Communion: The word, without getting too complicated can be seen as the combination of two words… Common – Union. Simply put, it unifies.
When was the last time you came to church, sat down, looked up, saw the communion tables and thought to yourself… “Oh, today we’re going to be unified.”?
Exactly! This doesn’t occur to us.
This weekend we are going to be receiving the elements of Communion. The bread, which represents the broken body of Christ and the juice which represents the shed blood of Christ. After taking the cup, he gave thanks and said, "Take this and divide it among you. For I tell you I will not drink again of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes." And he took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, "This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me." In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you. Luke 22:17-20 (NIV)
There are two thoughts I would like for us to consider about this…
Initially, it was instituted and first received at a meal. I don’t know about your family, but mine is a family on the go. It is often difficult to get everyone together at the dinner table each and every night so we have to protect certain days where we say, “No one makes plans on, such and such a date, so we can have dinner together.” Why do we do this? Because we want to be together, listen to what is going on in our lives and remain close. Individually we are Dan, Joy, Sara and Aubrey, but together we’re the Perkins. You see, coming to the dinner table, unifies, it brings the parts back together for the purpose of being whole… Which brings us to our second thought and for me the most important thought…
Remember the childhood story of Humpty Dumpty? Yeah, yeah, I know; you think I’ve been riding my bike behind a bus too long. Seriously, it’s a story about an egg that falls, breaks and needs to be put back together. His body, was shattered, spilled out requiring all the king’s horses (don’t ask me what they had to do) and all the king’s men to put him back together… you get the idea.
But do you?
Jesus’ body was broken, spilled out for the sake off putting all the King’s women and all the King’s men back together again. Physically, sharing in the Lord’s Supper brings us together. Spiritually, receiving the elements fixes our broken places and puts us back together.
You may be part of a church, you might be getting together as a family for the holidays, you may get together with friends for Starbucks, where ever you find yourself with someone else... you are "together." However, individually you may be broken. So, consider communion. Consider what it took to put you together as an indiviual and get together with Jesus... He is the best, the only common-union that matters.
