to capture and woo a world that desperately longs to move forward into what God has ordained for it – where all things are made right.
For this reason, let us approach Holy Communion as often as we possibly can. Let us do so in reverence, humility and with an openness to enter the life and freedom found it in so that we may be transformed and then carry that life and freedom into His world as His Church. And if we’re ever given the chance to administer Holy Communion or lead people towards it, no matter where we sit on the spectrum of belief about it, let’s do so understanding and grasping the significance of what we are called to do whether we be rock-star preachers or not. Even just calling people to remember what Jesus did on the cross is a significant thing to draw others towards.
Amen?