Union without Communion | CHURCH IN CHAOS | 1 Corinthians 11:17-34

You're listening to City Church Manchester. We

are a church that invites everyone to enjoy Christ

for the glory of God. If we can serve you in

any way, then visit our website at citychurchmanchester

.org to find out more. In the first place, I

hear that when you come together as a church,

there are divisions among you. And to some extent,

I believe it. No doubt there have to be differences

among you to show which of you have God's approval.

So then, when you come together, it is not the

Lord's Supper you eat. For when you are eating,

some of you go ahead with your own private suppers.

As a result, one person remains hungry and another

gets drunk. Don't you have homes to eat and drink

in? Or do you despise the church of God by humiliating

those who have nothing? What shall I say to you?

Shall I praise you? Certainly not in this matter.

For I received from the Lord what I also passed

on to you. The Lord Jesus, on the night he was

betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks,

he broke it and said, This is my body, which

is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. In

the same way, after supper, he took the cup,

saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood.

Do this whenever you drink it in remembrance

of me. For whenever you eat this bread and drink

this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until

he comes. So then, whoever eats the bread or

drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner

will be guilty of sinning against the body and

blood of the Lord. Everyone ought to examine

themselves before they eat of the bread and drink

from the cup. For those who eat and drink without

discerning the body of Christ eat and drink judgment

on themselves. That is why many among you are

weak and ill, and a number of you have fallen

asleep. But if we were more discerning with regard

to ourselves, we would not come under such judgment.

Nevertheless, when we are judged in this way

by the Lord, we are being disciplined so that

we will not be finally condemned with the world.

So then, my brothers and sisters, when you gather

to eat, you should all eat together. Anyone who

is hungry should eat something at home so that

when you meet together, it may not result in

judgment. And when I come... I will give further

instructions. Hello, everyone. It's great to

be with you to open up this next passage in 1

Corinthians. Let us bow our heads and let's pray

together. Let's pray. Father, we pray that the

words of my mouth and the meditations of our

hearts might be pleasing in your sight today.

Our Lord, our Rock. and our redeemer amen well

let me ask you as we start why do marriages fail

that's a painful and a sensitive question i i

grew up in a family where my parents divorced

so i know the pain of it but it's good to ask

why do they collapse Why do marriages fail? Sometimes

it is because of a major collapse. Something

explodes. Someone has an affair. A betrayal comes

to the surface. And overnight, everything falls

apart. But more often, marriages don't explode.

They just slowly fade. Of course, the wedding

day was beautiful. They said their vows with

sincerity. Their family and friends were joined

together and it was joyful, it was wonderful.

And from that moment on, they were husband and

wife. Legally, publicly, before God. But then

slowly, quietly, yet persistently, something

changes. They stop sharing their lives, their

dreams. Their time. Conversations become merely

logistical. So, you picking up the kids or am

I? Who was supposed to pay that bill? What time

are you home tonight? The people, they still

live in the same house. They still wear the same

wedding rings. They appear married to the outside

world. But inside something has died. They still

have union. They just no longer have experience

of communion. They're married in name. But they're

strangers in reality. And that's how many marriages

die. Not with a dramatic explosion, but with

a slow and tragic death. Now let me ask you a

similar question. If you're here tonight and

you're a Christian, how's your relationship with

Jesus going? Actually, let me backtrack a bit

because I'm using Christian jargon there. And

if you're not a Christian and you're here tonight,

you need to know something. Christianity is not

fundamentally about religion. It's fundamentally

about relationship. Christians don't simply know

things about God. We claim to know God personally,

relationally, intimately. In fact, when the Bible

looks for a metaphor to describe the relationship

between God, And his people. One of the most

popular ones the Bible uses is the image of marriage.

The church is the bride. Jesus is the bridegroom.

So Christian friends, let me ask you again. How

is your relationship with Jesus? How is your

spiritual marriage? Because. Sometimes Christians

can drift in exactly the same way as spouses

drift away from one another. We still believe

all the right things. We believe that Jesus died

on the cross for our sins, that on the third

day he rose again. But belief can remain up here

in our heads while communion in our hearts disappears.

And when life becomes hard, that gap becomes

painfully obvious. You know, Christians do go

through hard times. Jesus was absolutely clear

this is what will happen to us. We will experience

loneliness, we'll experience sickness, failure,

broken relationships, grief. And sometimes when

someone is going through one of those really

hard times... They'll say something very honest.

They'll say, well, I know that God loves me.

I know that Jesus died for me. I know that he

rose again and that he's coming back. But right

now, that just doesn't seem like it's enough.

Not while I remain single. Not while I can't

find a job. Not while I'm still estranged from

my mother. Now that's an honest thing to say.

And it reveals something very important. Knowledge

about Jesus up here in our heads. It will carry

us through in the good times. It will do that.

But when the world around you collapses. Knowledge

about Jesus will not be enough. Facts alone cannot

carry the weight of our suffering. What we need

is not simply knowledge about Christ, we need

knowledge of Christ. We need to know him personally,

intimately, experientially. It's not enough simply

to be able to explain the gospel. We must experience

the gospel. And that's exactly what Paul wants

the church in Corinth to understand in the passage

that Molly just read. We're continuing our series

in the book of 1 Corinthians. It's a letter written

by the Apostle Paul to a church that was frankly

in a bit of a mess. It was a church in chaos.

And Paul has already addressed a whole range

of issues in the letter so far. So he's spoken

about rival factions, about sexual immorality,

about food sacrifice to idols. And now we're

in a section dealing with the public worship

of the church. And specifically today about the

Lord's Supper. About communion. And he begins

with a shocking statement. Verse 17. In the following

directions I have no praise for you, for your

meetings do more harm than good. That's an astonishing

thing for a church pastor to say about a church

service. I'm sure many of us have been to some

pretty awful church services. You know, with

sermons that kind of meander on. Hopefully not

today. With music that's completely out of tune.

With notices that go on longer than the meandering

sermon. We've been to services like that. But

I suspect none of us would say that the service

did more harm than good. But that's what Paul

says here. What on earth is going on? Well, to

understand the situation, we need to remember

something about the early church. You see, the

early church didn't meet in large buildings like

this building. They met in homes. And the homes

they met in usually belonged to the wealthy members

of the church. Now, those wealthy believers,

they tended to be the major financial donors

to the church. They had flexible schedules. They

had leisure time. They didn't have to work very

much, which meant that they could arrive early

for church. And when they arrived, they brought

food with them. And not just any food. They brought

the Fortnum and Mason luxury hampers, caviar,

oysters, fine wine. And the wealthy believers,

they get there first. They gather in a small

dining room in the house. And they'd start eating.

And drinking. And feasting. Meanwhile, the majority

of believers, they were much, much poorer. They

were laborers and tradespeople, so they couldn't

go to church until after work. And remember,

in the Roman Empire at the time, they didn't

have a weekend. There was no designated day off.

So these believers, they'd arrive late after

they'd finished work. And when they arrived,

the dining room would already be full. So they

had to gather in a courtyard or in one of the

side rooms. And if they hadn't been able to buy

food, which many couldn't have bought, they would

have sat there hungry, watching the wealthy slosh

back their Chateau Lafitte Rothschild. Can you

imagine how humiliating that would have been

for them? That's the context of verses 17 to

22. And the consequences are severe. They're

set out in verses 27 to 34. The church was being

judged for what they were doing. Some members

had become sick. Some had even died. We'll return

to that a bit later on. But right in the middle

of the passage, the meat in the sandwich of it,

Paul reminds the Corinthians what the Lord's

Supper is. These verses are what are sometimes

known as the words of institution. And here is

the key idea. God has given us something extraordinary

in the Lord's Supper. Because we're not just

brains in a jar. You know that. We are body,

soul, units. And God wants to engage us, not

only mentally in our minds, but physically as

well. That's why Jesus gave to the church two

physical signs, what are often known as sacraments,

baptism and the Lord's Supper. Through them...

We don't simply hear the gospel with our ears

or even see the gospel with our eyes. We get

to experience the gospel. And in the supper,

we experience the gospel in three ways. In the

past, in the present, and in the future. Those

are our three points this afternoon. So first

of all, the Lord's Supper enables us to experience

the past. Look at how Paul begins in verse 23.

He says, Now there's a fascinating wordplay going

on there in the original. The word used for passed

on and the word used for betrayed in the original

Greek is the same word. It means to hand over.

So Paul hands over to the Corinthians what Jesus

handed over to Paul about what happened on the

night that he was handed over to death. That

means that the Lord's Supper is rooted in history.

It's not something that the church made up. It's

not something we thought was a great idea. This,

this. is a reenactment of an actual event that

took place on an actual night, the night that

Jesus was betrayed. But the meal itself on that

actual night was actually a reenactment of a

meal that took place more than a thousand years

before. The Israelites, the people of God, they

were slaves in Egypt. And they cried out to God

and God promised to rescue them. So he sent plague

after plague after plague against Pharaoh, king

of Egypt. Finally came the plague on the firstborn.

Every firstborn child in Egypt would die that

night. But there was a problem. You see, the

judgment, it was... For rebellion against God.

Seeking to live as if God wasn't in charge. And

the problem was that the Israelites were guilty

of that too. They too lived as if God wasn't

in charge. And so they deserve judgment. And

so God made provision for them. He said to them,

it's recorded in Exodus chapter 12. He said,

Exodus 12 · chapter mention

take a lamb, take a lamb without defect and kill

that lamb. And then take the blood of the lamb

and paint it. And paint it on the doorpost, on

the top and down the sides of your doorpost.

And the blood for me tonight will be a sign.

And when I see the blood, I will pass on over

your place. Because a substitute has died. In

the place of your firstborn. Then eat the lamb.

With bitter herbs. And eat bread that has not

been fermented. And so that's exactly what the

Israelites did. And when the Lord passed over

Egypt that night. In judgment. He saw the blood.

On the doorpost. And he passed over those homes.

And the family inside was spared. And every year

after that, God commanded the Israelites to celebrate

the Passover meal by reenacting it again and

again and again, year after year. The command

is recorded for us in Exodus chapter 12 and verse

Exodus 12 · chapter mention

14. And it says that this Passover meal celebration,

it was to be, the word is, a commemoration. Now,

the Hebrew word used there for commemoration

is zikaron. When the Greeks translated it into

Greek language, the word they used was amnesis.

And that is the exact same word that Paul uses

in 1 Corinthians 11, verses 24 and 25, when he

1 Corinthians 11:24

says that Jesus said, do this in remembrance

of me. We hear that word, remember, and we think

about mental recall, don't we? Like, I need to

remember the name of that person I met last Sunday

at City Church. Or I need to remember all those

things I learned in my revision for my exams

coming up. But that's not the way that the word

is used in the Bible. In biblical language, remembrance,

it is not merely cognitive, it is participatory.

The Passover meal wasn't just about recalling

history in our minds. It was about stepping into

the story of history and our experience. Experiencing

it ourselves. And that is exactly what Jesus

was doing when he celebrated the Last Supper.

You know, something interesting happened when

Jesus celebrated the Last Supper. If you read

the account, if you read it in 1 Corinthians,

you can read it in Matthew, Mark and Luke as

well. There is something missing in every single

account. Did you notice what was missing? This

is the Passover meal. What's missing? The lamb.

That's right. The Passover lamb is not there.

Why? Because the blood of a lamb. could never

really be an adequate substitute for a human,

let alone a whole Israelite family. It was always

pointing away from itself, forwards to something

to come, the true Passover lamb. The lamb without

defect. The perfect God -man. The only one who

has ever lived who did not sin. The only one

to ever live who deserved to be passed over in

judgment. The man who was sitting there at that

table at the last supper, serving out the bread

and the wine, who the very next day would be

passed over to judgment through death on a cross.

The Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the

world. Now do you see what that means? When we

celebrate the Lord's Supper, it's not simply

a visual aid, like having revision flashcards

to help you remember the gospel. It is participatory.

It is deeply experiential. We step into the past.

We experience the past for ourselves as we taste

the bread. We experience Christ's body broken

for us. As we taste the cup, we experience Christ's

blood shed for us. We're told in this verse,

it is the blood of the new covenant. The new

promise that no matter who you are, no matter

what you've done, if you come to Jesus with faith,

you're welcome. You're welcome. Just look at

verse 27. I think verse 27 is possibly top of

the list of most misunderstood Bible verses.

Let me read it. So then whoever eats the bread

or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy

manner will be guilty of sinning against the

body and blood of the Lord. Now some people,

they read this and they think, well that's pretty

scary. I better make sure that I'm worthy before

I come to the Lord's Supper. Make sure that I

haven't sinned too much. Make sure that my faith

is strong enough or else I'm just going to drink

judgment on myself. But that completely misunderstands

the point. In fact, it is the complete opposite

of what the Lord's Supper is all about. Why?

Well, because of the connection to the past,

to the Passover. Let me explain. Imagine this

scenario. Imagine it's the first Passover meal,

okay? And that evening, two Israelites, let's

call them Avner and Yitzhak, they're chatting

together on the street outside their homes. They've

heard from Moses, and Yitzhak, he turns to Avner

and he says, Avner, what are you going to do

tonight? Exactly what Moses said. I'm going to

get out the blood of the lamb. I'm going to paint

it over my doorpost. The Lord won't fail us this

time. But Yitzhak, he's a little bit nervous

about it. I just don't know. It just seems so

weird. Do you really think the blood on the doorframe

is going to save us? And Abner replies, well...

Yitzhak, just trust the Lord. Trust the Lord.

He won't fail us. He's never failed us before.

He won't fail us this time. Are you sure? Yes.

Yes, Yitzhak, I am. And so they return to their

homes. And that night, Abner gets out his paintbrush

and he confidently paints his door frames. And

Yitzhak gets out his, and he kind of tentatively,

nervously paints. Now here's the question. Which

family was saved that night? The confident family

or the doubting one? Both were. Because salvation

does not depend upon the strength of our faith.

It depends upon the object of our faith. In 1

1 Corinthians 11:27

Corinthians 11, verse 27, the word unworthy is

not an adjective. It is an adverb. It's not describing

the person who comes to the supper. It's describing

the manner in which they come. So if you're here

today and you're trusting the Lord Jesus Christ,

God invites you to come and to experience the

past of what the gospel has achieved. Experience

it firstly in baptism. That's the sign of entering

into the Christian life, of having died with

Christ to sin and being raised with Christ to

new life. The next opportunity to be baptized

is coming up on Sunday the 3rd of May. If you

haven't been baptized, please come and chat to

me afterwards. I'd love to share with you how

you can go about getting baptized on the 3rd

of May. But then, having been baptized, whether

as a child or as an adult, Come join us for the

supper. Experiencing the past. Actively. Really.

Truly. Secondly. The supper does not just take

us back. It brings us to Christ now. In the supper.

We experience the present. That's the second

point. You may know that Christians have disagreed

down through the centuries about precisely what

Jesus meant when he said, verse 24, this is my

body. Some have argued that he meant that when

we take the bread and the wine, they literally

are transformed and become the physical body

and blood of Jesus. It's called the doctrine

of transubstantiation. The Roman Catholic Church

has even gone so far as to say, well, it becomes

the physical body and blood of Jesus and the

priest comes up to the altar and he offers it

again as an atoning sacrifice for sin. As if

Jesus' death 2 ,000 years ago was not enough

to deal with our sin. Now that's clearly wrong.

Jesus died once for all. And remember, when Jesus

uttered these words at the Last Supper, He hadn't

yet gone to the cross. So he couldn't have been

speaking literally. And remember the context

of what's going on. It's the Passover. And all

the elements of the Passover, they were symbolic.

The Passover lamb pointed forward towards Jesus.

The bitter herbs pointed towards the bitterness

of their slavery in Egypt. The Passover is symbolic.

And so too is the Lord's Supper. Jesus was not

claiming to be physically present at the supper.

But that does not mean that he was not present

at all. Just turn back to the chapter that Malk

spoke from two weeks ago. 1 Corinthians 10, verses

1 Corinthians 10:16–18

16 to 18. I'm going to read the verses and as

I do, think, what does the word participation

mean here? So I'll read from verse 16. Is not

the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks

a participation in the blood of Christ? And is

not the bread that we break a participation in

the body of Christ? Because there is one loaf,

we who are many are one body, for we all share

the one loaf. Consider the people of Israel.

Do not those who eat the sacrifice participate

in the altar? What does participating in the

body and blood of Jesus mean? Well, some people

say it's talking about the church because the

New Testament speaks about the church as being

the body of Christ. The problem is that nowhere

in the New Testament does it speak about the

church being the blood of Christ. Nowhere. Just

not there. So that can't be right. It can't be

talking about the church here, participating

in the church. And I think the clue to understanding

verse 16 and 17 is actually verse 18. You see,

just like the Israelites, when we come to the

Lord's Supper, we get to share the benefits of

what happened at the altar. Not the altar of

the Roman Catholic Church, but the altar of a

cross outside Jerusalem. Listen to how the pastor

John Piper puts it. He said, we eat and drink.

That is, we take into our lives what happened

on the cross. By faith, by trusting in all that

God is for us in Jesus, we nourish ourselves

with the benefits that Jesus obtained for us

and when he bled and died on the cross. We do

that presently. Every time. we celebrate the

Lord's Supper. As John Calvin put it, Jesus is

mysteriously present in the supper, not physically,

but spiritually, whenever we eat together. That

doesn't mean that we get anything in the Lord's

Supper that we don't get when we open up the

Bible. We still get the same Christ when we come

to the Lord's Supper, but we get him differently.

You might even say we get him better. Because

when we get Christ in the supper, it doesn't

just engage our eyes and our ears, he engages

our smell, our taste, our touch. So we experience

in the present our union with Christ. We commune

with him. But we experience something else in

the present too. We experience our union and

communion with one another. That we are, verse

17 of chapter 10, one body. You see, that's why

Paul was so angry at what was happening in the

church in Corinth in verses 17 to 22. He was

angry because they were excluding fellow believers

from the supper. And that's the terrible irony

of those who misapply the warning of verse 27.

By refusing to the supper, people they think

don't have sufficient faith or have too much

sin, they are actually doing the very thing that

Paul condemns right here in verse 27. They're

excluding the church. They are denying the body

of Christ. And it is such a serious thing to

do that some of the members of the church in

Corinth were getting sick and dying, verse 30.

Judgment. But notice that this judgment was a

judgment of mercy. Paul describes it in verse

32 as being discipline. God is teaching his church.

The worst judgment that God can give us. It's

to do nothing about our sin, to just hand us

over to our sin. That is terrible because we're

being handed over to judgment. By taking this

action on the church in Corinth, he's saying

it's not too late. Turn before it's too late.

So how are we to apply all this to ourselves

today? Well, like I said, here at City Church,

we welcome you to the table. If you have put

your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, you are

welcome to come. If you're trusting in Jesus,

this table is for you. If you're not yet trusting

in Jesus, we hope that this present presence

will be true for you very, very soon. We're praying

for that. And when we come up in just a few moments

to receive the Lord's Supper, you're going to

see many people coming to the front from all

different backgrounds, all different ages. They'll

come up one by one. And if you're trusting in

Jesus, these people from all these different

backgrounds, all these different ages, they are

your family, your body, your people. Each and

every one of them. In the supper, we get to experience

the present reality of our church family. And

as you watch that, I'd like you to do something

else. I want you to see someone coming up to

the front who's not like you. From a different

background, different age. And I want you to

commit over the coming weeks to get to know that

person. And before Easter, To invite them round

to your house for dinner. Make real in your own

home what is a present reality here at the Lord's

table today. We experience our present communion

with God and with each other in the Lord's Supper.

And then finally, we experience the future. Look

at verse 26 for me. For whenever you eat this

bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's

death. until he comes. You see, the Lord's Supper,

it points forward. Like we saw at the start,

the heart of Christianity is relationship. Our

relationship with Jesus. A relationship that

the Bible likens to the relationship between

a husband and a wife. And the Lord's Supper is

a glimpse, it is a foretaste of the wedding supper

to come when our bridegroom, Jesus, returns.

In the early 1800s, a young man named Adoniram

Judson travelled to Myanmar to serve there as

a missionary. Now, Judson endured terrible, terrible

loss. His wife Anne died after many years of

suffering. Just six months after that, his young

daughter Maria also died. Far from home, Judson

stood at the grave of his loved ones. bearing

unimaginable grief. Yet he held on to the hope

of the gospel, and reflecting on his wife's death,

Judson said this, Our hearts were bound up together,

but though she has been torn from me, I shall

see her again. Now that confidence, it wasn't

sentimental optimism. It was rooted in the gospel

hope of the resurrection of Jesus. And it's exactly

the hope that the Lord's Supper points us to

this evening. When we come to the table in just

a moment, we will be proclaiming that death does

not have the last word. We will look back to

the cross where death was defeated in the death

of Christ. We will experience in the present

the joy of our union with Jesus and with one

another. And we will look forward to the day

when Christ comes back and the brokenness of

this sad and tragic world is finally undone.

As J .R. Tolkien put it so beautifully in The

Lord of the Rings, at that moment, every sad

thing will come untrue. In the Lord's Supper,

we get to experience a foretaste of the future

feast. One day, the table will be full. The grease

of this life will be undone. And loved ones who've

been separated from us by death, they'll sit

together again. And do you know who will be the

head of the table? The lover of our souls, the

Lord Jesus Christ himself. Look, I know that

there are many of us here this evening who've

suffered incredible loss. We grieve the loss.

of a loved one, the relationships that we've

never had. We feel pangs of loneliness, haunted

by those sad memories. Brothers and sisters,

as we lift our cups in just a moment, will you

hear it? Will you hear in your imagination's

eye the clink of our cups toasting? The Lord

Jesus Christ on that last day. As we join together

with loved ones who've been separated from us

by death. And as we join together with loved

ones that we never knew we had from around the

world and across the centuries. Will you hear

it? And will you experience it? Would you feel

it when we come to the supper? The embrace of

the one who said to you. I love you to death.

I will never leave nor forsake you. I am yours

and forever you're mine. Let me pray for us.

Lord Jesus, thank you that you are with us now,

really, truly and spiritually. Thank you that

we yet... Not simply to know things about you,

but to know you. Thank you that that has been

one, because Lord Jesus, at that last supper,

just straight after it, you were handed over

to death, on death on a cross. You went and were

denied communion with the God with whom you've

had communion eternally. So that we might experience

the closest. Of being with you. Help us to feel

it. Help us to experience. Help us to know it.

Right here and now we pray. Amen.