Good morning.
I would like to read some verses. I think most of these are familiar.
Acts 20:7
And on the first day of the week, we being assembled to break bread.
That is the only part I want you to look at. I did not know John was starting with this verse this morning. When I was asked to share on this, I thought it was duplication—but we need duplication.
1 Corinthians 11:20
When you come therefore together into one place, it is not to eat the Lord’s supper.
This is not a verse we often read when we come to the table, but it is a corrective verse. That is what it was supposed to be.
1 Corinthians 10:16–17
The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of the Christ?
The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of the Christ?
Because we, being many, are one loaf, one body; for we all partake of that one loaf.
Let me go down to the latter part of 1 Corinthians 10:20–22:
Now, I do not wish you to be in communion with demons.
You cannot drink the Lord’s cup, and the cup of demons.
You cannot partake of the Lord’s table and the table of demons.
Do we provoke the Lord to jealousy?
Are we stronger than He?
Then, in the eleventh chapter, there are verses that are very familiar, beginning in 1 Corinthians 11:23–33:
For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus, in the night in which He was delivered up, took bread;
and having given thanks, broke it, and said, This is My body, which is for you: this do in remembrance of Me.
In like manner also the cup, after having supped, saying, This cup is the new covenant in My blood: this do, as often as you shall drink it, in remembrance of Me.
For as often as you shall eat this bread, and drink the cup, you announce the death of the Lord until He come.
So that whosoever shall eat the bread or drink the cup of the Lord unworthily shall be guilty in respect of the body and the blood of the Lord.
But let a man prove himself, and thus eat of the bread, and drink of the cup.
For the eater and the drinker eats and drinks judgment to himself, not distinguishing the body.
On this account, many among you are weak and infirm, and a good many are fallen asleep.
But if we judged ourselves, so were we not judged.
But being judged, we are disciplined of the Lord, that we may not be condemned with the world.
So then, my brethren, when you come together to eat, wait for one another.
Lord, we just commit Your word to You. Our dependence is so obvious. We wait upon You that You would break the word of life to us once again as we come.
We tell You, Lord, that You alone have the words of eternal life. We tell You always, Lord, that unless You speak, we have no one to go to. You are the One.
We ask You, by Your Holy Spirit, to take this subject so familiar and make it real to us. Open our hearts, that we would be clearer, have better understanding, and participate more fully in this blessed table of Yours. Help us, we pray, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Well, some of you may remember that just a few weeks ago, when our Group E was on, I shared on fellowship at the Lord’s table. I am hearing heavenly music. Oh, it is Verizon music—excuse me.
I shared on fellowship at the Lord’s table. You may remember that I shared basically two points. It was, after all, just to be a brief opening. The first point—and I just want to use this as an introduction before we get really heavy into our subject—is that fellowship is the ultimate privilege.
There is no higher privilege we can have than this fellowship we have been called into. As a matter of fact, I think 1 Corinthians 1:9 puts it so clearly and so beautifully:
God is faithful, by whom ye have been called into the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
That is that exclusive, precious fellowship that we have been called into. It is the most exclusive, it is the most precious, and it is eternal. You could not have a higher privilege.
Now, I know sometimes people in life feel like they have been left out of something and missed something. But if you are in this fellowship, you will miss nothing.
I remember, sort of foolishly in high school—I do not know why; of course, I was just foolish in high school. Maybe that is the reason—thinking, when they went around the auditorium to tap us into the National Honor Society, that I was waiting for someone to tap me in, almost with my eyes closed, thinking, “They’ll tap me in.” Well, I should have thought about my grade-point average. It may have been a big hint.
Then, you know, we come into this fellowship—this, I do not want to use the word club, because it demeans it—this arena, this privilege, this ultimate communion with God. You can hardly take it in. That is the privilege of every saint of God. It is the ultimate privilege, and it is for eternity.
Now, do not take the wrong impression. Some people think it was because God lacked in some way. I think that is terrible and blasphemous. It was not that God lacked in some way, that He called us into fellowship to make Him complete. It is that He loves so much that His heart of giving compelled Him to take that created thing, man, and bring them into fellowship, and ultimately to make them in His image and likeness. That is the great privilege.
We talked about two aspects in 1 John 1:3–7. I will not read all these verses—maybe parts of them. This fellowship is in two aspects.
John writes:
That which we have seen and heard we report to you, that ye also may have fellowship with us.
That is one aspect.
Then it says:
And our fellowship is indeed with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.
That is the other aspect. This fellowship is with us, and it is with the Father, and it is with the Son. It is a dual aspect.
It also says later in those verses:
If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not practise the truth;
but if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another.
Now, did you notice the two aspects? In these verses, it is absolutely clear: fellowship with Him and fellowship with one another. This is the nature of the fellowship.
We also said the other day, when we shared on this, that fellowship is directly related to communion—to the breaking of bread. As a matter of fact, the word fellowship used in 1 Corinthians 1:9, and in other places, is that Greek word koinonia.
If you look at 1 Corinthians 10:16, when it talks about the blessing of the bread at the Lord’s table, it talks about this communion we have. That word communion is the exact same word, koinonia, as the word translated fellowship.
So we just tried to share with the brothers and sisters that this breaking of bread is at the heart of fellowship. It is the same as fellowship. As a matter of fact, this breaking of bread is the testimony and expression of that great twofold fellowship we have been called into.
Now, I hope those introductory thoughts are helpful in some way. Today, what I want to share on is assembling to break bread, but these first few remarks, I think, are relevant.
We are going to look at only three things. I know people have already come to me with questions: “Will you share on this? Will you share on that?” I am sure to disappoint some of you, because there is no way we can do a comprehensive sharing on this in one session. We would need much more time.
But there are some things that I think are very fundamental, and we need to reflect on them so that we are clear. We need to do that because there are many new ones who have come in who do not understand why we are here. There are many of us who have been here for years who maybe do not understand why we are here. I hope you do not take offense at that.
There are many of us who have been here for years and know, but it has grown to be an ordinary thing, a ritual thing. We need our hearts refreshed and quickened to see how precious this assembling to break bread is.
So that is the burden. We will share on three things:
I hope there are some things we can help each other with.
Well, let us begin with the first one: the purpose of our gathering. Turn back to that verse in Acts 20.
This is—I know you often hear me say this, and you may not believe me after a while—but this is one of my favorite verses in the Bible. It is absolutely clear. It tells the when and the why of the early church, and it is a precious verse.
I think some people read right past this verse and go right to the message of the apostle and right to the miracle. They miss altogether the absolute central importance of this verse in the Bible.
As the church matured, this is what was said:
And on the first day of the week, we being assembled to break bread.
That is the reason they gathered. It is the when they gathered—the first day of the week—and it is the why they gathered—to break bread.
Most of you probably know this is when Paul left Macedonia and went down to Troas. Some dear brethren went with him. Some went before him, like Timothy and Luke. We know the story. But this is the profound statement that is made about that little local gathering of believers in Troas: on the first day of the week, they assembled to break bread.
I think we need to pay attention to that. That is very important. It shows us what the church was occupied with, and I think it shows us what we should be occupied with.
I came upon a saying of Campbell Morgan when I was preparing. He said, “The occupation of the gathering was the breaking of the bread.” This was their purpose. This is the reason they gathered. It is absolutely clear in the Scripture.
Another said this: “The gathering at Troas was very suggestive. It gives us a hint of what their purpose was. It gives us an idea about what the early church was occupied with. It gives us an insight into what their gathering was like and what was important to them.”
That is the reason I think this little verse, often read over, is so profound and absolutely so important.
Now, some people see the story and get caught up in Paul’s monumental ministry. They must have begun early, and he ministered to midnight. By the way, I am not setting you up, in case you believe that, but many a preacher has used this for his justification.
He ministered to midnight, and then you remember dear old Eutychus, the boy in the window, who sleep overpowered, and he fell three stories dead. You would think that would have ended the preaching, but after they went up and had the love feast, he preached again until daybreak. This is a monumental, marathon message. I am not sure how anybody could do that.
Now, I like what I read from one, because I think sometimes people get the wrong impression. This is not justification for lengthy messages. It is just this thought: in the presence of the Lord, when we are really in the presence of the Lord, we lose this thought of time. That is all it means.
It is a special case. It is the apostle Paul, after all. He would maybe never be, and was never again, with those in Troas. So they did not want him to hold back, and he shared his whole heart with them in many words and profoundly extended his message.
But the thought is this: when we are in the presence of the Lord, what is important is not time, but the presence of the Lord. If we are really in His presence breaking bread, then we will not be so conscious of outward things. We will be conscious of Him.
The second thing people look at in this story, and forget the important verse in the beginning, is the miracle. One has called it the midnight miracle. Dear Eutychus—which means fortunate—it does not seem like he was very fortunate. He fell asleep, sleep overpowered him, and he fell out of the window dead.
Some people said he really was not dead; they just gave him artificial resuscitation. But Luke was the one who rushed down there—Doctor Luke, and Doctor Luke, the one who wrote this record, says, “We picked him up as dead.” So he was as dead as dead. You get the point.
So truly, it was a midnight miracle. Some people say, “Oh, if we just had more miracles, everything would be right. Oh, if we had the word—that powerful word—if we had those miracles, everything would be right.” But they forget that is not the real emphasis in this story.
The real emphasis is that, on the first day of the week, they gathered to break bread. That is what we want to focus on. Thank God, there is the word. The word has helped us so much. We do not deny the word. We have the word here. Thank God.
Thank God, the Lord moves again and again, and we see His great moving—miracle after miracle. We wonder how much He loves us. Thank God for that. But those are not our emphasis. Our emphasis is that we gather unto Him.
I remember the word ancient Jacob gave, talking to his sons:
And the gathering of the peoples shall be unto Him.
That is in Genesis 49:10. That is the sense in Troas. They were gathered unto Him. They were gathered unto Him to remember His death. They were gathered on this first day of the week to remember the Lord, and that was their supreme occupation.
Brothers and sisters, all these years, where we have succeeded and where we have failed, our burden has been the same. Our burden has been that we would be gathering together unto Him.
I remember singing that little verse, Genesis 49:10, over and over again as we gathered. Our hearts would swell with worship, because we knew—for an instant, we knew—like these believers at Troas, what our purpose was, why we were gathering, to Whom we were gathering, and what was the reason we were gathering.
That is the significance of this little meeting at Troas.
I said this verse in Acts 20:7 deals with the when and the why. First, it talks about the when:
And on the first day of the week, we being assembled.
Now, I do not know if you know what this means. The first day of the week is the Lord’s Day. It is Sunday. It is not the Sabbath.
Many say you should gather on the Sabbath. As a matter of fact, the Lord’s table makes the Jewish Sabbath obsolete. We do not celebrate the Sabbath. We do not gather on Friday. We do not gather on Saturday. We gather on the first day of the week, the day of resurrection.
On the first day of the week, our testimony, as we break bread and remember the Lord, is that we are in an altogether new dispensation. It is a new day for a new dispensation. It is not the former day, the end of the week. It is the beginning of the week. It is a new day.
You remember when Mary went to the tomb—the two Marys, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary. It says in Matthew 28:1, from the King James Version:
In the end of the sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary to see the sepulchre.
This was the day of resurrection. It was the Lord’s triumph. It was an empty tomb. It was a risen Christ. We have a new beginning.
The believers, as you read the book of Acts, were excited about the Lord of resurrection. They were witnesses. I know you have heard John Blanchard say this over and over: they became witnesses of the Lord’s resurrection. Their emphasis was on that new day, the Lord’s Day, the first day of the week.
Psalm 118:24 says:
This is the day which the Lord hath made;
We will rejoice and be glad in it.
This is that new day. This is the first day of the week.
Do you remember when the Lord, on that new day—that first day—was raised, and He appeared to those different ones? You remember the story in Luke 24, the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. They were conversing and talking, and the Lord Jesus came up. What a surprise.
After His resurrection, on that new day, He was walking beside them and began to unfold to them the Scriptures and all that had happened, and what it meant. They compelled Him, you remember, to stay.
It says in Luke 24 that these disciples at Emmaus bid Him to stay, and He stayed. He went with them and met with them. The story concludes that their eyes were opened in the breaking of the bread. That is how important it is.
On this first day, on this new day, what was important, what opened their eyes, and what made them see was the breaking of the bread. Then they said to one another, “Our hearts burned within us.”
Brothers and sisters, this is the sense we ought to have of the importance and purpose of this new day, this first day.
It is clear when you read the early church record in the second and third centuries that the early church gathered on this first day. It is clear. There is no argument about it. We have all kinds of ideas, but this little verse in Troas tells us what we ought to be doing.
So this is the when. It is the Lord’s Day. It is the first day of resurrection. It is the new day. It is the beginning, the dawning, of that new creation that we live in now because of the Lord’s sacrifice and because His body was broken and His blood was shed. That is what this day means.
Because of that, we read the why:
And we, being assembled, to break bread.
That is as succinct, profound, and powerful as it gets.
It did not say, “We being assembled to worship the Lord.” Worship of the Lord is very important, but it says, “We being assembled to break bread.” That was their purpose. That was their focus. That is the why. There is no ambiguity whatsoever in this verse.
Look again at 1 Corinthians 11:20. Remember, this is a rebuke, but it tells them what they ought to be doing:
When you come therefore together into one place, it is not to eat the Lord’s supper.
They were not doing what they were supposed to do. There was such disorder in the church. They were so unclear about why they gathered. They were so unsure of the reason. All they cared about was that one ate and another did not. All they cared about was displaying their gift.
But really, what the Lord wanted was a people who would return to Him on that new day, break bread, and simply remember Him. This is the why. This is the whole why. This is the purpose.
Now, if you asked this room, “Why do you gather?” I think you would get quite a few answers. Some of us would say we gather because of our friends and the brothers and sisters in Christ. I think that is true in many cases. But is that the real purpose we gather?
Some would say we gather for the ministry of the word. I have heard this—not about me, but about others who speak. They say, “When that brother speaks, the ministry of the word is so beyond what we have ever heard. The reason I come is for the ministry of the word.” We have the ministry of the word.
Some gather and hope there will be a miracle. I am all for miracles. Every one of us is a miracle. We were dead, just like Eutychus—dead, dead—walking dead, dead in our trespasses and sins, without hope and without God.
Then the greatest miracle happened. The Lord Jesus came to us, manifested Himself to us, and made Himself known to us. We, just as surely as Lazarus was raised from the dead, have been raised in newness of life. Everyone is a miracle. Never doubt it.
Some say we gather for the love feast, the family meal. There was a family meal. As a matter of fact, the church in the early days had the Lord’s Supper and a love feast all together—the family meal, the Lord’s Supper, and a family gathering to break bread and eat together.
Some may say, “Man, the reason I come there is you guys eat every Sunday.” I hope that is not the reason. But there is the love feast. It was here after dear, fortunate Eutychus—yes, I think he was fortunate Paul was there—was taken up. They broke bread and ate together, and then Paul had his key to speak until dawn.
Are these the reasons we gather? They are part of our gathering. They are not the reason for our gathering.
We simply gather for this single purpose: on the Lord’s Day, to remember the Lord and to obey that command when He said:
This do in remembrance of Me.
That is our purpose for gathering. That is the reason we come together. That is our very purpose. That is the why.
That is the reason they came together in Troas and the reason we come together here. Make no mistake about it, brothers and sisters. That is the purpose.
We are helped by the word. We are blessed by being with our real family, brothers and sisters. We are helped to know that we have all been rescued from darkness and brought into the kingdom of the Son of God’s love. We are helped and enjoy having a feast together. But that is not the reason we gather.
We gather simply for this one thing on the first day of the week: for the breaking of the bread. That is what we should do.
Now, the Lord’s table and the Lord’s Supper are two different terms. There is a twofold aspect to this breaking of bread, and that is what I want to get us to. A lot of people have not focused on that as much.
When you look at 1 Corinthians 11, it is the Lord’s Supper. That corrective verse, 1 Corinthians 11:20, says:
When you come therefore together into one place, it is not to eat the Lord’s supper.
Then, if you look in the chapter before, at 1 Corinthians 10:21:
You cannot drink the Lord’s cup, and the cup of demons: you cannot partake of the Lord’s table and the table of demons.
Here are the two aspects: there is the Lord’s table, and there is the Lord’s Supper. Make no mistake about it: if you read the context and study the context, you see the difference.
The one in 1 Corinthians 11 has to do with that vertical fellowship, where we remember the Lord’s death until He comes. It is that first aspect: fellowship with Him.
If you look at 1 Corinthians 10, it talks about the bread, that we have all eaten of the one loaf, and we all drink of the one cup. It deals with communion and that horizontal fellowship with the brothers and sisters, where our testimony, when we break bread, declares that we are one body.
We do not meet with all the brothers and sisters in Richmond, nor can we meet with all the brothers and sisters in Richmond. But we declare by our taking of this Lord’s table that we are one with all the body of Christ. Everyone that the Lord has received, we receive. Everyone that the Lord rejects, we reject. This is the Lord’s table.
The one is vertical. What do we do? We remember that ancient command:
This do in remembrance of Me.
You remember when the Lord Jesus, in Luke 22, had that last meal with His disciples. You remember the incident. At the Passover, He said:
With desire have I desired to eat this passover with you.
It was the Lord’s desire.
But then He changed the meal. He took bread, broke the bread, and said:
This is My body, which is given for you: this do in remembrance of Me.
Then likewise, after supper, He took the cup and said:
This cup is the new covenant in My blood.
This is what we do in that vertical relationship. We are taken up with Him. We are taken up with what He has done. We are taken up with what He has accomplished. Our whole purpose, as we gather, is to remember Him until He comes. That is the Lord’s Supper.
But at the Lord’s table, we have a second meaning of this fellowship. We declare that we are one with all the brothers and sisters. You have eaten of that loaf. I have eaten of that loaf. Together, our testimony is that we are one, and we cannot be divided. This is the Lord’s table.
This seems to me to be the purpose for which they gathered. I think that ties in well with that vertical fellowship with Him and that horizontal fellowship with one another. That is why the table is a testimony of this fellowship, a declaration of this fellowship.
The last thing I want to share about purpose, before we get more practical, is that the breaking of the bread was initiated by the Lord Himself. It was not initiated by man.
If it were initiated by me, certainly you would pay no attention. If it were initiated by some great saint of God, you might set up a denomination to do what he told you to do. But it was initiated by none other than the Lord Jesus Himself. That is the importance of it.
He is the One who said, “Take this bread and eat it.” He is the One who said, “Take this cup of the new covenant in My blood and drink it.” He is the One.
I love what Brother Nee says: “We are never the host. We are, at best, ushers.” The Lord initiated this. The Lord calls everyone to it, and we cannot refuse anyone He has called. We cannot refuse a single one He has called. This is the Lord’s initiation.
You remember when the Lord spoke to the children of Israel, the Jews. I will give you one incident about tradition. In Mark 7:8, from the King James Version, He said:
For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men.
That is what often happens in the church. We set up our own traditions. We set up our own ideas of what our purpose is to gather. We set up our own ideas, and we gather around them. That is how all the denominations start.
The Lord, who initiated this, gave us our purpose. May the Lord help us. Brothers and sisters, this is just what I want to say to you: can we be occupied with anything else? Can we have any other purpose? This is why we gather. It is to break bread.
Now let me get more practical. The preparation for our gathering is very important. The purpose is very important, but preparation for gathering is equally important.
I remember reading Andrew Murray’s little book. I do not know how many of you have it or have read it. I recommend it. It is really a devotional prayer, day by day, considering and meditating on the Lord’s table.
Andrew Murray understood the importance of preparation. He said this was the prayer on the morning of the Lord’s table: “Lord, prepare me and all the congregation for a blessed observance of the supper.” That was his prayer.
Brothers and sisters, I think very often we do not understand how important it is to prepare to meet with the Lord. We come sort of—I will borrow a Lance term—willy-nilly. We sort of come by the seat of our pants. We come and hope others will fill the space. We come passively watching instead of actively preparing and participating.
I think, if you read about the Lord’s table in the Word, you find it very clear that we are to prepare our hearts when we come to the Lord’s table. This is both an Old Testament and a New Testament principle.
Turn to Deuteronomy 16:16–17:
Three times in the year shall all the males appear before the Lord thy God in the place which He shall choose:
in the feast of unleavened bread, and in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of tabernacles;
and they shall not appear before the Lord empty:
every man shall give as he is able, according to the blessing of the Lord thy God which He hath given thee.
This was an Old Testament principle. Before you gathered in the presence of the Lord, everyone—everyone—was to have something and not appear before the Lord empty.
Now, you may be likely to try to excuse this away and say, “This is the Old Testament. This is not the New Testament.” But the same principle of preparation goes into the New Testament.
When you read about gathering together, the apostle Paul, in 1 Corinthians 14:26, says:
What is it then, brethren? When ye come together, each of you hath a psalm, hath a teaching, hath a tongue, hath a revelation, hath an interpretation. Let all things be done to edification.
Now, this is a principle. This is not talking about the Lord’s table or the breaking of bread, but it is talking about the spiritual principle that the people of God, before they come together, are to prepare their hearts to be in His presence.
You know, we often sing a song at the beginning. It is not because these brothers and sisters like to perform. I will not offend them and say it is not that they sing that well.
It is for one single reason: we gather early to prepare our hearts for the presence of the Lord. If there is no preparation, we will miss His presence. It is so vital.
Let me say this—take this as a brother, please, as a word of admonishment and not a word of condemnation. Take it from a brother who is as busy as anyone in this room.
I think it is important that we get here on time when we gather. I believe that is at the heart of preparation. I think people who are habitually late need to consider: Are you coming in a right attitude? Are you coming with a prepared heart? Are you gathering and setting your focus on this single purpose?
I believe that is very important. I would like to encourage you: please try. I know schedules. I have had kids; I have grandkids. I have a busy business, and I work many hours. I know what it means to be busy.
But let us take to heart this all-important word about preparation. It is absolutely necessary in the breaking of bread.
John told us they tried to send some verses out, and the computer got in the way. I often think computers get in the way. I will not go as far as Stephen, who says he is allergic to computers. But I tell you, I am the first one to scream when mine goes down: “Where is the IT guy?”
He sent out a verse—or they sent out verses. We do not do that just to fill space and time. It is so that we can prepare our hearts according to those Old Testament and New Testament principles.
Brothers and sisters, when you get those verses, meditate on them. Think about them. You may not be able to spend hours—I am not saying that—but you can spend ten minutes before you come, saying, “Lord, what do You have here? Prepare my heart.”
You can be like Andrew Murray and say, “Lord, prepare me and the congregation to meet and have a blessed observance of Your supper.” I think that is important.
I would even suggest that we need to pray for these groups. These groups seek the Lord for a word that might be given to help the saints and encourage us. We ought to take it seriously.
I do not know what other places do, since I am a local brother. I do not know, but I think that is very precious. I think we ought to take it seriously. In our preparation, we ought to take this word, meditate on it, think about it, and have our hearts ready—ready—for this occasion of the breaking of the bread.
May the Lord use this as an appeal. I do not want it to be condemnation. But I do believe it is important. Without preparation, you cannot really break bread in the right spirit. You will disrespect or disregard, or you will not come to an understanding of the full importance of what we are doing.
Every saint should be ready. I think that is absolutely important.
Now let us go to the last point: the practice of our gathering at the Lord’s table. It is not just a theory that we have, that it is our purpose to gather. We do not just talk about preparing and getting ready. We actually come together.
When we come together, there are certain things that we need to be mindful of, lest we do the wrong thing and our focus is not right.
As a matter of fact, the word communion, koinonia, the word fellowship, koinonia, means participation. It means that. You can look it up. It means you are actually participating in the gathering.
I do not know how you look at that word any differently, but when you participate in something, you are involved in it. You are engaged in it. You are part of it. You give your contribution, led by the Holy Spirit.
What you have prepared in the presence of the Lord and waited upon by your spirit, you wait for the Spirit’s anointing and the Spirit’s direction to offer up that sacrifice. That is what we do. It is participation, all under the leading of the Holy Spirit.
Now, participation in the Lord’s table is giving and not getting. If you forget everything I have said so far, please write that down.
Participation in the breaking of bread is giving and not getting.
That is as simple as I can describe it to you. Very often, we come to the Lord’s table and inappropriately begin to ask the Lord for things. We say, “Lord, give me strength this week. Lord, give me grace to get through this week. Lord, I am going through such troubles. Help me. Lord, heal me this week.”
All of those are important prayers. They are just at an inappropriate time. When we come to the Lord’s table, our focus needs to be upon the Lord Himself. Our focus needs to be upon the Lord and remembering Who the Lord is.
Our focus, then, needs to be giving and not getting. You understand? We have a challenge here, and I am sympathetic to this. Brothers and sisters, we live in a me-centered world.
Let me tell you, that is the one thing in a generation that is hard to take in the breadth and width of it. Everything is about me. Everything is about me.
If I am going to break my wife’s rule and use an illustration that I have said before—she cuts me off after a while and says, “You cannot say it”—but I will do it anyway, just despite her. I remember going down Huguenot Road one day and seeing a bumper sticker on the back of this young lady’s car. She may have been a sweet young lady; I do not know. It said, “I am the center of the universe.”
I thought, how appropriate for our age. Everything revolves around me. Everything is for me. It is all me, me, me, me, me. And that is not singing and warming up.
It is all about me. So when we come to the table, we distort the table. We make it about me. The focus is about me. It is all what You have done for me. It is all what I get out of You. It seems to me to be off from what the Holy Spirit intended it to be.
I believe it is Psalm 29:1–2. We used to sing this song. I do not know if we sing it much anymore. In the King James Version, it says:
Give unto the Lord, O ye mighty,
Give unto the Lord glory and strength.
Give unto the Lord the glory due unto His name;
Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.
That is the essence of the table. We are coming to give, not to get. May the Lord help us with that one little thing. We are coming to give.
In 1 Corinthians 11:26, it talks about how we proclaim, or announce, the Lord’s death until He comes. Brothers and sisters, I do not know how you can make an announcement or proclaim in silence.
It means literally our announcement is that the Lord is coming. We remember the Lord until He comes, and we proclaim His death until He comes in this day of resurrection.
The second practical matter is that the breaking of bread is for disciples and believers, and not unbelievers. Okay? Maybe that is too elementary for you, but I think John said it today: can you remember the One you do not know? Think about it.
Can you remember with fondness and with love the One you do not know? That is why it is not for unbelievers. Can you declare your oneness with a body that you are not a part of? You cannot. It is simple.
Some people say, “Why do you prohibit me from taking the Lord’s table?” We do not prohibit anyone. All who are the Lord’s should take the table, should break the bread. All who are not the Lord’s should not break the bread and take the table. You cannot. It has no meaning. It has no value.
You demean what others know as precious, and the purpose of their gathering, when you eat some elements not wondering what you are doing. It is for disciples and believers. This is a precious and serious thing.
Another thing that is important is our attitude. This is for believers. In 1 Corinthians 11:27, Paul says:
So that whosoever shall eat the bread or drink the cup of the Lord unworthily shall be guilty in respect of the body and blood of the Lord.
He goes on to talk about some very serious consequences. It talks about how they did this in an unworthy manner. Remember, let me back up: 1 Corinthians is corrective. Things were so out of order.
I think some people think, “1 Corinthians—great. Look at all these gifts, look at all that knowledge.” They were out of order. The apostle is setting things in order: what they should be doing and how they should be doing it.
Many were taking it in an unworthy manner, and he said, because of this, many are weak and infirm, and a good many have fallen asleep. That means, like Eutychus: dead, dead.
Now, that can make us fearful, and that can send us to two extremes, which I think are both harmful. It does not mean that you are personally worthy. I think Brother Nee nailed that so well. No one can say it better. It does not deal with personal worthiness.
We are taking the blood of Jesus, which has cleansed us from all sin and unworthiness. So it is not a matter of you being personally worthy. It is a matter of our attitude toward the table when we come. That is the difference.
Because they despised it, because they were out of order, and because they did all the wrong things, there were consequences. So we need to get away from this one extreme: “I am not worthy to take the table.”
Who is worthy to take the table? Are you worthy to take the table? Am I worthy to take the table? Is Jerry worthy to take the table? Not a single one of us can say we are worthy to take the table.
Because of His cleansing blood, we can take the table because He is worthy. That is the first thing. Let us avoid that extreme.
Then the other extreme is, “Oh, it is all of grace.” I hear it so much in this age. People say, “Oh, it does not matter. It is all of grace. It does not matter. Take the table.” There is no meaning, you know.
We need to know that it is very serious, and we need to do it in a worthy manner.
Finally, I think we partake of the table. 1 Corinthians 10:17 says, “We all partake.” 1 Corinthians 10:21 says, “You cannot partake of the Lord’s table and the table of demons.”
Our partaking is our participation in this twofold fellowship. “Take and eat,” the Lord said. “Do this in remembrance of Me.” As often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, as often as you do it—not irregularly. The emphasis is on often.
We partake, and our partaking is a testimony that we are in this fellowship. This fellowship is our life. Do you understand?
I think some people—again, do not take this as corrective—but some people use the word fellowship to describe a place. “I go to fellowship. I was at fellowship. I left my hat in the fellowship.” The other day John called me and said, “You left your book—your brains—in the fellowship.”
Our fellowship is with the Father and with the Son. Our fellowship is with everyone who has eaten this loaf. We are one because we are all of one loaf.
Our communion, our breaking of the bread, our testimony, is that we participate and we partake of this table.
So you go back to that verse: on the first day of the week, we being gathered to break bread. A lot of people might not want to hear this verse, but let me tie this in.
1 Corinthians 16:1–2 says:
Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I directed the assemblies of Galatia, so do ye also.
On the first day of the week let each of you put by at home, laying up in whatever degree he may have prospered, that there may be no collections when I come.
I should have said this during preparation. I know we do not like to talk about money. People get sort of twitchy if we start talking about money. But actually, I like this: Brother Nee says the two things we are to do on the first day of the week are, first, the breaking of the bread, and second, to prepare our financial offering for the Lord.
Those are the two things we are to do. Now, we may have the worship, we may have the meal, and we may have fellowship with one another, but those two things are the corrective things that Paul brought before the Corinthian church. That is what we are to do.
It is not about law. It is not a tithe. It is not ten percent. But it is in this new covenant, which His blood has purchased, that we do these two things.
I think we have slipped so far from that. I think we say, “It is all of grace. It does not matter.” But if you read the Word, it matters.
Well, let me close. I hope these simple lessons are helpful. I told you I could not share comprehensively, but we need to revisit this issue of breaking bread because I think many of us are not as clear as we should be.
I think, in addition to us, many of us who think we are clear have allowed it to grow sort of old and stale. That anticipation—that serious anticipation that Andrew Murray prayed about so fervently in that little book—is often missing.
Then the spirit of the breaking of the bread is gone as we come together.
Brothers and sisters, this is so we will know the purpose for which we gather together. This is so we will better learn to prepare our hearts before we gather. This is so, when we come together, we will know something of those practical things we do as we practise the breaking of the bread.
May the Lord help us.
Lord, we ask You to be very gracious to us.
Return to us this sense of what Troas knew, this little place. Return it to us. Give us this purpose. Cause it to be in our heart.
Give us a spirit of anticipation as we gather on the Lord’s Day for this single purpose. Lord, help us to know how to prepare. I confess, Lord, I do not know how.
I defer to my more mature brother, who said simply in his prayer, “Prepare us.” Prepare us for this occasion, a joyous occasion, of Your supper.
We do not want to come to You empty and let others give their contribution, while we hold back and do not give what You have given to us. Surely You will be deprived of Your place if we do that.
Lord, we ask You to help us to practically enter in. What holds us back? What keeps us from entering in? Help us to enter in, that You may have the first place and that You may have the glory.
For we ask this together in the precious name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.