Will you please turn to the book of Acts? Acts chapter 2, just one verse: Acts 2:42.
And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread and the prayers.
I repeat it:
And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread and the prayers.
Turn also to 1 Corinthians 10, beginning with verse 16.
The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a communion of the blood of Christ?
The bread which we break, is it not a communion of the body of Christ?
Seeing that we, who are many, are one bread, one body: for we all partake of the one bread.
Behold Israel after the flesh: have not they that eat the sacrifices communion with the altar?
What say I then? that a thing sacrificed to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything?
But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons, and not to God: and I would not that ye should have communion with demons.
Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of demons: ye cannot partake of the table of the Lord, and of the table of demons.
Or do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? are we stronger than He?
Now turn to 1 Corinthians 11, beginning with verse 23.
For I received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was betrayed took bread;
and when He had given thanks, He brake it, and said, This is My body, which is for you: this do in remembrance of Me.
In like manner also the cup, after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in My blood: this do, as often as ye drink it, in remembrance of Me.
For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink the cup, ye proclaim the Lord’s death till He come.
Wherefore whosoever shall eat the bread or drink the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner, shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord.
But let a man prove himself, and so let him eat of the bread, and drink of the cup.
For he that eateth and drinketh, eateth and drinketh judgment unto himself, if he discern not the body.
For this cause many among you are weak and sickly, and not a few sleep.
But if we discerned ourselves, we should not be judged.
But when we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, that we may not be condemned with the world.
Dear heavenly Father, what a joy, what a privilege, that Thou hast invited us to the table of the Lord. We do praise and thank Thee that in ourselves we are never worthy, but Thou hast made us worthy that we may be able to come and sup with Thee, and commune with Thee, to praise and to worship Thee.
So, Lord, as we continue in Thy presence, we do pray that Thou wilt breathe upon Thy Word and make it living to each of our hearts; that, Lord, whenever we come together to remember Thee, it will be real and living, and with eternal value. To Thee be the glory. In the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.
The Holy Spirit uses one sentence to sum up the life and testimony of the early church, and this is in Acts 2:42. There you find all those who believed in the Lord—not only the twelve apostles, not only the one hundred and twenty who waited in the upper room for ten days before Pentecost, but also the three thousand who came to the Lord on that day of Pentecost. All of them persevered. They continued. They lived constantly in the teaching and fellowship of the apostles, in the breaking of bread and prayers.
You know, this is how the early church lived, and this was their testimony to the world. All those who believed in the Lord persevered; they continued, they stayed, they lived in the teaching of the apostles.
Now, you will notice that it does not say the teachings of the apostles. It is the teaching of the apostles. We know that there were twelve apostles at that time, but we do not have twelve different teachings. Even though each of them was different—Peter was different from John, and James was different from Andrew—there was only one teaching.
As we read the New Testament, we may find that they had different emphases. It is very clear: if you read something written by John, even though his name may not appear, you know it is John. If you read something of Peter, even though you may not notice his name, you know it is Peter. Paul and the others each had their emphasis in teaching.
And yet, brothers and sisters, there is only one teaching, not many teachings. Peter did not have his own teaching. John did not have his own teaching. Paul did not have his own teaching. James did not have his own teaching. They all taught what the Lord Jesus had taught them.
So here you find the teaching of the apostles. It is singular in number, and the teaching of the apostles is none other than the teaching of the Lord. In Acts 13:12, you find the phrase, “the teaching of the Lord.” The proconsul in Paphos was amazed at the teaching of the Lord, even though it was Paul who was teaching it. Thus, all those who believed in the Lord Jesus in the early church continued in the teaching of the Lord.
They also continued in the fellowship of the apostles. Here again, you notice that it is not fellowships; it is singular: fellowship. Even though there were a number of apostles, their fellowship was one. Why? Because it is the fellowship of God’s Son, Jesus Christ.
Paul did not have his own fellowship. John did not have his own fellowship. Peter did not have his own fellowship. They were all in that one fellowship, the fellowship of God’s Son, Jesus Christ.
Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 1:9:
God is faithful, through Whom ye were called into the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
Brothers and sisters, we are all called into the fellowship of God’s Son, Jesus Christ. The fellowship of the apostles is none other than the fellowship of God’s Son, Jesus Christ.
In 1 John 1:3, John says:
That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you also, that ye also may have fellowship with us: yea, and our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.
So here you find all the believers in the early church. That is the way they lived. That is the way they continued together: in the teaching and the fellowship of the apostles—that is, in the teaching of the Lord and in the fellowship of God’s Son, Jesus Christ. This is the way the early church taught, and this is the way the early church lived. It is also the way that we should teach and live.
Teaching is concerned with truth. Fellowship is related to life. So here you find a well-balanced life: on the one hand, truth; on the other hand, life. On the one hand, the teaching of truth; on the other hand, a fellowship of life and love. It is not one-sided, but well-balanced.
As they continued in the teaching and fellowship of the apostles, you find the public expression of their perseverance in that teaching and fellowship. The public expression is the breaking of bread and prayers.
Now, brothers and sisters, sometimes we do not think too much about the breaking of bread, the Lord’s table, or the Lord’s supper. Sometimes we find that we neglect this matter of prayers.
The prayers here do not refer to our personal, private prayer. Of course, we know the importance of private prayer. But the prayer here is corporate prayer. It is the church coming together to pray, just as the church comes together to remember the Lord in the breaking of bread.
Today, in Christianity, people often do not think too much of the breaking of bread, or even of prayer. There are places where they do not break bread. For instance, the Friends, or Quakers, do not break bread at all. They think it is merely symbolic, merely an outward form, and that they have entered into the Spirit.
In some places, communion is observed perhaps once a month. In other places, people may partake only twice a year, perhaps at Easter and Christmas. People do not think too much of the breaking of bread. But remember, in the early church, this was the expression of all their continuance in the teaching and fellowship of the apostles.
Likewise, in Christianity today, people do not think too much about praying together. In some places there is no corporate prayer. People do not come together to pray. They think that if they can come on Sunday and spend an hour, that is enough; they do not care about coming together to pray.
In other places there may be a prayer meeting, but perhaps only three or five will be there. In other words, God’s people often do not put much emphasis upon corporate prayer. But in the early church, this was their life and their testimony. These two things—the breaking of bread and prayers—were the public life and testimony of the early church.
This morning, we are not able to enter into both matters, so we will concentrate upon the breaking of bread.
Sometimes we think the breaking of bread is merely a ritual, or merely a tradition. We may do it so often that we take it as something very common. But, dear brothers and sisters, we have to remember that this breaking of bread was instituted by none other than our Lord Jesus Himself.
On the night of His betrayal, as He gathered His own family, His disciples, with Him in the upper room to eat the Passover feast, toward the end of that feast our Lord Jesus took the bread. He blessed it, gave it to His disciples, and said:
Take, eat; this is My body.
Then afterward He took the cup. He gave thanks and delivered it to the disciples, saying:
Drink ye all of it; for this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many unto remission of sins.
So on that night our Lord Jesus gave to His church this breaking of bread to remember Him. Since that day, the church has been doing this very thing.
This was not only done in Jerusalem, Judea, or Samaria. It was continually done by the Gentile churches. God raised up the Apostle Paul, and through his ministry many churches were raised up among the Gentiles. They were doing the very same thing. It was not only done by the Jewish church; it was done by the Gentile churches too, because in Christ there is neither Jew nor Gentile.
Paul, of course, had not seen the Lord when the Lord was on earth. He had not heard what the Lord had said about this breaking of bread. Yet in 1 Corinthians 11 he said:
For I received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you.
Evidently, Paul received a revelation from the risen Lord. The risen Lord told Paul that wherever he went, wherever the church was established, they should have the breaking of bread as their public testimony and public life.
So we find that not only did our Lord, before His death and in view of Calvary, give us this breaking of bread; but even after He ascended and was seated at the right hand of the Father, He still commanded us to do this in remembrance of Him. You see how important it is to the Lord. Again and again He reminded His people: “Do this in remembrance of Me.”
Why does our Lord remind us so much about doing this? Is it because He is afraid that we may forget Him? How can we forget Him—He Who died for us, He Who loved us so much and gave Himself for us?
But, dear brothers and sisters, He knows our frailty. More than that, the reason the Lord seems to insist that His own do this is because He loves us so much. He loves us so much that He wants us to remember Him. He loves us so much that He does not want us to leave or depart from our first love.
The relationship between the Lord and us is a love relationship. It is not a merely mental thing. It is not a physical matter. It is a love relationship. He loved us and gave Himself for us. He loved us to the uttermost. He completely laid down His life for His own.
Because He loves us so much, brothers and sisters, He wants us to love Him too. The one thing that He desires of His people is first love. First love means first in time and first in quality. It means that we love Him as He has loved us.
The only way that He can keep us in that first love is by putting His love constantly before our eyes. Brothers and sisters, how easily we are enticed. How easy it is for us to look at this or that, and for our hearts to be led away by many things. But the Lord said, “Do this in remembrance of Me.”
This is His love for us: He wants to keep His love forever before our eyes, that we may not depart from that first love toward Him. So we do thank the Lord that He asks us to remember Him. It is not burdensome; it is for our benefit and for our good. And because this is His command, we ought to do it.
You know, there is something the enemy hates very much. The enemy hates God’s people coming together to break bread. Have you ever thought of that? Just as the enemy hates to see God’s people coming together to pray.
We often hear that the devil trembles when a saint is on his knees. If God’s people come together to pray, it shakes hell. That is why he tries every means to prevent God’s people from coming together to pray. Brothers and sisters, the same thing is true with the breaking of bread.
If you think of what he has done to God’s people today concerning the breaking of bread, you can see how clever he is in his devices.
There are some people who think very highly of this breaking of bread, this communion, this Lord’s supper. They see that this is the center of the life of the church, and they make it the center of church life and service. But you see how clever the devil is: he knows that he is not able to take it away, so he tries to change its character.
He makes the breaking of bread into a mass. What is a mass? A mass is a reenactment of the crucifixion. Through the blessing of the priest, they believe the bread is transformed into the physical body of the Lord Jesus. Thus people are said to eat the very flesh of the Lord Jesus when they take the bread.
Likewise, through the blessing of the priest, they believe the wine is physically transformed into the blood of the Lord Jesus. This is transubstantiation.
That is what a large group of so-called believers in Christianity believes: that the wine is transformed into the blood, and the bread into the physical body of Christ. In other words, everything is made physical instead of being understood in its spiritual reality.
Brothers and sisters, how many times must our Lord Jesus be crucified? Every time they celebrate the mass, Christ is supposed to be crucified once more. Yet Christ has been crucified once and for all.
Hebrews 10 tells us that our Lord Jesus, once and for all, offered Himself as a sacrifice and completed eternal redemption. He does not need to die anymore. Once is enough. He is now alive and lives forevermore. We are worshipping a living Christ.
Hebrews 6 says that if you recrucify the Lord Jesus, you make a public disgrace of Him. So you find how the enemy tries to turn it into something else, something unscriptural, other than what the Lord meant it to be. Because it has become so mystical, it has lost its meaning.
On the other hand, there are many so-called Protestants who see the device of the enemy in turning the breaking of bread into a mass. So they say, “No, no. This is merely symbolic.”
When the Lord Jesus said, “This is My body,” they say, “No, He means this represents My body. This is not really My body; it merely represents My body.” When He said, “This is My blood,” they say, “Of course, it is not His blood; it merely represents His blood.”
So, when we are doing it, they say it is just a symbolic thing. Now, brothers and sisters, when you reduce it to a symbol, you dismiss it to a secondary position.
In Protestant churches, the primary thing in the service is often the preaching of the Word, the ministry of the Word, the sermon. The sermon becomes the center of worship. Actually, the sermon is for the benefit of God’s people; it cannot be considered the center of worship, because worship should be centered upon the Lord, not upon the Lord’s people.
But we are deceived by the enemy into becoming so self-centered that even when we come to worship God, it is for our benefit only. Thus, in many Protestant churches, the sermon or ministry of the Word takes first place, and the breaking of bread is dismissed to a secondary position.
In some places, as I have mentioned, they do not even celebrate it. In other places, they do it only once in a while. They even say that if you do it too often, it will become common. Why? Because if it is merely symbolic, of course it will.
So, brothers and sisters, you find how clever the enemy is. He tries to take away from God’s people that public expression of their life and testimony of the Lord.
What is the bread? What is the cup? Brothers and sisters, on that night our Lord Jesus took the loaf and said, “This is My body.” He did not say, “This represents My body.” He said, “This is My body.”
When He took the cup, He said, “This is My blood.” He did not say, “This represents My blood.” In other words, when our Lord gave this to us, in His mind there was neither transubstantiation nor mere representation.
It is neither mystical in that sense nor merely symbolic. It is a spiritual reality. We need to see that there is a spiritual reality here. When the Lord said, “This is My body,” and when He said, “This is My blood,” brothers and sisters, we need to go beyond the physical and into the spiritual, because only that which is spiritual is real and eternal.
The blood of the Lord Jesus was shed on the cross. But remember: even if, on that day, you had been there at the foot of the cross and had drunk some physical blood from it, would your sins be forgiven? No. It is not the physical blood itself. It is what that blood means.
It is the blood that redeems us, that substitutes for us, that pays the price before God. You have to see the meaning of the blood, the value of the blood, the efficacy of the blood, the eternal efficacy of the blood. That is the reality, not merely physical blood.
As we take the bread, it is still bread that we are eating. We are not eating the physical body of Christ; then we would be cannibals. We are eating bread, but when we eat it with the eyes of faith, we see the reality of the body of Christ—how that body was broken for our sake, that He might join us to Himself and to one another.
When we drink the cup, it is wine; brothers and sisters, it is the fruit of the vine. We are not drinking blood. After God made His covenant with Noah, his sons, and all living creatures, God said that men were not to drink blood, because life is in the blood.
That covenant is still effective today. There is still winter and summer, cold and heat, seedtime and harvest. We are still living under the Noahic covenant. That is why, in Acts 15, Gentile believers were not required to keep the law of Moses or to be circumcised, but they were instructed to abstain from blood.
What we drink is truly the fruit of the vine. But, brothers and sisters, with the eyes of faith we see in that fruit of the vine the blood of our Lord Jesus. “This is My blood,” the Lord said, “for the remission of your sins.”
To us it is a spiritual reality. It is neither merely symbolic nor the mystery of transubstantiation. It is spiritual; it is real.
Why do we come together to remember the Lord? Outwardly, we are touching the bread and the cup. But remember, if we merely touch them outwardly, then this is a ritual, a form, a ceremony, and it has lost its meaning altogether.
But as we come together, break the bread, and drink the cup, in our spirit we see the body of our Lord Jesus broken for us. We see the blood of our Lord Jesus shed for us. Oh, how real it is! You touch reality, and when you touch reality, you touch God.
This is how important it is. Brothers and sisters, do not make it common. See how important it is, and how we need to come again and again to remember the Lord in this way, that our love may be renewed.
Do we touch the reality as we come to break the bread and drink the cup? Has it become common to us because we do it so often? How can it be a spiritual reality unless there is revelation—unless God, by His Spirit, opens the eyes of our spirit?
Brothers and sisters, we need the Lord, by His Spirit, to open the eyes of our spirit that we may see the Lord. Each time we gather to remember the Lord, we need to ask Him to give us a fresh revelation—to open the eyes of our spirit to see the Lord Himself, to see how He loves us, how He shed His blood for us, and how He laid down His life for us.
We need to see it in our spirit, and then with faith we come and partake. Then it is meaningful, and it is real. What a blessing it is!
You come to the Lord’s table and go away without being blessed—how can that be? You come to the Lord’s table without seeing the Lord, without feeling or touching His love, without having your heart stirred and your love toward Him renewed—how can that be?
The only reason we can do it in that fashion is because our spirit is dull. We just do it in a formal way, without seeing the Lord in our spirit.
The Lord wants to use this as a means for us to see Him. “Remember Me.” It is Me, brothers and sisters. When you see Him, you will come by faith. You will take this by faith, and there will be blessing and no curse.
This is the reason why the Apostle Paul, in 1 Corinthians, explains to us what the breaking of bread really means. In 1 Corinthians 10, he says:
The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a communion of the blood of Christ?
The bread which we break, is it not a communion of the body of Christ?
Seeing that we, who are many, are one bread, one body: for we all partake of the one bread.
Brothers and sisters, this breaking of bread is a communion. It is a communion of the blood of Christ. What is communion? Communion is sharing something in common; participating in it; taking part in it.
When God’s people come together around the table, drink the cup, and break the bread, this is communion. This is fellowship. We are in communion with the blood of the Lord Jesus.
In our spirit, we share in common. We have a fresh sense of all the efficacy, preciousness, and power of His blood. Every time we come to drink the cup, it is as though we refresh our memory of the forgiveness of our sins. Thank God, though our sins be as scarlet, they are now as white as snow.
Every time we drink the cup, we thank the Lord for the preciousness of His blood—that His blood continually cleanses us from all our sins, that we may stand before God with holy boldness. What a communion that is!
Every time we drink the cup, we once again feel the power of that precious blood: the blood that puts away our guilt before God, the blood that stills our conscience, the blood that shuts the mouth of the accuser. Once again, we experience the blessing of the blood. So it is called the cup of blessing.
Our Lord Jesus, in the garden of Gethsemane, drank the cup of curse for us. He drank every drop of it, and He left us the cup of blessing. We bless the cup of blessing. So it is communion with the Lord.
In 1 Corinthians 10, communion is not only communion with the blood of the Lord and with the body of the Lord. When we are breaking the bread and drinking the cup, we are in our spirit in communion with the Lord. Once again, we see His beauty. Once again, we pour out our fragrance and our love toward Him.
But 1 Corinthians 10 has another emphasis: communion in the blood of Christ and communion in the body of Christ. In other words, it is a communion of the saints. We are not only in communion with Christ; we are in communion with our brothers and sisters, because we share the same Lord.
In spite of all our differences—and those differences remain—there is something that we have in common: the blood of the Lord and the body of the Lord. We have Him in common. As we drink the cup and break the bread, it shows that we are in fellowship with all the brothers and sisters.
Though we are many, yet we are one. It is one loaf, one body. How pleasant it is! It is the fellowship of the saints. That is the public expression of the fellowship of the apostles.
If it is communion, then it is all-inclusive on the one hand and all-exclusive on the other hand. That is what communion is. You can commune only with that which you share in common; if we do not have it in common, there is no communion.
As we commune at the Lord’s table, we commune with all believers throughout the whole world. It cannot be exclusive in the sense of being limited to a few. Even though there are only a few of us here, brothers and sisters, this loaf represents the whole body of Christ.
We are not just breaking bread with a few. We are breaking bread with all God’s people all over the world. This is the body. We are having communion with all our brothers and sisters, known and unknown to us.
One thing we are sure of: we belong to the same body. We should have no grudge, no axe to grind, no controversy, no unforgiveness or bitterness toward any of our brothers and sisters. We embrace them in our hearts.
Brothers and sisters, as we come to the Lord’s table, it enlarges our hearts. Naturally, we are small, but God wants to enlarge our hearts. He expands our hearts when we come to the table, that we may embrace all our brothers and sisters throughout the world. Thank God, we are one.
But, on the other hand, because this is communion, because this is fellowship, it must be exclusive. That is to say, it must be separated from the world. The Lord’s table separates us from the world.
Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of demons: ye cannot partake of the table of the Lord, and of the table of demons.
There is no communion between the two. In 2 Corinthians 6, we find that we should not be unequally yoked, because there is no fellowship between light and darkness.
Brothers and sisters, as we come to remember the Lord, how we need to be separated from the world. Does the world still have a hold upon us? Are we still trying to serve two masters? This should be settled.
God has separated us. He has sanctified us from the world, and therefore we need to be separated from the world. Each time we come to remember the Lord, it is a public testimony that we do not belong to the world.
That is why the world hates us: because we do not belong to it. We belong to the Lord, and we belong to His family. Thank God for that.
Whenever we come together, brothers and sisters, it is an expression of oneness in Christ. As our brother mentioned this morning, the prayer and desire of our Lord Jesus is that we may be one, as He and the Father are one, that the world may believe that God sent Him.
Brothers and sisters, this is it. The breaking of bread is that public testimony to the world that we who believe in the Lord Jesus are one, that the world may believe. What a testimony that is! This is the breaking of bread.
Then Paul continues in 1 Corinthians 11. He speaks of the Lord’s supper. On that night, when our Lord Jesus was betrayed, He took the bread, blessed it, and gave it to us, saying:
This is My body, which is for you: this do in remembrance of Me.
Again He took the cup, blessed it, and gave it to us, saying:
This cup is the new covenant in My blood: this do, as often as ye drink it, in remembrance of Me.
The breaking of bread is in remembrance of the Lord.
Remembrance is looking back. We look back two thousand years ago. It may seem a long time, but we remember Him. Two thousand years ago, He loved us so much. There He was crucified.
Was it merely two thousand years ago? No. When we remember Him, the Holy Spirit brings that scene of Calvary to us today. It is as though He died for us today. Brothers and sisters, it is real, it is present, it is living.
Through the power of the Holy Spirit, Christ is brought to us at this very moment, and our love toward Him ought to be refreshed. That is why He wants us to remember Him: that our love may once again be refreshed, and that we may love Him with all our mind, all our soul, and all our strength.
The Lord Jesus said that as often as we eat the bread and drink the cup, we proclaim the Lord’s death. The Lord’s table is not only a remembrance; it is an announcement. Put another way, it is an exhibition.
What are we doing here? What has the church been doing throughout the centuries? Throughout the centuries, the church has been exhibiting the death of the Lord.
When people are celebrating the birth of Christ, we are exhibiting the death of the Lord, because He came to die. It is the death of the Lord that we exhibit.
Why do we exhibit His death? Because it is the death that conquered death. It is by His death that He destroyed the one who has the power of death. It is by His death that He now holds the keys of death and Hades. It is through His death that He brings life and resurrection life.
Brothers and sisters, this is the most glorious death in the whole universe. People like to hide death; they bury the dead because it is shameful. But thank God, here is a death that is our glory. We love to exhibit that death. We love to announce to the whole world that Christ has died, and because He has died, there is hope.
This is our testimony. This is our exhibition. This is our declaration to the world—not only to the seen world but to the unseen world. Satan trembles because at the sight of that death he was defeated forever.
Why do we call it an exhibition? How do we exhibit it? As we gather around the table, we find the bread on one side and the cup, with the fruit of the vine, on the other side. When the blood is outside the body, that speaks of death.
The blood of our Lord Jesus was drained. He was scourged, and blood came forth. He was crowned with a thorny crown, and blood came forth. He was crucified, and blood came forth from His wounds. Even at the very last, when the soldier thrust his spear into His side, out of His broken heart came forth blood and water.
Brothers and sisters, He has died. He is the First and the Last. He is the Living One. Yet He became dead, and He is now alive and lives forevermore.
This is our exhibition. That is why the bread and the wine are in separate places, and why we partake of them separately: because they represent the death of our Lord Jesus. We exhibit that death.
We will exhibit it until He comes. The breaking of bread gives us blessed hope. It tells us that one day He is coming back, and He is coming back to take us to Himself.
When we come to the Lord’s table and touch Him once again as our Lover, we cannot help but cry out, “Come, Lord Jesus.” We have not seen Him, but we love Him, and we desire to see Him face to face.
Oh, how we hope that when we come to break bread together, this will be the last time we do it here. The next time will be in that glorious day when our Lord Jesus drinks anew with us. It will be the day of His wedding, the marriage feast, when He will drink again with us.
How we look forward to that day! So, brothers and sisters, when we come together to remember the Lord, He gives us hope. The world has no hope, but we have hope—the blessed hope that our Lord is coming soon. This is what is meant by the breaking of bread.
If we see what the breaking of bread means, and if it really comes into our spirit, then, brothers and sisters, we will see what a blessing this is, because this is real.
Therefore, the Apostle Paul says that when we come to drink the cup and break the bread, we should not come in an unworthy manner, lest we drink judgment to ourselves. What does it mean?
On the one hand, nobody is worthy. Who is worthy to come to the table of the Lord? We are all like that prodigal son. We have wasted the grace of God. We have gone into a far country. We are reduced to hunger. We are not worthy to come back. We are not worthy to sit at His table.
But, brothers and sisters, it is the Father’s love, the redemption of our Lord Jesus, and the work of the Holy Spirit that make us worthy to come to the table of the Lord. He has made us worthy.
But since He has made us worthy, can we come in an unworthy manner? No. He has made us worthy; therefore, we have to come in a worthy manner. What does that mean? We have to prove ourselves first. Examine ourselves first.
Do not come casually. Do not come as though it were common. Do not come because it is routine, habit, or tradition. Brothers and sisters, do not come in that way. When you come, prepare yourself. When you come, prove yourself.
If, during the week, you have had any controversy with the Lord, any disobedience to the Lord, or anything that has not been confessed and forgiven, brothers and sisters, we need to examine ourselves before we come. There should be nothing between us and the Lord, because what we are doing is real.
We are not merely touching something physical; we are touching something spiritual. Because of this, we need to be prepared. We also need to examine ourselves concerning any controversy with our brothers and sisters.
If you hate any brother or sister, if there is bitterness in your heart, if there is unforgiveness in your heart—even though your brother may have offended you badly—have you forgiven him? If there is anything between you and any brother or sister in the whole world, let it be confessed and brought under the precious blood, so that you can come and worship Him in a worthy manner.
When we come together, we need to examine ourselves, and we need to discern the body. What does it mean to discern the body? It simply means that when you come, you need to see that this is the body. It is not exclusive in the sense of being merely a few; you are in fellowship with the whole body of Christ.
If we come in that way, then we will not be judged.
Sometimes there is a question: when we come together to drink the cup and break the bread, will it bring sickness to us? There is such fear among some people.
Remembering the Lord is the most blessed thing. Yet we do need fear—but not fear in that sense. The fear is lest we take it unworthily. That is what we need to fear. We do not need to fear other things, because this is the cup of blessing which we bless.
But we do need to fear lest we do it in an unworthy manner. In the church in Corinth, because they did it unworthily, some became sick and some even died. When you touch spiritual reality, it is so real. It cannot be treated lightly.
On the one hand, there may be serious consequences. But on the other hand, when we partake worthily, there is abundant blessing. Nothing blesses our hearts and does us good more than being at the Lord’s table.
Brothers and sisters, the Lord has invited you to His table. Do not purposely absent yourself from it.
The Lord used a parable: a king prepared a wedding feast for his son. He invited guests, but they neglected the invitation. They looked down upon the king and his son. They would not come. Do not do that.
Sometimes we do not come to the Lord’s table for one reason or another, perhaps for no reason at all. There is no excuse. We need to come to the Lord’s table. He has invited us.
In the early church, in Acts 2, they broke bread daily from house to house. Daily they met in the temple for the Word of God and the teaching of the apostles, and daily they broke bread from house to house for the fellowship of the apostles, because they were in persecution.
Later, because of practical reasons, you find in Acts 20 that it became the practice of the church on the first day of the week—that is, the Lord’s Day. The believers came together to break bread.
They did come together to hear Paul, but it was to break bread. Unfortunately, Paul spoke too long, and the young man fell down. I hope I do not do the same thing. But actually, you find that the important thing was the breaking of bread. They did not come merely to hear Paul; they came to break bread.
Brothers and sisters, this is why we break bread every Lord’s Day. This is the first thing; this is the center. This is the center of our worship to the Lord. The other things are secondary.
So I encourage you, brothers and sisters: do not miss the breaking of bread. Make it the first thing in your life. Oh, what blessing will come upon you.
Dear heavenly Father, we do praise and thank Thee. We who were unworthy, yet Thou hast made us worthy to come to Thy table, to sup with Thee. Oh, how we praise and thank Thee for it.
We pray that Thou wilt, on the one hand, encourage us not to look down upon Thy table, but that we will gladly come to Thy table. On the other hand, we pray that we may come in a worthy manner.
Lord, we do ask Thee that each time we touch the bread and the cup, we may touch Thee, and Thou wilt touch us once again; that the love between Thee and us will continually be renewed day by day until we see Thee face to face.
We ask in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.