Celebrating Reformation Sunday

The last Sunday in October is known as Reformation Sunday. It celebrates the beginning of the Protestant Reformation when Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg on October 31, 1517.

Reformation Sunday is a time for us to celebrate how God acted in history to preserve the gospel for us today. We are beneficiaries of what God did through men like Luther. Let us never forget to study Church History, thank God for his mercies to us, and learn the lessons of God’s providential dealings with his people.


Here are some practical ways to celebrate the Reformation this upcoming Lord’s Day.

1.     Prayerfully read and study the Scriptures addressing Reformation themes. For example, read about the authority of Scripture (2 Timothy 3:16-17), salvation by grace (Ephesians 2:1-10), and justification by faith alone (Romans 3-4).

2.     Digest a biography about one of the Reformers. A good biography on Martin Luther is Roland Bainton’s Here I Stand. T.H.L. Parker has a good book on Calvin’s life and legacy.

3.     Watch a movie about Luther and the Reformation. There is an older version and a newer one. This can be a great family activity! 

4.     Include your children by reading to them an age-appropriate version of the Reformation and its heroes. Reformation Heritage has put out some great books for kids.

5.      Visit Ligonier Ministries and listen to excellent sermons and lectures on the history and theology of the Reformation. They are completely free!

I hope you have a wonderful Reformation Day with your family!

What Legalism Is and Isn't

Christians are quick to charge others with legalism without clarifying what they mean. The charge of legalism, however, is a serious accusation and shouldn’t be thrown around lightly. We need to be more careful about calling other believers “legalistic" because what we call legalism isn't always so.

What Legalism Is

Legalism comes in many different forms. One form is what we might call full-blown legalism. This is the teaching that sinners can be saved by good works. Whether it’s completely by good works or a mixture of faith and good works, it doesn’t matter. Salvation is by God’s grace alone, and to teach otherwise is legalism. This form of legalism is pretty rare, though it’s certainly a problem in sections of the church today.

Another form of legalism, which is much more common, is the idea that Christians must obey manmade rules and regulations in addition to the commands of Scripture. Sometimes this comes in the form of arbitrary rules about makeup, clothing, and the length of your hair. At other times, these extrabiblical requirements concern holy days and dietary laws. The point is, no one other than Christ speaking in the Scriptures has the authority to bind your conscience. It is legalistic to make up rules for all Christians without any biblical warrant.

The most common legalism is best described as an attitude. We are guilty of legalism when we fall into the trap of thinking that God loves us more when we perform better. There more quiet times, the more Bible reading, the more prayer time, the better God loves me. That’s legalism, and that’s deadly. We must never forget that we are forever accepted in God’s sight because of what Jesus did for us on the cross once and for all. Christ’s finished sacrifice reconciles us to God and forever absolves us of all our shortcomings. Even though we know this in our heads, we have trouble believing this in our hearts. So we need to remind ourselves every day that we are not accepted by God on the basis of what we do. We are secure in our Father’s love because of who he is and because of what Christ has accomplished in our behalf.

What Legalism Isn’t

It is also important to understand what legalism isn’t. First of all, the desire to obey God is not legalism. If we are truly born again, we want to obey God because we want to please our heavenly Father. We are not trying to earn our salvation; we are expressing our gratitude for the salvation he has freely given us in his Son.

Secondly, the attempt to follow God’s law is not legalism. Believers should delight in the law of the Lord and meditate on it day and night. We aren’t using the law as the basis of our justification. The law is holy, righteous, and good. It sets before us a perfect pattern of God’s righteousness. The law reflects the righteousness and generosity of the God who gave it. So we cherish the law and delight to obey it out of love for Christ. The Reformers called this “the third use of the law” or the “regulative use of the law.”

Thirdly, striving to be careful and exact in our obedience is not legalism. Some Christians believe that we should simply “feel the Spirit” and do whatever subjective impulses come to mind. Whatever we feel is right is what we should do. This subjectivism is totally foreign to the Bible. True Christians want to do exactly what God says. We want to do it right away. We want to do it as he commanded.

Much more could be said on this topic, but we should seek to study the Scriptures on the subject and not throw around this serious charge without knowing exactly what we mean by the term.

45 Ways to Pray for Your Pastor

Christians should pray for their pastors on a regular basis. But do we know how to pray for our ministers? I offer this list of 45 items as a guide of biblically-informed prayers. Obviously, this list is suggestive, not exhaustive.  

1. Pray that your pastor continually abides in Jesus (John 15:5).
2. Pray that your pastor engages often in the duty and delight of private prayer (Mark 1:35; Matthew 6:6).
3. Pray that your pastor loves God above all other loves (Matthew 22:37) and that he loves people (Matthew 22:39).
4. Pray that your pastor loves his wife as Christ loves the Church (Ephesians 5:25) and that he raises his children in the discipline and admonition of the Lord (Ephesians 6:4).
5. Pray that your pastor manages his own household well, with all dignity keeping his children submissive (1 Timothy 3:4).
6. Pray that your pastor commands his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice (Genesis 18:19).
7. Pray that your pastor and his household would serve the Lord (Joshua 24:15).
8. Pray that your pastor is delivered from worldliness (James 4:4; 1 John 2:15-17) and especially the love of money (Matthew 6:24; 1 Timothy 6:10).
9. Pray that your pastor pursues sanctification and abstains from sexual immorality (1 Thessalonians 4:3).
10. Pray that your pastor exercises self-control over his tongue, his temper, and his appetite (1 Timothy 3:3; Galatians 5:22-23).
11. Pray that your pastor makes the best use of the time God has given him (Ephesians 5:16).
12. Pray that your pastor puts on the whole armor of God so that he might stand against the schemes of the devil (Ephesians 6:10-20).
13. Pray that your pastor burns (gospel heat) and shines (gospel light) the truth of God (John 5:35).
14. Pray that your pastor studies the Law of the Lord, does it, and teaches it to God’s people (Ezra 7:10).
15. Pray that your pastor studies God’s Word so that he might handle it rightly (2 Timothy 2:15).
16. Pray that your pastor keeps a close watch on himself (life) and the teaching (doctrine) so that he might save both himself and his hearers (1 Timothy 4:16).
17. Pray that your pastor teaches what accords with sound doctrine (Titus 2:1).
18. Pray that your pastor speaks only what God says (1 Kings 22:14).
19. Pray that your pastor prioritizes prayer and the ministry of the Word (Acts 6:4).
20. Pray that your pastor preaches Christ and him crucified in the power of the Holy Spirit, not in the wisdom of men (1 Corinthians 2:2).
21. Pray that your pastor proclaims the gospel of the grace of God (Acts 20:24).
22. Pray that your pastor proclaims the whole counsel of God (Acts 20:27).
23. Pray that your pastor faithfully shepherds the sheep who have been purchased by the blood of Christ (Acts 20:28).
24. Pray that your pastor does not lead by domineering over the flock but by serving as a good example (1 Peter 5:3).
25. Pray that your pastor gives a good account of the souls entrusted to his care on Judgment Day (Hebrews 13:17).
26. Pray that your pastor speaks to please God, not men (1 Thessalonians 2:4; Galatians 1:10).
27. Pray that your pastor preaches the Word of God, in season and out of season, reproving, rebuking, and exhorting with complete patience and teaching (2 Timothy 4:2).
28. Pray that your pastor effectively protects the sheep from wolves (false teachers) (Acts 20:29-30).
29. Pray that your pastor is able to refute those who contradict sound teaching (Titus 1:9).
30. Pray that your pastor does the work of an evangelist (2 Timothy 4:5).
31. Pray that your pastor is willing to endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they may obtain salvation (2 Timothy 2:10).
32. Pray that your pastor keeps his ministry faithful to God’s Word for the sake of the faith of God’s elect (Titus 1:1).
33. Pray that your pastor proclaims the truth that accords with godliness (both right doctrine and right living) (Titus 1:1).
34. Pray that your pastor shares both the gospel and his life with the congregation (1 Thessalonians 2:8).
35. Pray that your pastor is like a gentle mother nursing her children (1 Thessalonians 2:7) and like a faithful father exhorting his sons (1 Thessalonians 2:11-12).
36. Pray that your pastor practices hospitality (1 Timothy 3:2; Titus 1:8).
37. Pray that your pastor is strengthened by God’s grace (2 Timothy 2:1) to disciple faithful men who will disciple others (2 Timothy 2:2).
38. Pray that your pastor is prepared to share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus (2 Timothy 2:3).
39. Pray that your pastor avoids getting entangled in civilian pursuits (distractions) and keeps his focus on pleasing God (2 Timothy 2:4).
40. Pray that your pastor is a hardworking farmer who plants seeds and waters them (2 Timothy 2:6).
41. Pray that your pastor would gladly spend and be spent for souls (2 Corinthians 13:15).
42. Pray that your pastor’s planting and watering is blessed with God-given growth (1 Corinthians 3:7).   
43. Pray that your pastor ministers in light of eternity, seeking the things that are above (Colossians 3:1-2) and keeping in mind that all people will soon die and face judgment (Hebrews 9:27).
44. Pray that your pastor aims to present everyone mature in Christ (Colossians 1:28).
45. Pray that your pastor dies to himself so that he might bear fruit for God (John 12:24).

Declension in Love

Yesterday I shared some thoughts from the first chapter of Octavius Winslow’s Personal Declension and Revival of Religion in the Soul. In the second chapter Winslow narrows his focus to address a declension in the grace of love. It is possible for our love to grow cold (Matthew 24:12), and since love is “the spring-head of all the kindred graces,” it only makes sense to explain how we tend to abandon our first love (Revelation 2:4).

 

Winslow begins this chapter by explaining the importance of love in the Christian life. Love to God is “the primary and grand requirement of the Divine Law.” Jesus teaches that loving God with the whole being is the greatest commandment in the Law (Matthew 22:37-38). God is wise and good to require us to love him: “His wisdom saw the necessity of having one center of supreme and adoring affection, and one object of supreme and spiritual worship to angels and to men. His goodness suggested that that center and that that object should be himself, the perfection of infinite excellence, the fountain of infinite good.”

 

          In addition to being the essence of God’s Law, love is “the great influential principle of the Gospel.” God’s love is the first cause of the plan of salvation (John 3:16), and the motive of our religion is love: “the love of Christ controls us” (2 Corinthians 5:14). Winslow explains why this is the case: “Apart from the constraining influence of Christ’s love in the heart, there cannot possibly be a willing, prompt, and holy obedience to his commandments.”

         

          God’s love assures us of our adoption as his children. “The relation in which the believer stands to God, under the new covenant dispensation, is not that of a slave to his master, but of a child to its father.” He continues: “A holy, self-denying, cross-bearing life, is not the drudgery of a slave, but the filial, loving obedience of a child: it springs from love to the person, and gratitude for the work of Jesus; and is the blessed effort of the spirit of adoption in the heart.”

 

          Love is an active grace in the believer’s life. Faith works by love (Galatians 5:6). Love labors (Hebrews 6:10). “There is nothing indolent in the nature of true love; it is not an inert, sluggish principle: where it dwells in the heart in a healthy and vigorous state, it constrains the believer to live not to himself, but unto Him who loved and gave Himself for him; it awakes the soul to watchfulness, sets it upon the work of frequent self-examination, influences it to prayer, daily walking in his precepts, acts of kindness, benevolence, and charity, all springing from love to God, and flowing in a channel of love to man."

         

          Love is an essential part of the Christian’s armor. We are to put on the breastplate of faith and love (1 Thessalonians 5:8). “Who can overcome a child of God whose heart is overflowing with Divine love? What enemy can prevail against him thus armed?”

 

          Winslow reminds us that love exceeds all the other Christian virtues because “love is immortal; it is the grace of the Spirit that will never die.” Drawing on 1 Corinthians 13:13, he observes, “The day is not far distant, when faith will be turned to sight, and hope will be lost in full fruition, but love will never die; it will live on, and expand the heart, and tune the lip, and inspire the song, through the unceasing ages of eternity.”

 

          Before moving to the main theme of this second chapter, which is the declension of love in the soul of the Christian, Winslow invites us to consider our first encounter with the love of Christ. “For one moment let the Christian reader call to mind the period and circumstances of his first espousals to Jesus.” Let us remember that “blissful moment” when we were able to say, “I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine!” Recalling our first love awakens a desire to recapture the sweetness of the love of Christ in our hearts.

 

          Since it is true that “the grace of love in a child of God may greatly and sadly decline,” Winslow gives us characteristics of love’s decline in the soul.

 

Love has declined when we think of God and desire him less than before. “If there is coldness in the affections, if the mind grows earthly, carnal and selfish, dark and gloomy shadows will gather round the character and glory of God. He will become less an object of supreme attachment, unmingled delight, adoring contemplation, and filial trust.” If we sense that we think of God and desire God less than before, we must remember that God hasn’t changed. We have changed.  


Love has declined when we do not approach God as our loving Father as we did before. “The sweet confidence and simple trust of the child is lost.” “The tender, loving, childlike spirit, that marked the walk of the believer in the days of his espousals, when no object was so glorious to him as God, no being so loved as his heavenly Father, no spot so sacred as the throne of communion, no theme so sweet as his free grace of adoption, has in a great degree departed; and distrust, and legal fears, and bondage of spirit, have succeeded it.”


Love has declined when we misinterpret God’s acts of providence as if he is against us. “The mark of a vigorous love to God is when the soul justifies God in all his wise and gracious dealings with it; rebels not, murmurs not, repines not, but meekly and silently acquiesces in the dispensation, but it never so trying.”


Love has declined when there is little desire to spend time with God and when we do spend time, we do so more out of a sense of duty than delight. If we truly love the Lord, we want to commune with him in secret prayer. We desire to talk to him and experience the blessing of his presence. A Christian “cannot live in the neglect of constant, secret, and close fellowship with his God, his best and most faithful Friend.”


Love has declined when there is less tenderness and sensitivity in our walk with God. The lover of God fears offending his Father and dreads to slight his Friend. Nothing is sweeter to him than the nearness of God.


Love has declined when Christ is perceived as less glorious to the eye and less precious to the heart. “When there is but little dealing with his atoning blood, leaning upon his righteousness, drawing from his fullness, and bearing daily the cross of Christ, the love of a believer waxeth cold.”


Love has declined when we love less the people of God. If we love God, we love all who bear his image. 1 John makes it clear that if we say that we love God and hate our brother, we are liars (5:20-21). “If we love not the visible resemblance, how can we love the invisible Archetype?”


Love has declined when we desire less and less to advance his kingdom and glorify his name. “A true, spiritual, and lively interest in the increase of Christ’s kingdom, in the diffusion of his truth, the deepening of holiness in the church, the conversion of sinners, will invariably decline with the declension of the love to God.”

 

After sharing the characteristics of a loss of love for God, Winslow then moves to the causes of love’s declension.

 

Love for the World
“Love to God will expel love to the world; love to the world will deaden the soul’s love to God.” See James 4:4 and 1 John 2:15-17 for the biblical teaching on the danger of loving the world. Winslow warns, “No Christian man can maintain his spirituality unimpaired, his love uninjured, his robe unspotted, his walk irreproachable, who secretly admits the world to his heart.”  


Making Idols of God’s Creation
When we worship and serve the creature rather than the Creator, we will always lose our love for God. He doesn’t want to be second place to anything or anyone. Winslow warns about the grave danger of transferring our love to objects inferior to the Lord. Our idols never satisfy and always disappoint.


Misunderstanding God’s Dealings
When bad things happen in our lives, and we assume that God is out to get us or that he is against us, we will lose our love for God. Acknowledging God’s smiling face behind all his bitter providences is the key to maintaining a holy love for God. In the life of God’s children, bad things are the fruits of his love, not the result of his judgment.


Finally, in a manner similar to the counsel of chapter one, Winslow tells us what to do in order to return to our first love.
 
You need to find out the cause of your loss of love for God and do something about it. “Love to God is a tender flower; it is a sensitive plant, soon and easily crushed; perpetual vigilance is needed to preserve it in a healthy, growing state.” Consider the possibility that one of the three causes mentioned above is the root of the problem. Clear all obstacles to loving God supremely.


Draw continually from the fountain of God’s love. God’s love comes first. “We love him because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19). “O heart-melting truth! The love of God to us when yet we were sinners, who can unfold it? What mortal tongue can describe it?” As the sun is always shining, so God is always loving; yet we must stay in the sunshine of God’s love. We must bask in the glory of his unending love to us in Christ. “Seek to be filled with it, that you may know the love of Christ which passes knowledge, and that your heart in return may ascend in a flame of love to God.”

 

Deal much and closely with a crucified Savior. “Here is the grand secret of a constant ascending of the affections to God. If thou dost find it difficult to comprehend the love of God towards thee, read it in the cross of his dear Son.” “Deal upon this amazing fact; drink into this precious truth; muse upon it, ponder it, search into it, pray over it, until your heart is melted down, and broken, and overwhelmed with God’s wondrous love to you, in the gift of Jesus.” “Whenever thou detectest a waning of love, a reluctance to take up the daily cross, a shrinking from the precept, go immediately to Calvary; go simply and directly to Jesus; get thy heart warmed with ardent love by contemplating him upon the cross, and soon will the frosts that gather round it melt away, the congealed current shall begin to flow, and the ‘chariots of Amminadib’ shall bear thy soul away to communion and fellowship with God.”


Do not fail to honor the Holy Spirit in the great work of personal revival. “It is he that will fan to a flame thy waning love, by unfolding the cross, and directing your heart into the love of God.”


Remember that though your love has grown cold, the love of your God and Father towards you has undergone no change. “Retrace thy steps and return again to God.”

Personal Renewal

         In addition to reading the Scriptures, I find the reading of solid devotional literature to be a tremendous benefit to my soul. Since most of the best works of Reformed devotion were written in previous generations, this usually means that I turn to the old books. I’m currently reading OctaviusWinslow’s Personal Declension and theRevival of Religion in the Soul. Winslow was a 19^th century minister who preached at the opening of Spurgeon’s Metropolitan Tabernacle. His writing is profoundly theological, deeply heart-searching, and immensely practical.

I have just completed the first chapter of the book entitled, “Incipient Declension,” which is a general treatment of the problem of backsliding in the Christian life. Winslow calls this “soul declension.” Sadly, this spiritual regression usually happens “by a process of slow and gradual steps,” and may be undetected even by the person who is experiencing it.

Winslow doesn’t want to be misunderstood about the nature of this backsliding. He doesn’t believe that true grace may be lost. He affirms “the indestructible nature of true grace.” However, he does teach that we may lose “the health, vigor, and exercise of that grace in the soul.” True Christians may lose an enjoyment of all their privileges in Jesus Christ.

What is especially alarming about this first chapter is that we may be backsliding in our spiritual lives when all appears to be well. The Christian may be spiritually declining while still affirming the same theological truths. “The Word of God shall be assented to; but as the instrument of sanctification, of abasement, of nourishment, the believer may be an utter stranger to it; yea, he must necessarily be so, while this process of secret declension is going forward in his soul.”

Since we must know the problem before we look for a solution and probe the depth of the wound before we find the cure, Winslow spends time identifying the characteristics of the person who is backsliding.

Winslow places his finger on the central danger: “when there is more knowledge of the truth than experience of its power—more light in the understanding than grace in the affections.”

In point of fact, we may make a diligent use of the means of grace (the Word, Sacraments, and Prayer) without a true spiritual vitality. This formalism can serve as “the lullaby of the soul” which puts us to sleep, making us unaware of the true nature of our spiritual state. “Rocked to sleep by a mere formal religion, the believer is beguiled into the delusion that his heart is right, and his soul prosperous in the sight of God.”

“When a professing man can proceed with his accustomed religious duties, strictly, regularly, formally, and yet experience no enjoyment of God in them, no filial nearness, no brokenness and tenderness, and no consciousness of sweet return, he may suspect that his soul is in a state of secret and incipient backsliding from God.”

We may discover this coldness in our reading of the Scriptures. When we can read the Scriptures in a purely literary manner without relishing the spiritual truth contained in them, we may be sure that we have fallen into this unfortunate condition. “Nothing perhaps more strongly indicates the tone of a believer’s spirituality, than the light in which the Scriptures are regarded by him.”

Prayer becomes formal and dead when there is incipient declension of the soul. We lack an experience of the nearness of God and a taste of the sweetness of his presence.

Even more telling is the way that we relate to Christ. When we have “few dealings with Christ” we have regressed in our spiritual life. “We would be willing to test a man’s religion, both as to its nature and its growth, by his reply to the question, ‘What think ye of Christ?’

Here is where Winslow really shines. He explains how the essence of the Christian life is having Christ in the heart. He is the substance of our life, the source of our sanctification, the spring of our joys, the theme of our song, and “the one glorious object on which thine eye is ever resting.” We must “raise and fix the eye of faith simply and solely upon Jesus” if we are to return to spiritual health.

Before moving on to solutions, Winslow identifies another sign of spiritual declension. It is “an uncharitable walk towards other Christians.” He makes this moving statement: “The more entirely the heart is occupied with the love of Christ, the less room there will be for uncharitableness towards his saints.” We ought to love all those who love the Lord Jesus because we all are members of the same family.  

Winslow closes the first chapter with six practical exhortations for spiritual renewal. These are really helpful.

1. Be honest about the real state of your soul before God. If we ever want to return to the Lord, we must acknowledge our sin and guilt. Above all else, we must be honest with ourselves because the danger of self-deception is great. Seek to know where you stand with God, and ask the Holy Spirit to lay bare the secret sins of your soul.
    
2. Discover the root cause of your backsliding. What is feeding and at the root of your Christianity? What is the problem at the core of your declension? It may be “some spiritual duty secretly neglected, or some known sin secretly indulged.” “Your soul has lost ground; the Divine life has declined; the fruit of the Spirit has withered; the heart has lost its softness, the conscience its tenderness, the mind its seclusion, the throne of grace its sweetness, the cross of Jesus its attraction.”
    
3. Take the cause of your backsliding and lay it before the Lord in prayer. “This is just what God loves—an open, ingenuous confession of sin.” Admit your problem; ask for the Lord’s help. He alone can grant you repentance and revival.
    
4. Take action to put to death the cause of your backsliding. Drive the Sword of God’s Spirit into the root of your sin. Persevere in attacking the lust of your flesh and the deadness of your soul. Consider the principle upon which you were acting in sin and strike at that. Is it love of self? Kill it. Is it love of the world? Kill it. Is it a sin secretly indulged? Kill it. God will bless and work through the self-efforts of the believer to put sin away. We can kill our sin because our sin was killed in Jesus on the cross.
    
5. Enlarge your mind and heart with a greater love and enjoyment of Christ. Our minds must be “pre-occupied by Christ.” Love for Christ expels love for the world. When we enjoy the sweet fellowship and unparalleled glory of Jesus, we are able to resist the cancers of the soul.
    
6. Seek the filling of the Holy Spirit. Winslow calls this “the great secret of all personal revival.” He speaks of the need for “a fresh baptism of the Holy Ghost.” Winslow is not denying that the Holy Spirit permanently indwells all believers, but he is acknowledging a spiritual reality that is known in Christian experience. There are degrees of the influence and power of the Spirit in our lives. We must seek the Spirit earnestly, perseveringly, and believingly.
    

Finally, Winslow points out that God often uses a “deep trial, in order to recover you from your soul declension.” In order to get our attention, God graciously brings into our lives a bitter stroke of his providence so that he might win back our hearts. Although we do not want to suffer, we will rejoice if the trial is used by God to restore us to our former joy.

“O Lord, revive thy work! Quicken me, O Lord! Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation!”

First Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Waynesboro, Georgia

I am now the Pastor of First Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Waynesboro, Georgia.

First Presbyterian Church has a new church website available here. Our YouTube channel is available here.  

I should return to my devotional blog before too long.

Church Membership and Communion

When I invite Christians to partake of the Lord’s Supper at Grace Presbyterian Church, why do I invite baptized believers in Jesus Christ who are members in good standing of an evangelical church? Why is church membership required for Communion? Why is it not enough to be a Christian?

          Church membership is required because the Lord’s Supper is a covenant meal for God’s covenant people. Jesus instituted the Lord’s Supper in place of the Passover (Luke 22:7-8, 11, 13, 15), which was the covenant meal of the old covenant (Exodus 12:43-51). Jesus referred to the cup as “the new covenant in his blood” (Luke 22:20). And when Jesus instituted the Supper, he gave it to his disciples in particular, not the world in general. It was a fellowship meal for his faithful followers.

          When we read the book of Acts, which chronicles the growth and spread of the early Christian Church, we can see that the Lord’s Supper is celebrated by members of the church. For example, in Acts 2:41 we read that God saved 3,000 people on the Day of Pentecost. It was only after they received the word and were baptized that they participated in the breaking of the bread, which refers to the Lord’s Supper (2:42). Later in Luke’s history, we see that the early Church celebrated Communion on the first day of the week when they were gathered together as a church (20:7).

          When Paul writes to the Corinthian Christians, he makes it clear that the Lord’s Supper is observed in the context of the local church gathering together as a church (1 Corinthians 1:2; 11:17, 18, 20, 23, 33). The Lord’s Supper is celebrated as a communal meal in the context of the gathered church. It is not only a time for the individual Christian to remember Christ’s death (1 Corinthians 11:24-25), but it is also a time for Christians to come together and realize that we are one body (1 Corinthians 10:16-17).  

          The other important consideration is the warning of 1 Corinthians 11:27-29: “Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself.” The Lord’s Supper is a means of grace for believers, but it can be a means of judgment for unbelievers. We are told that we are not to eat with one who calls himself a brother and lives a life of unrepentant sin (1 Corinthians 5:11). Instead, we are supposed to enjoy fellowship with those who are members in good standing of the community established by Christ.

          The church membership requirement is unpopular in our culture. We live in a time of expressive individualism. We live in a day where the importance of the church is minimalized and marginalized. Sometimes people are confused by this requirement on account of the way many churches handle membership. But we must remain faithful to Christ’s instructions that his covenant meal is for his covenant people. We are, after all, communing with Christ and with each other. Let us do so in sincerity and truth.