Receiving Communion and Being In Communion

            “Is it more important to you to receive communion or to be in communion?”  1 Corinthians 11 contains teachings about communion and one part of it is familiar to us.  It's the part that tells us what it means to receive communion faithfully.  We refer to them in church short-hand as “Words of institution.  It's the verses 11:23-26.  “Lord Jesus . . . night betrayed . . . bread for you . . . remember me.  Cup of new covenant . . . remember me.”  It summarizes the conditions of what it takes for people to receive communion in a faithful way—it takes a gathered worshiping body. For reasons I won't go into, I believe strongly that communion is not a part of private devotion.  We read scripture in private, pray in private, fast in private, even sing hymns privately.  But I don't believe we should take communion in private.  To faithfully receive communion, this text suggests to us that the narrative needs to be shared.  This story of Jesus initiating the Lord's Supper is found in four places in scripture.  And the language suggests that it the narrative itself was something people repeated whenever they received communion.  So, we gather the worshipers, we tell the story, and we remember—Remembrance is a central component of receiving communion.  We remember and give thanks for the whole life of Jesus—his incarnational birth, his authoritative teaching, his compassionate ministry, his boundary-crossing meals, his triumphal entry, his disciple-making community, his arrest, trial and sacrificial crucifixion and his glorious resurrection.  But, says Paul, though we celebrate his whole life in Lord's Supper, we pay particular attention to the fact that whenever we eat this bread and drink this cup we proclaim the Lord's Death until he comes.”  So to receive communion faithfully means to have gathered worshipers, retold story, and Christ-centered memory. 

            But the parts of this text surrounding the familiar words of institution speak not of receiving communion but of being in communion.  Paul's tone is harsh, “In the following directives I have no praise for you.”  Apparently what was happening is Corinth was this—the weekly gathering would have been a complete meal—a First Century potluck.  Because it was First Century, pre-temperance movement, wine was served.  Enough food for the expected crowd would be set and enough wine.  But some people showed up early—probably because they were wealthy and didn't have to work such long hours, and others came late, probably because they had to work long hours or because traveling was more difficult from them.  And the early arrivers would devour the food and drink most of the wine they would be stuffed and drunk and leave crumbs and dregs for the people who arrived late.  This, Paul said, is not being in communion. 

            He went on to say, that when communion is taken in this way, people eat and drink judgment upon themselves.  And then the passage that's always bothered me--”That is why many among you are weak and sick, and a number have fallen asleep.”  Statements like that in the Bible always make us spiritually paranoid.  Do the bad things happen to me because I've sinned?  Are my diseases God's punishment for my misbehavior?  And because I don't believe God sends diseases to punish people, I've always avoided that part of the text.  But a little over a year ago, Amy Gopp our director of Week of Compassion—the Disciples Emergency relief fund, spoke about this text and had this insight about this passage.  She said, “Because of the lack of compassion, generosity and hospitality of certain members of the body, others grew weak, fell ill and died.”  We know that the over-eating and over-drinking can cause significant health problems for people.  But what about the others.  Since this might have been the one decent meal during the week, those who came late may not have been able to eat a complete meal.  While some indulged in self-destructive over-eating others might have continued in unhealthy malnutrition.  The way some people were  eating, got in the away of the other people eating at all.  The way some people consumed goods, was preventing others from having enough.  The way some people used resources drew essential  resources away from others.  And because of that, they were not in communion.  If we were to ask Paul the question, which is more important to receive communion or to be in communion, he would say unless you are in communion what you take is not communion.  

            Is it more important to receive communion or to be in communion?   The clear (Pauline) answer is obviously, You can't truly receive communion unless you are seeking to be in communion.  But then the pastoral side of me asks, well then what is the value of receiving communion (and administrating over the distribution of communion) knowing full well that we are not fully in communion?  And that's when I started to think about the role that receiving communion plays in our efforts to be in communion and to realize a fuller communion.  I think there's a larger study here to suggest four roles—communion as memory, mirror, model and milestone.  Receiving communion informs our being in communion by kindling and nurturing our memory, causing us to reflect on the condition of ourselves and the whole Christian family, modeling for us openness and generosity, and pushing ahead of us the eschatological vision of our destination in Christ.  We use mirrors when we want to look at ourselves and when we seek to examine ourselves.  Paul said “Let each one examine themselves before they eat of the bread and drink of the cup.”  Receiving communion is a time for us to look in the mirror and ask about the conditions of our spiritual lives and our interactions with others.  One of the shifts I pray that we begin to see emerge for us in our examination is that of shifting away from our preoccupation with our own “sin” and short coming to see the greater concerns for the condition of the body.

            Repeatedly when the issue of Racism comes up people become instantly defensive and intent on explaining how it is that they themselves are not racist.  Many white, middle-class American Christians believe that the only sins they bear responsibility for are those that they are somehow personally guilty of.  And even good and faithful Christians will ask how it is that we can bear responsibility for the sins of others without being judgmental.  And that's a good question—I can only worry about my sin because to worry about another's sin would be to judge another's sin. What happens when I look in the mirror at Communion?  I don't focus on just myself.  And I don't focus on just another person.  Rather, if we actually look at a mirror while taking communion, we would see ourselves within the gathered body of believers.  And from that vantage point can ask—what are the needs of this body and what is my responsibility here? How do I receive communion here and also be in communion here?  How do I eat in such a way that enables everyone else to eat as well?  At the table of the One who is Lord and Savior of the World, that mirror gets much larger and gets cast out much higher so that we can see the needs in East Arlington, and Bastrop, Texas, and Sao Paulo, Brazil, and  Geneva, Switzerland and indeed around the world.