SPEAKER_01: Hello and welcome to the Sermon Podcast of Mission Hills Church, located in San Marcos, California.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much for listening.
SPEAKER_01: We pray that this message blesses you and your walk with Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna be reading 1 Corinthians 11, 17 through 34.
SPEAKER_00: It goes on forever, so prepare yourself.
SPEAKER_00: But in the following instructions, I do not commend you, because when you come together, it is not for the better, but for the worse.
SPEAKER_00: But in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you, and I believe it in part, for there must be factions among you in order that those who are genuine among you, among you may be recognized.
SPEAKER_00: When you come together, it is not the Lord's supper that you eat.
SPEAKER_00: For in eating, each one goes ahead with his own meal.
SPEAKER_00: One goes hungry, another gets drunk.
SPEAKER_00: What?
SPEAKER_00: Do you not have houses to eat and drink in?
SPEAKER_00: Or you just do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing?
SPEAKER_00: What shall I say to you?
SPEAKER_00: Shall I commend you in this?
SPEAKER_00: No, I will not.
SPEAKER_00: For I received the Lord, what I also delivered to you.
SPEAKER_00: That the Lord Jesus on the night when he has betrayed you, betrayed, took bread.
SPEAKER_00: And when he has given thanks, he broke it and said, This is my body which is for you, do this in remembrance of me.
SPEAKER_00: In the same way also he took the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood.
SPEAKER_00: Do this as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.
SPEAKER_00: For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.
SPEAKER_00: Whoever therefore eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Let a person examine himself then and so he so eat of the bread and drink of the cup.
SPEAKER_00: For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment himself.
SPEAKER_00: This is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died.
SPEAKER_00: But we have judged ourselves truly.
SPEAKER_00: We would not be judged.
SPEAKER_00: But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined, so we may not be condemned along with the world.
SPEAKER_00: So then, my brothers, when you come together to eat, wait for another.
SPEAKER_00: Anyone is hungry, let him eat at home, so that when you come together, it is not for judgment about the other things.
SPEAKER_00: I give directions when I come.
SPEAKER_00: This is the word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_02: Uh good to be back with you all as we continue our series through 1 Corinthians.
SPEAKER_02: But um, before we do that, last week uh Margie surprised me with a little moment for uh working here for 20 years.
SPEAKER_02: And uh one of the things that happened was um I didn't get a chance to share with you a little bit about what the last 20 years of working here at Mission Hills has meant to me.
SPEAKER_02: And so I wanted to take a few moments this morning, and I want to share with you a few thoughts as I've been reflecting on the last 20 years, and uh a couple passages have come to my mind, and I wanted to share them with you.
SPEAKER_02: Uh the first is 2 Corinthians chapter 4, starting in verse 7.
SPEAKER_02: The Apostle Paul writes this He says, We have this treasure in jars of clay to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.
SPEAKER_02: We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed, perplexed but not driven to despair, persecuted but not forsaken, struck down but not destroyed, always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies.
SPEAKER_02: For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our mortal flesh.
SPEAKER_02: So death is at work in us, but life in you.
SPEAKER_02: And this passage has been coming to my mind over the last several weeks as I've been reflecting on um the last 20 years.
SPEAKER_02: I started uh at Mission Hills Church when I was 25 years old.
SPEAKER_02: I am now 45 years old.
SPEAKER_02: I started five uh the this church opened five days before my oldest son was born.
SPEAKER_02: And so he's now uh in college, and it's just like this amazing experience of thinking over 20 years of raising my family in this church.
SPEAKER_02: And and one of the things that has struck me about this passage in particular is the way Paul articulates life and death and the the sufferings that come with his ministry, but also the joys that come with his ministry.
SPEAKER_02: And the last 20 years, uh, I will say this without question, without hesitation, have broken my heart.
SPEAKER_02: Um, in 20 years of ministry, walking alongside many members of this church who have suffered immensely, uh, sickness, uh, sudden deaths, tragedies, being in the hospital, being in memorial services, being in people's homes, uh, where people who have suffered have suffered faithfully, and one of the great privileges and heartaches of ministry is walking with people who are suffering.
SPEAKER_02: And I have it has broken my heart to see what has happened and how people have suffered in this church, um, but also having to make decisions that are unpopular or difficult decisions, decisions that in many ways for me were a shattering experience.
SPEAKER_02: Uh decisions that broke my heart, decisions that I knew would not be appreciated, and I've thought about those experiences and what it means to suffer as a minister of the gospel.
SPEAKER_02: But above all, in the midst of all of those experiences, what I have come to discover and experience, as Paul says, is the life of Jesus.
SPEAKER_02: The life of Jesus.
SPEAKER_02: And in the midst of all of these things, some of the things that have just absolutely blown my mind as I've sat with people in hospitals and in homes and done memorial services with their families and been in counseling moments, is I have seen the way that the Lord Jesus Christ has worked in the midst of heartache and suffering and death, and he has shown his beauty and his goodness and his love through this church.
SPEAKER_02: And it's been a testament of the life of Jesus to me.
SPEAKER_02: It's been a joy for me to experience these things because it has strengthened my own experience of the love of God.
SPEAKER_02: I've been in counseling rooms where it seemed like obvious that these people were not gonna walk with Jesus, we're not gonna follow Jesus, do what he's asked them to do, and I've heard people give witness and testimony that despite all the obstacles and hardships, we're gonna follow Jesus no matter what.
SPEAKER_02: We're gonna do whatever he asks us to do.
SPEAKER_02: And it has witness to me in their own heartaches of what God has called me to.
SPEAKER_02: And that has been an encouragement to me.
SPEAKER_02: Uh the other passage is Luke 17.
SPEAKER_02: And this in Luke 17, 7 through 10, Jesus tells a parable about a master and his servants, and it's a really uh interesting passage of scripture.
SPEAKER_02: Uh Jesus in it, he says this.
SPEAKER_02: He says, Will any of you who has a servant ploughing or keeping sheep say to him when he has come in from the field, come at once and recline at table?
SPEAKER_02: Will he not rather say to his servant, Prepare supper for me, dress properly, serve me while I eat and drink, and afterward you will eat and drink.
SPEAKER_02: Does he then thank the servant because he did what was commanded?
SPEAKER_02: So also, when you have done all that you were commanded, say this we are unworthy servants.
SPEAKER_02: We have only done what is our duty.
SPEAKER_02: I was thinking about last week, and a number of you were congratulating me on 20 years.
SPEAKER_02: You gave me a round of applause, which is really nice, but it felt so uncomfortable.
SPEAKER_02: And it felt uncomfortable because imagine this.
SPEAKER_02: Imagine going to a restaurant, a fine dining restaurant, and um at the end of the service, everybody in the restaurant stands up and applauds the busboy.
SPEAKER_02: You just clean the dishes off so incredibly well.
SPEAKER_02: That water was so fresh.
SPEAKER_02: It'd be it would be odd, right?
SPEAKER_02: That would be odd, and for me that was a bit of what it felt like because I'm like the the way I've come to think of it as a kind of busboy in the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_02: And this experience of being congratulated, it was so encouraging, but at the same time odd and strange.
SPEAKER_02: Because what Jesus says here, I am an unworthy servant, and I have only done what is my duty.
SPEAKER_02: And maybe this is like the thing that I want to leave with you as I've reflected on 20 years of ministry here at Mission Hills Church, uh, is to say something like this.
SPEAKER_02: I am nothing.
SPEAKER_02: And that's not like, oh, Sam's beating himself up, he feels so bad, he feels sorry for himself.
SPEAKER_02: I am nothing.
SPEAKER_02: Christ is all.
SPEAKER_02: If my ministry here that the Lord has called to me, called me to is anything, it is to testify to the Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_02: I will go one day, but Christ will not.
SPEAKER_02: I will fail you, but Christ will not.
SPEAKER_02: It is his face that you will look upon one day and find the fullness of joy in.
SPEAKER_02: I am nothing, but Christ is all.
SPEAKER_02: There was a famous uh missionary, uh, his name was Count Zinzendorf, and he had a famous little adage.
SPEAKER_02: He said this preach the gospel, die and be forgotten.
SPEAKER_02: Preach the gospel, die and be forgotten.
SPEAKER_02: Christ is all.
SPEAKER_02: And so, Mission Hills Church, with whatever time the Lord gives me here at Mission Hills, my prayer is that each of you would not feel deeply connected to me as your pastor, but above all, that you would be deeply connected to the Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_02: As Jesus says in John 15, that you would abide in him.
SPEAKER_02: Abide in Christ.
SPEAKER_02: He is your life.
SPEAKER_02: And I, the best that I will ever do is clean the dishes off of your table and get you fresh water.
SPEAKER_02: Amen.
SPEAKER_02: All right, let's continue our worship service this morning with our passage of scripture in 1 Corinthians chapter 11, verses 17 through 34.
SPEAKER_02: Just as a reminder of the series that we're in, we're calling it Sinners and Saints.
SPEAKER_02: You have it there in your worship folder, and we call it that because as you read through 1 Corinthians, what you come to discover is this church in Corinth is full of sinners.
SPEAKER_02: They have made a mess of things.
SPEAKER_02: They have made a mess of their personal relationships, they have made some radically poor choices.
SPEAKER_02: In fact, we read in our passage this morning that some of them, before communion, are getting drunk.
SPEAKER_02: This is a church filled with sinners.
SPEAKER_02: And yet Paul opens his letter in 1 Corinthians chapter 1, verse 2, and he says this that they are called saints.
SPEAKER_02: He calls the sinners saints.
SPEAKER_02: And it's a dramatic opening line for the Apostle Paul because what he's doing is he's communicating, you may be sinners, but you are God's sinners.
SPEAKER_02: That word saints, it means to belong to God.
SPEAKER_02: You may be sinners, but you belong to me.
SPEAKER_02: And this is an incredibly important idea that the Apostle Paul begins this letter with.
SPEAKER_02: They have become God's own sinners through the work of Jesus Christ, what Paul calls in the beginning of his letter the word of the cross.
SPEAKER_02: They belong to God because of what Jesus has done for them on the cross.
SPEAKER_02: This means importantly that they no longer belong to themselves.
SPEAKER_02: They don't live for themselves, they don't live to themselves.
SPEAKER_02: And what we'll come to see throughout the whole letter here that Paul writes is that they actually, because they belong to God, God has something to say about how they live.
SPEAKER_02: God has some instructions.
SPEAKER_02: If you're gonna belong to me, if you are gonna be my saints, this is how I want you to live.
SPEAKER_02: And so he's gonna give some instructions on what it means to grow up and to mature in God's family.
SPEAKER_02: And that's really what this whole letter is about.
SPEAKER_02: And it's broken into five different sections, as we've uh talked about a number of times.
SPEAKER_02: Uh chapters one through four in the letter, Paul talks about divisions that are happening in the church.
SPEAKER_02: Chapters five, six, and seven, and Paul is talking about some issues surrounding sex and marriage that are happening in the church.
SPEAKER_02: In chapters eight, nine, and ten, he's gonna talk about Christian freedom and how we use our freedom to love and to serve one another rather than to indulge our own selfish desires.
SPEAKER_02: And then in chapters 11 through 14, Paul is gonna address some disorder and problems that were happening in their worship services.
SPEAKER_02: That's where we're at right now in chapter 11.
SPEAKER_02: We're kind of skipping backwards a little bit.
SPEAKER_02: Uh, Pastor Keating, the last two weeks, preached on chapters 12 and 13.
SPEAKER_02: We're gonna go back a little bit and then we'll skip forward next week.
SPEAKER_02: And then the last section that the Apostle Paul addresses is some questions around the resurrection, the final resurrection of all believers.
SPEAKER_02: And so this is the basic outline of 1 Corinthians.
SPEAKER_02: And we find ourselves in that fourth section as Paul addresses the gathered worship of God's people and what that gathered worship ought to look like.
SPEAKER_02: And one of those issues that has arisen in the church is how the church practices the Lord's table or communion, or sometimes we call it the Eucharist, which just means to give thanks.
SPEAKER_02: How the church practices the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: And so I want to give a little bit of historical context before we look at some of the points that come out of our text this morning.
SPEAKER_02: Uh, one of the important things to understand as we read this passage in 1 Corinthians 11, verses 17 through 34 is how worship happened in the ancient and early church.
SPEAKER_02: The ancient church didn't have buildings like this.
SPEAKER_02: They didn't have great cathedrals, they didn't have their own uh buildings to worship in.
SPEAKER_02: They worshiped in homes, and in particular, the homes of wealthy people.
SPEAKER_02: Wealthy patrons of the church would open their homes for the gathered worship of God's people.
SPEAKER_02: And these home, these house churches could be anywhere from 10 to 50 people, depending on how many that home would house.
SPEAKER_02: And so throughout the city of Corinth, these different houses would gather for worship on the Lord's Day, on Sunday, and they would worship the Lord together.
SPEAKER_02: And this is this passage we we see this idea come across in verses 17 and 18, verse 20 and verse 33, in which Paul describes the gathered worship as their coming together.
SPEAKER_02: When they come together, and this is a kind of technical term for the worship of God's people, when they come together and gather in worship.
SPEAKER_02: And this was happening in the homes of wealthy members.
SPEAKER_02: But what was happening as they gathered in the homes of these wealthy members is some of these wealthy members would arrive early to worship.
SPEAKER_02: And they were able to arrive early because they were wealthy.
SPEAKER_02: They had more leisure time, more space and time available to them, more than the poor people that were a part of the church.
SPEAKER_02: And so they were able to arrive early and they would start feasting.
SPEAKER_02: They would have a feast, a meal, as part of the gathering of worship, a whole meal.
SPEAKER_02: But in Corinth, it was only the wealthy people who were eating this meal together.
SPEAKER_02: Typically, people would bring their own food to it was kind of like, you know, church potlucks have been a part of the church since the very beginning.
SPEAKER_02: I wonder if there were casseroles there.
SPEAKER_02: And I wonder if they were any good.
SPEAKER_02: But the gathered worship, as they gathered and worshiped, they would eat a meal as part of this church gathering.
SPEAKER_02: But it was only the wealthy who were eating this meal together.
SPEAKER_02: And as part of this meal, they would also celebrate the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: There's a problem though, and perhaps you can start to see it already.
SPEAKER_02: The problem was they weren't waiting for the poor members of the church to get there.
SPEAKER_02: They weren't waiting for the poor members of the church to eat.
SPEAKER_02: They weren't including the poor members of the church in the meal that they were eating.
SPEAKER_02: And so we read in verse 20, look with me there in your text, when you come together, it is not the Lord's Supper that you eat, for in eating, each one goes ahead with his own meal.
SPEAKER_02: One goes hungry, another gets drunk.
SPEAKER_02: And what's happening is as they're eating, um, in many of these ancient homes, there were there was something like what we might call a living room, and it had couches and it had a low table, and people would sit and eat their meals there, and then outside of that room there was a bigger open space called an atrium, and that's where most of the poor people would gather, and they would see all the rich people in the other room eating the meal while they were all standing outside waiting.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe because they arrived late, maybe because they couldn't leave work, because a lot of them were servants and slaves in different households.
SPEAKER_02: And so they were being left out and they are going hungry, as Paul says there in verse 21.
SPEAKER_02: One goes hungry.
SPEAKER_02: But above all, not only are they not being included in the meal, but above all, they are being excluded from the practice of communion.
SPEAKER_02: They are being excluded from the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: And that's why Paul says it's not the Lord's table that you are eating.
SPEAKER_02: You're doing, whatever you may think you're doing, you're not doing communion because this just isn't how communion works.
SPEAKER_02: And not only this, they were feasting, these wealthy people in these churches were feasting to such a point and indulging themselves to such a point that some of them were getting drunk.
SPEAKER_02: Could you imagine that?
SPEAKER_02: Stumbling up to the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: But this is what's happening in Corinth.
SPEAKER_02: And the result of this problem that was happening is that this was creating division and humiliation in the church.
SPEAKER_02: That's what Paul says.
SPEAKER_02: Verse 18 for in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you, uh, socioeconomic divisions, a division between the wealthy and the poor.
SPEAKER_02: There's divisions, and not only divisions, but humiliation.
SPEAKER_02: They're humiliating the poor people who are coming to worship.
SPEAKER_02: That's where he continues in verse 22.
SPEAKER_02: He says, What?
SPEAKER_02: Do you not have houses to eat and drink in?
SPEAKER_02: Or do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing?
SPEAKER_02: It's an outrage to the Apostle Paul what is happening here in Corinth.
SPEAKER_02: Division and humiliation.
SPEAKER_02: The church was being divided along socioeconomic lines, and the poor in that division were being humiliated.
SPEAKER_02: Kind of standing on the outside looking in, watching all the wealthy people enjoy a feast while they couldn't participate.
SPEAKER_02: And Paul is outraged.
SPEAKER_02: Not only that, more than Paul, God is outraged.
SPEAKER_02: So, what is God's response to this problem that's happening in Corinth?
SPEAKER_02: Well, we we read one of the craziest sections in the New Testament.
SPEAKER_02: The Apostle Paul writes this Verse 29.
SPEAKER_02: He says, For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body, eats and drinks judgment on himself.
SPEAKER_02: That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died.
SPEAKER_02: You could read this something like this, uh, talking to one of our elders.
SPEAKER_02: It seems like what the what Paul is saying is if you don't do communion right, you're gonna be killed.
SPEAKER_02: Not entirely wrong.
SPEAKER_02: But this is what Paul tells us is that God is disciplining the church.
SPEAKER_02: They're growing weak, they're growing sick, and dying.
SPEAKER_02: God himself is outraged that the poor are being excluded from the practice of communion.
SPEAKER_02: And so, because of this, he disciplines his church.
SPEAKER_02: And it's important to note here that when a light when God takes a life in this context, as kind of shocking as that might seem to us, in the context of the New Testament, there are some things that are worse than death.
SPEAKER_02: There are some things that are worse than death.
SPEAKER_02: And when God takes a life, this doesn't mean that those people don't end up in heaven and aren't forgiven.
SPEAKER_02: That's not what's being talked about here.
SPEAKER_02: But it is a form of discipline and it is a form of warning.
SPEAKER_02: We have a very similar story told for us in Acts chapter 5.
SPEAKER_02: To a married couple, they lie to the apostles about how much they've given to the church, and then right on the spot they drop dead.
SPEAKER_02: And this was meant to be a warning to the church to take this matter seriously.
SPEAKER_02: It's a form of discipline.
SPEAKER_02: Even death can be a form of discipline.
SPEAKER_02: God is not pleased with how they are practicing the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: And so Paul is going to give a final bit of counsel here to the Corinthian church there at the very end of our passage in verse 33.
SPEAKER_02: So then, my brothers, when you come together to eat, wait for one another.
SPEAKER_02: And if you're hungry, let him eat at home, so that when you come together, it will not be for judgment.
SPEAKER_02: In other words, don't make the gathering of the church about your own personal meals.
SPEAKER_02: Make it about the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: And don't come to the Lord's table looking to fill your gut, but come looking to fill your soul.
SPEAKER_02: And so Paul instructs them to do this and to do it together, that no one in the church is to be excluded from this practice, especially not the poor.
SPEAKER_02: If you read one thing throughout both Old and New Testaments, is that God's heart is bent toward the poor.
SPEAKER_02: He has an inclination, a tender spot in his heart for the poor.
SPEAKER_02: And he says, if you are excluding them, you are violating a deep principle and deep character of God Himself.
SPEAKER_02: So, this is what's going on in Corinth.
SPEAKER_02: And I want to take three basic biblical truths from this text that we here at Mission Hills Church, I think, need to embrace from what Paul teaches here.
SPEAKER_02: Three essential truths about the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: First, the Lord's table is central to Christian worship.
SPEAKER_02: The Lord's table is central to Christian worship.
SPEAKER_02: Second, the Lord's table is a matter of serious joy.
SPEAKER_02: And third, and finally, the Lord's table is a place of Christian unity.
SPEAKER_02: Central to worship, serious joy, Christian unity.
SPEAKER_02: That's what the Lord's table is about.
SPEAKER_02: So let's look first at our first point this morning, that the Lord's table is central to Christian worship.
SPEAKER_02: Paul really gets at this starting in verse 23.
SPEAKER_02: He says, I received from the Lord what I delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, This is my body, which is for you.
SPEAKER_02: Do this in remembrance of me.
SPEAKER_02: In the same way also he took the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood.
SPEAKER_02: Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me.
SPEAKER_02: For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.
SPEAKER_02: My body, my blood.
SPEAKER_02: What Paul is continuing, he tells us that he's continuing a tradition that was handed to him.
SPEAKER_02: What he received, he's passing on.
SPEAKER_02: This is a tradition, tradition that obviously began with the Lord Jesus himself on the night that he was betrayed.
SPEAKER_02: He passed that tradition to his apostles, who passed this tradition to the Apostle Paul.
SPEAKER_02: This is a part of how Christians in their gathered worship worship the Lord Jesus.
SPEAKER_02: And he clarifies that this table, the Lord's table, is a place where Jesus' body and Jesus' blood are offered.
SPEAKER_02: My body and my blood.
SPEAKER_02: What this means about Christian worship is that Christ is present with and in and to his church, both in his word and in the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: If you were to ask this question, where is the Lord Jesus in Christian worship?
SPEAKER_02: One of the ways we would answer that is saying he's in the bread and in the cup.
SPEAKER_02: That's where he is, because that's what he said.
SPEAKER_02: This is my body and my blood.
SPEAKER_02: The table is how he embodies his promise.
SPEAKER_02: Jesus made some spectacular promises.
SPEAKER_02: Here's one of them.
SPEAKER_02: Matthew chapter 28, verse 20.
SPEAKER_02: I am with you always to the very end of the age.
SPEAKER_02: Matthew chapter 18, verse 20.
SPEAKER_02: Jesus says this, where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am in the midst of them.
SPEAKER_02: Jesus promised to be with us always.
SPEAKER_02: Jesus promised when his people gather, there he is in their midst.
SPEAKER_02: And one of the ways that he fulfills and keeps that promise is at the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: It is a pledge, a sign of his presence with his people.
SPEAKER_02: This is because Christian worship is Christ-centered.
SPEAKER_02: Christian worship is Christ-centered.
SPEAKER_02: Now I could say a lot about this, and I could talk on and on for hours and hours about what it means for Christian worship to be Christ-centered.
SPEAKER_02: But above all, what this means is that the focus is on Christ, and Christ is the one who serves us in worship.
SPEAKER_02: Christ is the one who serves, that's why we call it a worship service.
SPEAKER_02: Because Christ serves us here, and one of the places he serves us is at the table.
SPEAKER_02: When we come together, he says, I'm going to be there with you.
SPEAKER_02: The table is the means that Christ provided, one of the means he provided to be with his people in all times and in all places.
SPEAKER_02: How many of you have ever wanted to be in more in two different places at once?
SPEAKER_02: It's not, I've found it very difficult.
SPEAKER_02: One of the most difficult ways I've discovered this is when I'm driving in traffic because my spirit wants to be somewhere else than my body is, and I'm stuck in traffic, but I want to be somewhere else.
SPEAKER_02: And what I feel in that distance between where I want to be and where I am is anxiety and frustration.
SPEAKER_02: I can't be in two places at once.
SPEAKER_02: But the Lord Jesus, He can be, and one of the ways that He accomplishes this is through the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: I'm with you, my body, my blood, there with you.
SPEAKER_02: And not only is he with us, but He's with all of His gathered people all over the world.
SPEAKER_02: He fulfills His promise to be with us always at the table.
SPEAKER_02: So we could ask this question: how do we know that Christ is with us?
SPEAKER_02: Well, because He promised to be.
SPEAKER_02: I promise I'm with you always.
SPEAKER_02: And He promised specifically to be with us in the bread and in the cup.
SPEAKER_02: I'll be with you there.
SPEAKER_02: I'll meet you there.
SPEAKER_02: It's like think of it like this.
SPEAKER_02: Um, if Jesus sent you a text message, what would that be like for you, by the way?
SPEAKER_02: That'd be pretty wild, right?
SPEAKER_02: Probably have to do some verification here.
SPEAKER_02: But if Jesus sent you a text message and he said, Hey, I'd like to meet with you, what would you say?
SPEAKER_02: Well, my first question would probably be something like this.
SPEAKER_02: Huh?
SPEAKER_02: And then after that, I would say something like this, Well, when and where?
SPEAKER_02: When and where would you like to meet?
SPEAKER_02: And Jesus will say, Sunday morning at 9 a.m.
SPEAKER_02: in the worship service, I'll meet you there at the table.
SPEAKER_02: Because I've promised to be there.
SPEAKER_02: That's where my body and my blood will be for you.
SPEAKER_02: The table is Christ's pledge to us, the fulfillment of his promise.
SPEAKER_02: I'm here and I'm with you.
SPEAKER_02: So the Lord's table is central to Christian worship.
SPEAKER_02: Now, this can things can get a little weird here because uh Christ doesn't explain the mechanics of this, right?
SPEAKER_02: He says, This is my body and this is my blood, but he doesn't explain the mechanics of how it's his body or how it's his blood.
SPEAKER_02: How is the bread the body of the Lord?
SPEAKER_02: How is the cup the blood of the Lord?
SPEAKER_02: And Christians have thought a lot about these questions and divided, which is ironic, given that the whole point was to bring them together.
SPEAKER_02: But they thought a lot about it.
SPEAKER_02: And this the reason here is something I think that we need to all grasp together.
SPEAKER_02: Jesus doesn't explain the mechanics of how the bread is his body or how the cup is his blood.
SPEAKER_02: Um, there's a reason why we call it a sacrament.
SPEAKER_02: The word sacrament literally means mystery.
SPEAKER_02: Well, how is this the body of the Lord?
SPEAKER_02: How is this the blood of the Lord?
SPEAKER_02: It's a mystery.
SPEAKER_02: He doesn't explain it to us.
SPEAKER_02: That's why we call it a sacrament.
SPEAKER_02: Because somehow, mysteriously, hidden in that wafer of bread and that cup is the very body and blood of the Lord.
SPEAKER_02: He doesn't tell us how, he just promises it.
SPEAKER_02: We are invited to the Lord's table less to understand the mystery and more to trust the promise.
SPEAKER_02: Less to understand the mystery and more to trust the promise.
SPEAKER_02: I've promised you, I will be with you there.
SPEAKER_02: A Roman Catholic scholar, actually, uh, his name is Peter Creft, he said it this way.
SPEAKER_02: Jesus said, take and eat, not take and understand.
SPEAKER_02: But by faith, we grasp at the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: By faith, we grasp at the Lord's table that Christ is with us.
SPEAKER_02: One of the ways that we put our faith into action is taking the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: That's a part of Christian worship.
SPEAKER_02: So, the Lord's table is central to Christian worship.
SPEAKER_02: Second, the Lord's table is a matter of serious joy.
SPEAKER_02: C.S.
SPEAKER_02: Lewis famously said this: Joy is the serious business of heaven.
SPEAKER_02: Joy is the serious business of heaven.
SPEAKER_02: And I want to modify his quote just a little bit.
SPEAKER_02: Joy is the serious business of the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: One of the things that comes clear in this passage is that we are warned against a kind of flippancy at the Lord's table, a kind of arrogance at the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: The wealthy in their arrogance were excluding the poor.
SPEAKER_02: They were making the Lord's table about themselves, about indulging their own desires, about feasting for themselves and neglecting the poor who were in their midst.
SPEAKER_02: Their pride had blinded them.
SPEAKER_02: And they weren't taking the meal seriously.
SPEAKER_02: They were treating it as if it was an ordinary meal.
SPEAKER_02: That's why he says, You're eating your own meals.
SPEAKER_02: You're not taking the Lord's table when you do this.
SPEAKER_02: You're treating this as if it's some ordinary thing that happens, as if this is just a wafer of bread and just a cup of juice and nothing more.
SPEAKER_02: And there's a kind of flippancy that was being brought into the worship of the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: But the Lord's table, according to the Apostle Paul, it's a sacred meal.
SPEAKER_02: We are to take it seriously.
SPEAKER_02: The way he encourages the Corinthians to take it seriously, verse 28 is to let a person examine himself.
SPEAKER_02: Or verse 29, to discern the body.
SPEAKER_02: Here, the discerning of the body speaks not to the body of the Lord Jesus, but to the body of the church.
SPEAKER_02: That one of the calls we have as a church is to discern.
SPEAKER_02: When we are called together as a church, we're called together, all of us, rich and poor, male and female, Jew and Gentile, we are all called together to the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: And we need to discern that that's what the table is for.
SPEAKER_02: So he urges them towards self-examination and discernment to take seriously what's happening at the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: Why does he want them to take it so seriously?
SPEAKER_02: Because for the Apostle Paul, the table is a matter of serious joy.
SPEAKER_02: In Corinth, the poor were being excluded from the joy of the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: The Lord's table is a feast.
SPEAKER_02: Not because that little wafer of bread is so satisfying to your tummy, not because that little cup of juice slakes your human thirst, but it is a feast of Christ's grace to us.
SPEAKER_02: We are called to the Lord's table to feast on his incredible grace to us.
SPEAKER_02: It is a place of immense joy for each person who comes.
SPEAKER_02: And when the church unnecessarily excludes people from the Lord's table, it violates the joy of the table.
SPEAKER_02: One of the Lord's great joys is to share his table with his people.
SPEAKER_02: It is the joy of the Lord Jesus Christ to welcome all sinners who come in faith to his table.
SPEAKER_02: It is his great joy.
SPEAKER_02: And so Paul urges them to take it seriously, to not violate the principle of joy.
SPEAKER_02: And so this is why even here at Mission Hills Church, we give a time of self-examination in our practice of the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: Now, to be clear, this time of self-examination, when, you know, one of the worship leaders is strumming on a guitar, playing on the piano, and you're sitting there quietly, this is not a time to sit here by yourself and kind of beat yourself up for your sins.
SPEAKER_02: This is not a kind of, oh, woe is me, I'm so terrible.
SPEAKER_02: This is not a time to kind of shame yourself or make yourself feel bad for the things that you have done.
SPEAKER_02: You know what that time of self-examination is really all about?
SPEAKER_02: It's a time to stop pretending.
SPEAKER_02: It's a place to come undone in the presence of a Savior whose joy it is to offer to you his broken body and his shed blood.
SPEAKER_02: When you come to the Lord's table, it isn't to feel miserable about yourself.
SPEAKER_02: It's to bring whatever misery is in you to the Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_02: And He welcomes you here.
SPEAKER_02: He welcomes you to the table.
SPEAKER_02: And I want to be clear here that there's some anxieties about this, especially when we talk about, you know, eating the table in an unworthy manner, and some people are like, oh my gosh, how do I know if I'm worthy?
SPEAKER_02: How do I know if I'm worthy?
SPEAKER_02: We'll just start here with a general principle.
SPEAKER_02: You are not worthy.
SPEAKER_02: Okay?
SPEAKER_02: None of you is worthy.
SPEAKER_02: None of us comes to the table and can say, Well, I've earned it this week.
SPEAKER_02: Jesus, you're welcome.
SPEAKER_02: I performed well this week, and so I've earned a spot at your table.
SPEAKER_02: That is absurd.
SPEAKER_02: None of us are worthy.
SPEAKER_02: The only kind of sinner that is welcome at the Lord's table is the sinner who knows that he's a sinner.
SPEAKER_02: Okay?
SPEAKER_02: You all with me on that?
SPEAKER_02: The only kind of sinner that's not welcome at the Lord's table is the sinner who pretends that he has no sin.
SPEAKER_02: Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_02: If you come to the Lord's table and think you're doing just fine, and you have nothing to confess, no sin to be covered by the broken body and the shed blood of the Lord, then you are not welcome to the table.
SPEAKER_02: It's not a place to pretend like you have it all together.
SPEAKER_02: It's a place to come undone because you don't have it all together.
SPEAKER_02: Self-righteousness.
SPEAKER_02: Self-righteousness, elitism, not welcome at the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: It's a killjoy.
SPEAKER_02: Have you ever been around a self-righteous person?
SPEAKER_02: Are you a self-righteous person?
SPEAKER_02: They're not fun at all.
SPEAKER_02: You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_02: You always, you feel like you gotta be always super careful around them and not mess up and not screw up because you feel like they're gonna judge you.
SPEAKER_02: And the self-righteous are a kind of wet blanket on the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: And he, when we come to the Lord's table, the Lord wants to have a good time with us.
SPEAKER_02: He wants to offer us his grace and his joy and his life.
SPEAKER_02: And if you bring your self-righteousness to the table, your arrogance, your elitism, your pretending like you have it all together, then you've come to the wrong table.
SPEAKER_02: You see, because the Lord's table is a place where we come and we receive the stupid good news.
SPEAKER_02: I use that, I apologize.
SPEAKER_02: It is stupid good news.
SPEAKER_02: That all of your sins are forgiven.
SPEAKER_02: When you come to the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_02: All of them.
SPEAKER_02: The worst of you, and some of you in here have some pretty bad sins.
SPEAKER_02: I have some pretty bad sins.
SPEAKER_02: And we all come.
SPEAKER_02: And at the table, the Lord says, all is forgiven.
SPEAKER_02: Last and finally, the Lord's table is a place of Christian unity.
SPEAKER_02: This flows from points one and two.
SPEAKER_02: If the Lord's table is central to worship and it's a place of serious joy, then it is also a place where all the whole church gathers together with Jesus and with one another, sharing in the Lord's joy together.
SPEAKER_02: Because it is his joy to forgive us.
SPEAKER_02: And this is why we wait.
SPEAKER_02: We wait for one another.
SPEAKER_02: We do it together.
SPEAKER_02: We don't do it separately from one another.
SPEAKER_02: We don't do it privately, we do it together.
SPEAKER_02: It is a celebration of the way Christ has united us together.
SPEAKER_02: It's a place where worldly status falls away.
SPEAKER_02: Gender and ethnicity and social economic status, all the forms of worldly status fall away, and we come together, all as sinners in need of mercy, all as beggars looking for bread, all as deer panting for streams of living water.
SPEAKER_02: We come together in a common humanity.
SPEAKER_02: Because you have failed, and you have failed, and you have failed, and you have failed, and I have failed.
SPEAKER_02: And it's incredibly relieving to know that you're in a room full of a bunch of failures.
SPEAKER_02: Sharing together in the love of Christ.
SPEAKER_02: And here's one of the amazing things at the Lord's table, why it unites us together as fellow believers, is at the Lord's table we come to discover that Jesus loves you just as much as he loves me.
SPEAKER_02: Because sometimes I can't stand you.
SPEAKER_02: Right?
SPEAKER_02: Sometimes have you ever been next to somebody in church and you're like having a hard time with them?
SPEAKER_02: Like maybe it's your spouse, maybe it's a child, maybe it's a parent, maybe it's a friend, and you're sitting next to them and you're kind of like distracted by how upset you are with them.
SPEAKER_02: And when you come to the Lord's table, you know what Jesus is saying to you?
SPEAKER_02: I love that person so much.
SPEAKER_02: I just treasure them with all of my heart.
SPEAKER_02: In fact, I love them to such a degree that my body was broken for them and my blood shed for them.
SPEAKER_02: Do you see how it becomes much harder to resent your neighbor when you come to the Lord's table and you see how much he loves them?
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SPEAKER_02: A place of Christian unity, where we discover Christ's forever love for each of us.
SPEAKER_02: It is a place where Jesus says, I am with you.
SPEAKER_02: It is a place where we read in John 15, we come to receive the fulfillment in part of Jesus' words.
SPEAKER_02: John 15, 11.
SPEAKER_02: He promises that my joy, my joy may be in you, and your joy may be.
SPEAKER_02: anybody remember?
SPEAKER_02: Full.
SPEAKER_02: It is a place where our joy is full.
SPEAKER_02: And we come to the Lord's table to celebrate and to receive.
SPEAKER_02: Now I find it ironic that we're not taking communion today.
SPEAKER_02: I didn't plan it out well.
SPEAKER_02: And so I'm asking Mission Hills Church that you would forgive me.
SPEAKER_02: And that we, as we come to the Lord's table on the first Sunday of each month, that we keep in mind that this table is central to our worship.
SPEAKER_02: That this table is a place of serious joy.
SPEAKER_02: And this table is a place where we are united together as followers of Jesus.
SPEAKER_02: Amen.
SPEAKER_02: Let's pray.
SPEAKER_02: Father, we come today, sinners one and all.
SPEAKER_02: I come to you as a sinner.
SPEAKER_02: That you in your everlasting grace have called a saint.
SPEAKER_02: Have called to belong to you.
SPEAKER_02: And each of us comes, Lord, with our own failures and shortcomings.
SPEAKER_02: The ways that this week our selfishness got the best of us.
SPEAKER_02: The ways that perhaps we lost our temper.
SPEAKER_02: The ways that perhaps we lived in cowardice and fear when you called us to courage.
SPEAKER_02: The ways that we were lazy when you called us to diligence.
SPEAKER_02: The ways that we were proud when you called us to humility.
SPEAKER_02: The ways that we were greedy and envious this week.
SPEAKER_02: Perhaps it was in our marriage, Lord, where we failed.
SPEAKER_02: Failed to love our spouse.
SPEAKER_02: Failed to lay down our lives for them.
SPEAKER_02: Perhaps it was the way we loved our children this week.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe we lost our cool with them and we shouldn't have.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe we we neglected their heart.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe we were avoidant.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe it was a coworker or a friend.
SPEAKER_02: But Lord, we come as those people who fail.
SPEAKER_02: And yet we come to you because you have called us to yourself in your grace.
SPEAKER_02: Because of your Son Jesus Christ, because of his broken body and his shed blood, we can come.
SPEAKER_02: And so we come today to worship you, to give you thanks that you have called us to yourself.
SPEAKER_02: And Father, my prayer for us here at Mission Hills Church is that as we see Jesus love each person here in the church, that we ourselves would extend that very same love with which your son loves them.
SPEAKER_02: And that you would build up this body in your love.
SPEAKER_02: And we pray these things in the name of Jesus.
SPEAKER_02: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much for listening to the Sermon Podcast from Mission Hills Church in San Marcos, California.
SPEAKER_01: We pray that this message blesses you as you love God and love others.
SPEAKER_01: If you would like more information about our church, please visit us at missionhillschurch.org.
SPEAKER_01: God bless.