Mar 29, 2007
Running time: 30:30
(30:30)
In this sermon we’ll first, examine the major views of the Lord’s Supper, second, we’ll examine the Reformed view of “real presence” or “spiritual presence,” and third, we’ll examine the effects of the Lord’s Supper on Christians.
Scripture Lesson: 1 Corinthians 11:17-34
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2 comments so far
Jun 1, 2008Alex #
I love this website!!!!!!!!!!
but I digress…
I listened to your segment on the Lord’s Supper in your “What We Believe” series. I had a question.
One of the passages used was 1 Co. 11:29 where it says, “…anyone who eats and drinks without recognizing the body of the Lord eats and drinks judgment on himself.” (NIV) It appears that the phrase “of the Lord” is not in earlier manuscripts. This in my mind drastically changes the meaning. It would appear that it refers to discerning “the presence of Jesus in the covenant community”. I thought perhaps v.27 could refer to the presence of Jesus in the bread and wine and v.29 to the covenant community but that seems unnatural and forced.
Help!
Jun 3, 2008Rev. Tom Morrison #
Alex,
Thank you for your question.
The phrase, “of the Lord,” is not in the earliest and best manuscripts. Therefore, since these manuscripts are more accurate and the shorter reading (without “of the Lord”) in these manuscripts is more likely to be original (since copiests had a tendency to add or gloss), the verse should be read without the phrase “of the Lord.”
Nevertheless, the “body” to which Paul refers in v.29 is the body of Jesus Christ. Paul’s argument in this part of chapter 11 is that the church is in trouble exactly because they are not making a distinction (dicerning) between the bread and wine as an ordinary meal and the bread and the wine as the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. First, when Paul quotes Jesus’ words from the Gospels on the Supper, He quotes Jesus using sacramental language: “This IS my body…this cup IS the new covenant in my blood.” Jesus and Paul are using a figure of speech called “metonymy” – this is when the name of the thing (Jesus’ body)is transferred to the sign (the bread). Paul is quoting Jesus’ words here to prove that the Lord’s Supper is not an ordinary meal but a sacred meal in which the bread and the wine are instuments through which the Holy Spirit communicates the spiritual body and blood of Christ to the believer. Second, v.27 confirms this when Paul says that unworthy participants will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord. Eating the bread and the wine is to eat the body and blood of the Lord (spiritually speaking). Finaly, v.26 continues with this line and v.29 explains the serious nature of discering the sacred nature of – not any body – but the body of the Lord. To what other body could Paul be referring? Therefore, Paul’s consistent use of “soma” (“body”) and the context demand that “body” in v.29 refers to Christ’s body – His spiritual body received in the proper eating and drinking of the bread and the wine of the Lord’s Table.