St. Paul’s United Church
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Do This in Remembrance of Me – Rev. David Mundy
I Corinthians 11:22-34
Luke
22:7-19
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I’m going to take a few moments this morning to tell you about one of my
more meaningful experiences of the ritual we call The Lord’s Supper or Holy
Communion in the Protestant church.
It happened while I was in another country and the service was conducted
largely in the French language which, regrettably, I don’t speak. But in some
respects it didn’t matter because communion is about the symbols of bread and
wine as Christ meets us,
rather than in the words.
I was visiting the Christian community called Taize
situated in the heart of wine-making country. Taize
is an ecumenical Christian fellowship and it attracts tens of thousands of
visitors every year, most of them in their teens and twenties. In an era when
many denominations lament the absence of young adults, Taize’s
challenge is to accommodate everyone who wants to visit.
While I had been intrigued by Taize’s
attraction for young people, and it’s unique style of
worship, the special incentive for me was my son, Isaac. He took a year away
from university to spend time working in two Christian communities, this one in
France and another in Switzerland.
I went in February which is one of the quietest times of the year for
this community. Three times a day I went to worship in the cavernous church.
Although there were still several hundred of us present for each service it seemed relatively
empty as the Christian brothers filed in and worship began. You may be aware
that the Taize community has developed simple worship
songs or chants that are sung repeatedly to create a spirit of devotion and
worship. It’s not possible to describe how rich this experience can be in this
setting.
Some of the services included the sacrament of communion. The practice
there is to come forward for the elements. When I looked to the front of the
church I discovered that Isaac was one of the servers for this holy meal and
that I could join the line which allowed him to serve me. This young man who
now said the words of invitation had been the child to whom I had explained
this deep mystery of our faith only a few years before. I could recall the Ash
Wednesday service at which he assisted me in distributing the elements when he
was probably eight or nine years old at the time.
Needless to say, this communion with my son was a powerful moment. The
Lord’s Supper is about Jesus and his nourishing, ongoing presence in our lives
and his sacrificial, saving love. At the same time, it was a meal celebrated
with those he loved, the family he had adopted. While he may have been their
spiritual master, they are also invited to consider him as a friend.
Do this is remembrance of me. This morning we will focus on the fourth
stained glass window of our series of sermons on the windows of our sanctuary
and this one reminds us of the meal we now recognize as one of our Christian
sacraments.
It is situated on the west side of the sanctuary and shows Jesus
standing behind a table with his hand raised in the traditional teaching
gesture of Christian art. Actually in three of the four images on this side
Jesus has the two fingers of his right hand raised in this way. Our window is
rather formal and Jesus stands behind a table looking more like a priest than
someone sharing a meal with his disciples. In fact the disciples and any others
who had gathered to celebrate the Passover meal that fateful evening aren’t in
view at all. It’s unfortunate because there is a strong possibility that if
this was a traditional Passover meal the upper room where this gathering took
place would have been crowded with the men who had followed him for the past
three years along with others, including women and children.
How important is communion for us as Protestants? Our Roman Catholic
brothers and sisters celebrate the eucharist
each Sunday but we place a greater emphasis on the spoken word. All four of the gospels give us an account of
Jesus’ final meal. In the gospel of John, the last of the four to be written,
Jesus speaks at considerable length and there is the additional element of the
washing of the disciples’ feet as a sign of service, which isn’t found in the
other three.
It is in Luke’s gospel that we find the words which suggest that we are
to repeat this experience as a way of deepening our relationship with the risen
Christ: “do this is remembrance of me.”
It might be a little confusing to be told this, but the earliest biblical
recounting of this meal is not in any of these gospels. It is in the first
letter of the apostle Paul to the newly-formed Christian congregation in
Corinth. Paul’s letters were almost certainly written before three of the
gospels, Mark and Matthew and Luke. In this instance Paul is writing to
admonish the Corinthian community for becoming exclusionary at the Lord’s
Supper. It was more of a love feast than a formal religious ceremony and those
who had sufficient food were refusing to share with those who had little. Paul
warns them that if they are unwilling to share there will be judgement upon
them. This is a meal of radical acceptance and inclusion in Christ.
And again we hear “do this in remembrance of
me.” Remembrance.
Remember. Our Christian memory, passed from generation to generation is
essential to who we are. >From the very young to
the very old we remember who we are through the simple taste of food and drink.
It’s one of the reasons we took the step two decades ago to welcome
children into our celebration of communion. At the time it was controversial –
how could a child understand the meaning of the sacrament? Yet it helped us
appreciate that few if any of us can truly comprehend what is happening at the
communion table in a rational way. Somehow the bread and juice become Christ for us and we are transformed. It is a
glorious mystery.
Through the years I have conducted many services in nursing homes where
some of the worshippers are no longer able to focus for any length of time on
words and memory has failed them . My experience is that two things still
matter, the music of familiar hymns and the simple act of taking the bread and
the juice of communion. In one of those institutions the staff would help us by
giving us enough of the plastic medicine cups for everyone at the service
because they were easier to hold than the tiny glass communion glasses. It
seemed appropriate that they we all received our “medicine for the soul”
together in this way.
We have been willing to stretch our perception of how we can participate
in this meal of redemption and new life. On Easter morning this year we all got
up from our seats and moved to the various stations in this sanctuary to
receive the elements. This simple movement allowed us to consider what how it
is that we come to Christ to accept what he is willing to offer us.
It is important for us to allow this holy meal to be alive and
meaningful for us, because Christ is still present to us. Just as on that night
long ago Christ comes to us as disciples and deniers, those who are true-blue,
and abandon him, those
who are traitors and friends. We come with an awareness of our need. I like the
way Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury put it in a sermon
It’s the really hungry who can smell fresh
bread a mile away. For those who know their need, God is immediate – not an
idea, not a theory, but life, food, air for the stifled spirit and the beaten,
despised, exploited body.
There is something about this stained glass image of Jesus which I hadn’t
noticed until coming into the quiet of the sanctuary and gazing at it for a
while. It’s a feature that I didn’t see when I was looking at the photograph on
my computer. It has to do with Jesus hands. They bear the marks of the piercing
of the nails from the cross of Calvary. The crucifixion didn’t happen until the
day following this meal, so why has the artist included the stigmata, the marks
of Christ’s suffering?
It may be as a reminder that this last meal on Holy Thursday led to the
darkest day of the Christian year which we call Good Friday. Or it may be a
reference to another meal mentioned in Luke’s gospel which took place on the
day of resurrection. We’re told that two of Jesus’s
followers left Jerusalem to walk to the village of Emmaus, several kilometres
away. As they travelled,
the risen Christ joined them, but they didn’t recognize him.
Jesus attempts to explain what has unfolded through scripture but the message
doesn’t seem to take hold. It is when they stop at the end of the day for a meal
As they came near the village to which they were going, [Jesus] walked ahead as if he were going on. But they urged him strongly, saying, ‘‘Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.’’ So he went in to stay with them. When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight. They said to each other, ‘‘Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?’’ Luke 24:28-32
Perhaps you can recall a time when communion has been particularly
meaningful for you and how the simplicity of this act has touched your spirit
and opened your eyes to a deeper relationship with Christ. What was it in that
moment that stirred you?
And while it will be a while before we join together in this communal
meal as a congregation we can make the commitment to let it take on a renewed
meaning for us that will allow us to live beyond fear and as Christ’s
disciples.
Our window reminds us that it is Christ who is our host and the one who
offers the assurance that whatever life brings to us we are not alone.
Whenever you do this, remember Jesus who is the crucified and Risen
Christ.