I'm short on time, so this will be short. We had Communion in church yesterday and I found myself musing over something. Paul records that Jesus said, "This cup is the new covenant in My blood; do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me" (1 Cor 11:25). The phrase, "as often as you drink it" caught my eye.
What do you suppose the disciples heard when He said that? What did they think He was referring to when He said "as often as you drink it"? We're all quite sure it was ... Communion. We all assume Jesus was establishing a new sacrament. But, to what does "it" refer? Does it refer to the cup He referenced during the Passover meal ... the "cup after supper"? Does it refer to any time we eat? I've never been quite clear. I suppose that's one of the reasons churches are so widely variable on how often they do it.
It's an idle speculation and I'm not making a point. Just curious. If He meant a particular cup in the Passover meal, He expected it once a year at most. If He meant "whenever you eat," He intended it to be a lot more often. I know the real point is that we remember. That's the important point. But sometimes I wander down paths in my mind ... like this one.
2 comments:
I've had similar wonderings about Communion when Paul warns about people eating Communion as a meal to sate hunger. Even the most traditional Meal I've been to where an actual loaf of bread was passed around and torn apart, it was still just the bread and wine, nothing that would even tickle a hunger pang. So, is part of the reason churches do Communion the way they do a means of avoiding that problem all together?
Yours is a very good question. Luckily, I don't believe it to be significant since Jesus didn't elaborate all that much. Though more than once a year seems to be what the early Church believed, since it seems they did it weekly.
Speaking as one who is always on a rabbit trail, I would simply do a search/study on the history and meaning of the Lord’s Supper. (I utter “Inquiring minds want to know” so regularly that my Google Search home page lets out a weary sigh upon opening and displays a set of rolling eyes where the “oo” in “Google” should be! :)
P.S. Keep following those paths, for they provide the fodder for your daily blogging, right? I like this quote I found from John Steinbeck: "Ideas are like rabbits. You get a couple and learn how to handle them, and pretty soon you have a dozen."
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