– 13 Min Read
Introduction
Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. 15 I speak as to prudent people. You judge what I say. 16 Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ? 17 Since there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread.
– 1 Corinthians 10:14-17 (LSB)
Should anyone be able to take the Lord’s Supper? This is a question that has perplexed most churches and Christian theologians throughout church history. The immediate concern is that we make a mockery of the Supper by having a free-for-all at the Table. Can Christians and nonbelievers partake? What about baptized and nonbaptized? What age; children or infants?
The other concern is that we prohibit someone from taking the Supper who genuinely has a right to. Does the Bible allow us to bar sincere believers from Communion even though they may not be baptized or have yet joined the church? Again, these are things we need to think about.
I am not sure if I will be able to answer every question and argument, but I hope to at least shed some helpful light on the subject.
“Family Meal”
We need to remember the context in which the Lord’s Supper was instituted. Jesus was with His disciples in the upper room celebrating the Passover meal when He gave this New Covenant ordinance (Matt. 26:17-28; Mark 14:12-24; Luke 22:7-20). The Passover is a family meal. All of the family (Exod. 12:3-4) was to sit down and eat the whole roasted lamb (Exod. 12:8-9) at twilight (Exod. 12:6).
It is important to note that it was a meal that was given to the Israelites and not to the Egyptians. This is exclusively a covenant family meal and is not to be shared with those outside of the covenant family.
This is also how it is with the Lord’s Supper. It is a meal that was established in the context of the Passover and its pattern is perpetual. Only disciples of Jesus are allowed to come and partake of the Lord’s Table. During the Supper, Jesus specifically said “This is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins” (Matt. 26:28; Mark 14:24; 1 Cor. 11:25).
A fundamental feature of the Lord’s Supper is that it is a part of the New Covenant and if it is a part of the New Covenant then it is only for those who are in the New Covenant. To put it another way, it is given to the “many”, those whose sins are forgiven.
How can one partake of an ordinance of a covenant they do not belong to? You could say, “They cannot; at least not properly.” If the wine represents the blood of Christ, which was spilled for the forgiveness of sins, then how can an unbeliever, whose sins have not been forgiven, have any right to take it? The symbol falls flat and has no real meaning if unbelievers are permitted to take it. This may seem like I am fighting an argument no one is offering, but this is important to establish for later.
Paul tells the Corinthians that some of them are getting sick and are dying because of how they are “not discerning the body rightly,” and by doing this they are “sinning against the body and blood of Jesus.“
Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner, shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord. 28 But a man must test himself, and in so doing he is to eat of the bread and drink of the cup. 29 For he who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgment to himself if he does not judge the body rightly. 30 For this reason many among you are weak and sick, and a number sleep.
– 1 Corinthians 11:27-30 (LSB)
I take this to be speaking of believers doing this and not unbelievers, however, there is a principle we can draw from this. Unbelievers cannot discern anything about Christ nor can they love the body of believers that make up the church [1]. It only makes sense that believers alone have the privilege and right to come and partake of the Lord’s Supper. This would automatically rule out the paedocommunion position; for infants cannot discern the body. The Lord’s Supper is for believers only.
“All ignorant and ungodly persons, as they are unfit to enjoy communion with Christ, so are they unworthy of the Lord’s table, and cannot, without great sin against him, while they remain such, partake of these holy mysteries, or be admitted thereunto; yea, whosoever shall receive unworthily, are guilty of the body and blood of the Lord, eating and drinking judgment to themselves. (2 Cor. 6:14–15; 1 Cor. 11:29; Matt. 7:6)”
– 2LCF: Article XXX, Paragraph 8
“Who Is In The Family?”
The next question is, “Who is in the family?” This is where we will find great disagreement. Above when I said that only members of the New Covenant should be participating in the signs, (ordinances), of the New Covenant, the Presbyterians would give a hearty, “Amen!” It is here, where they will get off at the nearest exit because Baptists and Presbyterians disagree over who belongs in the New Covenant. Children who do not believe in Jesus, who are not united to Him, who do not have Christ as their Mediator, are not a part of the New Covenant (1 Tim. 2:5; Heb. 8:6-13; 9:13-22; 12:18-24). This is not restricted to children but is true for all people.
The New Testament tells us how one is visibly recognized as someone who belongs to the New Covenant family, and it is by baptism (Acts 2:38-41; 8:12-13, 38; 9:18; 10:48; 16:33; 18:8; 19:3-5). Baptism is how one visibly enters the family, (the local church). Baptists have historically affirmed that no one has the right to the Table unless they have first been baptized [2].
Q. 103: Who are the proper subjects of this ordinance [the Lord’s Supper]?
– The Baptist Catechism
A. They who have been baptized upon a personal profession of their faith in Jesus Christ, and repentance from dead works. (Acts 2:41-42)
Now, we must remember the language we are using here. We are not saying that just because someone is baptized they are a part of the New Covenant. Just because someone is baptized does not necessarily mean that they are a true believer. Plenty of unbelievers are baptized and will be baptized in churches. Only those who have “God’s Law written on their hearts,” who personally “know God” and have “their sins forgiven” are a part of the New Covenant family.
“Behold, days are coming,” declares Yahweh, “when I will cut a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, 32 not like the covenant which I cut with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, but I was a husband to them,” declares Yahweh. 33 “But this is the covenant which I will cut with the house of Israel after those days,” declares Yahweh: “I will put My law within them, and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. 34 And they will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, ‘Know Yahweh,’ for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,” declares Yahweh, “for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.”
– Jeremiah 31:31-34 (LSB)
That part where God says that He “will put [His] law within them, and on their heart [He] will write it” is a very important part. This is another objective fruit for us to visibly see. Baptism is visible and necessary for a Christian to do before they can identify with the church. For if they will not identify with Christ, how can the church receive them as a disciple of Christ? But once this has happened and they have entered into a covenant community of other Christians, they will be proven by their fruit.
Jesus explained to His disciples how to tell good trees from bad trees (Luke 6:43-45) and the apostle Paul tells us what to do once we have identified the bad ones who found their way into the church.
I wrote you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people; 10 I did not at all mean with the sexually immoral people of this world, or with the greedy and swindlers, or with idolaters, for then you would have to go out of the world. 11 But now I am writing to you not to associate with any so-called brother if he is a sexually immoral person, or greedy, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or a swindler—not even to eat with such a one. 12 For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Are you not to judge those who are within the church? 13 But those who are outside, God will judge. Remove the wicked man from among yourselves.
– 1 Corinthians 5:9-13 (LSB)
Paul tells the Corinthian church to “not even eat with” someone who claims to be a Christian and lives like an unbeliever. The “so-called brother” who brings reproach upon the church and Christ’s name by his unrepentant, public sinfulness, is not to be associated with. These are certainly people who were baptized, added to the number of the Corinthian church, and were considered brothers and sisters in Christ. By their unbroken pattern of sinfulness, they blaspheme the God they claim to serve and therefore should be barred from the Lord’s Table. We are not even to eat with such a person.
As we collect all the biblical data, we see that those who are a part of the family are those who have been baptized and walk in the newness of life. They have truly been washed clean by the blood of Jesus, were baptized, and they bear this reality and the New Covenant sign visibly for others to see (John 13:5-10; Rom. 6:1-13; 1 Peter 3:21-22). They are recognizable to the Christian eye. They are real Christians. This is who the Lord’s Supper is for, those who truly belong to the family.
“Self-Made Orphans”
Covenant Renewal Worship is something that is largely ignored, but it is a repeated theme of the Bible as we have already discussed. The people whom God has made a covenant with, come together and participate in the ordinances of worship God prescribed and gave to them. The Lord’s Supper is no different. We come together “as often as we meet” (1 Cor. 11:25-26) and we worship by renewing our commitment to Christ in taking the bread and wine as symbols of His body and blood.
But what is so special about the Lord’s Supper is that it is a form of worship that you cannot do on your own. You have to come and be a part of the local assembly, a church.
Since there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread.
– 1 Corinthians 10:17 (LSB)
See, there is no such thing as a rogue Christian taking the Lord’s Supper as they wish. They must be in covenant community with a local body of other Christians. This is the only way to partake of the Lord’s Supper; with other Christians. And this is consistent with how our Lord instituted it; is it not? He supped with His disciples. Bobby Jamieson puts it this way;
“Therefore the Lord’s Supper is the place where inclusion in and exclusion from the church happens. To be admitted to church membership is to be admitted to regular participation in the Lord’s Supper. Church membership simply is regular admission to the Table. Church members are those who are authorized by the church to regularly partake, and who in fact do.”
– Bobby Jamieson [3]
The Lord’s Supper is an ordinance that brings many together to make them one (1 Cor. 10:17) and by doing that it necessitates church membership. Those who claim to not “believe in church membership” and refuse to join a church, are forfeiting their right to partake of the Lord’s Supper. These people instead want to establish their own set of rules of how they will “do church,” and how they will “operate in the family,” all while never being a part of the family. They instead, are self-made orphans.
Conclusion
The Lord’s Supper is for the family. When the church comes together on the Lord’s Day and feasts together with the bread and wine they are proclaiming the Lord’s death until He comes (1 Cor. 11:26) and they are renewing their commitment to the Lord as one united body (1 Cor. 10:17). They are becoming what Jesus prayed for; “that they may be one, just as We are one” (John 17:11, 22). The keyword is the word “together.” The Lord’s Supper happens when the local church assembles; when the family comes together. One of the ways we are to be “diligent to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Eph. 4:3) is by regularly partaking in the Lord’s Supper together as a family.
Works Cited
[1] Bobby Jamieson, Understanding the Lord’s Supper, (B&H Publishing Group, Nashville, Tennessee, 2016), 46
[2] There was the Closed vs Open Communion debate of the 17th century between figures like William Kiffin (1616 – 1701) and John Bunyan (1628 – 1688). Kiffin was in the majority position that communion should be “closed,” meaning that unless the individual was a baptized member of the church they could not partake of the Lord’s Supper. Kiffin relied on John Calvin and the Regulative Principle of Worship in his arguments. Bunyan, on the other hand, was in favor of the “open” position. He published several arguments in favor of open communion such as “A Confession of My Faith, and A Reason of My Practice” and “Differences in Judgement About Water-Baptism, No Bar to Communion.” This debate resurfaced again at the end of the 18th century. Andrew Fuller (1754 – 1815) would find himself amid a change among his Baptist brothers and would write in favor of the “closed” position. For the majority of Baptist history, the “closed” position was held.
[3] Bobby Jamieson, Understanding the Lord’s Supper, (B&H Publishing Group, Nashville, Tennessee, 2016), 50