Focal passage: 1 Corinthians 11:17-29
The older I get, the more I recognize both the importance and difficulty of – oh yeah, remembering. There are at least a couple of different kinds of remembering that take place in our lives. We remember some things nostalgically – simply recalling fondly a person or event and how we felt. You might think of a former teacher or a trip to the beach.
We must remember other things, however, because they require action on our part – things like staying on a complicated but important medication regimen or taking out the trash each week.
The reality is, for all of us, we are prone to forget and need reminders. Some of the things mentioned above aren’t really disastrous if we forget. Other things bring much greater consequences.
God knows His people are prone to forget. On the plains of Moab, Moses in giving a series of speeches (Deuteronomy) to Israel before going into the Promised Land, called the people over and over again to “remember” who God was and what He had done and admonished them not to forget.
In giving the Lord’s Supper to His Church, God placed before us a regular and visible reminder to remember Christ’s sacrifice for us on the cross. And this remembering should always call us to action.
It should first call us to worship – worship the God who redeemed us by His Son. We are here, not for ourselves, but for God, united in Him and with one another. It should also call us to proclamation.
Even in our participation in the Lord’s Supper we proclaim that we have been reconciled only through the sacrifice of Christ, not based on our merit or works. It should lastly call us to evaluate our lives. Paul warns the Corinthian believers not to come to the Lord’s Table unexamined. Because Christ paid such a price for our sin, we should come humbly, gratefully, confessed, and clean.
The next time you partake of the Lord’s Supper to remember Christ’s sacrifice, don’t simply reflect nostalgically. Ask God’s Spirit to drive you to action – worship, evaluate and proclaim!