Humble Hero

The Reasons for Celebrating the Lord’s Supper

But the Communion service was not to be a time of sorrowing. As the Lord’s disciples gather around His table, they are not to mourn over their shortcomings. They are not to recall differences between them and their brethren. The foot-washing service has included all this. Now they come to meet with Christ. They are not to stand in the shadow of the cross, but in its saving light. They are to open the heart to the bright beams of the Sun of Righteousness. They are to hear His words, “Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you.” John 14:27. HH 307.6

Our Lord says, “When oppressed and afflicted for My sake and the gospel’s, remember My love. That love is so great that I gave My life for you. When your duties appear hard, your burdens too heavy to bear, remember that for your sake I endured the cross, despising the shame. Your Redeemer lives to make intercession for you.” HH 308.1

The Communion service points to Christ’s second coming. It was designed to keep this hope vivid in the mind. “As often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death till He comes.” 1 Corinthians 11:26. HH 308.2

Christ instituted this service so that it could speak to our senses about God’s love. There can be no union between us and God except through Christ. And nothing less than the death of Christ could make His love effective for us. Only because of His death can we look joyfully to His second coming. Our senses need to be awakened to lay hold of the mystery of godliness, to comprehend, far more than we do, the atoning sufferings of Christ. HH 308.3

Our Lord has said, “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you. ... For My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink indeed.” John 6:53-55. We owe even this earthly life to the death of Christ. The bread we eat comes at the expense of His broken body; the water we drink, of His spilled blood. Never one, saint or sinner, eats his daily food, but he is nourished by the body and blood of Christ. The cross of Calvary is stamped on every loaf; it is reflected in every water spring. The light shining from that Communion service makes the provisions for our daily life sacred. The family food becomes like the table of the Lord, and every meal a sacred service. HH 308.4

Concerning our spiritual nature Jesus declares, “Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life.” By receiving His word, by doing the things that He has commanded, we become one with Him. “He who eats My flesh,” He says, “and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who feeds on Me will live because of Me.” John 6:54, 56, 57. As faith contemplates our Lord’s great sacrifice, we receive the spiritual life of Christ. Every Communion service forms a living connection to bind the believer to Christ, and through Him to the Father. HH 308.5

As we receive the bread and grape juice symbolizing Christ’s broken body and spilled blood, in imagination we witness the struggle that enabled us to be reconciled to God. Christ is presented crucified among us. The thought of Calvary awakens living and sacred emotions in our hearts. Pride and self-worship cannot flourish in the heart that keeps the scenes of Calvary fresh in the memory. Whoever looks intently at the Savior’s matchless love will be transformed in character. He will go out to be a light to the world, to reflect in some degree this mysterious love. HH 308.6