Message Seven

The Lord’s Table and the Lord’s Supper

Scripture Reading: 1 Cor. 10:14-22; 11:17-34

1. The record regarding spiritual eating in the Bible is a strong indication that God intends to dispense Himself into us by the way of eating—Gen. 2:9, 16-17; Exo. 12:1-11; 16:14-15; Deut. 8:7-10; Rev. 2:7, 17; 3:20; 22:14:
   1. To eat is to contact things outside of us and to receive them into us, with the result that they eventually become our constitution—Gen. 2:16-17.
   2. Food is anything we take into us for our satisfaction; whatever we desire, hunger, and thirst after is the diet according to which our being has been constituted— Job 23:12b; Jer. 15:16; Num. 11:4-6.
   3. What a person eats gets into him and causes him to become an expression of that thing; this is based on the principle that eating is a fellowship, a participation—1 Cor. 10:16, 21.
   4. Eating is the way to experience God’s dispensing and to be mingled with Him for His expression—Gen. 1:26; 2:9.
   5. We are what we eat; therefore, if we eat God as our food, we will be one with God and even become God in life and in nature but not in the Godhead—John 6:32-33, 35, 41, 48, 50-51.
   6. We live according to that with which we are occupied and saturated; if we eat Christ and are saturated with Him as the life-giving Spirit, we shall live Christ— v. 57; Phil. 1:21a.
   7. The entire Christian life should be a feast, an enjoyment of Christ as our banquet—1 Cor. 5:7-8; 10:16-17:
      1. We should all eat the same spiritual food, not eating anything other than the Lord or enjoying anything in place of the Lord—vv. 3-4.
      2. Eating is related to enjoyment; if our enjoyment is something other than Christ, then in the sight of God that enjoyment is idolatry—vv. 7, 14, 22.
2. The emphasis of the Lord’s table is the fellowship of His blood and body, the participation in the Lord, the enjoyment of the Lord in mutuality, in fellowship—vv. 16-17, 21:
   1. The Lord has given Himself to us that we may partake of Him and enjoy Him by eating and drinking Him:
      1. The One who presents His body and blood to us is Christ as the all-inclusive Spirit—15:45b; 2 Cor. 3:17.
      2. This wonderful Christ is everything to us for our enjoyment; all that He is, is for our participation and enjoyment.
   2. “The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the fellowship of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the fellowship of the body of Christ?”—1 Cor. 10:16:
      1. Fellowship here refers to the believers’ communion in the joint participation in the blood and body of Christ.
      2. The fellowship makes us, the participants in the Lord’s blood and body, not only one with one another but also one with the Lord; we make ourselves identified with the Lord in the fellowship of His blood and body.
      3. In 1:9 the fellowship is the fellowship of the Son of God; in 10:16 the fellowship is the fellowship of His blood and body, indicating that He has been processed for our enjoyment.
   3. “Seeing that there is one bread, we who are many are one Body, for we all partake of the one bread”—v. 17:
      1. We are all one Body because we all partake of the one bread; our joint partaking of the one bread makes us all one.
      2. Our partaking of Christ makes us all His one Body; the very Christ of whom we all partake constitutes us His one Body.
   4. The table with the body and blood of Christ is the reality of Christ as the good land; whenever we come to the Lord’s table to enjoy Him as the all-inclusive One, in our experience we are in the good land enjoying the riches of the land.
   5. Our participation in the Lord’s table must be in the unique fellowship of His unique Body, without any division either in practice or in spirit.
3. The emphasis of the Lord’s supper is the remembrance of the Lord—11:24-25:
   1. At the Lord’s table we receive His body and blood for our enjoyment; at the Lord’s supper we give Him our remembrance for His enjoyment.
   2. Regarding the Lord’s table and the Lord’s supper, there is mutuality; the Lord’s table is for our enjoyment, and the Lord’s supper is for His enjoyment.
   3. The word unto in verses 24 and 25 implies a result—a continual remembrance of the Lord for His satisfaction.
   4. The real remembrance of the Lord is to eat the bread and drink the cup—vv. 24-25:
      1. The bread is of life, and the cup is of blessing— John 6:35; 1 Cor. 10:16.
      2. To eat the bread and drink the cup is to take in the redeeming Lord as our portion, our life and blessing; this is to remember Him in a genuine way.
   5. “As often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you declare the Lord’s death until He comes”—11:26:
      1. To take the Lord’s supper is not to remember the Lord’s death but to declare and display it.
      2. We should take the Lord’s supper unto the remembrance of Him by declaring His redeeming death until He comes back to set up God’s kingdom— Matt. 26:29.
      3. When we eat the Lord’s supper with a view to a continual remembrance of Him in His first and second comings, that supper becomes a satisfaction to Him in relation to the kingdom, God’s administration.
   6. In taking the Lord’s supper we must discern the Body to determine whether the bread on the table represents the unique mystical Body of Christ—1 Cor. 11:29.
   7. Eating the Lord’s supper should remind us to live a life in the church to bring in the kingdom for the satisfaction of the Lord Jesus—v. 26; Matt. 26:29.