Real and More Real

We come now to the portion of our service where we join together at the Table of the Lord. The Bible tells us that when we joined together to worship God, even though we look around and see a gym, we are, in reality sitting in the throne room of God. For the past hour and a half we have been seated in the heavenly places with myriads and myriads of angels, elders, and saints. If you would like to read about what is happening all around you turn in your Bibles to Revelation chapters 4-6. Not only are we worshipping with saints who have gone before us to their rewards, we are also worshipping with all the saints who are currently worshipping in our time zones. So, those saints down the street who don't have their act quite as together as we do are probably seated right next to us in glory. We just can't see them because we are bound to this earth.

The Bible also tells us that the meal we are about to partake of is the same kind of thing. We see, feel, and taste normal bread, but it is not simply bread, it is also the body of Christ. And the wine we are about to drink is physical wine, but it is also the blood of Jesus poured out for you to save you from your sins.

The Bible also tells us that in the same way that bread and wine does something in our body to keep it going and growing, so too, does this particular bread and wine work in our hearts to cause the real us to go and grow. This is said to be a spiritual meal. We who worship Jesus as Lord are spiritual beings. So, this meal, the table of the Lord, is a spiritual meal as well as a physical meal. This is why we have the warning in the bulletin about who may and who may not partake with us. If you don't believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you eat his body and drink his blood while living in rebellion, you eat and drink judgment on yourselves.

So if you have believed on the Lord Jesus Christ and have been baptized into his body, please join with us as we celebrate at the Lord's Table with God himself and with the angels, and the rest of the saints.

Father, God of joy and God of strength, thank you for giving us this table. We come to you remembering the great gift you gave us when Jesus died in our place. We thank you for the bread which is his body, broken for us. We thank you for the wine, which is his blood, poured out on our behalf. We thank you that Jesus rose from the dead and now sits at your right hand interceding for us. And we thank you for the Spirit which lives in us, empowering us to live godly lives. We praise you and thank you in Jesus' Name, Amen.