Let's open our Scripture now in 1 Corinthians chapter 11 verses 17 through 34. We will once again meditate in the letter of Paul to the Corinthians regarding to the Lord's Supper, chapter 11 beginning or reading verse 17. This is what God says in His Word. But in the following instructions, I do not commend you because when you come together, it is not for the better but for the worse. For in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you, and I believe it in part, for there must be factions among you in order that those who are genuine among you may be recognized. When you come together, it is not the Lord's Supper that you eat. For in eating, each one goes ahead with his own meal. One goes hungry, another gets drunk. What? Do you not have houses to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I commend you in this? No, I will not. For I receive from the Lord what I also deliver to you, that the Lord Jesus, on the night when He was betrayed, took bread, and when He has given thanks, He broke it and said, This is My body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of Me. In the same way, also He took the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in My blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of Me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes. Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and the blood of the Lord. Let a person examine himself then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. But if we judge ourselves truly, we will not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world. So then, my brothers, when you come together to eat, wait for one another. If anyone is hungry, let him eat at home. So then, when you come together, it will not be for judgment. About the other things, I will give directions when I come." Let's pray once again. Our Heavenly Father. We read Your Scripture. We read the Word of God. And now, once again, we claim for the works of the Holy Spirit. We need You, Lord, to help us to see ourselves and to change our hearts according to Your law. Please, God, work on us, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. There is a movie in a book, of course, that speaks a little bit about this passage that we are dealing with today. I don't know if you remember the Narnia Chronicles or if you already read it, but in one of the movies became very spread how it would be for the movie The Table of Aslan, which the one who would represent Jesus Christ in some reasons, how it would be to be in his table during the Feast of Love, the Love Feast. And the idea in the books is to help the reader to understand what is happening there. So, the main characters, they went to an island and they found a huge table full of every kind of food that you can imagine. Many different kinds of fruits and breads and cheese and a lot of other things. And they were invited to eat because they were part of those who believed in Aslan. And even so they were not seeing him, they believed in him and they were waiting for him. So they went to the table, but for some reason they looked far away at the end of the table and they saw three knights there. And these knights, the three of them, they were stoned. And instead of going to the table and eat, they became afraid. Why are these men stoned if they are at Aslan's table? It doesn't make sense. And then they asked for the lady who was showing them the island, and she said, well, you are free to eat. But these three, they start to fight at Aslan's table. And it's not permitted to fight at his table, because here we're supposed to behave as Aslan wants us to behave. Of course, this is a chronicle, it doesn't speaks like Scripture, of course, but it represents a lot what we find in these verses that we read today. The context of the passage that we are reading, it's the love feast or also called agape feast, which is a Greek name for love, agape. The idea of this feast, it was that all the communities in a region, for example, let's take our region, Grand Rapids region, with all the cities around Grand Rapids, the idea is that all the URCs in this region would be together in one place to celebrate a feast, a feast of love. And in this feast, which happened until the seventh century of the church, they were eating together and having a time that's supposed to be for love. And in one moment during this feast, the elders, the pastors of the congregation, they will stop the feast. and they would partake the Lord's Supper. They would distribute the Lord's Supper. So, all the congregations in a region, they would celebrate the Lord's Supper together. And after the Lord's Supper, they would come back to the feast and they would celebrate love once again for a long time. So, the contest is that it's supposed to be the love feast, a feast that would bring joy to their hearts, that would be a good fellowship among churches in a region, that would build them as a strong church together. But instead of being a love feast, what Paul is saying specifically to the Corinthians, it's that among them, this love feast was a feast that was leading them to something worse. And that's what we find in the first verse, because when you come together, it's not for the better, but for the worse. And he was looking to this church, a church who was full of many problems, and he was talking to them now regarding to this feast, and since the communion was given among the feasts, he was also talking about the Lord's Supper. And he was calling them to understand the meaning and the reality of the communion, and that reality should make the whole feast be completely different. And how he will deal with that, first of all, in verses 17 through 22. He will speak about their love feast. It's the first part. We will see here some problems with this church. The first one, it's in verse 18, because divisions were happening among them. This also relates to other parts of the Scripture, and we need to understand that to understand which kind of division was happening during these feasts. The first thing is that they were being involved in false teachings. How can we know that? Well, there are two specific texts in the Scripture that will reveal that. The first one is Jude, verse 12 to 13, and there we will find Jude saying about the love feasts. and how the false masters were going to their feasts, and instead of partaking properly of that feast, they were spreading their ideas to destroy the church. Jude 12 and 13, I will read it for you. It says, they are hiding reefs at your love feasts. As they feast with you without fear, shepherds feeding themselves, waterless clouds swept along by winds. fruitless trees in late autumn, twice dead, unprotected, wild waves of the sea casting up the foam of their own shame, wandering starts for whom the gloom of other darkness has been reserved forever. So Jude was saying, among you, during the love feasts, they are spreading evil. They are, instead of speaking about God's things, instead of being the doctrine of the apostles, they are spreading their own thoughts, they are deceiving you, and they are completely Okay, being among you while you are celebrating this feast. The first part is this, and 2 Peter 2 verse 13 also speaks about this feast and about the false masters, and there we find they count in pleasure to reveal in the daytime. They are blots and blemishes, revealing their deceptions while they feast with you. So the idea of the love feast became something that was not pleasing God, and it was not glorifying the name of the Lord, because many false masters were inside of this feast, and here in 1 Corinthians we find that they were causing division, division among the believers. So the apostles, for example, one of the problems of the church of 1 Corinthians, it was about the resurrection of the body that will come in the next chapters of 1 Corinthians. And this verse, chapter 15 specifically, so these false masters, and this is what they were claiming in that time, and other parts of the Scripture speaks about that. They were claiming that Jesus Christ was not resurrected from the dead. This is not new in history when we see people today saying, Jesus died and He is still dead. Since the beginning, people were saying, we don't believe in the resurrection of the bodies. We don't believe in those things. But in the love feast, in the feast that will lead to the Lord's Supper, It should not be allowed to have someone saying, well, we don't believe in the resurrection of the body. Because if someone claims that, what is the purpose of the celebration of communion? We are here celebrating communion because He died and He came back to life. And because He came back to life, we will also come back to life because of His works we will receive. grace from God. But if there is no resurrection, what is the purpose of the celebration? And this is just one idea of these divisions. We cannot go through all of them. You can read 1 Corinthians later and find many problems that probably were being discussed in this celebration, but during the feast, they were divided. They were fighting. They were fighting with others, and we see that factions started to happen among them, and some divided, were always fighting with others. So, in every love feast, they were fighting and fighting and fighting, and the idea is they don't supposed to do that. They don't suppose to divide the church because when we are among the presence of the Lord, we should be one people, one body of one Master. And that's why Paul here, it's not questioning the fact that factions was among them, but actually he was saying, well, And there is a way in this in which this is good because you will be able to recognize who has the truth. Because if you are celebrating this Lord's Supper, for example, if someone says, he didn't resurrect from the dead, we will say, okay, this guy is wrong. We are here to celebrate another thing. We are here to celebrate that His body and His blood saved us from our sins. So, if someone says, I don't believe in resurrection, we will deny and we will rebuke him because he's lying about the person of Jesus Christ. This is the first problem, the visions. Another problem it was… when they were partaking the bread and the food and the wine in that situation. We will see in verse 20 that they were doing this improperly. Some of them, they were eating their own meals while others were hungry and while others were drunk. So, it was not a simple celebration where you go, you eat, you drink, and everyone goes home happy and full of joy. It was a feast full of sins. I'm eating a lot while I'm seeing someone hungry. And instead of offering him my food, I will continue to eat, and it's his problem if he's hungry. And of course, the drunkenness was among them, and it's crazy to imagine that they were okay with that. The answer that Paul gives in these verses, in verse 22 actually, it's, I think it's funny, like, what? What is happening there? It doesn't make any sense. We don't find this kind of expression in the Scripture many times. One of the apostles saying, what? Like, are you completely crazy? Are you okay celebrating a feast like this while you are eating all your food? You have in the next table a guy, a family hungry, their children are hungry, and you are okay? You are just, let's continue the party? That's completely madness. Are you drunk to celebrate the Lord's Supper? We should come to His presence with our reason completely perfect. We should remember Him. That's the word that He will use. We should remember what He made, the purpose of our salvation, and you come drunk to this party? Are you lost? What is happening with you? That's the problem that He is. saying, confronting here, carnality, it was something that was among them in their feasts. And we will see that this carnality was bringing consequences to them. We will see that better in verse 30, but there you see that because of their behavior, they were becoming weak, ill, and they were coming to death. There are consequences when we behave improperly in the presence of a holy God. And that's what Paul was trying to say to them, what are you doing? I cannot say anything good about your feasts. That's what he's saying at the end of verse 22. I will not command you. You are completely lost. You need to change. Pay attention in how we're supposed to partake the Lord's Supper. And then we come to verses 23 through 26 when he will bring the idea, the correct idea of the Lord's Supper. First of all, this Supper, it's commanded by God. We receive from the Lord. It's something that it comes from Him. He teaches how to do it, and we don't invent anything according to that. So, He said, and we obey. That's how you should celebrate the Lord's Supper. I don't know if you know about the missions who are going around the world, but some of them, they are inventing a lot of things. We have a mission, for example, among the native Indians in Brazil, and for them, they say it's very difficult to find wine in the jungle. to bring wine to partake this Lord's Supper there. So, what did they make? They choose a fruit, the name of the fruit is acai, I don't know if you heard about, it's a wonderful fruit, and they decide to partake the Lord's Supper with acai. What is this? Like, is it what God says in His Scripture? No, they are inventing things. Okay, the fruit has the same color, so let's do it with other things. I don't have water to baptize, so I will baptize with lettuce because lettuce is 99% water. Like, this is crazy. Can you identify the craziness of these things? We have the specific things commanded, and that is what Paul is telling to them, I receive from the Lord and I'm delivering to you, so do it like it's supposed to be done. We don't invent anything. We don't make our desires come out while we are doing these things. It's what God says. And what does God say? Two specific things. The first one, Jesus took the bread, verse 24, and He took the bread in the night that He was betrayed, and He, giving thanks to the Lord, broke and said, "'This is My body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of Me.' By the same idea. In verse 25, he took the cup and he said to them, this cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink in remembrance of me. So, two simple ideas. The bread and the wine, the bread represents the body, the wine represents the blood, and that's all. Do it in remembrance of me. But suddenly, in the history of the church, some start to say, okay, those elements, they will be transformed. What is this in the text? It's not there, right? We cannot find the wine becoming blood. It's in remembrance. So, people around the world, especially in the Roman church, they believe the bread becomes meat. becomes the body of Jesus, literally, so they don't eat the bread. They let the bread dissolve in their mouths because they cannot bite Jesus Christ in their mouths. And this is sadness like the sadness that these people was doing here. It doesn't say that the bread becomes literally the body. And of course, we are not drinking blood. We drink wine, and when you drink the wine, you will feel the taste of wine, and we know what is the taste of blood. It's very different. So, we are drinking wine and we are eating bread, so transubstantiation, it's not something that comes from the Scripture. And it's not consubstantiation like Luther said, too, because it's not both of them working together. Here, it's very precise, and the Reformation brought that out through Zwingli and Calvin specifically, and they show us the presence of Christ is a spiritual presence. And we will do those things, we will take the elements and we will eat and drink in remembrance of Him. We will read that many times today because everywhere in the text is saying, in remembrance of me. I will be spiritually there, but it's in remembrance. It's not literal, but it's in remembrance. And what are we remembering? That's the idea. we are reminded ourselves that He paid the price of our sins. That's what we're supposed to have our minds focusing in the celebration of the Lord's Supper. He paid the price of my sin. My sins, they were bringing me to death. I was completely lost. I was part of the darkness of this world. I was serving Satan. I was serving my desires. I was serving this world, but kindly and lovely through the blood and the body of Jesus Christ, He took me from the darkness and He brought me to light. I'm saved now. I'm not a slave of sin anymore. I will not, I'm not walking to death anymore because I received salvation through His works. I will have eternal salvation through the works of Jesus Christ. I need to remember that because this is very important to me. We cannot forget the works of Jesus Christ for us, because if we forget, we will act like crazy people, like they were doing in those feasts. They will eat while some are hungry. They will be drunk in the presence of God, and they will think they were pleasing Him, but they were not. the remembrance of Him should bring us to praise Him, to exalt Him, to be thankful for everything He made for us. So the celebration of the Lord's Supper, it's a moment of joy. Our hearts should be full of joy because we are in the presence of a holy God, and we are His children, and He saved us, and nothing can take us from His hand. Joy! Hope is there. Grace is there. Mercy is there. Let's celebrate His name. This is what the Lord's Supper represents, not a party of sins. a feast full of sins as they were doing there. And that's why we move now to the last part, verse 27 through 34. He will speak again about their feast. What are you doing? You are eating the bread and drinking the cup in an unworthy manner. And if you do that, you are guilty concerning the body and the blood of the Lord. So, we cannot interpret this, the next verses, without a contest here. A lot of people is afraid to partake the Lord's Supper because they are full of fear of these verses now, 27 through 39, to 30 actually, because they think, okay, I commit a sin this week, and since I commit a sin, I cannot come to the presence of the Lord. Well, that's why we pray, and we ask forgiveness again, and that's why we prepare our hearts, that's why we examine ourselves to be ready for this moment. God will forgive you if you want to change. The thing here is if you love more your sin than Jesus Christ, if you don't see Jesus Christ as your Savior and your Lord, don't partake because you don't suppose to partake. If you have an idol to worship in your heart or in your house, it doesn't matter. You don't suppose to come to His table because at this table there is only one Lord and His name is Jesus Christ. And if you need to change your life first, do it, and then you come and partake. why there is discipline in the church, for example, and one of the terms of discipline is, you should not come to the Lord's table. Because of these verses, the elders, the deacon of the church, they are looking to you and saying, hey, we don't want to see judgment upon you. If you are committing a sin, And even with people calling you to repentance, even with the Scripture calling you to repentance, if you know, even you know that you should change your life, you still say, I will not change, this table will be something terrible for you. That's what God is saying here. That's what He will say. everyone who comes unworthy to His table will be guilty concerning the body and the blood of the Lord. So examine yourself, and then eat and drink. But if you do not deserving to be here, not because of your works but because of Jesus you will eat and drink judgment on yourself." So, the Lord's Supper, it's a call to repentance. It's a call that Jesus Christ is calling you and saying to you, stop to love your desires. Stop to love your sins. Stop to love this word, and put your eyes on Me. I am the only way to save you. Abandon your sins. Abandon your strained heart that is fighting against God, and repent. And once you do that, come to this table. through this table we can find two different things, and then we come back to verse 30. Weakness, illness, and death, if we partake improperly, and this verse is a polemic verse for many. Because here, Paul is saying that because of their unworthy behavior, because of their sins, they were becoming weak, ill, and dying. And this is terrible for everyone, right? We don't want to die if we partake improperly at the Lord's Supper. But the idea here is, look to these men, they were drunk. They are coming to the table drunk. This is the kind of sin that they were doing. Can you see? They were eating a lot and letting their brothers and sisters hungry. And they were completely okay with that. This is the kind of sin that this church was doing. They were acting against God and against His law. And then we realize that because of their sins, they were partaking and receiving judgment. Some of them were weak, were ill, and some of them were dying. God took the life of many people in the Scripture because of their sins, and we still will see that in the New Testament. We will never forget Ananias and Sapphira bringing a wrong offering to God and dying immediately. So if you are drunk right now, if you are fighting against everyone in church, If you are bringing destruction to your family, to your community, if you are one of these guys here, don't partake. This is crazy. Change yourself. Repent. Change your way of life and be ready to receive what we will receive today. joy, hope, gladness, thanksgiving. We will celebrate the name of our Lord. because we know that He is the only way, and we know that everything we have comes from Him, that every gift we have comes from Him, that salvation comes from Him, and we only can rejoice in the presence of this holy God. But be prepared. We are once again in the moment where we will come to the Lord's Supper, and this supper needs to bring you to sanctification. Maybe you need to once again ask forgiveness to God. By the same time, this celebration should bring you to the presence of your Holy Lord. We need to remind about His sacrifice because we need to remind that our sins, they asked a huge payment, and that payment, it was the death of our Lord at the cross. He paid the price. of our sins, and we need to remember that. But we also should remember that through His work, He brought us salvation. We are here not like sons of the darkness anymore. We are saved by Jesus Christ, by the name of Jesus Christ. We are part of His body. We are accepted in His table. We can drink the cup and we can eat the bread because He saved us from our sins and we are His family now. So it's a time to celebrate you, to fill our hearts with joy and united. Pay attention, not divided, but united. We should praise His name, exalt His name, and proclaim His name because salvation came to this world and we can rejoice in His presence. That's the meaning of this supper that we will celebrate right now, and I must call you then to prepare your heart and examine yourself, and let's rejoice together in the presence of this Holy Lord. Let's pray. Close your eyes. Let's talk to our God. Our Heavenly Father, we thank You once again, because if we are here, it's because of Your beloved Son, Jesus Christ. because He saved us, and now we are able to come to Your presence. Lord, we are full of joy in our hearts. We are full of thanksgiving because a miracle happened in our lives, and You save us from our sins. You took us from the darkness, and now we can only rejoice in Your presence.