The table and the font are sacred. [I Pet 4]

I was almost weeping in church today. I was praying fervently about an issue that is fairly urgent and checking the phone to see if there were any messages about it. I had troubled sleep relating to the same issue [1]. And we were talking about a time when the disciples walked to Emmeus, and how Christ was not recognised until the meal. Followed by communion: which I could not participate in, for I was unworthy. So I went for a walk, and thought about the theology of communion, and where the errors were.

Today's walk turnaround point.
Today’s walk turnaround point.

What we do with our bodies matters. We get our bodies into more trouble than the body gives us [2]. Our lack of discipline, our refusal to take up the burdens of each day and do what is needed, not what is convenient or pleasurable, affects our prayers,. chills our heart, and makes us unloving and inhospitable.

The end of all things is at hand; therefore be self-controlled and sober-minded for the sake of your prayers. Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. Show hospitality to one another without grumbling. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace: whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies—in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.

(1 Peter 4:7-11 ESV)

I think James once said that true religion was to care for the widows and orphans and keep oneself untrammeled in this world. These acts are the fruit we look for. We don’t practice true religion by letting ourselves fall out of training, both spiritual and physical. The spiritual matters: the table is not merely a meal, our life is more than our body mass index, maximal dead lift, or peak oxygen uptake.

If all it took was discipline and feeling spiritual, we could find fellowship any Saturday at the Harrier’s club and every Sunday on the long run or cycle. The reason we meet together in the name of Christ is that Christ is there, and the reason that we celebrate the table as we do is that Christ is then there.

Nor do we practice true religion if we concentrate on the physical alone, and neglect the spiritual. I saw many people on today’s walk watching their children play ripper rugby, or surfing, or running. There is nothing wrong with these things, but that fellowship is not the true kirk, in the same way that any meal and any table is not the true table. From the regulations that Kiwi Presbyterians have.

Those leading are free to select from or adapt any of the many Reformed orders that are available, but should be aware that Assembly has set out – in the regulations relating to elders leading communion – what should normally be included in a service of communion…

…bread and wine shall be set apart, with the unfailing use of Christ’s words and acts of institution, with thanksgiving, and there shall be communion using both bread and wine by presbyter and people.

The service of Holy Communion shall normally include:

  • Prayer of humble approach to God with self-examination and confession, and the declaration of God’s mercy to penitent sinners.
  • The ministry of the Word, including readings from the Scriptures with preaching.
  • Affirmation of faith.
  • Intercession for the world and the Church.
  • The offering to God of his gifts to his people including the bread and the wine, of their praise and thanksgiving and of themselves.
  • Invocation of the Holy Spirit.
  • Praise for God’s glory and goodness in creation; thankful commemoration and showing forth of the redemptive work of Christ in his birth, death, resurrection, ascension, and in his institution of this sacrament; thanksgiving for the hope of his coming again in glory.
  • The breaking of the consecrated bread.
  • Expression of communion with God, with one another, with the whole people of God on earth, and with all the company of heaven.
  • The Lord’s Prayer.

We do not make the table a meal like any other because it is corporate, it is worship, and we recall in public the death and resurrection of Christ. In the communion we publically unite with Christ: along with baptism it is a direct command from Christ and the Apostles [3]. Now, we can and should call for the blessing of God on our works and acts, meals included. It is a good thing to read and pray in the morning, to pray for your children in the evening, or to pray the hours. But that devotional life is private, and not my business. The table and the font are the foundation of the church, and they must remain holy. For the words and work of Christ are recalled by them. Lest our prayers be hindered.
____________________

1. Family issues around travel. Civilians involved.
2. Yes, I’m quoting C. S. Lewis.
3. We can argue about the number of sacraments later: the reformed say two — the Romans have (I think) baptism, confirmation, communion, holy orders, confession, extreme unction and excorcism. The orthodox do baptism, confirmation and first communion at once: the Pentecostals have an extra ritual called ‘baptism of the holy spirit’.

3 Comments

  1. hearthie said:

    Said a prayer that your family gets where they need to, in safety.

    Sermon tonight, from the Bapticostals*: Pastor Mike is encouraging us to expect great things from the Holy Spirit in the near future – to put up our sails, expecting the wind to fill them, as t’were. I was raised Baptist, in a tradition that doesn’t expect the more spectacular gifts of the Spirit to be used for today, so I find this interesting – and hopeful. Doesn’t everyone want more of God to show through in their lives?? Is that the baptism of the Holy Spirit? Are we just being humans and slapping labels on things and then we argue about the labels while we agree about the things??

    April 19, 2015
  2. Chris Gale said:

    Well, I grew up in the Charismatic movement, and have seen the extreme ends of it. I have zero problems with Calvary Chapel and similar groups who accept the gifts of the spirit exist (cessationalism is a flawed doctrine) but there are those who make this into a required step for salvation, and they, also are in error.

    April 19, 2015
  3. hearthie said:

    Ja, among the various ways of trying to explain CC is “charismatic with a seatbelt”.

    FWIW I’ve been at the church for 13? years now, and have only heard someone speak in tongues once, at a prayer meeting – and she was praying quietly in a corner.

    I think it’s useful to compare notes. Or I just like to talk. One or the other. 😀

    April 20, 2015

Comments are closed.