By Mark Grace, CCCNZ Ambassador
1 Corinthians 11:28
Engari kia uiui te tangata ki a ia ano, ka kai ai i taua taro, ka inu ai i taua kapu.
Everyone ought to examine themselves before they eat of the bread and drink from the cup.
One of the things I’ve noticed about driving in Auckland is that you have to spend more time looking in the rearview mirror than you do in Feilding. To get where you are going, you need to be more aware of what’s behind you. In the same way, I don’t think we can fully see where Paul is going in verse 28 unless we see what’s in the rearview mirror.
“Examine yourselves,” he says. In light of what? Look in the rearview mirror. Verse 27 makes it clear: in light of the danger of eating the bread and drinking the wine in an unworthy manner.
What does 'in an unworthy manner' mean? Look in the rearview mirror again.
In verses 17-22, we see that an unworthy manner is a manner that denigrates Christ by humiliating the poor. It is eating communion in a way that mirrors the divisions of society.
Looking ahead again in verse 28, we see that Paul takes seriously the personal responsibility of examining ourselves in preparation for taking communion. At the same time, he does not diminish our corporate responsibility to examine ourselves as a community.
Communion is a time to reflect on our vertical relationship with God and our horizontal relationships with each other. Communion is a time when we reflect on the body and blood of Christ given for us as individuals and as a whole church community.
1 Corinthians 11:28 prompts us to examine ourselves and our contribution to the unity and health of our church families.
Let me invite you: when taking communion this Sunday, examine yourself in light of Jesus’s death and resurrection. But don't stop there—look at your church family around you. Are you loving them in a way that displays the unity won for us by the gospel?
