From the Pastor: His Bread for Us
"The bread which I shall give for the life of the world is My flesh." John 6:51
One popular chorus, often used at communion services, opens with the
line, "Take our bread, we ask you; take our lives.." Now with all due
respect to the author of those lines we must ask with sanctified reason
concerning this song (cf. 1 Corinthians 14:15) whether it is correct to assert
that the communion bread is our bread offered to Him. This smacks of a
"sacrificial" concept of the Lord's Supper whereby the bread is our
offering to Him in an unbloody sacrifice, well known (or should be!) as
the Roman position.
On the contrary, Scripture provides no basis at all for thinking that
the Lord's supper is anything we offer to God. Rather, it is all about
what He gives to us. The bread represents His body given for us;
likewise the wine. However, the text which sums it all up is the one
above. In the Lord's Supper the spiritual truth of "eating His flesh",
of "feasting on Christ" is represented and symbolized. Therein Christ's
benefits are offered to you, and in participating by faith in Him they
are personally guaranteed.
Come then to Him today to partake of those benefits: the forgiveness of
sins, the deliverance from the wrath to come, the acceptance in Him for
eternal life, the guarantee of His sustaining through this life. As He
offers to us His bread, let us receive it with grateful thanks and
resolve to live the Christian life maintained by His flesh. |
Now let our souls be fed
With manna from above,
And over us Thy banner spread
Of everlasting love.
(Methodist Hymn Book, Hymn 761)