Episode Transcript
Jon: So when you think about if you're struggling in your obedience, if you're struggling to glorify God and to love others, if you're struggling to be satisfied in Christ - in the will that he has for you, we are in instructed by scripture to be using the means of grace, AKA communion, to sustain us and grow us so that we can do the duties that are required of us.
To be clear, now, these are not duties to confirm our salvation. These are not duties to earn favor with God. They are the reflection of the nature - and this is why we say they are born out of gratitude. Because what is it you're looking to? The gift of the gospel through the means of the table as your motivation to obey the father.
Justin: The last thing it says in our confession about the table that I think we want to talk about for a moment as well is this - this is the last sentence of 30.1 in the second London confession - “The supper is to be a bond and pledge of their communion” - so common union with Christ and each other. So this again is why you don't take the Lord's supper individually.
Jon: That's right.
Justin: You know, you wouldn't take it by yourself someplace. You would take it with the body of Christ because the supper is about our union with Christ and our union with one another. We use the language a lot in our church: “We all cling to one another as we cling to Christ.”
Jon: Amen.
Justin: And that's the picture of it. I mean, this is the language of first Corinthians in a number of different places. We've already picked up on first Corinthians 11 and how, when Paul says that if somebody comes and eats and drinks without discerning the body, what he's meaning is you're not discerning the body of Christ. That's what it is to take the supper in an unworthy manner.
But then, in first Corinthians 10, I want to pick back up on this language. First Corinthians 10:16-17: ”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? Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread.”
So, this idea of our union with Christ and our participation in the body and blood of Christ is inextricably tethered, according to the apostle Paul, to our union with one another as Christ's body. It's a beautiful picture, you know, of how we together come with a collective sense of our need for Christ.
We, together, come to receive the bread and the cup as a sign of our union with Christ, the forgiveness of our sins and righteousness in his name, in our union with one another, as his people.
Everyday Grace 022
