“The table of the Lord” (1 Corinthians 10:21).
Dear congregation,
“Why don’t we allow just anyone to come to the Table?”
Fair question. I know there are those who have wondered it. A visitor shows up and walks up to the communion table. Why do we insist that he must speak to the consistory first? Why does the church have any say at all? It’s personal. No it is not. It is the communion of the saints in its purest form.
Paul rightly calls it...
“The table of the Lord.”
It does not belong to us. It belongs to Jesus Christ. Appointed by Him, His Word gives it meaning, and entrusts its oversight to His local servants. Everything on that table is Him. The bread is His body given. The wine is His blood shed. Sitting around that family table are those who confess, “That I with body and soul, both in life and death, am not my own, but belong unto my faithful Savior Jesus Christ.”
Every communicant is a guests at His Table.
That means we need to pay attention to holy instruction.
The Host welcomes hungry believers of any degree. He warns against eating and drinking unworthily. In the same letter, Paul writes, “Let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread, and drink of that cup” (1 Corinthians 11:28). These words require, yes require something. We are to meditate very seriously about it, what we say by attending, and upon Whom we are depending.
Coming to the Table is a re-confession of faith.
With bread in hand, I confess that I need the death of Christ applied to my soul. With the cup at my lips, I confess His blood as my only righteousness. When I sit among His saints, I confess that I belong to Him and them. We are the family of God.
Yes, our lives may contradict that confession. Paul speaks about one who is “called a brother” but continues in open sin (1 Corinthians 5:11). The flock must not treat that lightly. Love for Jesus, concern for the lost, and care for the congregation require God’s under shepherds to be involved.
Think of Thanksgiving dinner at your grandparents house. The whole family is there. The food is on the table. Forks and knives clanking against the plates. Sweet and intimate fellowship. Then, unannounced, a stranger walks through the dining room and sits at the table, takes a turkey leg, and begins to eat. No introduction. No name. What would happen to that table? It would, at the very lease, interrupt family communion. Everyone would think, if not ask “Who is this?”
This is why attendance involves governing.
The Lord’s servants can’t see into anyone’s heart. They can, however, ask some very basic questions. It is common sense. “The elders which are among you I exhort ... Feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the oversight thereof” (1 Peter 5:1,2). To hear a person’s confession, consider his walk, and ask whether he is under the care of a faithful church is reasonable. Basic elements, really, of any responsible church. When Jesus instituted His supper, it was in an upper room. Only the disciples were present. There was no open invitation sent out to everyone Jesus touched. No. It was a carefully selected list of friends. We must think on that, congregation.
When a visitor meets with the consistory beforehand, it’s a conversation that serves a loving, protective purpose. We want to know the person who wants to sit at this family meal. We need to understand if he knows what this meal means. The elders are charged to watch for souls, “as they that must give account” (Hebrews 13:17). That responsibility reaches even to the Communion Table, our most intimate setting of all.
“If it’s guarded so carefully, is there really a place for me?”
Dear one, weak faith has a place open at the Table.
Our Catechism describes a people displeased with themselves because of their sins, yet trust that those sins are forgiven for Christ’s sake, and desire increasingly to strengthen their faith and amend their life (Heidelberg Catechism, Question 81).
I read a struggle in that description. Weeping, even.
Dear one, are you grieved by your sin? Do you seek a righteousness outside yourself in Jesus Christ? Do you want to forsake what displeases Him, but painfully feel how much sin remains within?
Our Host knows how to receive such guests.
The One who wants His servants to guard His Table, also gives the Table to nourish the weak. The weak do not need distractions. They are trying to focus on Jesus. Such a thing may encumber their nourishment. His protection for His bride and her sustaining is seen in this. He will have us take His holy things, seriously. Yet have His hungry children filled.
Remember what it cost Him.
Before there was bread for us to receive, His body was broken. Before there was a cup of blessing, He drank the bitter cup of His Father’s wrath. Our welcome rests there.
So, as a new communion season approaches, we ask,
Whose Table is it?
The Lord’s.
Then whose Word should govern it?
His.
And upon whose mercy may a redeemed sinner rest?
The One who says, “This is my body, which is broken for you.”
Your friend and pastor,
J. Lewis