1 Corinthians 11:34

1 Corinthians 11:34. If any man is hungry, let Him eat at home. ‘The religious gatherings of believers are for higher purposes man satisfying the cravings of natural appetite: this should be done at home.'

that your coming together be not unto judgment do not issue in blighting rather than blessing.

And the rest any other matters on this subject requiring to be looked into will I set in order whensoever I come implying a shade of uncertainty as to the event.

Note. If the two opposite theories of the Lord's Supper, which have occasioned such protracted controversy in the Church, are brought face to face with the strange abuses of that ordinance at Corinth which are here depicted, we cannot but think that it would go far to show with which of them the apostle's teaching best accords. The one theory is, that under the forms or elements of bread and wine the body and blood of Christ are really corporeally present, given, received, and partaken of by the communicants, whether worthy or unworthy, believing or not believing. But while the Church of Rome holds and teaches that, after consecration, the elements are ‘transubstantiated' into the body and blood of Christ existing no more save in their ‘form' or appearance and that in the Lord's Supper ‘there is made a true, proper propitiatory sacrifice for the sins both of the living and the dead;' the Lutheran Church holds and teaches that the elements remain the same after consecration as before, but that ‘in, with, and under' them Christ is really corporeally present, offered, and received; and they utterly repudiate the sacrificial theory of the Eucharist, as dishonouring to the one all-perfect sacrifice of the Cross. What is common, however, to both these Churches is their doctrine of a material presence of Christ in the Lord's Supper. The opposite of this theory is, that the Lord's Supper was designed to represent and set forth through the senses to the minds of believing communicants the one sacrifice for sins, which “for ever perfects them that are sanctified;” that while on the communion table there is only bread and wine, the faith of the devout communicant pierces through the outward elements to that of which they are the instituted symbols, and discerns “Jesus Christ openly crucified before his eyes;” and opening his soul to Him, there and thus set forth, he holds living fellowship with Him, “receives of His fulness and grace for grace;” by faith he eats the flesh and drinks the blood of the Son of man in all the sacrificial significance and precious fruits of His atoning death in a fresh sense of pardon, peace, access to God, newness of life and hope of glory.

Now suppose that the first theory was what the apostle taught to the Corinthian Church, the question arises, What sort of abuse would this be likely to generate? Could they possibly confound it with an ordinary meal, and come dropping in one after another, each to satisfy his own appetite? Is the thing conceivable? Nay, if they but vividly realised what this theory supposes that Christ Himself is corporeally on the communion table would they not draw near with an awe approaching to dread as they took into their hands so ‘tremendous a mystery' as the phrase is? [1] But since the very opposite of all this was what the Corinthians did, we confidently affirm that no such view of the Lord's Supper was or could have been taught by the apostle at Corinth. Well, let us next try the other theory, bringing it face to face with the Corinthian abuses. According to that theory, the apostle taught that nothing is on the Lord's table, from first to last, but bread and wine, and that Christ is present there only to the faith which realises it through the instituted symbols. In that case, of course, unbelieving and unspiritual communicants would discern no Christ there at all, nor draw forth through it aught of His fulness as the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world. Even real converts, but slightly affected with the death there held forth, and the glory of His promised presence there, would pay more attention to the outward scene, in its varied arrangements and impressive actions, than to what it was designed to convey. Above all, since we know that the celebration of this ordinance was associated with an ordinary meal, would not the danger be great that superficial communicants would forget that they “had houses” of their own “to eat and drink in,” and come to the Lord's table rather to satisfy the cravings of nature than to “shew the Lord's death”? Beyond all reasonable doubt, if any such abuses crept in as this chapter tells us existed at Corinth, this second theory is that alone which could explain it: on the other theory we confidently say the thing is inconceivable.

[1] The following account of part of the ceremonies with which Archbishop Laud consecrated Creed Church (the church of St. Catherine Cree), when Bishop of London, on 16th January 1630, was attested on oath by eye-witnesses before the Lords at the Archbishop's trial. (It is an extreme case, but will all the better illustrate the tendency of the Real-Presence theory): “As he approached the communion table, he bowed very near to the ground six or seven times; and coming up to one of the corners of the table, he there bowed himself three times; then to the second, third, and fourth corners, bowing at each corner three times; but when he came to the side of the table where the bread and wine were, he bowed himself seven times; and then, after reading many prayers by himself and his two chaplains (they all this time on their knees by him, in their surplices, hoods, and tippets), he himself came near the Bread, which was cut and laid in a fine napkin, and then he gently lifted up one of the corners of the said napkin and peeped into it till he saw the bread, and presently he let it fall, and new back a step or two, and then bowed very low three times towards it and the table; when he beheld the bread, then he came near and opened again, and bowed as before. Next he laid his hand upon the silt cup, which was full of wine, with a cover upon it. So soon as he had pulled the cup a little nearer to him, he let the cup go, flew back, and bowed again three times towards it. He approached again, and lilting up the cover of the cup, peeped into it. Seeing the wine, he let fall the cover, flew nimbly back, and bowed as before. After these and many other gestures, he himself received, and then gave the Sacrament to several principal men, only they devoutly kneeling near the table.” (Prynne's History of the Trial, etc. fol. Lond. 1646, p. 114.)