communion

Welcome brother or sister to the sanctuary of this church.

Please feel free to stay a while in the presence of God

 Jesus instituted this communal meal at Passover time, at the last supper with his disciples before his death. At the Passover Festival people looked back to the deliverance from Egypt, and forward to the coming kingdom of God. The Lord's Supper, too, looks back. It reminds us, by the bread and wine, of the past event of Jesus' death. And it looks forward to the time when Jesus will come again. Paul told the Corinthian Christians "You proclaim the Lord's death until he comes."

During communion, the breaking and passing of the loaf of bread is a reminder that Jesus' body was given for us. The shared cup of wine is a token of the blood and death of Christ. His death was a sacrifice that sealed the new covenant-agreement between God and man, just as the old covenant was sealed by the blood of sacrificial oxen. So Jesus says, "this is my blood...which seals God's covenant."

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(1 Corinthians 11:23-34, ASV)

23 For I received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which he was betrayed took bread;

24 and when he had given thanks, he brake it, and said, This is my body, which is for you: this do in remembrance of me.

25 In like manner also the cup, after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood: this do, as often as ye drink it, in remembrance of me.

26 For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink the cup, ye proclaim the Lord's death till he come.