Communion Meditation-One Mind

As God remakes the world through Jesus Christ, one of the results that we should be aware of is the unification of His people. It seems that we have only got along a short distance on this great requirement.

But we should not despair. In Christ and in Christ’s Church, we see the unification of every tribe and tongue and language.

The world continues to vainly attempt to bring together various peoples from multiple cultures. Their vain attempts always blow up in their faces. Without Christ it is impossible to unify divided man.

But in Christ, mankind is made one body. We are brought together as one. We ARE unified in Jesus. Now, it is true that it does not always look like that. There are factions, members of Christ causing discord and disunity. But Jesus does not leave us alone. He continues to wash us in His Word, teach us His ways and lead us to the place where we lay down our way and take up His. And once we have all taken up the way of Christ, doing, saying and living as Jesus requires of us, then the reality of our unity in Him will be manifest to the world.

This meal is part of what makes us one. Believe Jesus. Learn His ways. Eat and drink of Him and thus be of one mind.

Disunity

At the very center of the result of the fall of mankind is discord, distrust and disunity, all of which flow directly from the actions of Adam and Eve, heeding the serpents treacherous words, to become like gods.

Discord results when one seeks to be in the middle of the attention or perhaps even muscling out whomever is currently in the center of attention because there really is nobody more important than you.

Distrust always casts a sidelong glance wondering if the actions and motives of others are honest and heartfelt or if they are simply that other person’s means of getting ahead of me.

Disunity is always friends of discord and distrust. The only way to unity is to defy discord, seeking peace in the midst of chaos, even if it means that you go unnoticed in the process.

Unity gives a deaf ear to distrust, seeking rather to believe the best about others, even if it means making a costly mistake now and again. Because love suffers all things.

Do you cause disunity through discord or distrust? Stop now. Confess your sins. Repent and be forgiven.

Communion Meditation- Tree of Life

This morning we have looked into the Fall of mankind. Man, who was in communion with God, fell out of favor with Him and were driven out of His paradise. But God did not leave man in a state of misery. Even in the beginning, God was gracious and merciful. He received the sacrifice of Abel but his brother’s deeds were evil.

And so God gives us promises, even in the midst of miseries, lost hopes, lost kinship, lost close fellowship. He holds out hope to us that He will hear us, receive us, bless us and dwell with us forever.

Of course, we realize all of this in the person of Jesus Christ. God came down to us and restored mankind to His favor forever. All those who cling to Jesus have returned to God’s garden and are encouraged to close communion and now to eat of the tree of life and live forever.

Our tree of life is Jesus, Himself, and His Spirit that dwells with us always.

By faith, take and eat and drink of Him and live.

Exhortation- Put Aside Strife

In the Fall of man, both man and earth became subject to futility. The Earth began to produce thorns and thistles, man was divided against man and murder entered into the heart of Cain. While the glory of God on the Earth remains, the first glory of true unity in the midst of God’s vast creation, was shattered. And so we live in a divided world where there is trouble from every side. We have trouble with the environment, trouble with our neighbors, trouble within our families and trouble in our own hearts. But Christ came to save us from all of this and to save us in the midst of all of this.

That peace must first begin in your own heart and flow out from there. If God has called you His own, and He has, then He has called you to peace and to a ministry of peace. Where there is strife and division, there you will find the devil. But we who belong to Christ do not have to obey the devil, the world or the flesh. We are Christ’s workmanship created for good works in Christ.

So, where is your strife? Is it with spouse? Boss? Neighbor? Friend? Foe? But where does this strife come from? Does it not come from your own heart that is not at peace with God and with what God is doing in the world and in your own life?

Put aside the strife. Confess your sins. Repent of your divisions. Be reconciled to God and man. And receive the peace of Christ.

Communion- Table Fellowship and Love

As we eat the Lord’s Supper together each week, we should be mindful of what is going on. We remember the Lord’s death and we show the power of His death in gathering us as the people of God. We are a gathered body of forgiven sinners.

But this meal does even more than that. For some, what I just said would be controversial, that the meal actually ‘does’ anything. But it does. We are not merely remembering or showing, we are also becoming. Eating together is a formative action. When families eat together, they grow up together, knowing one another, loving and serving one another, partaking of one another.

Those same things are going on here as we eat the Lord’s Supper. The breaking of the bread and the sharing of the wine gathers us together, unifies us, strengthens us and binds us together.

Close table fellowship is at the center of what it means to love one another.

Exhortation- Love is the Thing

We are learning about God’s Covenant with His people. The main thing we should remember is that at the center of the Covenant is a love relationship. This is true of the persons in the Godhead. The Father, Son and Spirit love one another and are completely unified. Even when the Son is required to submit to the Father, the love relationship remains intact. The Son loves to submit to the Father and the Father’s commands are giving in love to the Son.

So, we must learn to rule in love as well as submit in love. This sort of understanding leaves no room for tyranny and it leaves no room for a grudging submission. Parents, husbands, employers use real authority but it is an authority that is wielded in love. Children, wives, and employees submit but their submission, as long as it can be fully given without sin, is given wholeheartedly and without envy or any root of bitterness.

To the extent that our ruling is done in a heavy handed and tyrannical way,we must confess our sin. To the extent that our submission is done grudgingly, we must confess our sins. We must learn to both rule and submit in love.