“Full of Mystery, Full of Meaning”
Reading: 1 Corinthians 11:23-26; John 13:1-17
Written and preached by Luke Richards
Sometimes the most powerful sermons are the ones that we don’t preach. Sometimes the most powerful sermons are the ones we do together. That’s why the church has so long practiced this time of communion. It’s been a regular and necessary part of Christian worship for as long as there have been Christians, because this sermon is so full of meaning. It’s worth taking a moment to stop and remember what it is we do in this time, because the meaning is sometimes so hidden by the mystery of what we’re doing, and at the same time we can become so comfortable with and so immune to the mystery that it just becomes normal, ordinary, part of the background.
Usually, we think of a sermon as being something a preacher gets up and speaks to all of you. We think a proclamation has to be spoken using words. But this meal of shared bread and juice really is a sermon in physical form. It’s a sermon you can pick up and handle, it’s a sermon you do in public for all to see, it’s a sermon you don’t just breathe out for other people to hear, it’s a sermon you take into yourself and use to feed yourself. It’s a sermon that becomes a part of you.
Usually, we think of this act of communion as being me taking the bread and juice for myself, and it’s that act of taking it that is communion. But communion involves much more than that; the table cannot be separated from the word. It’s true that the bread and the juice are today’s sermon, but that sermon requires us doing Scripture together so that we can be in the proper place to receive this tactile sermon, this sermon we pick up and eat. I’ve been in churches who celebrated communion with no explanation or proclamation at all; they just dimmed the lights in the middle of their morning worship service and passed around plates with little cups of juice and little pieces of tasteless bread. But that’s not communion, because this sermon that we pick up and eat together must also be proclaimed to the people. We need to hear Scripture read; we need to hear the verbal reminder that what we do here today is a sign of the salvation God has worked for us through Christ. This is Christ given for you.
Usually, people think of salvation as being between me and God. For me to be saved, I need to come to Christ, I need to get my life in order, I need to receive the grace of God. But communion must be communal; this is the grace of God given to the community of Christians. It’s true that sometimes we celebrate communion as individuals or as families, but normally it is something that the entire community of faith participates in. And that’s important. We are invited to the Lord’s Table together. We share a common meal, a common savior, a common bond in the grace God has given us in Christ. This communion is grace shared with one another.
Usually, we think of grace as being something intangible, something you can’t put your hands on, something invisible. We think of it as a spiritual reality that God magically pours into us. It’s certainly true that the Holy Spirit often works in mysterious, invisible ways. It’s true that God’s grace often surprises us because we don’t see it coming. But the Lord’s Supper is one of those times in which God’s grace is right here for you to pick up and receive. It’s a physical sign and reminder of the fact that God did not stay in His heavens: He created this magnificent creation, fallen though it may be, He loves this world He has made, and in fact He was even willing to take the stuff of humanity onto Himself. The Word was made flesh. God did not keep Himself separate from puny mortals like you and me, He loved us to the point of being willing to become one of us. The Son of God was willing to become a human to save us with His very life. Grace became flesh and walked among us, available to any who would come and receive Him. And so it is today with the Lord’s Supper. The mystery of God’s grace is here today on this table, waiting for you.
And usually, we think of grace as being something out of the ordinary, something special, as though God can only work in the big moments through miraculous means. But He chose to give us this meal together through some of the most common foods of all. Wouldn’t it be more fitting to use the most expensive, grandest, rarest, most extravagant of foods for God’s grace-filled meal? But no, He chose the simple things, the common things, that which is available and familiar to everyone. He is a God whose grace flows through the unexpected things of life, a God who loves to pour out grace on the lowly, a God who delights in the humble, a God who makes the first last and the last first. This broken bread and poured out juice is a physical sign of the One who saved us through unexpected means, by His own sacrifice, by His willingness to give Himself entirely to the mission of the kingdom of God, by making a choice that overcame death itself. This simple meal is the grace of God.
Usually, we think of gratitude as being expressed verbally, by saying thanks, by sending a card to say it for you, or by doing something nice in return. But if we want to show our gratitude to God for this grace He is offering us our best response is simply to receive that grace. This meal is also known as the Eucharist, which comes from a word that means “to give thanks.” To show our gratitude to God, we receive His grace. We participate together in this community of grace, and in so doing we commit ourselves to the kingdom that Jesus began. The way for us to show our gratitude is to live in that kingdom that works through the humble and lowly things. It’s a kingdom that overcomes death with life, overcomes evil with good, and overcomes hate with love, and so by eating this sermon today we are making a statement that we will live in that kingdom.
It’s a sermon with an extra layer of meaning and mystery during this time of year since we are so close to our holiday of Thanksgiving, so that act of gratitude is especially relevant today. But this Sunday is also the last Sunday of the Christian calendar. The Christian year begins four Sundays before Christmas with the season of Advent, so we begin the Christian year in anticipation of the coming of Jesus, and then we move through Good Friday and Easter, when Jesus was crucified and raised from the dead, and on to Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit was given to the church. The year ends with this recognition that Jesus Christ is our King eternal. He is the victorious one, the Lord of all things, the one who has defeated death and inaugurated a new kingdom. And so as we take communion together today, we are not only grateful to Him for what He has done, we are also proclaiming that this path of being broken and poured out for our salvation is the chosen path of His kingdom. This is how His kingdom works. This is how our King conquers.
We read the passage from John’s gospel in which Jesus washes His disciples’ feet, an action that took place during that Last Supper which is the model for our meal together today. By washing their feet, Jesus was making an example of Himself for His disciples, making it clear that the greatest in His kingdom really are the servants, and if you understand what He was saying, you will go and do likewise. “You will be blessed if you do them.”
And so there is proclamation through the spoken word and there is proclamation through our actions together and there is proclamation through the physical bread and juice that we pick up and eat. And we are making a commitment to God in this time, we are making a commitment to one another in this time, and we are making a commitment to ourselves as well. We see all of these things wrapped up in this humble bread and juice, in our actions together, in our words to one another, and in our going out from here to do what Jesus our King called us to do.
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