Turn in your Bible with me now as we look at God's Word in the book of First Corinthians. It's found on page 1036 of the Bibles that you can find around you there under the chairs, 1036. First Corinthians chapter 11. I'm starting a new series this morning, if you were wondering. Now that it's the new year, we also have a new series and we're going to look at a new subject. The series that I'm going to go into is called, why do we do the things we do? Each week for the next six or seven or eight weeks, we're going to look at a number of practices in the Christian church and some of the practices here at UPC and ask the question, why do we do that? I suspect that some of the things we're going to talk about, you've wondered, why do we do this here at University Presbyterian? For example, next week we're going to talk about worship and the subject is why do we worship the way that we do? A few weeks after that, we're going to talk about why do we ask people to be members of the church? What's that all about? Why do we do? What's motivating that? We're going to talk about why we baptize babies. In a couple of weeks, Matt Reiman is going to preach on, why do we obey God? After all, he said, is free, right? The law is no longer the basis of our righteousness. Why do we have to obey him? We're going to look at a number of different things, some controversial, some not so much so, and ask the question, why do we do that? Today's subject is why do we celebrate communion? Obviously, I chose that subject because we're going to be celebrating the Lord's Supper in just a few minutes. Look with me in 1 Corinthians, chapter 11, and I'm going to begin reading in verse 17. I'll stop at verse 26 and ask you to leave your Bible open at that point because we will look at the rest of the chapter later on in that message. 1 Corinthians chapter 11 beginning in verse 17. Paul is writing to the Christians in Corinth and he says in the following directives, I have no praise for you, for your meetings do more harm than good. 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. When you come together, it is not the Lord's Supper you eat. For as you eat, each of you goes ahead without waiting for anybody else. One remains hungry and another gets drunk. Don't you have homes to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you for this? Certainly not. But 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. The Word of the Lord. Hey, one of the things that my family and I enjoyed the most over the Christmas break was having all of our kids and all of our grandkids as well as a great-dain and a ferret and a cat all together in one place for a number of days. We had a great time and it was very sad to see them go home. One of the many things we did together was we went to medieval times. How many of you have been to medieval times down in Kassimi? The rest of you have to go to medieval times. It is the very definition of Orlando tackiness. But it's fun, especially if you have some little kids around because you sit on this bench and you watch some jousting and you watch some horse displays and so on. Of course, the whole thing is in the context of a royal banquet. They give you a big plate of food and it's actually not bad, a half of a chicken as well as a couple of spare ribs and a little cold baked potato and a couple of other things that are really not so bad. But the whole thing is a royal banquet because you are given a personal invitation to join the King of the Realm, King Philip, who sits high upon a platform overlooking the entire activity as well as his beautiful daughter-in-law, the lovely Princess Leonor. You know, I know that the idea of a royal banquet is so foreign to modern Americans if it requires us to go to medieval times to experience something like that because the whole thing is just very funny and I think it would be a great experience for everybody to go because the only King that you and I ever have dinner with is Burger King. So you've got to go meet King Philip and Princess Leonor. Enough funny stuff. I say it only to create the sense that the whole concept of a royal banquet is quite far into us, but this banquet that you and I have been invited to today is a real banquet. And you and I have been invited here by a real sovereign, the King of Kings, the Lord Jesus Christ. He has invited you to his table today. You're about to have an encounter with the creator of the universe. You're about to join in with an experience, a celebration that has been going on for some 20 centuries involving millions of men and women and boys and girls all around the world down through time, talking about, of course, the Lord's Supper. But you know what I'm afraid of? I'm afraid that for many of us, the Lord's Supper is no more meaningful than the dinner that I had at medieval times. For example, if I could ask this question, how much time did you prepare this week for this meal? Did you think about it this week? Oh, it's the first Sunday of January. Now those of you who are new to our community, you get a pass here. But everybody else, you knew that today's the day we celebrate communion, did it cross your mind this past week? Did you prepare yourself for it yesterday? Did you wake up this morning with a measure of excitement and enthusiasm? As you knew, today's the day you get to eat the bread and drink the grape juice, the symbols, the means of grace that God has given us to think about the body and blood of Christ. Did it cross your mind? You see, I think for us, if we're honest, it's an event, it's a celebration, it's an experience that we definitely need to talk about today. We need to ask the question, why do we do this? Why do we and Christians everywhere make a regular practice of celebrating this meal, the same meal in essence, that Jesus celebrated with his disciples just hours before his betrayal and his crucifixion? Why do we do it? Why do we eat this bread and drink this cup in the way that Paul the Apostle describes here in 1 Corinthians chapter 11? Why? Well I could give you a very simple short answer and the sermon would be pretty much over by just simply saying that we do it because Christ has commanded us to do it. You see, the Lord's Supper is one of two ordinances that Jesus Christ gave his church and told us to observe until he returns. The one is baptism and the other one is this one, the Lord's Supper. We call these two things sacraments. Now you won't find that word in your English Bible, the concept is there, but the word itself comes from the Latin word sacramentum, which is merely a sacred thing, such as a sacred right or a sacred doctrine or something like that. Sometimes it's called communion, other times Lord's Supper. Some of you may even come from a tradition in which it was called the Eucharist. Nothing wrong with that word at all. It comes from a Greek word that simply means to thank God, to thank. So it is a time of thanksgiving as well as a time of communion. There are other reasons besides the fact that they are sacraments and that Jesus has commanded us to do them, that call us today to enter into this celebration. Other reasons, let me give you four. The first two I'm going to spend the most time on because I think they're the ones that maybe are a little harder to grasp and then we'll also touch on two more. We celebrate communion in order to do four things, in order to remember, to reflect, to receive, to be renewed. All four words, of course, starting with R, so that you can hopefully remember them better. Why do we celebrate communion? First of all, we do it in order to remember. Remember what? Remember Him, Jesus Christ. That's why we do it. Verse 24, Jesus is speaking and he says, this is my body referring to bread, this is my body which is for you, do this in remembrance of me. And the words in verse 25 are similar. He says in verse 25, this cup is the new covenant in my blood, do this whenever you drink it in remembrance of me. The Lord's Supper is a time to remember Jesus. Now that's a tricky word though, remember, because we use the word a lot of different ways and I want to guard us against using it in a very common way. For example, we often use the word remember to simply talk about mentally recalling a fact that might otherwise be forgotten or ignored. For instance, I might say, I should remember that next week is your birthday. See, that's simply a mental activity of pulling a fact from one brain cell into another to make sure I don't forget it. And I do not think at all that that's what Jesus meant in this text when he says, do this in remembrance of me. I doubt that anyone here will ever forget the fact that there was a man named Jesus who lived and died and rose again. So it's not merely recalling a fact that we have communion, there's something deeper going on. For example, think of what we mean when we say remember 9-11. Now see, when we say remember 9-11, we mean far more than simply recall the fact that planes were crashed into buildings in New York City and in Washington, DC on September 11th, 2001. That's not what we mean. So what we mean is that we should go back to 9-11 in our hearts and in our minds. It means to visualize the anguished faces of thousands of Americans on that fateful morning who were fleeing for safety. It means to feel the fear that must have been in the hearts of those 3,000 or so people, firefighters and workers who were trapped inside the World Trade Center on 9-11. It means to attempt to hear their cries in our ears, their cries for help. It means to try to smell the stench of death. That's what we mean when we say remember 9-11. Don't let it get dislodged from not just our memories but from our hearts and our passions. Right? That's what we mean when we say that. That we might learn the lessons of that fateful morning and honor the memories of those who died. That's the sense in which we are to eat the bread and drink the cup in remembrance of Jesus. We're remembering a day far more dramatic and with much more cosmic significance than even September 11th. When you see the bread broken before you this morning, when you hold the bread in your hands, now I know we could debate the issue, is this the best kind of bread to be having in the Lord's Supper? Don't let that be a distraction. Instead focus on the main thing here. When you hold the bread in your hands and then when you eat it, be keenly aware of the death of Jesus Christ. As you savor the bread, attempt by God's grace to savor Jesus Christ, that is think about his love for you. His passion for his church. Think about the fact that he bore your sin, your shame, your guilt, your fear. He bore the wrath of God that should have fallen upon you. He took it away from you and absorbed it in himself. Let those thoughts really sift from head to heart. And then when you hold the cup in your hand this morning, the grape juice. Think about the fact that the blood of Jesus Christ was really shed for you. As you drink the grape juice, believe that every one of your sins passed present and future was fully atoned for by the death of Christ. Thank God that there is therefore now no condemnation for any of us who are in Christ Jesus this morning. Thanks to the once for all sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Remembering Christ in the sacrament of the Lord's Supper means far more than simply recalling the fact that he died. It is savoring Christ to use that word I used earlier. It is believing that he is here with you now spiritually present in this meal and trusting that he loves you, that his body and blood are forever yours and you are forever his. But some of those thoughts characterize your celebration of communion sometimes I say when we have communion that we should feed upon Christ and that is what I mean. To feed upon him by faith is to remember Jesus. Now why do we celebrate communion? Well first to remember but secondly in order to reflect. We celebrate communion in order to reflect. Reflect on what? Well look with me now at the rest of chapter 11 I asked you to hold your place so that we could return to it. I would like to read verses 27 through 34 and finish Paul's thought here. Look at verse 27. He goes on to say about the Lord's Supper, therefore 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. A man ought to examine himself before he eats of the bread and drinks of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without recognizing the body of the Lord eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many among you are weak and sick and a number of you have fallen asleep. But if we have, but if we judged ourselves we would not come under judgment. When we are judged by the Lord we are being disciplined so that we will not be condemned with the world so then my brothers when you come together to eat weight for each other. If anyone is hungry he should eat at home so that when you meet together it may not result in judgment and when I come I will give further directions. Did you notice as I was reading that passage that there are stern warnings in these verses? He talks frequently about judgment and let me just remind you that our Christians this morning that the judgment that he's talking about is not final judgment. It is not that you're going to wake up on judgment day and realize that your sins have in fact not been paid for. That is not the kind of judgment he's talking about. He's talking about chastisement. God chastens those he loves. And if you're a believer you get chastened sometimes by the Lord and that's what he's referring to here. So there's a stern warning that you must engage in this supper in a certain way or else you will be sinning. That's the clear teaching of this passage. In verse 27 he warns us against eating and drinking in an unworthy manner. Take note of that phrase and highlight it if you will. Don't eat and drink the body and blood of the Lord in an unworthy manner. Now what does he mean by that? Well first of all he does not mean that in order to have the elements of communion you must be a perfect person or that you must be sinless or that you have done a thorough inventory and confessed all your sins. That is not even possible. So he's not asking us to be perfect here. The sacrament is not perfect for perfect people. It is for deeply flawed, deeply broken people like you and like me. It is for sinners who have failed and know that they need the grace and mercy of God. So if you're a sinner this morning you're invited and encouraged to come. That's not what it means to drink and eat in an unworthy way. However part of what it means is that you must be a Christian in order to take communion. So that means that when it comes time for the sacrament you need to be honest with yourself. You should be honest and ask yourself have I asked Jesus Christ to be the savior and leader of my life or not? You've got to be honest. If you've never admitted your sins to God if you've never asked God to forgive you of your sins, to make you his child, to bring you into his family and you've put your trust in your faith in Christ and Christ alone. If you've never done that you should not take the bread or drink the cup this morning. If you do it it would be eating and drinking in an unworthy manner. You would be inviting some kind perhaps of chastening into your life. But when Paul warns against eating and drinking in an unworthy way he's not just saying that you need to be a Christian. The people to whom Paul was writing were Christians and yet they were in danger he says of judgment. So what makes a believer unworthy to partake of the Lord's Supper? Well in order to answer that question let's go back to the beginning of our text this morning. Let me dwell on this for a few extra moments. At the beginning of our passage did you notice what was going on in Corinth that Paul was writing about here and warning them about look at verse 17. He says your meetings do more harm than good. In verse 18 he says that there are divisions among you and this is something Paul has addressed many times throughout the letter of 1 Corinthians. The factions, the division, the party spirit that was in the church of Corinth. And then in verse 20 he says when you come together it is not the Lord's Supper that you're eating. In other words Paul is saying you might be thinking that you're having communion but you're not not really sure you're eating the bread and you're drinking this wine but don't you dare call it the Lord's Supper because you're violating Paul says the very essence of what the Lord's Supper is about. And he goes on in verse 21 to explain what the situation in Corinth was. Look at verse 21 he says for as you eat each of you goes ahead without waiting for anybody else one remains hungry and another gets drunk. Yeah this was really happening in the Corinthian church. Let me see if I can help you kind of put the pieces together. See in the early church you didn't just have communion you had a potluck dinner. They called it an agape feast, a love feast, and the dinner was held in connection with the celebration of the Lord's Supper. We have a couple of times a year, a potluck dinner, it would be like every time we have communion we would be doing it right here or in the commons in the connection with a big potluck. And so there were people in the church of Corinth who were asked to bring stuff to the dinner. Everybody who could brought food to share. But see the problem was that there were poor people in the Corinthian church who had very little if anything to contribute to the potluck. And there were rich people, wealthy people who had tons of food, tons of wine that they could bring to the dinner and supposedly share with people. There were halves and there were have-nuts. And what was happening was that the halves were bringing their stuff, laying it out on the table, but then they were elbowing their way to the first of the line. And they were piling the food on their plates and guzzling the wine to the point of drunkenness before the poor people who didn't have anything to share back in the back of the line could even get anything. And so what Paul says to these Corinthian Christians is that you're turning the Lord's Supper into an occasion for gluttony and selfishness. That's why don't call it the Lord's Supper because it's not. And so Paul says to these selfish Christians in verse 22, do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing? He says, what shall I say to you? Shall I praise you for this? Certainly not. See here's the point, the Lord's Supper is a family meal. It's a family meal. It's not just about you and Jesus. It's about us and Jesus gathering before Christ around his table. So when we have communion, we're supposed to spend some time reflecting and asking ourselves some hard questions, questions like this. Is there any sense in which I am doing to my brothers and sisters here at UPC what those selfish Corinthians were doing to their brothers and sisters? Am I guilty in any way of the same thing at the heart of it as the Corinthians were guilty of? Is there a person or perhaps a class of people that I am belittling or judging or avoiding? Because I think I'm better than they are. Am I holding on to a critical spirit? Is there unresolved anger or bitterness that I still need to work out with somebody before I come to the table? Have I been gossiping about anyone in the body of Christ? Have I given a false or a bad report about someone? Have I rejoiced in someone's harm or wished evil about another person in the family of God? See now we're getting to the heart of verse 29 of what it really means when it says for anyone who eats and drinks without recognizing the body of the Lord, eats and drinks judgment on himself. That does not mean simply to discern that this is the body and blood of the Lord. But instead it seems in context of this chapter to more point in this direction. That when you eat the Lord's supper you need to recognize that your brothers and sisters are just as much a part of the body of Christ as you are. That Jesus died for them just like He died for you. He loves them just like He loved you. You are not just feeding on Jesus, you and Him. No you are feeding on Christ with your fellow believers and Christ asks you indeed calls you to reflect on how you've been relating to them. Don't belittle them. Don't think ill of them, don't slight them or push yourself in front of them or criticize them in your heart because if you do, verse 22 would say that you are despising the church of God. So this morning what I ask of us all is to spend a few moments before and during the table of time today doing some soul searching reflect on your attitudes toward others, examine how you've treated people lately. If you find something to repent of, repent of it right then and there, sometimes maybe you need to get up out of your chair and go talk to somebody. Or you might just say Lord I resolve here and now I'm going to go ahead and have communion but I resolve that I'm going to have that conversation with that person later on today. So please help me do that. Give me the strength as I eat the bread and drink the cup. Give me the strength I need to resolve this difficult situation. See that's part of repentance. It's part of examining yourself and getting yourself right, reflecting in the context of communion. Communion is a time to remember, it's a time to reflect. Let me just quickly go on and enumerate the third and fourth one so that we have adequate time for the supper. The third thing I want you to do and notice in this text is to celebrate communion in order to receive, in order to receive, receive what? God's embrace, God's embrace. Look again at the words of Jesus in verse 24, he says this is my body which is for you. It's for you. Did anybody get a special gift for Christmas this year? Something you really were delighted in? Anybody? How about you wives? Every come to you from your husband, every kiss begins with K. You remember that, right? Anybody get a new iPod, a new iPhone, a new bike, perhaps something like that? Isn't it a great feeling when the person distributing gifts says, ah, this one has your name on it here? Jesus says, this is my body, this is my blood, these elements have your name on them. They are for you. So this is a time to receive, receive, receive the kiss of God, the sign of the body and blood of Christ, the seal of God's love upon your heart, receive it. And fourth and finally, we celebrate communion not only to remember, to reflect and to receive, but to be renewed, to be renewed. It is no coincidence that God chose food to be the elements of the Lord's Supper. In verse 23, the Lord Jesus on the 90 was betrayed, took bread. Verse 25, after supper, he took the cup. Jesus says to eat and drink. As food is nourishment to the body, so the Lord's Supper is nourishment to the soul. Somebody once asked me, Mike, how can I grow in the Christian life? I really want to grow. And he said, but I feel like I've plateaued, I feel like I'm getting nowhere with God. In fact, I feel like I'm going backwards. And so I said, well, do you read your Bible? Yeah, I do that. Do you try to pray on a regular basis? And he said, yes, I do, do that. And I said, well, when is the last time you had the Lord's Supper? And he said, I don't go to church very often. I kind of like to sleep in on Sunday morning. And I said, that may be your problem. See, friends, it's not rocket science. The Lord's Supper is a divinely ordained means of growth to neglect it, is to neglect your soul. To enter into it in a slip-shod way is to undervalue your soul, your spiritual condition. God, the Holy Spirit says he wants to use this meal, to quicken us, to help us, to bring us to life, to strengthen us, and to build us up in the faith. There are many ways to grow, but this is one of the best. So I'm glad you're here. Let's remember. Let's reflect. Let's receive. And let's be renewed. Come. The King is calling us to his banquet. Let's pray. Lord Jesus, thank you for this feast. Thank you that you are truly a King, and you've called us to your banquet. So God, would you help us please to remember, to really remember, help us to reflect, to look inside and examine ourselves and discern the body of the Lord, the brothers and sisters who are with us. Help us Lord to receive, sometimes it's easier to give things than to receive, and we want to receive your body and your blood today, and then Father, help us finally to be renewed, to eat and drink today, believing, deeply believing in the body and blood of Christ as the gifts that you've given to us. Bless we pray, this ordinary bread and this ordinary juice, and let them, Lord, be divinely ordained means of growing closer to you and with each other. And we ask this in Jesus' name, Amen.