TO LIFE!

                When I open Facebook, it always asks, “What’s on your mind, George?” I was tempted recently to answer with one word, “Death,” to see what the response would be. It’s true, however, I do think of death rather often, for several reasons. One, because its in the news – graphically and repeatedly. I should stop watching the news, but I won’t. I am reminded of death also because of my age. The longer I live the more friends and family members I lose. Another reason I think of death is that both my daughter and my wife have had near death experiences. One doesn’t forget things like that.

                My reading also leads me to think about death. Some books I read are mysteries, which always focus on someone’s death. A book I am re-reading now is not a mystery, but it speaks of death often. It is titled, My Grandfather’s Blessings. Stories of Strength, Refuge, and Belonging, by Dr Rachel Naomi Remen, a medical doctor who works with cancer patients. One of them had survived 3 major surgeries in only 5 months. He described himself to her afterward as being “born again.” She asked him what he meant, and he said the experience of facing his death had challenged his ideas about life. He was stripped of all that he knew, all of those ideologies and philosophies that he had built his life on, and was “left only with the unshakable conviction that life itself was holy.” She commented, “he had discovered that we live not by choice but by grace. And that life itself is a blessing” (p 325).

                As I thought about this it occurred to me that Jesus must have thought something like this when he faced death during his ministry. He knew that he would not die for a Pharisaic ideology – or for any other ideology people build their lives on – and  certainly not any of the polarizing “isms” that divide us today. He was very clear about why he came, which was also why he had to die. He said it plainly in John 10:10-11, “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” If you read through John’s Gospel you will find over and over again that its all about life. He opens by saying, “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God,” and quickly adds, “In him was life and the life was the light of all people.” And he continues throughout the Gospel to show us the one who said “I am the way the truth and the life… “ and “I am the resurrection and the life.”

                The cancer patient was right. Life is holy, and it is ours by grace.  This broken bread and the cup remind us of the life Jesus gave that we might live. It would be appropriate when we lift the cup to use the traditional Jewish toast that says simply, “To Life!”

THE LONGEST TABLE

                Today is World Wide Communion Sunday and Christians all over the world have gathered at the Lord’s Table to remember Jesus Christ.

                Matthew 26:20 says: “When evening came, Jesus was reclining at the table with the twelve.”  The table Jesus and his disciples used in the upper room of a home was probably quite low, U shaped, and they reclined on cushions.

          

      As Christianity spread around the world many kinds of tables have been used. I like this simple yet elegant table that the Scottish architect Rennie Mackintosh designed for a church in Glasgow, Scotland.

                Our table in Corinth where Paul taught about the Lord’s Supper was unique. On a Sunday morning our tour group sat on the ground and used a flat rock for a table as we had communion.  Also, in youth camps I have had communion where only what nature provided – a rock, a stump, even the ground – served as our table.

                In Spokane, our son’s family attended a church that had an exceptionally long table. It was long because there is indented across the entire front of the table a carving of the last Supper.

                Thinking of long tables, a writer in the Christian Standard magazine once pointed out how appropriate a long table can be. He begins by describing his grandmother’s Christmas dinner table. He says, “It stretched through the dining room to the living room of her old farmhouse. It was so long there was a place for all her children, and grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. It was so long that there was room for folks far from home – Ireland, Germany, even Tennessee. … That table was so long that it was never full until family members who sat there in years gone by were brought back by a fond remembrance or a hilarious memory of Christmases past. It was Christmas at grandmother’s house, and it was the longest table I had ever seen.” Then he added: “But I came to know different, or better. The communion table is the longest table in the world. And I know just how far it stretches” (Lee Magness, Christian Standard, June 10, 2007).

                You and I also know how long this table is, don’t we? It stretches from here to the poor in Calcutta’s slums, to the affluent in Anglican Cathedrals, and to the weary warriors in the Mid-East. It has room for the peasant farmers of India, the beaded Maasai woman of Kenya, the immigrant laborer from South America, and the socialite from New York. There is always room for more at this table, and all are welcome. It is the longest table in the world.

                Certainly, it has room for us and Jesus invites us to come, to eat this broken bread, his body given for us; to drink this cup, his blood shed for us. Come to the Thanksgiving Table, the longest table in the world.

LOVING HEARTS LIVE LONGER

                Recently, in a newspaper medical column by Dr Oz, I saw this catchy sentence: “Loving hearts live longer.” He cited studies that say married couples live longer, on average, than single people. Maybe that’s why Frances and I can celebrate our 69^th anniversary today. We have spent 69 years in what I sometimes think of as an assisted living arrangement. Dr Oz went on quickly to say that it isn’t just married couples, its anyone who has close, open, honest relationships with other people who live longer.

                What Dr Oz said is not new. The preacher in Ecclesiastes spoke of it long ago when he wrote: Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their labor. For if they fall, one will lift up his companion. But woe to him who is alone when he falls, for he has no one to help him up. Again, if two lie down together, they will keep warm; but how can one be warm alone? Though one may be overpowered by another, two can withstand him. And a threefold cord is not quickly broken (4:9-12).

                The same concept can be seen in Paul’s description of the church, especially in 1 Corinthians 12 where he speaks of how members of the body lift one another up. He says, “members should have the same care for one another. If one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; or if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it (25-26).” Earlier, in chapter 10 Paul uses a rich, Greek word for this relationship. It’s the word, KOINONIA, and it means “fellowship,” “participation,” or, as several versions say in verses 16-17, “communion.” He says, “the bread which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? For we, though many, are one bread and one body; for we all partake of that one bread.” Though we are many, yet we are one body. This is close to marriage language – the two become one. The many have something in common that makes them one.

                Through our years in the church, Frances and I have experienced how loving hearts are one in Christ and lift each other up. One example: We were in Oklahoma for seminary, two thousand miles from home, no family around, no way to communicate with family, not even a telephone, and our first child was born. I sent a telegram to tell the folks at home. Frances got sick in the hospital and had to stay for over a week. To go home, she needed more help than I could give her by myself. Our immediate families couldn’t help, but the family of God could, and did. Good friends stepped in, took her home and gave her and Gary the care they needed for a few days.  This is “koinonia,”, loving hearts, the church, in action.

                The Lord’s supper as “communion,” as an expression of koinonia, points to what the church is, a collection of loving hearts. And the result is life, long life, both here and hereafter.

"THIS IS MY BLOOD ... "

                In the OT laws about food and drink one of the best known says that blood was absolutely forbidden (Lev 17:10-14). Consequently, a complex system of kosher butchering was designed with its chief aim being that no blood should remain in the animal and so risk being eaten or drunk.

                In light of this prohibition, statements by David and later by Jesus are remarkable. David’s came when he was at war with Philistines who were encamped in his home town of Bethlehem. He was hot and thirsty and was heard to say how much he would like to have water from the well at Bethlehem – which was of course inaccessible due to the Philistines. But that didn’t stop three of his stalwart fighting men. They broke through the Philistine army, got water from the well at Bethlehem and brought it back to David. But David didn’t drink it. His shrewd sense of political judgment was even sharper than his thirst. “God forbid,” he said, “that I should drink the blood of these men, who went at risk of their lives” (2 Sam 23:17). He didn’t want to profit from their readiness to put their lives on the line for him. To drink the water would be equivalent to drinking their blood. He couldn’t, and he wouldn’t do that. He poured the water on the ground (N.T. Wright, John For Everyone, 85).

                Jesus also spoke about drinking blood. Although he did not speak literally anymore than David did, his words were even more shocking and remarkable. In John 6 Jesus says to a skeptical crowd, “I’m telling you the solemn truth. Anyone who believes in me has eternal life. I am the bread of life…. And the bread which I shall give is my flesh, given for the life of the world…. I’m telling you the solemn truth, if you don’t eat the flesh of the son of man, and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Anyone who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day.”

                Whereas David refused to profit from the risk of life made by the young men by drinking the water, which would be like drinking their blood, Jesus wants everyone to profit from the sacrifice of his life. “Easily the best explanation for this,” says N.T. Wright, is that John understands Jesus’ language here to refer to the eucharist, the Lord’s supper, the sacrament in which Jesus’ body and blood are, in a mysterious way, offered to believers to be eaten and drunk” (Wright, 86).

                Paul put it in concisely in 1 Cor 10:16: “The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a sharing in the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not a sharing in the body of Christ?” I don’t understand this mystery, but it seems to all come down to faith. As Jesus said, “Anyone who believes in me has eternal life. I am the bread of life.”  Do you believe? If so, let us confess our faith and receive his body and blood.

A Communion Meditation

What Do You Have?

Mark 8:1-9

                In the upper room, as Jesus took the loaf of bread, broke it, and gave thanks, it may gave triggered a memory for some of his disciples. They may have remembered the time when Jesus asked them to do something that was clearly impossible. It was one of the many times that Jesus had acted as the host, breaking the bread and giving thanks.  It was the time in Mark 8 when about 4,000 people had followed him into the desert region of Decapolis.  Mark says, “he called his disciples and said to them, ‘I feel compassion for the multitude because they have remained with me now three days and have nothing to eat; and if I send them away hungry to their home, they will faint on the way; and some have come from a distance.” Then he laid the problem at their feet saying, “give them something to eat.”

                Can you imagine the started look on their faces?  You can hear how impossible they thought this was in their question, “How can we feed all of these here in the desert?”  There’s nothing out here, they might have continued. No supermarket, no McDonald’s, nothing. What can we do?  Then he asked, “how many loaves do you have?”  What is available to you? What do you have? What is under your control?

                When the disciples shared their seven loaves and a few small fish Jesus turned that table in the desert into a life-giving communion table. Mark says, he took the seven loaves and then, “He gave thanks and broke them and started giving them to his disciples to serve them.”

                Later, long after the upper room, the disciples must have continued to remember those occasions when Jesus went through the same action and fed the multitudes. When they sat in the assembly at worship, as we are now, and saw the bread upon the table, they must have seen not only the living presence of Jesus, but heard his word once again, “Give them something to eat.” And they could see themselves once again, with rough fishermen’s hands, breaking off the bread, piece after piece after piece, without end, until all were fed. Somehow, miraculously, in their rough hands, that bread was multiplied.

                And so it is today. Every piece of bread upon this table that conveys to us the energy of Christ can be multiplied in our lives today and tomorrow.  Someone in our neighborhood, our city, in Syria, in the Ukraine, or in Kenya can be stronger in body and spirit because we worshipped here today. The bread of life taken by us today can be multiplied across the world by our faith and action. For that reason, the communion, which symbolizes the body and blood of Christ, and the offering, which symbolizes our faith in action, are united to feed not only us but a spiritually and physically starving world.

THE CUP OF SALVATION

Psalm 116

                Have you ever known, or known of, someone who was on a certain road to death and then by one action was delivered from death?  Can you imagine the roller coaster of emotions they experienced?  I have seen a TV story of a man whose heart was about to stop because of irreversible damage and then he received a heart transplant.  The report showed two families meeting for the first time.  I saw the mixture of sorrow and joy on a mother’s face as she listened through a stethoscope to the steady heartbeat of her deceased son inside another person’s chest.  And I watched as the recipient hugged and thanked the family with great, joyful gratitude for the gift of life that he had received.

                Those same emotions are also seen in Psalm 116 where the psalmist, standing before the congregation, testifies emotionally of being encompassed by the “snares of death” and facing the “terrors of the grave.” His language is strong and emotional as he describes how he faced what looked like certain death.  But then he says, “I called upon the Lord saying, ‘save my life, O Lord” (v 4).  And he heard me and “delivered my soul from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling” (v 8).  Then the psalmist asked, “what can I do out of gratitude to Yahweh, in return for all his kindness to me?” (v 12).

                Immediately, he says, “I will take the cup of salvation, and call on Yahweh’s name.  I will give back to Yahweh what I promised, in front of all his people” (Vss 13-14, N.T. Wright translation in Paul for Everyone, 2 Corinthians, 48).

                As redeemed and resurrection people who have been saved from eternal death, how can we express our gratitude?  We too can take the cup of salvation that represents how Jesus Christ has given us the gift of life, and we can give back to the Lord through the stewardship of our talents and treasure what we vowed in our baptism to give him.  So let us take the cup of salvation and fulfill our vows to the Lord.

THE ROYAL WEDDING FEAST

A communion meditation for May 6, 2018

                A big royal wedding is coming. Do you have your invitation and have you figured out what you will wear? No?  Oh, you probably think I am referring to Harry and Meghan who are soon to be married.  No, I refer to a much bigger, more significant wedding. One that you definitly are invited to and for which your wedding attire is already set. We read about it in Rev. 19:6-9. John writes:

Then I heard something like the voice of a great multitude and like the sound of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder saying, “Hallelujah! For the Lord our God the Almighty reigns.  Let us rejoice and be glad and give glory to him, for the marriage of the Lamb has come and his bride has made herself ready. It was given to her to clothe herself in fine linen, bright and clean; for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints.”  Then he said to me, “Write, ‘Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.’”

                John uses his imagery freely enough to allow the church to be both the bride and the guests invited to the wedding party.  “Hallelujah!”  Its party time; its exciting, joyful because the bridegroom has come.

                In contrast to this great joy there is a very sad picture in Rev. 3. It’s the picture of a church closed to the presence of the Lord.  John shows us the Lord, the bridegroom, standing alone at the closed door of the church and saying, “Look! I’m standing here, knocking at the door. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come into them and eat with them, and they with me.” N.T. Wright says “no early Christian could have heard those words without thinking of the regular meal, the bread-breaking, at which Jesus would come powerfully and personally to give himself to his people. Such meals anticipate the final messianic banquet. They are advance ‘comings’ of the one who will one day come fully and forever” (Revelation for Everyone, 36-40). 

                We are at one of those “advanced comings” now.  Someday the Lord will come again and there will be a great party – a messianic banquet – a royal wedding feast.  And we are all invited.  In the meantime, he comes to us now in the Lord’s Supper, as a foretaste of that great banquet that is to come.  Have we opened the door to him? If we have he has promised to come in and eat with us now.

               

"PROCLAIM THE LORD'"

If Jesus Christ is the hope of the world, we who are Christians face the question, how can we most effectively proclaim Christ crucified in our culture?  One answer to this question is found in Paul’s words to the Corinthian Christians in 1 Cor 11:23-26, in which he reviews the words of institution by the Lord at the last Supper.  He concludes his review by saying, “as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.” By faithfully observing the Lord’s Supper we proclaim the Lord’s death.

Suppose, however, that we lived in a country that was closed to the gospel and church assemblies were not allowed?  What could we do?  Here is what one church did, as told in a recent issue of Christian Standard (Dick Wamsley, March 2018).

“TCM (Taking Christ to Millions) is an international training institute in Austria, where theological graduate students from countries in eastern Europe, Russia, the Middle East, and central Asia converge for concentrated study to help them reach their people for Christ.  One student at the institute describes how the church he serves in one of those closed countries observes the Lord’s Supper each week.

The adults meet at an appointed time each week at a restaurant for a meal.  They may sit at several different tables, but the predetermined leader situates himself so everyone in the group can see him.

After everyone has finished the meal, the leader picks up a piece of bread and bows his head in silent prayer.  Everyone knows what he’s doing, though nothing is said.  When he lifts his head, he eats the piece of bread.  Others at the various tables follow his lead.  Then he bows again in silent prayer.  Again, he lifts his head and picks up a glass of wine, water, or whatever else he has, and he drinks.  Others follow in like manner.

No words are spoken.  No one acknowledges what they have just done.  But everyone at the tables knows they have just “proclaimed the Lord’s death.”  In fact, it’s the very reason they gather in a public place to observe the Lord’s Supper – to proclaim Jesus’ death even at the risk of being discovered.

The student’s story draws us into the profound sacredness of the Lord’s Supper: that we proclaim our Lord Jesus’ death with other Christians around the world, some of them at risk of their own lives.”

With this in mind, we come to the table, whether in a church sanctuary or a public restaurant, and proclaim the Lord’s death.

FINISHING BY IMITATING

                A man I have known for 70 years, a colleague in ministry, a companion on trips, a competitor on the golf course, and who became my best friend, died recently.  I have thought of him a lot this past week and what I might say at his memorial service.  At the same time, I was thinking about what to say for our memorial service here today at the communion table.  These thoughts brought together several NT texts.

                2 Tim 4:7-8 came to mind as I thought about Orris.  Paul wrote it near the end of his life: “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith; in the future there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge will award to me on that day; and not only to me, but also to all who have loved his appearing.”

                The idea of “finishing the course,” reminded me of Jesus. At one point in his ministry, Luke tells us in 9:51, Jesus “set his face steadfastly to go to Jerusalem.”  He was determined to follow that course, and eventually, with a few stops along the way, he made it to Jerusalem.  There, at the end of his journey he found a cross.  As he hung upon that cross, having accomplished all that his Father sent him to do, Jesus said, “It is finished.”

                I wondered, why was Paul able to say what he did at the end of his life?  I think much of the answer can be found in what he said earlier to the Corinthians.  In 1 Cor 11:1 he urged them, “be imitators of me, just as I also imitate Christ.”  Paul tried to imitate Christ.  He wanted to imitate his love, his forgiveness, his servanthood, even his sacrifice.  Therefore, he said in Phil 1:20-21, “It is my earnest expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but that will full courage, now as always, Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me to live is Christ but to die is gain.”

                After Paul urged the Corinthians to imitate him as he imitated Christ he went on in the same chapter to express his disappointment in how they were observing the Lord’s Supper.  They were not “discerning the body,” that is the body of Christ.  They were not living out what the Lord’s Supper called for.  They were not imitating the love of Christ, his forgiveness, his servanthood and his sacrifice. 

                The call of the Lord’s Supper has not changed.  In it we can hear the voice of Christ himself saying, imitate me … imitate my love, imitate my forgiveness, imitate my servanthood, imitate my sacrifice. 

                If we do that we will be able to say with Paul at the end of our journey: “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith.”