“The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ?” (1 Cor. 10:16)
Our life in Christ is celebrated here at this table every week. And we celebrate by breaking bread and blessing wine. He was broken to make us whole. By His stripes we are healed. We break and we bless.
In the history of the Christian Church, we have tended toward one of two ditches. On the one hand, Christians have tended to emphasize the brokenness, and on the other hand, Christians sometimes emphasize the blessing. Churches that camp out on the brokenness may seem welcoming to the broken, but they don’t often move past the brokenness. They don’t seem to acknowledge actual healing or progress in Christ. Churches that camp out on the blessing can seem optimistic and mature, but they often seem to ignore real brokenness and sin, and they can appear to be places where the broken are not welcome.
But the glory of being in the body Christ is that God has accounted for both of these realities, and He teaches us to hold them together here at this meal. Together we have deep scars and brokenness, and together, we have enormous blessing and growth in grace. And we need one another. No one in this room has moved beyond the need for God’s grace. There are no perfect husbands, wives, parents, children, roommates, employers, employees in this room. We break this bread because He was broken for us because we are broken. But He doesn’t leave us there; He has also determined to bless us. Despite our sin and failures, God is working in our brokenness an eternal weight of glory. In our halting, stumbling, fumbling attempts to follow Jesus, God is giving us the inheritance of His Son Jesus. He’s giving us His obedience, His wisdom, His faith, His joy, and by the time He’s done, He will have given us the world. So we break bread, and we bless wine – this is our communion in Christ. We are broken and we are blessed. This is the offer of the gospel.
So come and welcome to Jesus Christ.
Photo by Milivoj Kuhar on Unsplash
Leave a Reply