Communion is a mystery, but an essential one. There are various ideas about what “this is my body means” and this is a passage that would argue for transubstantiation — that the bread and wine are Christ and we are eating him. And others that the table should be universal, for if we drink at this table we would all be saved. Calvin has a comment on this below (yes, I hit the commentaries again) but I want to look at one of his main points.
The Jews were treating Jesus with contempt. He did not fit their model, he must be dismissed.
The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate, and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.” Jesus said these things in the synagogue, as he taught at Capernaum.
(John 6:52-59 ESV)
OK, now for the commentary. Some of you can skip this, but there is a point to it. If you look what Brown noted, there is a sense that the gospel is not enough
That was my last time – its time to look elsewhere when the minister and elders are chasing experience rather than repentance. Well over 100 years of faithful service at the site will be thrown away on a sea of experience by ignorant people in leadership who do not know what the Gospel is. I know others are concerned but only one has confronted the minister. The devil is working hard and although he has lost the war he fights on – there will be enormous damage along the way to the last day.
I am not sure if it is ignrance, or accomodation. For the world judges success by success, and will throw those to the side who do not follow their narrative.
Consider, for a second, the US elections. The best thing you can say about the primaries is that they are close. Clinton just scraped past Sanders on the Dem side, and Trump lost to Cruz, but not my much on the Rep. side. But the press are talking about triumph and downfuall, when neither exist.
Our politicians are fallen. Trump and Palin are flawed, but are not traitors: Clinton is facing indictment for doing pretty much what Wikileaks did. But that is not the narrative. Those who deviate from the narrative are treated with contempt.
Verily, verily, I say to you. The just resentment which Christ felt, when he saw his grace rejected with such haughty disdain, constrained him to employ this oath. For he does not now make use of simple doctrine, but likewise mingles threatenings for the purpose of striking terror. He denounces eternal perdition against all who refuse to seek life from his flesh; as if he had said, “If you hold my flesh in contempt, rest assured that there remains for you no other hope of life.” The vengeance that awaits all despisers of the grace of Christ is, that with their pride they miserably perish; and the reason why they must be urged with plainness and severity is, that they may not continue to flatter themselves. For if we threaten with death those diseased persons who refuse to take medicines, what must we do with wicked men, when they strive, as far as lies in their power, to destroy life itself?
Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man. When he says, the flesh of the Son of man, the expression is emphatic; for he reproves them for their contempt, which arose from perceiving that he resembled other men. The meaning therefore is: “Despise me as much as you please, on account of the mean and despicable appearance of my flesh, still that despicable flesh contains life; and if you are destitute of it, you will nowhere else find any thing else to quicken you.”
The ancients fell into a gross error by supposing that little children were deprived of eternal life, if they did not dispense to them the eucharist, that is, the Lord’s Supper; [160] for this discourse does not relate to the Lord’s Supper, but to the uninterrupted communication of the flesh of Christ, [161] which we obtain apart from the use of the Lord’s Supper. Nor were the Bohemians in the right, when they adduced this passage to prove that all without exception ought to be admitted to the use of the cup. With respect to young children, the ordinance of Christ forbids them to partake of the Lord’s Supper; because they are not yet able to know or to celebrate the remembrance of the death of Christ. The same ordinance makes the cup common to all, for it commands us all to drink of it,
We should not treat our politicians with too much respect, but instead pray that they, flawed as they are, will not break under the burden of leadership and do good. What we cannot do is treat the gospel with contempt.
For God is not tame, and will not follow our narrative.
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