Dissecting Our "Personal" Relationship With God - Part Three: The Lord's Supper

Rivers of blood has been shed at the hands of Protestant and Catholic Christians alike over the doctrinal intricacies related to Holy Communion. The Lord's Supper, once precious and living, became the center of theological debate for centuries. Tragically, it moved from a dramatic and concrete picture of Christ's body and blood to a study in abstract and metaphysical thought.        Clearly, Protestants do not practice the Supper the way it was observed in the first century. For the early Christians, the Lord's Supper was a festive communal meal. The mood was one of celebration and joy. When believers first gathered for the meal, they broke the bread and passed it around. Then they ate their meal, which then concluded after the cup was passed around. The Lord's Supper was essentially a Christian banquet. And there was no clergyman to officiate.        Today, tradition has forced us to take the Supper as a tongue-tickling thimble of grape juice and a tiny, tasteless bite-size cracker. The Supper is often taken in an atmosphere of solemnity. We are told to remember the horrors of our Lord's death and to reflect on our sins.        In addition, tradition has taught us that taking the Lord's Supper can be a dangerous thing. Thus many contemporary Christians would never take communion without an ordained clergyman present. Often, they point to First Corinthians 11:27-33. In verse 27, the apostle Paul does warn believers not to participate in the Lord's Supper "unworthily". In this instance, however, he appears to have been speaking to church members who are dishonoring the Supper by not waiting for their poor brethren to eat with them, as well as those who were getting drunk on the wine.        So why was the full meal replaced with a ceremony including only the bread of the cup? Here's the story. In the first and early second centuries, the early Christians called the Lord's Supper the "love feast". At that time, they took the bread in the cup in the context of a festive meal. But around the time of Tertullian, the bread and the cup begin to be separated from the meal. By the late second century, the separation was complete.        Some scholars have argued the Christians dropped the meal because they wanted to keep the Eucharist from becoming profaned by the participation of unbelievers. This may be partly true. But it is more likely that the growing influence of pagan religious rituals removed the Supper from the joyful, down to earth, non-religious atmosphere of a meal in someone's living room. By the fourth century, the love feast was prohibited among Christians.        With the abandonment of the meal, the terms breaking of bread and Lord's Supper disappeared. The common term for the now truncated ritual was the Eucharist. Irenaeus was one of the first to call the bread and the cup an offering. After him, it began to be called the "offering" or "sacrifice".         The altar table where the bread and cup were placed came to be seen as an altar where the victim was offered. Supper was no longer a community event. It was rather a priestly ritual that was to be watched at the distance. Throughout the fourth and fifth centuries, there was an increasing sense of awe and dread associated with a table where the sacred Eucharist was celebrated. It became a somber ritual. The joy that had once been a part of it had vanished.         The mystique associated with the Eucharist was due to the influence of the pagan mystery religions, which were clouded with superstition. With this influence, the Christians began to ascribe sacred overtones to the bread and the cup. They were viewed as holy objects in and of themselves.        Because the Lord's Supper had become a sacred ritual, it required a sacred person to administer it. Enter now the priest offering the sacrifice of the Mass. He was believed to have the power to call God down from heaven and confine him to a piece of bread.         Around the tenth century, the meaning of the word body changed in Christian literature. Previously, Christian writers used the word body to refer to one of three things: (1) the physical body of Jesus, (2) the church, or (3) the bread of the Eucharist.        The early church fathers saw the church as a faith community that identified itself by the breaking of bread. But by the tenth century, there was a shift in thinking and language. The word body was no longer used to refer to the church. It was only used to refer to the Lord's physical body or the bread of the Eucharist.         Consequently, the Lord's Supper became far removed from the idea of the church coming together to celebrate the breaking of bread. The vocabulary change reflected this practice. The Eucharist had ceased to be a part of a joyful communal meal but came to be viewed as sacred on its own, even as it set on the table. It became shrouded in a religious mist. Viewed with awe, it was taken with glumness by the priest and completely removed from the communal nature of the ekklesia.         All of these factors gave rise to the doctrine of transubstantiation. In the fourth century, the belief that the bread and wine changed into the Lord's actual body and blood was explicit. Transubstantiation, however was the doctrine that gave  theological exclamation of how that change occurred.         With the doctrine of transubstantiation, God's people approach the elements with a feeling of fear. They were reluctant even to approach them. When the words of the Eucharist were uttered, it was believed that the bread literally became God. All of this turned the Lord's Supper into a sacred ritual performed by sacred people and taken out of the hands of God's people. So deeply entrenched was the medieval idea that the bread and cup were an "offering" that even some of the Reformers held to it.         While contemporary Protestant Christians have discarded the Catholic notion the the Lord's Supper is a sacrifice, they have continued to embrace the Catholic practice of the Supper. Observe a Lord's Supper service in most Protestant churches and you will observe the following: (1) the Lord's Supper is a bite-size cracker or small piece of bread than a shot glass of grape juice or wine. As in the Catholic church, it was removed from the meal, (2)  the mood is somber and glum, just as it is in the Catholic Church, (3)  congregants are told by the pastor that they must examine themselves with regard to sin before they partake of the elements, a practice that came from John Calvin, and (4) like the Catholic priest, many pastors will sport clerical robes for the occasion. But always, the pastor administers the Supper and recites the words of institution, "this is my body", before dispensing the elements to the congregation.   With only a few minor tweaks, all of this is medieval Catholicism through and through.         The Lord's Supper, when separated from its proper context of a full meal, turns into a strange, pagan-like rite. The Supper has become an empty ritual officiated by clergyman, rather than a shared-life experience enjoyed by the church. It has become a morbid religious exercise, rather than a joyous festival - a stale individualistic ceremony, rather than a meaningful corporate event.        As one scholar put it, "It is not a doubt that the Lord's Supper began as a family meal or a meal of friends in a private house... the Lord's Supper moved from being a real meal into being a symbolic meal... the celebration of the Lord's Supper moved from being a lay function to a priestly function. In the New Testament itself, there is no indication that it was the special privilege or duty of anyone to lead the worshipping fellowship in the Lord's Supper."        When Israel had departed from God's original thought, the prophet cried: "Thus says the Lord, 'Stand by the ways and see and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is, and walk in it;  and you will find rest for your souls'" (Jeremiah 6:16).   In the same way, can we shun the vain traditions of men and return to the ancient paths...those holy traditions that were given to us by Jesus Christ and His apostles? 

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