Discerning the Lord’s Body (Part 3 of 3)

In Part 1 we looked at a few problems with the traditional perspectives of the familiar communion passage found in I Cor 11:29-30.

In Part 2 we talked about Johnny, one of my spiritual sons, as he spent a significant amount of time with another part of the body of Christ in his very early years of walking with the Lord… which was vital to Johnny’s growth and maturity in Christ. 

In Part 3, we’ll unpack this communion passage and focus on the various parts of the body of Christ… and we’ll examine the contribution each part has to the whole.  First, let’s revisit the passage:

“Therefore whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord.  But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup.  For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body.  For this reason, many are weak and sick among you, and many sleep.” – I Cor 11:29-30 (NJKV)

Let me paraphrase this same passage in the (MEV) Mark’s Expanded Version.  🙂

Anyone who participates in this meal without a high regard for and a functioning relationship with the rest of the larger body of Christ is guilty of not honoring Jesus’ whole body.  Are you honoring and relating to the myriad giftings and strengths of His many-membered body?  If you think you… or anyone… can skate through life without needing the rest of the body of Christ, it will be to your own detriment.  You will cut yourself off from the blessing and life-flow that comes from those other parts.  In fact, this reduced life-flow may leave you vulnerable, weak, sick or even spiritually asleep.

What about Johnny?
If I had kept Johnny in our revival-themed church, it’s likely that he wouldn’t have gotten the foundational Bible teachings that he needed to build everything else on.  He might have even been confused when trying to make sense of Holy Spirit activity in his unenlightened and ambiguous framework of the rest of Scripture.  This could have left him vulnerable to discouragement or disillusionment… potentially stunting his growth… or even worse. 

How would you respond?
Suppose you have a new believer in your congregation.  Suppose you discern that their motivational gifting is prophetic.  But your congregation has a strong emphasis and grace for evangelism.  With this mismatch, your new convert may end up frustrated… or frustrate you… as they grow up.  If his prophetic leanings are not nurtured by your group, then your new convert could be stunted in their prophetic growth.

But you’ve discerned their prophetic motivational gifting, and you affirm and ground them in basics of the Word of God.  And then you begin to convey how advantageous it would be for him to be ‘under’ the influence of mature prophetic gifts and anointings.  With his agreement, you send him to ‘Uncle’s’ prophetic church.  While there, his prophetic gift has a much greater likelihood of maturating at a maximum rate.

Because you steered your new convert into an environment that nurtured his gifting, he’s not weak, sick or sleeping in his growth or gifting.  Not only is your new convert strong, but the body of Christ now has another healthy prophetic voice equipped, vetted and endorsed to bless the body of Christ.

Now, just plug-in the gifting of any member of the body of Christ and see if the strengths of your congregation are matched for that person.  Then assess the strengths of other congregations to see if they are a match for that person.  I think you understand the dynamic at work here.

But actually, that part is easy!  As you can probably foresee, the bigger problem is that a leader or mentor has to be very secure in order to ‘lend’ their son/daughter to be trained in another part of the body of Christ.  Can we do it?  Are we secure enough?  Do we know our strengths and weaknesses?  Do we know what graces the other groups have to offer?

Back to the communion passage
Now, isn’t this more in keeping with our understanding of the heart of our Savior?  His body is quite diverse and graced and expresses itself in myriad ways.  So He invites us to His table and entreats us to enjoy the benefits of His powerful blood which was shed on the Cross, while we honor and receive the benefits of different parts of His body functioning together in mutual love and harmony. 

When we look at verses just before and just after I Cor 11:29-30, we find that Paul is poignantly focused on their lack of consideration for each other when they come together to eat… “one being drunk already before the others have arrived… and there is no food left for the hungry latecomer.” (my paraphrase).  There was no regard for others in the body of Christ.  Paul says, “Judge yourself”.  In other words, realize the problem you are creating… and exercise self-control.  If you don’t, some will go hungry… and you will create factions or divisions in the body of Christ.  These factions diminish the potential life-flow across the body of Christ.

Paul is clearly addressing the lack of self-control and the resulting potential harm or factions.  Taken in context, the disturbing communion ‘caution-phrases’, are clearly admonitions for us to relate honorably with other members of the body of Christ.  Without this honoring and relating, by our own volition, we make our hearts, souls, and giftings susceptible to weakness or even ‘sleeping’.

I feel comfortable saying that the judgment referenced in this passage occurs as a result of our own preclusion from the life-flow and blessing of God that we could have received from Him through the broader body of Christ.

What’s the take-away?
Obviously, whenever God speaks a thing in Scripture, He can have multiple layers of meanings and many applications.  But the emphasis of this particular series focuses on our need to honor the full body of Christ so that we escape the sad consequences and lack of wholeness that results when we create and practice division in the body of Christ.  Let the reader understand.  

Jesus, Your body is wonderful and beautiful!  And we love Your Communion Table!  Thank You!

— MLH