Communion this Sunday

by Joe Thorn on September 6, 2007

We’re having communion this Sunday at Redeemer. It’s a once a month celebration for us. I’d be interested in hearing about how often you celebrate it at your church, and how you do it. In terms of the distribution and observance – we change things up.

Jesus invites his saints
To meet around his board;
Here pardoned rebels sit and hold
Communion with their Lord.
For food he gives his flesh,
He bids us drink his blood;
Amazing favor! matchless grace
Of our descending God!

This holy bread and wine
Maintains our fainting breath,
By union with our living Lord,
And int’rest in his death.
Our heav’nly Father calls
Christ and his members one;
We the young children of his love,
And he the first-born Son.

We are but several parts
Of the same broken bread;
One body hath its several limbs,
But Jesus is the head.
Let all our powers be joined
His glorious name to raise;
Pleasure and love fill every mind,
And every voice be praise.

- Isaac Watts

About Joe Thorn

I am the Lead Pastor of Redeemer Fellowship in Saint Charles, IL, and author of Note to Self: The Discipline of Preaching to Yourself. Jen is my wife, and Katherine, Elias, Madeline and Kilian are my kids.

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  • http://gunny93.blogspot.com/ GUNNY HARTMAN

    Our church celebrates the Lord’s Supper the first Sunday of the month and we offer both grape juice and red wine.

    We also have a few readings we affirm together in the process:
    Confession:
    Almighty God, our Heavenly Father,
    we have sinned against You
    in thought and word and deed,
    through negligence, through weakness,
    through our own deliberate fault.
    We are truly sorry and repent of all our sins.
    For the sake of Your Son Jesus Christ, who died for us,
    forgive us all that is past;
    and grant that we may serve You in newness of life
    to the glory of Your name. Amen.

    Prayer of Humble Access:
    We do not presume to come to this, Your table,
    merciful Lord, trusting in our own righteousness,
    but in Your manifold and great mercies.
    We are not worthy
    so much as to gather up the crumbs under Your table.
    But You are the same Lord whose nature is to have mercy.
    Grant us, therefore, gracious Lord, that by faith in our hearts
    we might eat of His flesh and drink of His blood,
    that we may evermore dwell in Christ and He in us. Amen.

    We’re not high church or all that liturgical, but we’d probably considered more so than the typical Southern Baptist church.

    We also have our elders (myself included) take turns officiating the Lord’s Supper.

  • http://inlightofthegospel.org James Grant

    Hey Joe. I enjoy your blog, and this post caught my eye. My church went from having communion quarterly in 2005 to monthly in 2005. Then at the beginning of 2006 we went to bi-weekly. We are moving toward weekly, but we have not made it yet. For me personally, I cannot overstate the importance of frequent communion for the life of our church.

    We struggle with the issue of distribution. We stopped serving it row by row and started having people come down and get it. Now we allow families to share a common cup if the so choose, but that created some confusion [over a period of time] on the part of children who are not coming down. For example, they thought their daddy had to come down and get it. So we have started to think through different things. In some way we want everyone to come down and receive a “blessing” from the ministers who are distributing the elements. But we are still thinking through it.

    Lord bless, JHG
    In Light of the Gospel

  • Micah

    we are a little different because we are a house church sort of group. We meet on Tuesday nights and have a meal together then move to the living room to study scripture and pray. Most weeks we do the Lord’s Supper after the time of study and prayer. We typically read through passage were Jesus gives the bread and wine as his body and blood to his disciples, then set a single cup with a loaf of bread in the center of the room. Everyone who is taking part then takes a piece of bread and dips it in the cup (we use grape juice just to keep from having issues with the denominational higher ups.)

    This has worked well for us. It is a little different from your typical pass the plate sort of Lord’s supper that most of us have experienced, and we are by no means tied to this format. It is just what has worked so far with our group. As our groups grow, expand, and divide, we expect there to be many different formats that are used.

    Micah

  • http://dannyslavich.wordpress.com Danny Slavich

    Our church observes it weekly. The communion elements (a loaf of bread and a carafe of grape juice) stand at the front of the auditorium during the whole service.

    Our pastor always transitions at the end of his sermon into how the topic/passage points to the Gospel.
    He preaches the Gospel, while tearing the loaf of bread in half and pouring the cup of juice into two bowls.
    He then leads us in an interactive reading from 1 Corinthians 11.

    After that, two halves of bread and two cups of juice are taken into the two back corners of the room.
    The members of the congregation then get up “as led” and form two lines, one for each communion station.
    We tear a piece of bread and dip it into the juice.

    I enjoy celebrating it weekly, and having it tied into the Gospel every time.

    Sometimes, the reading out of 1 Corinthians can be somewhat mechanistic, but overall, I really appreciate our church’s focus on it in worship.

    Blessings,
    Danny

  • http://www.joethorn.net Joe Thorn

    Thanks for sharing guys. I really appreciate how different churches practicing the ordinance in good, but different ways.

  • Scott Morgan

    Joe,

    We are a Calvinistic Southern Baptist Church. The Lord’s Supper is served the third Sunday of the month. We use bread and wine because these are the elements that we have been commanded to use . John Broadus makes some great statements about bread and wine in a paper called Immersion Essential to Christian Baptism in Jeremiah Jeter’s book entitled Baptist Principles Reset. The book can be ordered by calling 479 963-3831( The Baptist Standard Bearer). Hope this helps. I enjoy your blog !

  • Scott Morgan

    Joe,

    I forgot to mention that we are a closed communion church. We serve the Lord’s Supper to church members only in good standing( Of course Salvation and Baptism and church membership are essential before someone in our church can partake).

  • http://www.rvanneste.blogspot.com Ray Van Neste

    Hey Joe,
    Good to be hearing from you again.
    We have communion weekly as the culmination of each service. It has been beneficial for us to have the sermon each week lead us to the Table. It is a good reminder to the preacher that every text leads us to the cross in some way. After hearing the word we are reminded that the sins which have just been rebuked are forgiven, that the grace which has just been extolled is received in the cross, that strength is available for obedience, etc. If it is of any interest, I have written on this here.

  • http://raewhitlock.com/ Rae Whitlock

    Hey there, Joe. I’m part of a PCA church plant that celebrates the Lord’s Supper weekly.

    At the end of the sermon, our pastor leads us in reciting a confession of faith — sometimes a creed, sometimes an adapted catechism answer (like Heidelberg #1), sometimes a confession of a saint. He then explains Communion, gives the scriptural warning as a fence, and then pronounces the words of institution. The assistant pastor (or another church leader) holds the loaf of bread and the chalice of wine, and the congregation moves from their seats to the bread and cup as they’re ready. The pastor stands on the side, available to pray with anyone (communing or not).

    We made this change pretty recently (Easter, I think) from passing the wafers and grape juice thimbles down the aisles. It’s been really beneficial for our people, I think.

  • http://ryan.thewentzels.org/ Ryan Wentzel

    We celebrate the Lord’s Supper weekly. The first three weeks of the month we celebrate it in the evening service. The fourth Sunday of the month we celebrate it in the morning so that those who are unable to make it to the evening services have the opportunity to participate in the Lord’s Supper as well.

  • http://theviewfromosprey.blogspot.com/ Tom Bryant

    We celebrate every other month alternating between Sunday morning and Sunday evening. We are a close communion church. For a long time we only did Sunday nights because we are pretty insistent on unbelievers not participating but didn’t want just ask them to leave. But a good number of senior adults – with which Florida abounds – couldn’t drive at night. So we compromised.

    We try to do it differently each time, but Sunday nights are never the same except for the elements. We have done a passover supper. We have done it completely silently. We now do it around dining room tables in the fellowship hall on Sunday night to emphasize the family remembrance.

    We are doing it this week and we’re going to spend time talking about what we remember about Jesus from the bible that is special for us.

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  • Ann

    I found your site interesting. Our church has communion every sunday to give thanks and praise to God for all things, for the blood his son Jesus shed for us and the price Jesus paid of our sins. Sometimes the juice and bread is passed round, other times everyone comes to the front and get theirs and occasionally we partake of it together at the front. It is a special time for all, a coming together.

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