One of the things I like about the way we observe communion at Dove Mountain is that Pastor Allen visibly breaks the loaf right before our eyes. I am reminded of a communion meditation on this subject written by Pastor Douglas Wilson. Reprinted here from his blog, it is entitled "Breaking, Bread, Breaking Sin." For any of you are reading this before going to church today, may it help you as we prepare for the Lord's Table.
"This bread is the sacrament of the body of the Lord, as He put it. And when He picked it up in the institution of this meal, He took the bread that represented His own body, and He gave thanks, and He broke it. The remarkable grace and love that we see here is striking, but there is something else to be learned from this. Jesus broke the body that was to bear our sins, and in that breaking we see the salvation of the world. What else does God break? When we think about this, we should come to recognize what sorts of things are broken in the world as we commemorate this meal in true evangelical faith.
God breaks the images and idols (2 Kings 23:14). God breaks the houses of the sodomites (2 Kings 23:7). God breaks the weapons of war (Ps. 76:3). God breaks the jaws of the wicked (Ps. 3:7; Job 29:17). In short, God breaks all rebellion and sin.
In this memorial, we can see how He does this in such a way that we are not consumed. God made Him who knew no sin to become sin on our behalf (2 Cor. 5:21) so that we could be broken with Him, and restored and made whole with Him. Jesus took on the likeness of sinful flesh so that all those corruptions could be placed on Him, and there broken forever (Rom. 8:3). God condemned sin in the flesh, and in that condemnation, in that breaking, you can see your only hope.
In just a moment, I will lift the loaf of bread up and I will break it. Just as surely as you see that bread broken, so you are invited to see your sins, all of them, broken forever.
This is good news indeed. Come, and partake of it."
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