LAST MEAL AND TESTAMINTS - IKON 5 23 06

There has been more than a little disagreement among Christians over the centuries about what the Lord's Supper (as Paul calls it) means. On one end of the spectrum we have the Catholics, believing the bread and wine actually become, on a molecular level even, the physical flesh and blood of Jesus. (Transubstantiation) In the middle of the spectrum we have Lutherans and others who believe that while the bread and blood do not become the physical flesh and blood of Jesus, a spiritual life giving sustenance or spiritual flesh and blood mysteriously inhabits the bread and wine we eat and drink. (Consubstantiation) Then, at the other end of the spectrum we have the Baptists who believe the bread becomes stale small square cracker-like thingies and the wine becomes Welch's grape juice. (Simplification)

Fights caused by the Lord's Supper go all the way back to the first Century when Paul wrote about a disagreement of another kind in the Corinthian church:

"And then I find that you bring your divisions to worship—you come together, and instead of eating the Lord's Supper, you bring in a lot of food from the outside and make pigs of yourselves. Some are left out, and go home hungry. Others have to be carried out, too drunk to walk. I can't believe it! Don't you have your own homes to eat and drink in? Why would you stoop to desecrating God's church? Why would you actually shame God's poor? I never would have believed you would stoop to this. And I'm not going to stand by and say nothing.

Let me go over with you again exactly what goes on in the Lord's Supper and why it is so centrally important." 1 CORINTHIANS 11:20-23 (THE MESSAGE TRANSLATION)

That's what I'm finishing studying today to teach tomorrow at ikon: What, again, is the Lord's Supper and why is it so important? Find out what Testamints (those little candies with verses printed on them) have to do with all this tomorrow night, 8pm. See you there.