When I was a child, Communion seemed to take forever. In an attempt (I suspect) to keep restless kids occupied, an adult suggested that we pray for each person who walked past our pew. I can’t remember how much praying I did then, but the advice stayed with me. As an adult, I often pray for my fellow congregants as they take Communion. This little spiritual practice has given me a richer picture of the Body of Christ.
Praying for Image-Bearers
As a member of our church for more than a dozen years, I know something of the life stories of those who share in the body and blood of Christ on Sundays. I pray for the widow who lost her husband of many years. I pray for the single mom and her child who just moved from out of state. I pray for the rumpled teenager whose parents dragged to church, and for the excited little girl in a sparkly dress holding her dad’s hand.
I meditate on the fact that each person is made in the image of God. The man who joyfully raises his hands in worship and the man who grouses about the music being too loud are both beloved by God and my brothers in Christ. The woman who dominates any conversation and the shy young woman who barely speaks, for all their differences, are both my sisters in Christ and created by God for higher purposes. “For we are His workmanship,” writes Paul, “created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:10).
Loving for the Long Haul
As a young couple, my husband and I moved several times, switching churches along the way. After some years overseas, we settled here and joined our current church. It took me some time to internalize the truth that we were here, in this place and in this church, for the long haul.
In my natural inclination, I like and get along well with some people and dislike or am annoyed by others. (I hope I’m not alone in this!) God constantly reminds me that He loves even the people I want to avoid. That I am to love the fellow Christian whose words make me bite my tongue, the one who disagrees with me on every church decision, and even the one who voted for “the other guy.” In His grace, God grows my patience and love by placing me with a few brothers and sisters in Christ who annoy me as much as any pesky childhood sibling living in the same household. I expect that I’m that pesky sibling to some in my church, as well!
Committing to a church for the long haul means that I don’t walk away from the situations and people that cause me frustration. I pray to see them the way God does—and often over the years, God has answered that prayer. I see the beautiful passion for serving others in someone with whom I regularly disagree. I get to know the troubles someone has endured—things that might make that person hard to get along with—and I admire their tenacity and faith. My judgmental first impressions have often turned out to be just a blip on the way to an appreciative and fruitful relationship.
God, in His creativity and grace, brings all kinds of people together in Christ.
For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. … If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell? But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as He chose. (1 Corinthians 12:12, 15–18)
Yes, every churchgoer I know has been placed in my church by God. Who am I to think that someone doesn’t belong?
Body of Christ
And so I wait and pray as my brothers and sisters take Communion. One by one, and yet all together, we walk or run or limp to receive the bread and wine, the body and blood of Christ. Each of us carries within joy and tragedy, sin and virtue, hard times and happy times, burdens and hopes, to the altar rail. We chew and swallow the bread and wine, the body and blood, until it is also within us, carrying forgiveness and strength and the sure faith that we are Christ’s beloved.
In these holy moments, the body of Christ is given to the Body of Christ.
The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread. (1 Corinthians 10:16–17)
The ordinariness of bread and wine and the regular rhythm of weekly Sunday worship can fool us into seeing only the material and missing the mystery. How does a bite of bread and sip of wine somehow make us a part of Christ and a part of one another? It’s a holy mystery, a wonder, a miracle, enacted week after week: Jesus, hidden in the ordinary stuff of life, dwells in us and makes us part of Him. Surely the presence of the Lord is in this place, whether it be a soaring cathedral or a small chapel. Surely the Spirit of the Lord dwells in His Body, the church, wherever and whoever it may be.
To learn more about the church as the Body of Christ and the gifts that Jesus gives to His people in Communion, try Gathered by Christ: The Overlooked Gift of Church.
