We are coming hurriedly to the close of this series of sermons on the principles and practices of our Baptist people, there remaining two more after this one.
This morning we come to the study of the subject of our Lord’s Supper. I have named it "Close Communion" because that is the term under which it is most thought of in connection with its observance in our Baptist churches.
The Apostle Paul had heard of some discention in the church of Corintn. There had been serious moral lapses and there was great need for some church discipline and so he writes them a letter to set in order all the things of Christ in that church. One of the things on which they had gotten into confusion was the administration of the Lord’s Supper. So early as Paul’s day, the people had begun to misapprehend the meaning of the Lord’s Supper and to misuse it and to abuse it, so Paul takes it in hand to set this matter in order in the church of Corinth and we find the record of it in 1st Corinthians, Chapter 11, beginning with verse 17 and continuing to verse 30.
Verses 23 to 26 will be recognized by all of us who are regular attendants upon our monthly administration of the Lord’s Supper as the words which we always read on that occasion; that glad, joyous occasion when our memories are refreshed and when our gratitude is enlarged as we meditate upon the things that Christ did for us as represented in this supper.
The verses preceding these are Paul’s condemnation of the Corinthian church for their abuse of the Lord’s Supper. The verses following these verses named, are Paul’s words of warning to them against abusing the Lord’s Supper.
Now let us take these verses from the 23rd to the 26th and see what their teaching is concerning this glorious ordinance of our Saviour. This blessed ordinance has been the occasion for many a hard word and that is to be profoundly regretted. We must admit to our shame, that the Lord’s Supper has been the center of severe conflict, Interminable and unceasing war has been waged about it. There is not an item or an element in the Lord’s Supper that has not been the occasion of contention. These, sad facts, however, may be a testimony to the supreme importance and to the sublime significance of this glorious ordinance. I always approach the table of the Lord’s Supper under a divine compulsion and in the spirit of a holy awe. It is a solemnly sacred institution. It should be preserved inviolate from every attack and while the contentions that have grown about it and around it are deplored, it must also be continued as long as the Supper of the Lord is abused, and it must be contended for in the Spirit of Christ, as in the case of the Apostle Paul, whose words we read.
The fact that this simple ordinance in the purity of its origin, in the simplicity of its administration and in the sublimity of its meaning, has been misapplied and misused ought to be more heartrending than the fact that there have been contentions about it, and we must still continue to contend for its purity even to the cost of blood, if necessary.
Let us, however, at this hour, if we may seek to divest this holy ordinance of all controversy and seek, by divine grace, to invest it with the garments of Holy Scripture. I ask you, then, to study with me these verses.
"For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you."
The verse teaches that this ordinance, as well as the truth concerning it, is of divine origin. It came from the Lord.
"That the Lord Jesus, the same night in which he was betrayed, took bread and also the cup."
The sacred teaching in these verses is concerning the simple elements to be used in the administration of the Lord’s Supper. "And when he had given thanks, he brake it and said, Take, eat, this is my body which is broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me.
"After the same manner also he took the cup, when he had supped, saying This cup is the New Testament in my blood; this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me."
The third teaching in these verses is concerning the recipients of the Lord’s Supper.
"For as often as Ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do show forth the Lord’s death till he come."
The fourth teaching in these verses concerns the meaning of the Lord’s Supper, the significance of the bread and of the wine, the sublime symbolic representation that they bear to those who receive it as well as to those who may look on. And then follows finally his words of warning against abusing it.
Let us, then, very briefly and very simply and very humbly study these four things about this ordinance of our Saviour.
Paul says that teachings concerning the Lord’s Supper, as well as the ordinance itself, is not of man, nor of the will of man. It had no mere human origin. Paul and the church of Corinth and you and I and all the rest, "have received of the Lord Jesus" that institution which He established on "the same night in which He was betrayed." It was conceived in the brain of Jesus. It was born in his own heart and brought forth in the deep travail of his passion on that sacred, solemn night before the morrow when there was to come the tragedy of the cross to bear down his soul unto death and to make the Son of God a propitiation for the sins of the world. On that solemn night He gathered about Him the little group that had followed Him for the three and a half years and said to them:
"I have a solemn sacred thing to commit to your trust and from you to others and through all the centuries until I come again."
If, then, this ordinance of the Lord’s Supper is of the Lord Jesus Christ and does not belong to us and did not originate with us, then the Lord Jesus Christ has the right to set the metes and bounds about it, to say who shall take of it and who shall not, and what it shall represent and what it shall not represent for it has come from Him and not from man. It is His and not mine, it is His and not yours, and it isn’t for me to say how it shall be done nor when it shall be done nor where it shall be done or who shall be invited to it. It is His and not mine. I am His servant to do the things He has commanded concerning it.
The sacred teaching in this Scripture has to do with the elements that are to be used in the dramatic portrayal of death of our Lord, for the Lord’s Supper, like the ordinance of baptism is a drama to act out before the eyes of the people the great teachings concerning His death, burial and resurrection.
The elements are simply bread, unleavened bread, and the Gospel calls the other element "the fruit of the vine."
Let me digress just far enough from the main line of thought to say a word about the use of wine in the administration of the Lord’s Supper. So intense has been the feeling and the passions of men concerning the Supper of the Lord that they have even come to the most strenuous contention concerning the elements that should be used. Now everybody is agreed that it should be unleavened bread for bread with leaven in it, which has the elements of death, cannot represent the pure, spiritual, sinless body of Christ. But we have not been agreed to the use of the particular character of the fruit of the vine. I have always been of the opinion that it ought not to be grape juice but ought to be pure, fermented wine. It is a long study, whole volumes are filled up with it and I am of this conviction because that is the thing which our Lord used and I called your attention a moment ago to where the Corinthian church abused the Lord’s Supper. When they came together, instead of taking just a sip of it, they drank and drank and drank until they were drunk. The element they used, if taken in sufficient quantity, would make them drunk. I felt, however, that perhaps my convictions were too severe on that line and that I should yield to the sentiments of my brothers about it. I do not know whether that was the thing to do or not. If that is the teaching of our Lord and the early church practiced it, and when we find what the Word of God says about it we ought not to yield one iota from its teachings.
Our Catholic friends say that the expression in these verses as quoted ’from the words of our Lord, "This is my body" and "this is my blood" means that the literal body of the Lord Jesus and the literal blood of the Lord Jesus, by the blessing of the Priest on that bread and wine, is transformed into it and is actually and really present. We do not so understand it.
Our Lutheran friends are a little milder and they say that this expression means that the body of Jesus is present with the bread; that the bread and the wine are not really His body and His blood but that His body and His blood are present with them and that they are applied to our souls in the taking of the Supper of the Lord. These theories are called transubstantiation and consubstantiation respectively.
The Baptist and all the Protestants of the world reject both of these ideas and say that the body of Jesus is neither transformed into the bread nor is it really or vitally present with it but that the bread and the wine simply symbolize what Jesus did for us in his atonement on the Cross.
A Hebrew Christian, a friend of mine, has given me a beautiful idea in connection with the meaning of these words of our Saviour, "This is my body." You will recall that the Lord’s Supper was established on the night of the Jewish Passover, according to their custom. That was a memorial of God’s deliverance of His people when they came out of Egypt and was to be a perpetual memorial of God’s care over them. Now this Jewish Christian friend says that it was the custom at that Passover Feast, when administering the Passover for the priest to pronounce his blessing upon the bread and upon the wine and after that he would take a little piece of it and lay it over on a napkin and then fold it up and take that piece and put it aside and say, "This is for the Messiah" and then come and administer all the rest that was left. And through all these long centuries of waiting and of heart anxiety, looking forward to the coming of their Messiah, the Jews every year put aside that little piece of bread and kept it for the Messiah. Oh, it is a pathetic thing that through all the years they looked forward to His coming and when He came they rejected Him. Jesus performed all of the Jewish customs and one of them was the administration of the Passover and on that night they had the Passover Supper and, according to that long custom, He took the little piece of bread and it was wrapped in the napkin and it was put aside. Then Judas went out. And when they were left there, Jesus went over to the side and got that little piece that had been put aside for Him, as all the Jews understood that through all these long centuries it had been their custom to do, and He brought that out and said "No more is this to be put aside, for this is my body. I am now come. This is my body broken for you." And likewise with the cup. "This has been put aside through all the centuries but I am here now and this is my blood." I would rather believe that teaching. It is in perfect harmony with what He said about the supper in one of the verses, and fulfills all of its meaning.
The third teaching of these verses had to do with the recipients of the ordinance of baptism.
The recipients of the first Lord’s Supper were His disciples. I call your attention to the fact that the Lord’s mother wasn’t there. There is no record that she was ever baptized. The baptized faithful disciples of the Lord, the Church, was there and to them gave Jesus this ordinance. He said, "Take YE and eat." If Jesus then did not invite his mother to the first Supper, then why should we complain that our mother or some loved one cannot be invited to the Supper as we take it.
But let us look into this question a little further. The Word of God lays down three conditions to the recipients of the Lord’s Supper, viz., baptism, church membership, and fellowship. I am going to take these in their reverse order and take fellowship first.
Paul said to the Corinthian church, "There are divisions among you, there are schisms among you and when you come together and sit around the Lord’s table, it is impossible for you, under those conditions, to take the Lord’s Supper. You may have bread and wine there, but I assure you it takes more than that to make a Lord’s Supper." What does it take? It takes harmonious fellowship in doctrine and in service and in practice. How absurd then is the argument that men and women of every faith can come together and believe any sort of doctrine and pass around the bread and wine and call that the Lord’s Supper.
I raise this question with you. Is the Lord’s Supper a church institution or a Christian institution? Is it for all Christians or is it a church ordinance. There are those who will answer, and doubtless there are some here this morning, who will answer "Yes, it is for all Christians." Then let us see. A band of Christian men and women meet tonight in some home. They are godly men. There are Presbyterians, there are Baptists, there are Methodists and other denominations. They are good Christian characters. Some of them propose, "We are Christians, let’s get some bread and wine and pass it around and have the Lord’s Supper." They do so. Will that be a Lord’s Supper? Would you admit that as the Lord’s Supper. Certainly not. It takes more than simple bread and wine to make the Lord’s Supper. And we are not raising a question as to the character of the people. They may be ever so good. It isn’t raising any question as to their character to say that they do not administer the Lord’s Supper when a thing like that is done. It is, then, a church ordinance and must be administered by authority and in the church to make it valid and to make it scriptural.
Then there must be church membership in order for it to be received. I want to raise this question concerning the impracticability of open communion. Does not every church administer the Lord’s Supper as often as that church thinks its members ought to take the Lord’s Supper. Some every Sunday, some once a month, some once a quarter for the benefit of the members of that church. Now if every church administers the Lord’s Supper as often as that church thinks its members ought to take the Lord’s Supper, then why should the members of that church come to another church after taking theirs and claim the right and privilege of taking the Lord’s Supper with that church when the church of which they are members administers the Lord’s Supper as often as they think the members ought to have it. There must be church membership as a pre-requisite to the taking of the Lord’s Supper.
All of the Christian world is agreed that baptism is a pre-requisite to the Lord’s Supper. I am going to prove that every Christian in the world is a close communionist and that that title is not to be applied to Baptists alone. I draw a circle here on an imaginary black-board. A great circle, and in the center of that circle I place a table, which is the table of the Lord, and in this circle are all the people of the world, Christians and Mohammedans and Jews and Buddhists and infidels and everybody is inside of that circle. Now which of the people in that circle would be admitted to the table of the Lord? Shall all of the people be admitted. "Why, no," everybody says, "another circle should be drawn in this circle, and that some of the folks should be shut out." We draw, then, this other circle. We leave on the outside of this inner circle all infidels, all Mohammedans, all Buddhists, all that are not Christians, we leave them on the outside and on the inside of this circle we have only the Christians, those that believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Which of them, then, are to be admitted to the table of the Lord? All of them are Christians but shall they all be admitted, No, we must draw a third circle and we must shut out some of these. We must shut out those who have not been baptized and who are not members of the church. All of the Christian world admits that; that this third circle must include only those who have been baptized. I quote these words from the American Presbyterian:
"Open communion is an absurdity, when it means communion with the unbaptized. I would not for a moment consider a proposal to admit an unbaptized person to the communion and can I ask the Baptists so to stultify and ignore his own doctrine as to wish me to commune with him while he believe that I am unbaptized? I want no sham union and no sham unity, and if I held Baptist notions about immersion, I would no more receive Presbyterians to the communion than I would receive a Quaker. Let us have unity, indeed, but not at the expense of principal; and let us not ask the Baptist to ignore or be inconsistent with his own doctrine. Let us not either make an outcry at his ’close communion,’ which is but faithfulness, until we are prepared to be open communionists ourselves, from which stupidity may we be forever preserved."
Let us read from Henry "Ward Beecher:
"A Pedo-Baptist who believes that baptism is a pre-requisite to communion has no right to censure the Baptist churches for close communion. On this question there is a great deal of pulling out of motes by people whose own vision is not clear."
Dr. John Hall, of New York, one of the leading Presbyterians of the world, says:
"If I believed with the Baptists, that none are baptized but those who are immersed on profession of faith, then I should, with them, refuse to commune with any others."
Dr. Hibbard, the great Methodist leader, says:
"It is but just to remark, that, in one principal the Baptists and Pedo-Baptists churches agree. They both agree in rejecting from communion at the table of the Lord and in denying the rights of church fellowship to all who have not been baptized. Valid baptism they consider as essential to constitute visible church membership. This also we (Methodists) hold. The only question, then, that here divides us, is, What is essential to valid baptism?"
The distinguished Episcopalian, Dr. Wall, says:
"No church ever gave the communion to persons before they were baptized. Among all the absurdities that were held, none ever maintained that any person should partake of a communion before they were baptized."
I might go on indefinitely quoting similar statements on what these Presbyterians and Methodists and Congregationalists and Episcopalians say. They say, "Draw this circle that shuts out all unbelievers and draw this circle that shuts out all unbaptized." All right, then, we will cut a door in that third circle and call that door baptism and we will admit through that door to the table of the Lord all that will come. We Baptists cut a door and say baptism is imersion and all that will come through that door shall come to the table of the Lord. The Methodists say that is right and proper, but they come and cut another door and call that door "Sprinkling," and say that whoever will come through that door shall come to the table of the Lord. The Presbyterians cut a door and call it "Pouring." Whoever comes to the table of the Lord must come through one of these three doors. We Baptists shut up all the doors but one, we stand with Paul for one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism, and we say that they must come through that door and that one only.
The table of the Lord here in this circle is not mine, it is His and he has prescribed the rules and regulations by which it shall be approached and it isn’t for me to say who shall come and who shall not. Jesus alone says that. All of the ugly words that have been applied to us is because of our contention for this belief. We have been called selfish, we have been called uncharitable, we have been called stingy, we have been called all sorts of things. Oh, my brothers and my friends of other denominations, it is not a lack of love on our part for you but it is because of our loyalty to Jesus. We feel that it is His and He has given us the law and we have not the right to break down that law and admit to the Lord’s table those who He Himself would not admit. The door is opened right through here, through the baptistry, to the table of the Lord and the door is open to every one who will come through it. Now if you do not come to the table of the Lord in the manner that we are taught and believe, then who is to be blamed, you or us? Who is responsible, you or us? You can get there just as all the rest of us have come, through the baptismal waters. All the rest of us have come to it through that door. We are not close communionists, we are wide open. You can come by coming in Christ’s way. Our contention is very much like this. The ordinance of baptism is a great monument to our Saviour’s burial and resurrection. You stand on the other side of that monument and say you will not come to the Lord’s Supper unless we break that monument. We want to welcome you and shake hands with you but we cannot break down this great monument. Let us take, for example, this great, beautiful, monumental window that some worthy person has eriven to our church. There is a man standing on the outside and he says "Mr. Dodd, I am a Christian and I want to have fellowship with you." I reply, "Please come in, brother, and I will take your hand and welcome you and give you a seat." "No," he says, "I want you to shake hands with me through this window." This great beautiful memorial window stands there between us and he says, "I will not come unless you break out this window and shake hands with me through here." And he calls me stingy and selfish and such things as that because I won’t break out this window in order to shake hands with him. Brother, we cannot break this great ordinance of our Saviour in order to show our fellowship with you. We will shake hands with you and will pray with you and sing with you and work and worship with you in many ways, we will do a thousand things, all that we can to show our fellowship, and Christian love but we cannot break the ordinance of our Saviour in order to let you come to the table of our Lord simply to show our fellowship one with the other.
I want to show that Presbyterians and Methodists and Episcopalians are closer communionists than the Baptists are.
Dean Hodges of the Episcopal church, says:
"Water is poured upon the head and ancient and sacred words are spoken and this is what happens: the baptized person is made a member of the Christian church."
In the Episcopal Prayer Book, this question is asked."
"Who gave you this name? ’I received it in baptism whereby I was made a member of the Christian church."
Dr. Hodges says, in The Presbyterian Confessions of Faith, page 472:
"Infants were members of the church under the old Testament from the beginning, being circumcised upon the faith of their parents. Now as the church is the same church; as the conditions of membership were the same then as now and since baptism has taken precisely the place of circumcision," (I don’t know where he gets that about baptism taking the place of circumcision for if all members were circumcised then there was nothing for the girls for only the boys were circumcised. Besides Jesus was both circumcised and baptized as was Timothy and Paul and all the rest of the Jews. So baptism couldn’t take the place of circumcision at all. Dr. Hodges continues:
"It follows then that the church membership of the children of professors should be recognized now as it was then."
The Methodist Discipline, page 188, says on the baptism of infants:
"That he may be baptized of water and the Holy Ghost and received into Christ’s Holy church and be made a lively member of the same." Now then, Episcopalians, Presbyterians and Methodists all say that their baptized infants are members of their church. Now quoting again from Presbyterian Confession of Faith, page 475, we have:
"All members of the church have not a right to all privileges of church membership. Thus baptized members have no right to come to the communion until they make a profession of personal faith."
The babies that are in their mothers’ arms who are already members of those churches are not permitted to take the Lord’s Supper. Now every Baptist church says to every one of its members, "Come on and take the Lord’s Supper. Come, you are entitled to it."
Now, the Methodists and the Episcopalians and all the rest will draw a fourth circle and shut out some of their baptized members. They are closer than the Baptists. They don’t let all of their own members take the Lord’s Supper.
Our Lord has laid down the conditions of the approach to the table of the Lord and in the most loving and sympathetic way we must stand for what the Lord has said even if they call us by ugly names for it. We will deplore it and wish that they wouldn’t but we must be loyal to our Savior and His teachings even at the cost of money or life or blood, or ridicule.
Now the last teaching of these Scriptures is concerning the meaning of this glorious and blessed institution. It is fraught with sublime significance. "When we consider the solemn, sacred circumstances under which it was established, the divinely regenerated custodians to which it was committed and the holy meaning which our Lord attached to it, is it any wonder that men have gone beyond what our Lord commanded and have attached saving grace to it? For example, Cardinal Gibbons writes, Faith of our Fathers, page 356:
"On the Cross He purchased our ransom and in the Eucharistic sacrifice the price of that ransom is applied to our soul."
Again:
"Let us represent to ourselves the mass as another Calvary which it is in reality."
But that this is not justified is clear from our text. This is not a sacrament. We should never call it such. It is a memorial supper of the death and the shedding of blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. It stands for the greatest event in all the history of the world. The Savior said:
"As often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup ye show the Lord’s death ’til He come."
When the humble disciples of Christ gather about the sacred table and commune in accordance with that divine compulsion, they look back with the eyes of faith to Calvary’s Cross where their redemption was purchased, and look forward with the eyes of hope to that Great Deliverer whose coming again shall bring peace and quiet to the world. And so the table of the Lord is the great central place between these two events and ties them together.
Finally: This warning of Paul’s is that if we take of it unworthily or in an unworthy manner, we take it to the condemnation of our souls. I wonder if you and I coming to the table of the Lord with any thought of our mother or any thought of our loved one pressing out our thought of Jesus, is not equivalent to taking the Lord’s Supper unworthily. I wonder if in case the Lord’s Supper, in its joy and blessing to you or me, can be increased by the presence of one who is not there, though of the most sacred earthly relationship, if that is not taking the Lord’s Supper unworthily. If what Jesus ascribed to it is not enough, full and sufficient, then the adding of any human relationship would stultify it and violate and make it invalid.
Oh, let us from time to time gather about this holy institution to understand what it means and to take it as Christ commanded and in no other way.