I’m sympathetic to letting visibly unrepentant sinners (who still profess Christ) to the table; I bring with this the presumption, though, that the church will be addressing that visible lack of repentance through appropriate means.

Let’s face it - we’re all unrepentant sinners at times. And even if we fence the table from those living visibly unrepentant lives, how many more come living invisibly unrepentant lives? Is that a distinction we need to be concerned with?

How do you interpret 1 Cor 11:27, Brent, where Paul warns against taking the bread and cup “in an unworthy manner”? Is he simply continuing his argument from Ch. 11, talking about not coming in and eating before everyone’s there? Or is there something more to it?

For background: I, too, come from a believer-Baptist background where the leader of the communion service urges believers to reflect and repent before partaking and urges unbelievers to refrain.

Chris, I believe that the ‘unworthy manner’ is indeed defined by the text’s context - a complete lack of honor to Christ by treating the Supper as if it were some sort of self-indulgent gluttony fest.

In other words, when you come to gather for the Lord’s Table, be serious!!!! and remember what this is supposed to be about.

That being said, it is, I believe a great time for reflection upon our lives and an appropriate opportunity to confess and pray before the Lord, not a pre-requisite and condition, but as a suitable call and position.

Brent… I don’t know about all these fancy religious terms you and your commenters are using to define people and protocols, but I do question the correctness of one of your statements:

“Communion is for Believers only because that is who Jesus effectually died for, therefore, that is who the elements are for.”

I would assert that Jesus died not ONLY for believers, because that would make salvation OUR doing, not HIS.

I’m not usually one for dissecting religious arguments, but I think this presupposition is important to your quandary about communion. Other than exclusivity, what would be the reason for denying people communion?

EDIT: Jesus didn’t practice a fenced table neither should we. 11 believers and Jesus all shared the bread and wine along with Judas.

The categories are all wrong for this question and likely even the question itself needs to be recast.

In addition, Eddie, your comments about the hypostatic union are just off. Jesus obviously knew about Judas as *one person* and we can’t go around making our Lord schizophrenic in regards to analyzing something like this issue and then basing theological conclusions off them as a result. Otherwise, we go astray of Chalcedon.

Furthermore, the mention of Judas partaking is not at all accidental on the part of the Gospel writers. We need to remember that the historic account of the Gospels is not merely a historic retelling of the event sufficient to tell us only what Jesus was doing at the Supper but that there are clear theological overtones and points being made on the part of the Gospel writers themselves after the fact.

What this inclusion points to on the part of Jesus allowing Judas to partake is the height of his apostasy and subsequent judgment for betraying His Lord. And, as Scripture has one ultimate Author, we see a very simiilar position in 1 Corinthians 11 where judgment is mentioned yet again in regards to the Supper for those who would partake unworthily.

The missing link here is not about believing or rightly professing as individuals, but the covenantal relation between those who would celebrate the Supper. Judas was both a covenant member of the people of God at the time as well as a seemingly committed disciple. You can’t have apostasy without prior membership in something besides just the club that has voluntarily professed faith in Christ. For someone like Judas, there is a real objective status to being in Christ that is only tangentially related to actual belief in Him as we often cast it today. If this were not true, there would not be false professors and tares in among the wheat for one thing. But, this also makes possible the great grace that is attached to the Supper itself in receiving those who always are most certainly unworthy except as they reside in their Savior Jesus Christ. To put it another way, the Cross speaks just as much and just as loudly in judgment as it does in grace.

I realize this goes against the grain of Baptist construals of this issue but reality has a way of sinking in and it isn’t always easy to realize your own tradition is sadly deficient in thinking and theologizing about these things.

At Trinity, we welcome anyone to partake of Communion via the Table who is a Christian unless they are clearly under discipline in another church or in our own fellowship. We can do this because it is the Lord’s Table and not merely the table of our own fellowship.

Clearly, though, the table was fenced at least in part in New Testament times. It was not fenced so much so that one couldn’t fall under judgment for partaking unworthily otherwise the admonition itself on the part of Paul in 1 Cor. 11 is empty and little more than hypothetical. However, 1 Cor. 5 shows us also that the local assembly does have both the right and the duty to excommunicate members who are in flagrant sin and to treat them as an outsider (ie. one which is not in communion with them) and barred from any fellowship with the believing community which would obviously include the Supper.

Kevin,

Not sure where you got the idea that I thought Judas was two persons. And your schizophrenic comment seems to be a common misuse of the word since schizophrenia is not multiple-personality disorder. Be that as it may, your comment that “Judas was both a covenant member of the people of God at the time as well as a seemingly committed disciple.” is off-base. Judas was not a member of the New Covenant as his defection/apostacy proved. 1 John 2:19 addresses the Judas/Demas positioning - They went away from us because they were not really OF us…

I’m fairly confident that your baptism/covenant views would not allow for agreement here, but that is my belief.

Eddie,

I suppose if you can mess with the meaning and proper use/application of the hypostatic union as it was defined 1500+ years ago at Chalcedon and also in the text of Scripture, I can for the moment play fast and loose with the term “schizophrenia”.

Judas was a covenant member of the people of Israel–the Jews and as such entitled to be there just like any other Jew at Passover. The church (and the New Covenant) itself was not really constituted as of yet since our Lord had not gone to the Cross (when the covenant was actually “cut”) and the Spirit had yet to descend on them. What Jesus did at what is commonly called the Last Supper is celebrate the Passover as a model of what would later become the Lord’s Supper.

I have no doubt that we would disagree as to the covenantal status of the unbeliever in our local assemblies but that is a clear difference between Baptist thinking and classical Protestantism. My position however is clearly Reformed and based off the clear continuities present in Scripture in regards to the covenants.

Mr. Kevin Johnson,

First please call me Will. May I call you Kevin? If the OT points to JC and the rest of NT explains JC then shoudn’t we look first to and try to emulate JC?

If though we look at the rest of scripture it seems to point to JC model of particular inclusion. Regenerate and unregenerate ate at Passover’s for millennium. First example are the same Jews that worshiped a false god while Moses received the Law also took part in the 1st passover before their exodus.

Then there is Judas in the NT. Later Paul admonished the Corinthians that some slept because of their mishandling of communion yet that reveals they too took it in the first place. Paul’s admonishment is the context of taking it correctly.

Jesus “fencing” of the table was limited at best. No doctrinal or relational litmus test was given excluding some form of professed faith in him. It was his church family that took it. Those who come into our fellowship and worship with us as professing Christians regardless of their possession (assuming we don’t know one way or the other) of a relationship with Christ should be granted access to the table. We should encourage those in sin to repent before taking yet offer the table to all and warn what they risk in not doing so. We should certainly examine ourselves before partaking yet not make it so closed that it looses its original meaning that Jesus was the Lamb of God slain for the sins of the world.

Will,

Yes, you can call me Kevin.

I do not think our positions are very far apart. I differ with you only here–excommunication is a valid but extreme form of church discipline that the local assembly must engage in on occasion. The incestuous pervert in 1 Cor. 5 was cast out of the Christian community he was abusing and forbidden from the table as a result.

Today, the Christian Church makes the mistake of fencing the table too often for idiotic and self-serving reasons. Some Lutheran churches for example require you to sign a card stating doctrinal agreement with their positions prior to taking communion. That is wrong-headed and anti-catholic. Other churches think you must have been baptized in their denomination or be a member of a like-minded church prior to partaking. That also is ridiculous on the face of it.

But, we should not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Both in the Old and New Testaments we have examples where flagrant sinners have been rightly ejected out of the covenant community both temporarily and even permanently. Or, worse still, churches excommunicate someone for sins which should not be put forward in a public setting or for the wrong reasons.

I agree with you that Jesus Christ is the key interpretive element in looking at both Testaments in Scripture. Would that today’s grammatical/historical/overly scientific hermeneutic fanatics would return to just a bit of how the Apostles interpreted the Old Testament. We would be doing much better in that case and likely be even closer on issues like this.

One of the things I most hate about the Internet is the handicap it presents in directly communicating with someone else. This is an imperfect medium to imperfect men. The “eye of correction” is consistently turned inward in my case - of that I assure you (and I also have more than enough folks to provide me with similar help whether I need it or not). Doubtless, you have been willing to return the favor.

So, acontextual criticism of any sort can be hard to receive on the Internet especially in a culture that tends to avoid a hard and thoughtful look at almost anything as politically incorrect.

The important thing here is how we receive and evaluate said criticism not just whether or not we ought to give it. Why does repeated criticism bother us? Do we welcome it the way David did? I’m not so sure. Does this have anything to do with pride or a lack of humility? Matthew Henry’s commentary on Psalm 141:5 is absolutely exceptional in this regard.

It’s not that I was personally rebuking you in terms of some flagrant sin. I was commenting on the content of your post and that it does not really reflect what the Bible teaches on the issue. Did not Paul do the same with Peter though his case was more extreme?

You endorsed a common Baptist idea that you present above though with some level of doubt. We can of course amiably disagree here and there is more than enough room to discuss the particulars (and I would urge you to consider that the greatest part of my comments above is addressing the issues at hand in light of the Bible and not mere criticism of you or your view).

But, we are called as elders especially to “exhort and convict those who contradict” (Titus 1:9) with the ultimate aim to help those around us and in our care live as they have been called to live (Titus 2 ff.).

I don’t believe harmonizing the Gospels is a necessary component of understanding the Last Supper or the chronology involved. Nor is there any need to use Judas as an example as if he’s the sole support for what I’ve already outlined. The argument is bigger than that and based on our identity as Christians and members of the covenant(s).

No one is hoping judgment falls on those who partake wrongly. In fact, the warning exists to warn. We don’t want people partaking in order to invoke God’s judgment. We want them to repent! However, Hebrews 10:29 is quite clear to show us that there are those trample underfoot the blood of the covenant by which they were sanctified (among other passages).

I agree with you that navel gazing and inordinate time spent considering our own unworthiness of the Supper is a waste of time and not what Paul was getting at in telling us to examine ourselves and to discern the body rightly. I am all for sinners partaking who are aware of and desirous of repentance. I view excommunication as a last ditch attempt at disciplining/rescuing someone by the church and not as a sledge hammer by which we pummel people into submission.

As far as “doctrinal agreement” and Lutherans in the Supper…the example provided by yours truly above is remarkable. Odd that Paul never required a card nor is the New Testament filled with the metaphysical precision required to discern the Body as Lutherans do. But still we need the card. It’s not a catholic thing to do and defending it in the name of avoiding people getting killed really is grandstanding in the matter. If the Supper really is a communication of the Body and Blood of the Lord, it certainly isn’t limited to Missouri Synod Lutherans (or their understanding of communion) or any other sectarian division of Christianity. It needs to be presented to anyone who has been baptized in the name of the Triune God of Scripture, worshiping in a local assembly, and is in union with Christ.

At the time of the Apostles there was general agreement in doctrine and so forth. They were not divided up into denominations with different beliefs. But people were kicked out for false doctrine. After the formation of these denominational bodies (and even prior with the various heretical sects that existed at different times) just about everybody practiced close communion. It’s really a pretty modern idea to leave the table open to all. If someone is in a Lutheran church but has Wesleyan beliefs, why isn’t he there? Why isn’t he communing with the Wesleyans?

As a former Baptist I understand that the sacrament has very little significance in Baptist churches. It’s a secondary thing tacked on whenever people feel like doing it as a reminder that Jesus died for them. But along with the early Christian who met to “break bread” (referring to the Lord’s Supper) I believe it is central to the worship of the church. They did not primarily meet to hear a sermon or sing or whatever else (even though these things did take place), they met to break bread.

I believe that Christ really meant it when He said “This is my body” and “This is my blood.” I partake of Christ’s actual body and blood and there is danger in not discerning His body and blood and treating it as some kind of fellowship meal.

I get angry when I hear people on the radio who think it’s silly that people who oppose abortion want to impose their beliefs on others. They simply don’t take the time to look at what the other people actually believe and why they think this belief is worthy of legislation. They simply don’t realize that it’s an argument over whether or not a human being is being murdered.

I think there is something similar going on here. If you don’t believe the Lord’s Supper is anything more than a memorial meal then it makes sense that you wouldn’t be as concerned about who partakes and who doesn’t. However, if you believe that Christ’s actually body and blood are being consumed and that people have actually died or gotten sick from partaking unworthily then you are going to be more concerned about fencing the table. Which brings us back to the importance of a agreement on what the Lord’s Supper is prior to having discussions about communing with one another. The confessional Lutheran, Catholic, and Orthodox positions on close communion only sound silly and anti-catholic if you disagree with them on what the Lord’s Supper is. Practice varies within the LCMS. At my church you would need to talk with the pastor prior to communing. Some LCMS churches practice open communion but when they do so the pastors are breaking their ordination vows and being dishonest.

Kevin:
I never said that there was open communion at the time of the Apostles. I don’t think there ever was. At the institution only twelve were invited and even later on if somebody walked in off the street I don’t think that they would let them participate without finding out what they believed. At the time people were certainly tied to the local assembly than they are today and people knew who the others were communing with them. There certainly wasn’t the kind of church-hopping that we see today. Do you allow the oneness Pentecostal to partake? Or do you use it as an opportunity to show them that this is a serious matter and call them to repentance? There were people of all kinds of different heretical groups that were not allowed to commune.

I understand that there are a number of Reformed theologians and others who claim that Lutherans teach consubstantiation but this is simply not true. You will not find it in the Lutheran Confessions or any of the standard dogmatics as something that we actually teach. Unlike the Roman Catholic position which is based on Aristotelian metaphysics and the Reformed and Zwinglian positions which are both based on misinformed Christological concerns, the Lutheran position is based on the words of institution themself.

From my experience as a member in different Reformed churches the Calvinist position ultimately turns into Zwinglianism. The idea that Christ is not present in front of you but that the Holy Spirit lifts you up to heaven to partake of the body and blood of Christ is difficult to maintain and unlike Calvin himself most Reformed denominations don’t seem to have a problem with Zwinglians and many get squirmy when you say things that Calvin did.

Unity must be based on a common confession. Ignoring those differences has always been bad for both bodies. Just look at the churches in Germany or the United Church of Christ here in America.

Charles,

I think perhaps we are dealing with a different definition of open communion. I do not mean anyone is able to partake of the sacrament (as you say above, ‘off the street’), but only those who have been baptized in the name of the triune God. That Baptism undoubtedly implies an orthodox confession as much as it implies a real profession of faith seen in a life of good works. So, what the Apostles set in terms of precedent for us is that if you are a baptized and generally repentant Christian, you are most certainly welcome at the Table of our Lord.

What we have before us is not the Table of the Missouri Synod Lutherans or any other denomination but Christ’s Table. To assert otherwise is most assuredly to depart from apostolic practice and the outline of Scripture. This, of course, has implications.

At our church, no, ‘Oneness Pentecostals’ would not partake because they deny the faith “once for all delivered to the saints” in denying the Trinity as who God is. I’m not saying there are *no* standards (and reading that into what I’ve written above seems highly unreasonable), only that our standards out to be the norm as we see from Apostolic practice and the biblical design. The Apostles drew the line at fundamental Christian orthodoxy and not on matters secondary to the faithful.

I did not say that you believed or that all Lutherans believe in consubstantiation though clearly some have over the life of the Lutheran Church (*as if* today we can speak of *one* Lutheran Church). If you read what I wrote above carefully you will see that I made room for a Lutheran view in terms of sacramental union in accordance with the Lutheran confessions. Regardless, though, you still have yet to establish that ‘discerning the Body’ is a matter of viewing what happens in the sacrament rightly.

It is not universally held by all Christians that the Lutheran position correctly puts forward the right understanding of the words of institution. Though you are free to posit such a view is obvious and welcome in the spirit of Christian freedom. But, Lutheran churches have no right to close communion for anyone who disagrees within the sphere of Christian biblical/creedal orthodoxy. As I explain above, for one thing, the Church prior to Luther did not always view it the same way as Lutherans posit the matter especially when we look at the period of time when the Church herself was undivided and not fraught with the later errors of Medieval Catholicism. You can’t establish anything but a variety of views concerning the Supper and what happens therein in the first six hundred years of Christianity (as the later debates of Ratramnus and Radbertus and the advent of transubstantiation in 1215 AD make quite clear) and to pretend that your relatively new view is THE view that all Christians must subscribe to prior to communing with you and your churches is just without biblical or historical support.

Unity is based at least in part on a common confession, but the common confession is the Gospel “once for all delivered to the saints” and not the Lutheran understanding of the sacraments or other matters which are clearly secondary in nature. To say otherwise or to equate your understanding with the Gospel is to disenfranchise the majority of the Christian witness and population over the last two thousand years since Missouri Synod and other Lutherans are quite clearly in the minority. You can’t go around pretending that other Christian brothers are not really Christian and thereby can’t partake with you when the reality of the matter is that non-Lutherans really are Christians and united to you and your Lutheran brothers by virtue of the blood of Christ through the work of the Holy Spirit at the direction of God the Father and not united via some trifling understanding of this that or the other in regards to what happens to bread and wine in the sacrament when the ritual is performed.