Scott Moore: Welcome to the "Building Faith and Family" podcast with Steve Demme.  I'm your host, Scott Moore. Thanks for joining us today. Good morning, Steve. How  are you today? 

Steve: I'm well. How are you? 

Scott: I'm good. 

Steve: I was in Peoria, Illinois, for a Homeschool conference this past weekend.  They're a lovely group of people and I can still remember a bunch of them that I got  to talk to. I love connecting with people that are moving in the same direction. One of my last workshops was on daily Bible reading and prayer, which to me, is  fundamental. There were a bunch of people signed up for it. I was really pleasantly  blessed and surprised by that. It made me want to do a series on fundamental truths. Today, we're going to do one on the many facets of communion or the Lord's Supper.  Before we do, I have a wonderful quote which a friend posted on Facebook, which I  really like, by C. S. Lewis, "Christianity, if false, is of no importance, and if true, of  infinite importance. The only thing it cannot be is moderately important."  Scott: That's one that I think is actually by C. S. Lewis. 

Steve: It is by C. S. Lewis. You're thinking people attribute things that aren't? Scott: I think there's a whole website dedicated to fake C. S. Lewis quotes that are on  the Internet. There's so many of them. Anyway, I think that's an actual real one. Steve: It sounds like him because it's deep, and it's accurate. It made me want to  apply it to our topic this morning because Christianity, the Lord's Supper, baptism, if  these things are of no importance, let it go if they're false. If they're true, we need to  understand them. We need to dig into them. We need to do our due diligence. Let's pray. Father, thank you for our brother, C. S. Lewis, and all the many ways that  he's encouraged us by his writings and his sayings, the ones apparently that are  accurate. We draw near today to you because you are true, and you are of infinite  importance. 

We want to understand your word. We want to understand what it says about these  important fundaments of our faith. I pray that you'll help us that end today in Jesus'  name. Amen. 

Scott: Amen. 

Steve: I am going to begin with Matthew, then Mark and Luke. Then with that nice  foundation, we'll get to John. Matthew 26:26-30. "As they were eating, Jesus took  bread, and after blessing it, broke it and gave it to the disciples and said, 'Take, eat.  This is My body.' 

"And He took a cup, and when He had given thanks, He gave it to them saying, 'Drink  all of it, all of you, for this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many  for the forgiveness of sins. I tell you, I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until  that day when I drink it new with you in My Father's kingdom.' When they had sung a  hymn, they went out to the Mount Of Olives." 

Mark 14:22-26. "As they were eating, He took bread, and after blessing it, broke it  and gave it to them and said, 'Take. This is My body.' He took a cup, and when He had  given thanks, He gave it to them, and they all drank of it. 

"He said to them, 'This is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many.  Truly, I say to you, I will not drink again of the fruit of the vine until that day when I  drink it new in the kingdom of God.' When they had sung a hymn, they went out to  the Mount Of Olives." 

Real similar, the first two mentions of this in the New Testament. Luke 22. "When the  hour came, He reclined a table and the apostles with Him, and He said to them, 'I have  earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. For I tell you, I will not  eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God.' 

"He took a cup, and when He had given thanks, He said, 'Take this and divide it  among yourselves. For I tell you that from now on, I will not drink of the fruit of the  vine until the kingdom of God comes.' And He took bread, and when He had given  thanks, He broke it and gave it to them saying, 'This is My body, which is given for  you. Do this in remembrance of Me.' 

"Likewise, the cup after they had eaten, saying, 'This cup that is poured out for you is  the new covenant in My blood.'" I could stop and expound on the variations, but the  first two were pretty similar. This one's a little bit different because for the first time,  He says, "Do this in remembrance of Me.” This was the Passover meal, before He was  to be crucified.  

Now we get to John, and John takes it to a different level. I could the whole sixth  chapter of John because there's so much in it. I'm going to read enough, to give us  what we need. John 6:31-35. 

"Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness as it is written, He gave them bread from  heaven to eat. Jesus then said to them, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses  who gave you the bread from heaven, but My Father gives you the true bread from  heaven. For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the  world.' 

"They said to Him, 'Sir, give us this bread always.' Jesus said to them, 'I am the bread  of life. Whoever comes to Me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in Me shall never  thirst.'" 

Further on, "I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and  they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven so that one may eat of it  and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this  bread, he will live forever." 

He's leading up to John 6:53-58. "Jesus said, '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 will also 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.'" That's very different than the first  three gospels. He says, "I am the bread of life. You need to eat Me. My blood is true  drink. You need to drink it." 

As a result, I think you know this, in John 6:41, the Jews grumbled about Him because  He said, "I am the bread that came down from heaven." 

Then a few verses later, "I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone  eats of this bread, he will live forever, and the bread that I will give for the life of the  world is My flesh." Then the Jews disputed among themselves saying, "How can this  man give us His flesh to eat?" 

When many of His disciples heard it, they said, "This is a hard saying. Who can listen  to it?" Jesus, knowing in Himself that His disciples were grumbling about them, said to  them, "Do you take offense at this?" 

Further on, “After this, many of His disciples turned back and no longer walked with  Him. So Jesus said to the 12, "Do you want to go away as well?" Simon Peter answered  Him, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have  believed and have come to know that You are the holy one of God." Wonderful scriptures. Puzzling scriptures. Mysterious scriptures. All-encompassing  scriptures. I don't know how else to put this because naturally speaking, people are  still grumbling today. 

They didn't stop grumbling way back in the first century. They've been grumbling ever  since. Some people say, "Oh, it's a symbol." Some people say, "No, it's the real body  and blood." I don't even know which substantiation we're going to talk about. I'm not  going to even get into the theological debate. 

My policy, and anybody that's listened to this podcast long enough will know this, I'm  believing it. I simply take it as it reads. This is true blood. This is true drink. Whenever  I have been a pastor or participated in Lord's Supper services, I simply say, "Father,  You said this was Your body and Your blood, and we believe it." 

We mix it with faith. According to scripture, faith is the assurance of things hoped for.  It's the conviction of things not seen. I think if we would teach it, and believe it, and  move forward, we'd be fine, but we have to try to figure it out. 

I can't figure out forgiveness of sin. I can't figure out being clothed in His  righteousness. I can't figure out how I'm adopted into His family. I can't figure out  how I'm washed in the blood of Jesus any more than I can figure out how His body can  be in that bread, and His blood can be in that grape, fruit of the vine, but I believe it. I receive it by faith, and I move forward. Let me keep going because I think we have  to turn our heads off, you might say, a little bit now, and embrace the mystery of it.  Embrace the concept because we don't want to lose it. 

C. S. Lewis said this is eternal. This is important stuff, and we need to get a hold of it.  We're not going to get a hold of it if we're going to stand and hold it at arm's length. We need to have God write it on our hearts and say, "Father, I don't understand it  perhaps any better than the Jews, or the disciples, or even the 12, but I don't need to  understand it. I need to mix it with faith and believe it. Thank you for giving us Your  body and Your blood." 

I'm going to jump into 1 Corinthians 10, then come back to John. 1 Corinthians 10  16-17, "The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation or communion in  the blood of Christ?" 

Most of us have used the word communion, or holy communion, or the Lord's Supper,  and I'd like to go into the Greek a little bit because the word for participation is  koinonia. It means participation. It means communion. It means close fellowship. This is special fellowship, but it's more than that. We're participating in the blood of  Christ. I'll read it again. "The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in  the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of  Christ?" 

We are actually participating in the body and blood of Christ. That helps me because  if I'm participating, I'm eating. I am taking it into my body. My Pastor used to pray,  "Father, here are the elements, and now turn them into the body and blood of Jesus.  By faith, we receive them as the body and blood of Jesus."  

Interestingly the word for blessing is eulogious which is where we find the word  eulogy. When we come to the wine, which is the cup of blessing, we bless it. Somebody has to bless it and pray, "Father, make it exactly what you said it is." Jesus  said, "This is My body. It just doesn't represent His body. It is His body." "Because  there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one  bread. We're joined to it."  

Let's go back and read John 17, which has nothing in one sense to do with the Lord's  Supper, and it has everything to do with the Lord's Supper. 

John 17:20-23. Jesus is praying to His Father. "I do not ask for these only, but also for  those who will believe in me through their word that they may all be one. Just as You,  Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us." 

Wow. Just as you, Father, are in me, we're united, and I'm united with You, that they  also may be united in Us. That is true communion. We're not only having Holy  Communion or holy fellowship with each other at the Lord's table, we're having holy  fellowship with the Father and with the Son. 

It goes on. "So that the world may believe that you have sent Me. The glory that You  have given Me, I have given to them that they may be one, even as We are one. I in  them and You in Me. That they may become perfectly one so that the world may know  that You sent Me and love them even as You loved Me." 

In my notes, I have headings. In the first two-thirds of what we've read, I have true  bread, true drink, true fellowship. Here, I have true communion with the Father and the Son. All of this happens because by faith, we believe these scriptures, and we put  them together. This is true fellowship. This is true koinonia. 

I have seen churches whose name is Koinonia Community Fellowship Church. You  want to talk about a redundancy because Koinonia Community Fellowship Church,  you're saying the same thing. We're all together. We're one. We're united. United is not  just with each other. It's with the Father and the Son. 

When we break the bread and we drink the cup, we are participating in the blood of  Christ. We are participating in the body of Christ. That's why we're all one. There's  probably no time that we are more one than when we are all partaking of Jesus' body  and blood. 

That may be the closest that we have attained to true unity, is participating in the  body and blood of Christ. Then it goes on in 1st Corinthians 11. This is why we read  all these scriptures. Paul is giving his take on the Lord's Supper. 

"I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you that the Lord Jesus, on the night  when He was betrayed, took bread. When He had given thanks, He broke it and said,  'This is My body, which is broken for you. Do this in remembrance of Me.' "In the same way, He also took the cup after supper saying, 'This cup is the new  covenant in My blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of Me.'" Most  of that, we've already read in the gospels, but this next sentence is different. "For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death  until He comes." I believe that, and I partake of this with my brothers in Christ on a  regular basis. We often pray, "Lord, let the proclamation of your death, burial, and  resurrection be proclaimed as we eat this bread and drink the cup." We have no idea what happens in the heavenlies when we, brethren, are united, taking  in Jesus' body and blood, and proclaiming His death until He comes. I have to say it.  The Lord’s Supper or Holy Communion is more than a memorial service. It is more  than symbols. We actually are doing this. We are proclaiming His death until he  comes. 

This is a gospel presentation or an evangelical presentation going out to the  outermost parts of the Earth as we partake of His body and blood. I have had the  Lord's Supper in different settings with different groups of believers, and I do not  know what everybody in that room is thinking, but I know what I'm thinking. I am partaking of Jesus Christ's body and blood, and I am proclaiming His death until  He comes. I am one with the Father and one with the Son as I do. Scott, you did not  even have a chance to breathe. 

Scott: Wow. That's pretty awesome, all of it together. My thoughts are random, so I'm  not sure they're worth sharing. 

Steve: Try. You're usually right on target. 

Scott: One of them is that I do find it fascinating that when Jesus told them all that  they need to eat of His flesh and drink of His blood, and then a whole bunch of  people stopped following Him. That particular part always makes me chuckle a little. 

I wonder how many pastors and churches throughout the world have ever given a  sermon with the sole intent of driving people away. That was the result, and it's not  like Jesus didn't know that was going to happen before He did that. Anyway, like I  said, that one's random. 

Steve: It did separate who was in and who was not. 

Scott: Exactly. He was driving a stake in the ground there, really. 

Steve: You might say he removed the mystery. They knew what he was saying. Scott: I don't know if His 12 disciples really got what He was talking about until way  later. I get the feeling they had seen and heard enough from Him and knew Him well  enough at that point that like Peter said, "Where are we supposed to go?" In my own interpretation of that, it almost sounds like he's saying, "Look. We know  this sounds nuts, Jesus, but we love You and we know You, so we're going to stick  around, even though this does sound crazy. Sorry." 

Steve: Peter, this is one of the times when the spokesman did a beautiful job. He said,  "Where else are we going to go? There is nobody else. We don't understand it either,  but we're with you no matter what happens."  

Scott: My next thought to get off of the weirdness of that whole saying and whatever,  that meal is such an intimate setting. He knew he was going to his death. None of the  rest of them understood what He was talking about. 

He knew exactly where He was going, what was going to happen in the next 24, 36  hours, whatever it was. He knew what was happening. Yet, as He says, "I've longed to  share this meal with you." How often do we approach that meal feeling like that? Like  this is really heavy. The mystery of it, the beauty of that scene is so powerful. Steve: As you say, there's depth to it. I don't know how this last paragraph will fit in  here, but I'm going to read it. After Paul says, "You proclaim the Lord's death until He  comes," then he says, "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. "Let a person examine himself then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup, for  anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on  himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died." I don't know how many times you've heard that preached on, but that tells me that  this is more than symbolism. This is more than something that we're going through  the motions here. This is the body and blood of Jesus. Be careful, but don't let it keep  you from the table. 

When I'm receiving the Lord's body and blood, I pray again. I know the pastor has  prayed, but I pray again. "Father, wash me in the blood of Jesus. Cleanse me." In one  sense, he's saying, "You need to do this. Do this." He's also saying, "Be careful when  you do it." 

The Lord's supper, I don't know how to put it, but the seriousness and the sobriety of  it straightens you up. You say, "Wow. I need this. I don't have life within me unless I  partake. But man, I'm going to die if I don't do it well." 

It makes you shape up real fast. Sometimes people can shape up, I don't know if it's  just me or anybody else, but I take these things literally. I believe them, and I pray,  "Lord, wash me in the blood. Wash me afresh. Cleanse me. I don't want to eat this  wrongly, but I don't want to miss it, either." 

Scott: I think the two dangers are to make it too religious and turn it into this big  formal religious ceremony that loses its meaning by ritual, or to let it be too familiar  and too commonplace that it's like, "Oh, yeah, we're having a pretzel and some  juice," kind of thing. 

Scott: Like you said, it's very meaningful, very powerful, and we ought to approach it  that way, but it is also intimate, and holy, and true. 

Steve: Amen. I like that word. It says true drink. This is true food. This is true drink.  This is Me. This is My body. This is My flesh now. I did this for you because I want you  to live forever with Me. I want you to be one with Me and the Father and each other. This is powerful stuff. There's not a whole bunch written on it, but we also have to  understand this is in the context. This is the Passover. This is a very important meal  for the people that were hearing the gospel. This is a very important meal in the  Passover feast celebration, and Jesus took it up a notch, which He often does. Let's pray. Father, thank You for Your provision, and Your teaching, and Your  example, and Your words. Like all of Your words, they are true, but they also inspire  us, and they also convict us. This is what the word of God does, and we're thankful  for the work of God in our hearts. 

As we hear these words, help us to embrace them. Help us to not shake our head and  walk away, but help us to move forward in faith, and eat the bread and drink the cup  because we know that we're partaking of God Himself in the flesh. Thank You. In  Jesus' name, amen. 

Scott: Amen. That's our show for this week, folks. Thanks for joining us for the  Building Faith and Family podcast with Steve Demme. If you have a question for the  show, email Steve at spdemme@Gmail.com. Thanks for joining us. Have a great week.