To Speak Without Words - Psalms 19:1-4

Welcome to Eat This Bread Drink This Cup

The communion meditation today is based on a passage of Scripture from the Old Testament, Psalms 19:1-4. In this passage of Scripture, David, the psalmist, describes how the sky and heavens declare the glory of God. While they do not speak, their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world. Similarly, the bread and the fruit of the vine in the cup we set aside to remember the Lord's Supper speak for themselves and tell the story of a Savior's love, who offered Himself on a cross to save us from our sins. One day when this message has been proclaimed all over the world, Jesus will return to Earth at the command of His Father to take us home to heaven to be with Him forever. On that day, we will no longer need symbols to remember Jesus' love; we will see Him face-to-face. All Scripture quotations are from the New International Version (NIV) and are used with permission.

As you listen to the episode today, my hope is that you will be encouraged from the time spent meditating on what Jesus has done for you. You are a special person; the one Jesus died to save! 

Transcript

Welcome to Eat This Bread Drink This Cup. The title of my communion meditation today is "To Speak Without Words." I read from Psalms 19:1-4 (NIV). All Scripture quotations are from the New International Version (NIV) and are used with permission.

1 The heavens declare the glory of God;

   the skies proclaim the work of his hands.

2 Day after day they pour forth speech;

   night after night they reveal knowledge.

3 They have no speech, they use no words;

    no sound is heard from them.

4 Yet their voice goes out into all the earth,

    their words to the ends of the world.

The idea of communicating without a voice or words seems foreign at first until we subject the idea to closer scrutiny, then we recognize that it happens all the time. Sometimes when no words can express the depth of our feelings, the touch of your hand on the shoulder of a grieving brother or sister speaks volumes in sympathy and support. The song, "The Look of Love," written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, includes the lyric,

"The look of love,

it's saying so much more than

just words could ever say.

And what my heart has heard,

well, it takes my breath away."

All of this and more is included under the rubric of nonverbal communication. When it comes to nonverbal communication, our God is King. I asked ChatGPT, "How many words are found in all human languages, living and dead?" It's reply from the point of view of a linguist was, "We don't know, and with current evidence we probably can't know. It is almost certainly in the hundreds of millions or more, but no accepted global count exists." When asked, "How many stars are there in the universe," the reply was about 200 sextillion observable stars, or as Carl Sagan wrote, "Meanwhile the Cosmos is rich beyond measure: the total number of stars in the universe is greater than all the grains of sand on all the beaches of the planet Earth." Or, stated yet another way, the universe contains roughly one million billion billion times as many stars for every human word ever devised to describe it! What this means is that God's voice through His creation, the sky and heavens, speaks to us day and night of His majesty and power, and sadly, most of the time it is not seen or heard by the inhabitants of Earth. When Jesus established the Lord's Supper, He selected symbols, the bread and the fruit of the vine in the cup, that also speak to us without words from His table in our midst. Yes, we have been schooled from the Scriptures, but when we look at the bread, it says, "I represent His body that was nailed to a cross," and the fruit of the vine in the cups, it says, "I represent His blood that He shed on the cross that we might have the forgiveness of our sins." These words are further amplified by the fact that we both taste and feel these symbols with our other senses. I could stand here today and hold before you first the bread followed by the fruit of the vine in the cup without any monologue, and we could have a meaningful shared memory of our Lord's sacrifice for us—such is the power of these symbols and their spoken words. Today, don't just check the box for "Lord's Supper observed," but immerse yourself in the moment. Let us pray.

Abba, Father. Today we bless and set aside this bread and the fruit of the vine in this cup to remember Your Son, Jesus. We know that the bread represents His body that was nailed to the cross, and the fruit of the vine represents His blood that He shed for us. As we pour out the wine from the cup, we are reminded of how Jesus poured out His own blood that our sins might be forgiven. Abba, Father, these symbols speak so clearly and plainly to us today. While we may have heard them speak to us many times in our Christian walk, yet they still have the same message—Jesus loved me so much that He would die in my place to save me from my sins. I look forward to the day when a symbol remembered is no longer needed; I will see Him face-to-face. In the name of Jesus, I pray. Amen.

Today, Jesus invites you to partake of His supper. I read from Matthew 26:26-28 (NIV).

26 As they were eating, Jesus took some bread and blessed it. Then he broke it in pieces and gave it to the disciples, saying, “Take this and eat it, for this is my body.” Let us partake of the bread.

27 And he took a cup of wine and gave thanks to God for it. He gave it to them and said, “Each of you drink from it, 28 for this is my blood, which confirms the covenant between God and his people. It is poured out as a sacrifice to forgive the sins of many." Let us partake of the cup.

And the assembly of believers said, "Amen!"

Until next time, from Numbers 6:24-26, “The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.”

Artist's Note: If you have questions about the Lord's Supper, I invite you to visit my website, https://eatthisbreaddrinkthiscup.com, for a brief overview. The Eat This Bread Drink This Cup podcast is listed in most podcast directories, and I invite you to add my podcast to your favorites and be notified of new posts. There is a written transcript that accompanies each podcast, and you are free to use the transcript in accordance with US copyright law. My prayer is that you will benefit personally from this time with Jesus and encourage others to observe the Lord's Supper. In these trying times, we need to keep our eyes on Jesus!