A call to restore the Lord’s Table to our weekly Worship.
The weight of Scripture is for a frequent communion. Yet, our hearts may still have some objections. I’d like to use this final article to address some of those objections and to give some recommendations on how to begin the path to greater obedience in our churches.
Counter-arguments
It is helpful, at least briefly, to deal with some counter-arguments here. There are at least two that are commonly given. The first argues that weekly communion will bring an improper focus on the sacrament so that we will slip into the error of the Roman Catholic Church. The second argues that if we use the sacrament too often, we will not value it.
We rightly see that the Roman Catholics give a false pre-eminence to the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. In the 16th century, the result of this was not weekly communion for the average member of a Catholic church. Many laymen in the church at that time only had the sacrament once a year. The high view the Catholic Church had of the sacrament was cause of takingcommunion away from the average Christian. The reformation restored the Lord’s Supper to the average Christian, although not in every reformation church and only in part for some. The Roman Catholic fear of the holiness of the Supper (ultimately a failure to understand justification), continued to play a role in the understanding of many Reformed people. This fear, in part, might explain why we still do not practice weekly communion today.
Yet the worry remains. If we make the Lord’s Supper a more significant part of our church life, we will create a false reliance on the earthly elements of the Supper for salvation, rather than the God who gives the Supper. That is possible. That is possible when the Lord’s Supper is done weekly, or monthly, or quarterly, or yearly. History demonstrates that our current system will just as likely result in people having a Roman-like attitude toward the Supper, viewing it as a supper only for the extra holy. We merely need to think of the Netherlands Reformed Church and their attitude toward the table. You will often hear that one must have a mystical experience of the certainty of faith before we approach the table. This possibility should not undermine our obedience to the call of God to practice the Supper frequently.
We should also note that Baptists will argue in the same way about the practice of infant baptism. If you practice infant baptism, people will look to the baptism rather than to Christ. This error happens in churches that practice infant baptism, but that doesn’t make the argument true. The answer is to teach people that the proper purpose of the sacraments.
A proper understanding of the Lord’s Supper depends on preaching that takes time to teach people about what the Lord’s Supper means. This preaching will always point the eyes of the people to the Lord Jesus Christ who gives of himself in the Supper. As we’ve tried to emphasize throughout this whole series: word and sacrament must work together. Both must show the Lord Jesus otherwise both will be ineffectual.
Our answer to the second objection is very similar. Might a higher frequency of communion correlate with less respect for the Supper? Possibly. Again, what matters is the teaching. If we follow Christ in all things, the Supper will be a spiritual benefit for the people of God. In my experience, and I admit that it is merely anecdotal, our current system does not necessarily result in a deep desire for communion. We have both those who desire the Supper and those who don’t understand what the big deal is. The only way to counteract that is good teaching.
The crucial thing in combatting apathy toward the Supper is to emphasize that this is Christ’s self-gift to us. Weekly communion may be one of the best ways to combat this apathy. To value this truth we must continually be reminded of it. Through the Spirit, we eat of Christ, so that we are transformed into his image. That is amazing! That boggles the mind! That should create in us a desire for a closer, deeper, and more frequent union and communion with Christ.
Both of these arguments are based on conjectures of how we might experience weekly communion. We ultimately don’t know. What we do know is that if we obey Christ, he will bless us. That means we can’t base our decision on the possibility of spiritual problems. Besides, apathy and superstition are things the church will always have to fight. The question is how best to fight those problems. If we are willing to hear the Word of God on this point, one weapon in that fight is frequent communion. We go forward with confidence in Christ; not in ourselves.
If you have followed the argument so far, you will see that in the Supper, there is the offer of Christ himself; our Lord. The Lord’s Supper was created to give us the assurance that God loves me. The word without the Lord’s Supper is like a marriage with no physical contact. Again I ask, why would we refrain from using that good gift frequently? God is not a miserly God. Why do we keep this demonstration of his grace limited to a quarterly or a monthly practice?
What to do
As far as I can see, there is no principled stance against weekly communion. There is only a pragmatic one. That is not how reformed ministers are supposed to argue for or against a practice in worship. I believe the arguments laid before us demand a serious response. We ought to have weekly communion embedded in our church order. If we call our churches to preach at least twice a Sunday, we ought to have communion at least once a Sunday. In this way, we will follow the good pattern, the good tradition, which God has laid out for us in the scriptures. I give the caveat that we would have to give years, perhaps decades, to work through that transition. God is patient.
Of course, if implemented, we will have many practical problems. We have a system that is built around quarterly communion (even so many of our churches practice monthly or bi-monthly communion). We would need a form that assumes weekly communion. Due to logistical problems, many of our churches that practice communion at the table would likely have to move to the pew (If we think of the feeding of the five thousand as a sort of proto-Lord’s Supper, this is not entirely without precedent). We recognize that this is a functional thing, not necessarily an ideal thing.
Perhaps the architecture of our churches would have to change so that they look more like banquet halls rather than lecture halls. Remember, things like pulpits and pews are not necessarily that old. The church has had had different ways of using space for gathering together. Of course, that looks far into the future. What is important is that we do it. Naturally, this will take different forms in different places.
I do not believe that this is something worth dividing the church over. Although it is clearly a defect, analogous to belief in credo-baptism, it does not depart from true worship to the same degree as something like credo-baptism or other defective forms of worship in our day. I do not intend to break with my brothers over this even though their stubbornness saddens me.
Yet I do have hope. Recently, I came upon Nehemiah 8: 17, when reading Scripture, “And all the assembly of those who had returned from the captivity made booths and lived in booths, for from the days of Jeshua, the son of Nun to that day the people of Israel had not done so. And there was very great rejoicing.” It seems that even though the feast of booths may have been celebrated, it was not done in the way God called Israel to practice that festival until the time of Nehemiah. One may wonder why David or Solomon or Hezekiah did not follow this institution of God, whether it was the stubbornness of the people or their lack in zealously following all the law of God.
But God was gracious. More than that; he went from grace to grace. In restoring his people after the exile, he also gave the
