For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when He was betrayed took bread, 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.” In the same way also He took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.”  For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes.

You may think what I am going to write is obvious; you may think it scandalous and unacceptable!

Among Protestant Christians there has been a desire to repudiate elements of mediaeval Roman Catholicism; rationalism has come to prevail among us. Resultantly liberal Protestants have called into question the miracles of Jesus. I heard a BBC broadcast in which a clergyman said, “I believe the miracles are true but not that they happened”!   Another well-known minister questioned the resurrection saying, “I believe that Jesus was raised from the dead spiritually but not bodily.” So increasingly those who profess Christianity may spiritualise the gospel narrative until it becomes meaningless. We must resist any such undermining of faith.

The passage we call the ‘Institution of the Lord’s Supper’ assumes the real presence of Christ. We should not detract from it.

I  The Lord WAS really present in the First Coming

Have you ever wondered what Paul meant when he said that he “Received from the Lord…”? It is suggestive that the Communion formulary was revealed directly by the Lord Jesus — a supernatural revelation. Certainly Paul records in Galatians that things were revealed in the desert where he spent time with the Lord, but three years later he did confer with Peter as well. Peter was in a position to relate the event of the Last Supper and at the least confirm the details of the event.

For the apostles Jesus was no mystical figure or fairy-tale character. He really was there among them. They saw and heard everything happen. The Christmas narrative was not just a nice story draped with tinsel and decorated with snow, but history.   The crucifixion was not just a poetic way of speaking about the love of God, but an horrific execution in space and time. The institution of the Lord’s Supper was not just a tradition, but a record of events of which the disciples had been a part.

II  The Lord SHALL BE really present in the Second Coming

I turn to the final words of our passage: You proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes. The Lord’s Supper is occasion when we look back and we remember, but it is also a time for looking forward to when He comes again. There is about the Sacrament this challenging tension between past and future.

His second coming will be as real as the first. We are talking about the passage of history and the concluding and momentous event at the end of history. There will be a day when everything will be changed. The bus will no longer run; and the television programmes will no longer be broadcast. It will be such as we cannot properly imagine and the Lord will be here — not metaphorically but really.

III    The Lord IS really present in the Communion

Here is a mystery. When in the upper room at the Last Supper Jesus took bread and said “This is my body” what ever did He mean? Now that He is corporeally in heaven He still says of the bread “This is my body”. Clearly He does not mean corporeally, but mystically and very really.

What we affirm is not to be mistaken for transubstantiation. We are not saying that bread changes its substance and becomes flesh or that the wine turns into blood. The writers of Scripture were quite capable of identifying such a change and that is what is recorded in John 2: When the master of the feast tasted the water now become wine. But neither is it sufficient to say that there is no more to the Holy Communion than our activity of remembering. Remembering is what we are commanded to do, but He, Christ, does something too — He comes to us by the Holy Spirit. He feeds our souls with His flesh and blood.

His presence is not simply His omnipresence (that He is everywhere) and it is more specific than that He is in the midst where two or three are gathered (Matthew 18¹⁹). God was never limited to a temple, but He was present in a special and supernatural way in the tabernacle’s holy of holies where the shekinah glory appeared. He is present in a special and supernatural way in the Holy Communion. It is here that Christ, who is really present, is united with those who by faith feed on His flesh and blood.
Among Protestants mere memorial-ism seems to have prevailed and persuaded many. In consequence we see church worship reduced to singing worship songs which we are told bring us near to God. Biblical and apostolic worship is about Scripture and Sacrament. It is by these things that we draw near to God. Let us take seriously the words of the Lord when He says, “This is my body”. Of course, it is a work of the Holy Spirit, and by faith, but let us not ‘spiritualise’ away the ‘real presence’ of Christ.

In September I rode around the churches on Romney Marsh in a sponsored cycling event to raise money for ‘Friends of Kent Churches’. A thirty mile round trip took me to grand cathedral-like structures, to the iconic Fairfield church pictured and everything in between. (Don’t let anyone think that the level roads are an easy option: the strong coastal wind seemed to be against me most of the journey.)

The first striking thing about the little building of St Thomas a Becket at Fairfield is that there is no road approach to it. There are two single tracks across fields where sheep graze and one of them was useless the day I was there because the small footbridge over a ditch was down, leaving me with only one option to gain access to the small place of worship.

  
The exterior appearance of Fairfield is unusual and perplexing – a brick-built ancient church? (The explanation is provided by 1913 reconstruction.) But the inside is even more intriguing. There is a three tier pulpit which is enchanting but far from unique, and then the tiny altar is quite a curious sight. I was told that the barrier around the altar is not an altar rail but a fence to prevent the grazing sheep from entering and desecrating the sacred Table. Can it really be the case that sheep have to be kept out?!

Now this is all very suggestive. What are we to think about ‘guarding the Table’? Who are we to admit to the Sacrament? There are those who restrict access rigorously and others who laxly allow almost anyone to come. The bread and wine are for those who love the Lord and seek to walk with Him, for sinners who trust in His atoning work at the cross. It is such persons who will understand the assurance, “The Body of Christ broken for you, the Blood of Christ shed for you.”

Of course, goats should be discouraged from coming to the Table, but not the sheep! Let the sheep come and here let them feed on Christ their Saviour.

But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God—and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. (1 Corinthians 1³⁰)

The Apostle Paul leaves us in no doubt whatsoever concerning the focus of his ministry. He expresses it more than once in the opening chapters of First Corinthians.             We preach Christ crucified (1²³)                 For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified (2²)

The emphasis is in spite of its unpopularity at the time. The Greeks looked for philosophizing and the Jews for miraculous signs, but God’s ‘wisdom’ is found in this extraordinary historic event of crucifixion. Scholars dispute the sense and significance of the trio, righteousness and sanctification and redemption. In the absence of any other juxtaposition of these three and this order, we propose that Paul uses the great combination as a way of saying that everything that is important and matters is encompassed. Everything that God has to say is summarized in this great agonizing act. Christ in crucifixion became all that has to be said and done.

Whatever the audience, Jewish or Gentile, and whatever the need to be addressed, the cross says it all. We may be speaking apologetically, pastorally or evangelistically, to the young or to the old, but Christ crucified is always the right message. Before going onto the platform with Pastor Richard Wumbrandt, a close friend of mine announced that he had heard the Pastor speak several years earlier. Upon that Wumbrandt asked what he had preached on that occasion. My friend, a little embarrassed, admitted that he could not recall. He was rebuked with the words, “I preached Christ. I always preach Christ!”

If the message is Apologetic the subject must be Christ. Of course there is a very important place for discussing all sorts of issues such as epistemology (how we know what we know), origins, the problem of evil, and so on, but we will always come back to the Saviour.

Let us take the last of those issues as an example and the point will be clear. The problem of the existence of sin and suffering in a world in the control of a loving and omnipotent God is a perennial cause of perplexity, to put it mildly. How can God tolerate evil? He does appear to tolerate it, but that is incomprehensible. There is no easy answer; we can offer no fool-proof solution to the problem. Nevertheless, we can say something that puts the issue in a different perspective and it is this: God has come in Christ and has been involved in and subject to the sin and suffering of this world. He does not preside over it remotely with no personal knowledge of it. It has brutally impinged on Him personally, in time and space. He has even uttered the ‘Why’ question Himself: “My God, My God, why…?”

This perspective is not a conclusive answer to all our questions, but it does bring new light to the problem.

If the message is Pastoral the subject must be Christ. We all have to experience difficult days sooner or later. Perhaps friends have disappointed us, others have falsely accused us, rogues have ripped us off or robbed us. Or perhaps we have been in pain because of illness, accident or even assault. And so the troubles of this life go on. Often I would like to be able to say to another that I know the experience and understand. Usually I do not know and can only begin to guess. What I can confidently say, though, is that Christ has walked this painful path and He knows, He really knows what suffering is all about…

For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help. (Hebrews 4^15-16)

My dear friend, the Lord knows all about your troubles. He has been in this world. See Him at Calvary; look up at the crucified Saviour and hear Him cry.

If the message is Evangelistic the subject must be Christ. It is no good encouraging a man to keep the commandments or to observe religious duties and leave it at that. Neither a moral life nor a pious deportment will be of much use when it comes to the final judgment. When the question is asked at the pearly gate as to why we should be admitted, no answer that begins “I have…” will make any favourable impression.

I need to point men to the cross. There is life for a look at the crucified One. What matters for salvation is what He has done.

If I remember Christ crucified I will always have something to say that will address the need of the man I have with me. I will have the very message that helps whoever he is.

My audience may be very young, but I shall still speak of the cross. At Mr Noah’s Nursery School we always have a Bible story at the end of the morning or the afternoon. The children have a favourite story. They call it ‘the sad story’ because it is associated with a song that begins “Oooh, what sad day when the angry leaders killed Jesus; oooh, what sad day when they laid His body in a tomb.” It is the story of the cross. You would hardly believe that three year old children would listen to such an account, but it is a real favourite.

Another day I will be with one who is at the end of this worldly life. Some die with confident peace because they know the Lord and where they go. Others may be fearful. I can tell you how I will speak to the man who is frightened of the unknown and who asks what he must do. I say to him, “Hold on to Christ who was crucified. Just hold on to Him and you will be safe.”

“I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified”  (1 Corinthians 2.2)

Here was the Apostle Paul’s resolution and it is my own new year resolution. Too easily we can become spiritually eccentric — that is, off centre. The focus of the Apostle, and in deed all Scripture, was the Lord Jesus Christ, God incarnate, crucified and risen. What a powerful message: the crucified God.

I want to learn more of Him. To that end I am going to need to read His word, study the cross, and remember the Lord in His appointed way, which is the Sacrament.

I need to let the crucified (and risen) Lord shape my thinking, my values and priorities. Even at their very best, the driving values of humanism are quite different. I cannot afford for my version of Christianity to be mere worldliness dressed up in religious clothing.

I have to present to the church and our society, not religion, or even Christianity, but Christ and Him crucified.

The bell turret at Iden Green Congregational Church