Many are confused over the issue of the Lord’s Supper. Who is it for? Who is it not for? Does it matter? The Lord’s Supper is one of two ordinances or sacraments that the Protestant church has traditionally recognized as a thing that Christian churches ought to do. While some groups of Protestants have added to the list of sacraments, generally we have only recognizes two that are perpetually binding. These two ordinances are: Baptism and the Lord’s Supper.
In the Lord’s Supper, we remember Christ and proclaim his death until he returns (1 Corinthians 11:23-26). There has been much debate as to the presence of Christ at the Lord’s Supper, but there has been very little debate as to the importance of observing the sacrament. But like Bob Dylan once said, “The Times they are a changin.” For example, the Open Episcopal Church will now mail the wafer to your home for you to enjoy at your leisure (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/5483394/Church-leaders-offer-communion-wafers-in-the-post.html). Baptists generally do as poor a job administering the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper by quickly adding it to the end of the service and rushing through it to get out by noon. But should this be the case?
The Biblical testimony is clear. Don’t play around with the bread and wine. What happened at Corinth should be a warning to us. Paul told the Corinthians who were abusing the Lord’s Supper, “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. 28 Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. 29 For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. 30 That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. [7] 31 But if we judged [8] ourselves truly, we would not be judged. 32 But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined [9] so that we may not be condemned along with the world” (1 Corinthians 11 ESV).
Apparently, some of the participants of the Lord’s Supper were getting sick and dying as a result of their abuse. That fact should startle us at the very least. The abuse of the Lord’s Supper at Corinth was serious enough for Paul to spend a good amount of expensive paper on. And in some ways we must be thankful that there was an abuse so that we would know how not to behave at the Lord’s Supper.
More will come on this subject at a later time. But for now, we should be willing to recognize that God takes the Lord’s Supper seriously. There is an improper way to observe Communion. Although we may never be certain that we are observing the Lord’s Supper 100% correctly, we certainly do not want to fall into the snare of the Corinthians.