leo MUNION MEDITATION 1 Cornthians 11:23-26
j VANUARY 7, 1973 1 dohn 4:9-10

[ There has probably been more writen about the Sacrament of Holy Communion than about

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any other aspect of the church's tite\ Although I have not read it all, I have read a

good bit, and my favorite descriptive words about the sacrament were written by Dom Gregory

Dix in a book entitled "The Shape of the Liturgy.” |commentints on Jesus' words at the
Last supper, (*00 this in remembrance of me") Dix writes:

[ves ever another command so obeyed? {For century after century, spreading slowly
to every continent and country and among every race on earth, this action has been done,

in every conceivable human circumstance, for every conceivable human need from infancy

and before it to extreme old age and after it from the pinnacles of earthly greatness to

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the refuge of fugitives in the caves and dens of the earth.\ Men have found no better thing

than this to do for kings at their crowning and far criminals going to the scaffolds\for
armies in triumph or for a bride and bridargom in a little country church: or the proclama-
tion of the dogma or for a good crop of wheat \ For the wisdom of the Parliament of a mighty

nation or for a sick old woman afraid to die;\for a schoolboy sitting an examination or

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for Columbus setting out to discover Anericas\ for the famine of whole provinces or for the

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soul of a dead rover in thankfulness because my father did not die of pneumonia; \ oman

because the

for the settlement of a

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Turk was at the gates of Vienna;\ fer

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stri kes\ for a son for a barren woman s\tor Captain So~and-So, wounded and prisner of war\
while the lions roared in the nearby anphitheatre:\on the beach at Dunk iri| whilenthontes

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a; ane caid fill many pages with reasons_why men have done
this, and not tell a hundredth part of then.\ And best of all, week _by week and month

by month, on a hundred thousand successive Sundays faithfully, unfailing, across all the
AME Cousaomd, Do Murs in pememborauce" — fas femroleged
parishes of Christendom, theeapiasebhiiteudisibites nif spe mmpneanlent peeled sal awl lama atleast abel

To those who know a little of Christian history, probably the most moving of all the
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reflections it brings is not the thought of the great avents and the well-remembered saints,

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but of those innumerable millions of entirely obscure faithful men and women, everyone with

his or her own individual hopes and fears and joys and sorrows and loves - and sins and
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temptations and prayers - once every whit as vivid and alive as mine are now.\ They have left
— a namnenniiniel me nl ~~

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no slightest trace in this world, not even a name, but have passed to God utterly forgotten

by nen. \ Yet each of them once believed and prayed as I believe and pray, and found it herd

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and grew slack and sinned and repented and fell again.\ Each of them worshipped at the
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eucharist and found their thoughts wandering and tried again, and feit hgavy and unre-

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sponsive and yet knew - just as really and pathetically as J do these tings \ The sheer

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stupendous quantity of the love of God which this ever repeated action has drawn from the

obscure Christian multitudes through the centures is jnwitself an overwhelming thought.

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{All that going with one to the altar every morning. )

The Session of this church determined some years ago that the first Sunday of the New

Year was a fitting and appropriate time for the Sacrament to be celebrated by our congre-

gation. \ It is a time both for looking backward and forward.\As anather_ year begins it is a

time for reflecting on where we've been,\how we've grown \ what we've accomplished a” or
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how we've failed. \ It's also a time for renewal and rebirth, for new beginnings and new

hopes and dreams \ And it is appropriate that rt of this New Year observance be the oldest

and, still today, the most common act in Christendom. \ I invite you, therefore, to think

with me about the sacrament as an act of looking backward -an act of remembrance, but also

an act that affirms something that is real today and will be real tomorrow.

There is a commercial on television that I think is particularly interesting. \ it's
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purpose is to sell a certain brand of baking flour, and it does so by advising mother to

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"bake a nenory".\ visually one is transported to childhood, a cozy kitchen on a wintry

day, with Mother and daughter working on a batch of cookies.\ It's a catchy and, I think,

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rather good commercial because it has hold of something very real;enamely, the Seeissy of

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love remembered i@ something which love once aid.\ depends on the wiiyersetukemen

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tease Chat memory retains acts rathern than words sand the phenomeum that to_ remember the

act is to experience the feeling as a current reality. | To conjure up that warm kitchen

_— ths
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and mother baking cookies is to feel_loved aii over again\ And the Madison Avenue hope +3
that you will feel loved when you pass that brand of flour on the grocery shelf and
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purchas-a five paund bag.

We remember acts more clearly than we remember words - because actions do speak louder
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than words \ Especially when it comes to the expression of deep and powerful emotions.

Have you every been frustrated because you felt so deeply about something you couldn't

find words strong enough to express yourself? | Have you every experienced the inadequacy

of the verbal communication, “I love you?"

When we feel dep | ys, we e_act\ Sometimes a hand shake without verbal interchange speaks

votumes \ He literally leap for joy -\ hen Purdue is dost by one point with twepty seconds

to go, the 14,000 000 people in Mackey Arena are not turning to each other and commenting that
it's a wy exciting game - even though that's exactly what they are feel ing.\ Norgal_verbat
interchange can't bear the weight of that kind of excitement.\ So people stamp their feet,

and stand up and clap. \ if Purdue wins, people jump up and down and sometimes even embrace.

If Purdue looses people slam their fists with their hands, stomp out, stam the car door
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and then drive home much too aggressively.
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Pacing back and forth is a common expression of anxiety and stress tress.\ And wher when a

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has lost someone close and dear you and I Verbally express

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condolences ‘\we say ("I'm sorry". | fee shove words saa, buckle | under the weight of our
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feelings:\so we buy flowers, or bake a cake ~ or embrace them and say Ys there anything

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I can do?" ,gwhich translates \"give me some way to express how deeply I am feeling for
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you because the words aren't getting the job done." |

The Gergan poet/philosopher Goethe observed that\"The highest cannot be spoken; \it
can only be acted" \ That is the rationale for ritual and liturgy in the church \ That is
why choirs process and candles are lighted, music played and sung.\ It is why in a way,

clergymen wear robes and stand_behind ornate pulpits.\ It is why men build churches and mot

just meeting rooms. \ It is why, 2,000 after the event, we have taken what real ly was a

dinner - an evening meal - and enshrined the words and gestures in centuries of tradition.

Because, somehow, that common meal - remembered and repeated Jiturgically -

expresses more of our faith than any of us can express verbally. \ Somehow, bread broken
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and wine poured out express more of the Good News of God's love than all the sermons
eT re ESE aceyr ected
you are likely to hear.
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God = whose love for us this ritual expresses - 5s oke.| He used words to reveal himself.
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He used the words of his prophets and the leaders of Israel to tell men of his great love.
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But ultimately God too had to do sonething.\ In the fullness of time an act took/place of

speaking. | God's word became flesh,| A baby was born in Bethlehem of Judea :\ the love of God
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aman whe spelsr fer bh— tuk whier cet ims obe duce e

In an essay on “Truth and Love" John Baillie put it this way:| "Christ did not come to

earth merely to tell us the truth, and if he had come only to do that, then his coming

would hwe been of none effect. | He spoke as no man had ever spoken, yet not even His
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speaking would have been listed to, if he had done nothing else but speak.| Our Lord came

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to earth not to tell us what to do, but to do #omthing for us.\ He did not come to give us

a pea piece of iis mind. | He did not come to oie. us good advice. | Thank God for that!
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fhe world has alwas been short of loving action, and it was to engage in loving action for

our sakes that our Lord came to earth.\He spoke the truth indeed, but He spoke it to us
from the heart of a lade that suffered and died for our sakes." (A Reasoned Faith P.58-59)
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So we remember a love that could not be contained in words, but which a@mm in an act -

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a man ~ a savior. And we remember“by-ourselves - acting; \not talking about it, but by

breaking bread and eating its\ by pouring wine and drinking.

And yet it's muchmore than an exercise in corporate remembering for us. | It's a

celebration of something that is real and contemporary. \That's the way it is with good

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symbals - valid rituals.
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The flag is a symbol:\it reminds us of something once done-\of brave men in Phila-
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delphia and Lexington and Concord.\ It reminds us of events and acts that have great

meaning: \getysbura, Omaha Beach, Iwo sina. \ but the flag is a valid symbol only as it

celebrates as well something that js contemporary: \the unity - the common gals and_hapes -

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the national adhesiveness of the American people.

Wedding rings stand for an act once done \ an event in which we participated in the
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past. \ But they are valid symbols only as they represent a love that has grown and deepened

over the Yaéars.

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gre cor perate ct oF remembering

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The Sacrament of Holy Communion ~ the liturgical symbol of God's love becomes a way

of experiencing that Tove, a

when we bring to it our love ,\ our belief} our hopes and our trust. \ The scholars have
we men aoe a comes

| It becomes more than a sacred memory
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always called it a "means of Grace," and that's what the phrase means.\ The ritual becomes
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the way of experiencing God's love,

We come to church on Sunday mornings, I would guess, for a wide variety of reasons.

We come to communion on the first sunday of a New Year with different expectations, with

different memories of the year past and different personal hopes for the year ahead | We

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come ~ significantly - with different degrees of faith: \some of us believe very much and
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some of us believe very litte:\some are hot: some are cold. \ But we come together to

communion - not as individuals alone, but as members of a congregation - whose faith as

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a congregation is much greater than the individual faith of any one of us alone. | ve help
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each other, that is to say, to believe - and to experience the love of God.

\ “Men have found no better thing than this to do for kings at theifcrowning - for

armies in triumph and fr an old woman afraid to die \white the lions roar in the ampi-
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theatre or on the beach at Dunkirk Yor for that matter - on the First Sunday of a New
Year.

“For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus, on

the night he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks he broke it and said,

‘This is my body, which is for you. | Do this in remembrance of ne. \in the same way also the cup,
after supper saying, (‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood. \Do this, as often as you

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drink it in remembrance of me." AMEN

Qur Father, we don't always understand the sacrament; we don't always respond to the ritual.
Accept what we are able to bring - and help us to experience the miracle and joy and

salvation of your love: through Jesus Christ our Lord. AMEN