DAILY BYTEThink for a moment about the last time you took communion or had an experience of taking communion that was particularly powerful or meaningful for you. If you have never taken communion, keep reading to hear more about what communion at the Lord’s Table is all about.
Did you know that communion is also called “Eucharist,” which literally means, thanksgiving? We have been talking this week about giving thanks. What would our lives look like if we only criticized one another and God without taking time to say thank you? The Scriptures describe the last supper that Jesus had with his disciples before he was crucified. A key moment in that description is when Jesus gives thanks.
What if Jesus had skipped the part of this crucial time together that was about giving thanks? What if he had simply laid the broken bread, his broken body that we all share as the church and as a family in the world, lifeless on the table? How would the world be different, if God in human form had not taken the time to give thanks?
But, Christ does not offer himself as a lifeless sacrifice. Christ offers himself as a living sacrifice, just as we have the opportunity every day to give our lives in thanks and service to one another.
Before Jesus did anything else, when the supper was ready, the apostle Paul writes that “Jesus on the night when he was betrayed” (not the night when he sat down to a cozy dinner with his family of people without issues…) “took a loaf of bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, ‘This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me’ “ (1 Corinthians 11:23-24).
We are not alone. We live together as the family of God. This is a family that has always and will always have issues. We are all broken and imperfect.
But, when we come to the communion table – the table of Eucharist – the table of Thanksgiving - we give thanks that in the midst of our imperfection, thanks that we are still welcomed and loved by God.
So, the next time that Eucharist is offered to you, remember that Jesus is thankful for you and invites you with open arms to come to the table and give thanks for life in all its brokenness in return.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Meditate on this today, as you remember that Christ sacrificed his broken body in thanks for your life.
“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."
