Jun 7, 2015
Why is it that on the Sunday mornings we take a tiny piece of
bread and a tiny cup of juice we call it the Lord’s Supper? It’s
not even a snack much less a supper!
But from the beginning the Lord’s Supper was a supper. Jesus was
eating the Passover meal with His disciples when He broke the bread
and gave the cup to His disciples (Matt. 26:17-29; Mark 14:12-25;
Luke 22:7-23). The early church celebrated the Lord's Supper as a
shared meal (Acts 2:42, 46; 20:7; 1 Cor. 11:20-22, 33-34). In fact,
1 Corinthians 11:17-34 indicates that the Lord’s Supper was
celebrated weekly by the entire church family as a part of the
meeting of the church.
From 1 Corinthians 11:17-34 I want to make a case for
re-establishing the Lord’s Supper as a shared meal here at Grace
Church. As I will explain later, this will not replace but
supplement our Sunday morning observance of the Lord’s Supper.
As we turn to 1 Corinthians 11:17-34 we realize quickly that it is
a stern corrective for abuses that were taking place at the Lord’s
Supper meal in Corinth. In fact, Paul reveals that these abuses
were the reason the Lord had disciplined church members with both
sickness and premature death (11:30)! The value Jesus places on the
Lord’s Supper is a compelling reason for us to restore it to a
shared meal.
Paul confronts two problems. First, the union of believers one with
another was being violated.