1 Corinthans 11:17-34 - Being Worthy of The Lord's Supper

17 But in giving this instruction, I do not praise you, because you come together not for the better but for the worse.

But in giving this instruction - This instruction refers to the instructions that Paul is about to give regarding the Lord's supper.

I do not praise you - This is in contrast to the praise Paul had for the Corinthian saints in verse 2 where he praised them for holding firmly to the traditions that Paul had delivered to them.

you come together - Coming together is the essense of Christianity.

John 13:34,35

"A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another."

It is in our coming together that we are able to express our love for one another. Is there a church anywhere that meets for the express purpose of loving one another???

not for the better but for the worse - Coming together should be a good thing but the Corinthian saints had turned it into something bad.

18 For, in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that divisions exist among you; and in part I believe it.

when you come together as a church - The Greek word for church is ekklesia. It means called out ones. God has called out his saints to come together as a body to demonstrate His love to the world by how we love one another.

divisions exist among you - Divisions are a normal part of the body. God has chosen to continue to allow us to sin. For God's love shines brightest against the dark backdrop of our selfishness.

and in part I believe it - Part of Paul desires for the body to be a perfect reflection of God's holiness, but Paul has also learned that God sometimes leaves us with a thorn in the flesh to keep us from becoming independent of His grace. Divisions are part of the normal Christian church.

19 For there must also be factions among you, so that those who are approved may become evident among you.

there must also be factions among you - Factions (the Greek word haireseis from which we get heresy) are a necessary part of the life of the church.

those who are approved - God approves of certain behaviors which result from certain beliefs.

may become evident among you - In a race the victor is determined by comparing times. God's approval becomes evident by comparing the lifestyles of those who hold to different beliefs.

20 Therefore when you meet together, it is not to eat the Lord's Supper,

Therefore - Paul uses therefore to refer back to the divisions among the church.

when you meet together - The church is to meet together as one body; not as separate cliques meeting in the same building.

it is not to eat the Lord's Supper - We meet together to eat together, but it is not the Lord's Supper if we do not eat as one body.

21 for in your eating each one takes his own supper first; and one is hungry and another is drunk.

each one takes his own supper first - This is the exact opposite of the love for one another that marks us as His disciples.

Mark 9:35

Sitting down, He called the twelve and said to them, "If anyone wants to be first, he shall be last of all and servant of all."

one is hungry and another is drunk - This goes against the very words of our Lord. We demonstrate His providential love for the world by providing for the needs of one another. Our Lord, Himself, said that the righteousness of eternal life is based on our taking care of one another. (Notice that He did not say that it is based on believing certain things or on His work on the cross; but those are subjects for another time)

Matthew 25:44-46

"Then they themselves also will answer, 'Lord, when did we see You hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not take care of You?' "Then He will answer them, 'Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.' "These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life."

22 What! Do you not have houses in which to eat and drink? Or do you despise the church of God and shame those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you? In this I will not praise you.

Do you not have houses in which to eat and drink - If you don't feel like being loving then just roll over and go back to bed.

Or do you despise the church of God - The church of God corresponds to the temple of the Old Covenant and to the body of Christ. The temple is where the world could come and see what Yahweh was like. Now we have Christ as the demonstration of God's love and we are His body for all the world to see.

Hebrews 1:3

And He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,

and shame those who have nothing - Instead of letting people feel the love and acceptance God has for them we turn the church upside down and make them feel ashamed before God. In God's eyes we all have nothing to offer Him. We are all equal before Him. We are all saved solely by His gracious love. By excluding those who have nothing we deny the heart of the gospel.

²³ For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was betrayed took bread;

For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you - This is an example of the traditions that were handed down from Jesus to Paul mentioned in verse 2.

in the night in which He was betrayed - How amazing is this! What a contrast to the selfishness of the Corinthians. On the very night when He is about to be betrayed, not just by the very nation He has come to save, not just by Judas, but when He is eventually disowned by all of His disciples He demonstrates the love of the Father by giving His very life for the sake of the betrayers.

took bread - Jesus took the bread of the Passover feast and expressed its full meaning. He turned the shadow of the Law into the reality of God's grace. How petty we are to take the bread of His gracious love and withhold it from those who are hungry.

24 and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, "This is My body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of Me."

and when He had given thanks - The Lord's Supper is sometimes called the Eucharist which means the giving of thanks. The Corinthians were to be coming together to express thanks to the Lord for setting them free from their sins by dying in their place.

He broke it - As was the bread, Christ's body was broken in our place.

This is My body, which is for you - His body was offered up to God as an offering for sin for us, instead of us.

do this in remembrance of Me - We remember the love God has shown to us by loving those He brings into our lives and especially those who believe in His love.

25 In the same way He took the cup also after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in My blood; do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me."

In the same way - Just as He took the bread of life and gave it new meaning, so also He took the cup and gave it its full meaning.

He took the cup also - The cup filled with red wine represented the lamb's blood shed to spare the children of Israel from the death angel in Egypt. The blood represented both the wrath and the salvation of God. God's wrath was poured out on the lamb instead of the Isrealites and so provided for their salvation.

There is a good article on the cup here

This cup is the new covenant in My blood - In the same way as the bread, the cup represents the reality that Jesus' blood was shed instead of ours. Jesus is the way, and the life, and the truth. The Law was merely a shadow of the reality we now have in Christ.

26 For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes.

For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup - So how often should we celebrate communion? As often as we think we should proclaim the Lord's death in our place. Shouldn't the proclamation of the Lord's death be the centerpiece of all our gatherings?

you proclaim the Lord's death - The way God has chosen to demonstrate His love for the world is through the Lord's death. We come together to proclaim God's love for the world.

until He comes - Until He comes and completely demonstrates that His unconditional love rules over all mankind. Until He comes and completely demonstrates that the conditional love of the Law, as described in the following verse, has been done away with.

Joshua 8:34

Then afterward he read all the words of the law, the blessing and the curse, according to all that is written in the book of the law.

27 Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner, shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord.

Therefore - Because the Lord's Supper is a proclamation of His death for all.

whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord - The eating and drinking together is to be an image of God's love for all.

in an unworthy manner - The manner in which we eat or drink the Lord's Supper is either worthy or unworthy. We are not worthy or unworthy. Worthiness is determined by how well we represent the image of God's love. If we eat and drink as one body then we are doing so in a worthy manner. If we eat and drink selfishly then we are doing so unworthily.

shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord - If we eat or drink in an unworthy manner then we are misrepresenting the unconditional love of God which the broken body and the shed blood of the Lord represent.

"Every celebration of praise and thanksgiving is meant to achieve what Jesus effected in table-fellowship---thanksgiving, praise, mutual acceptance, reconciliation, fraternity. When worshipping communities continue to harbor grudges and nurture resentments against one another, when cool cordiality and polite indifference flourish, when cliques and splinter groups abound and the lines of social, religious, and ethnic divisions are reinforced, their worship services shore up rather than tear down the barriers that divide people and diminish the quality of life. Communion is celebrated unworthily."

From "A Glimpse of Jesus, Stranger to Self-Hatred" by Brennan Manning. Chapter 3, Healing Through Meal-Sharing.

28 But a man must examine himself, and in so doing he is to eat of the bread and drink of the cup.

But a man must examine himself - This examination is just to see if each individual is representing the union of the body through participation in the Lord's Supper. It is not a time for introspection and confession of past sins. It is an examination of one's immediate present attitude towards the Supper.

29 For he who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgment to himself if he does not judge the body rightly.

For he who eats and drinks - It is the manner in which we eat and drink which is unworthy. We are not unworthy. We have been made worthy by the very body and blood of Christ which the Lord's Supper represents.

eats and drinks judgment to himself - Eating and drinking selfishly brings God's judgment because we destroy the Lord's Supper.

if he does not judge the body rightly - If we fail to recognize that the Lord's Supper represents the unity of the body of Christ then we will shatter its image of God's love.

30 For this reason many among you are weak and sick, and a number sleep.

For this reason - Because many fail to discern the body of Christ in the Lord's Supper. Many see it as just another meal. This is a strong argument that the Lord's Supper in the early church was very different from the "meal" we see in churches today. How could anyone mistake the little wafer and thimbleful of grape juice for a meal?

many among you are weak and sick - Those who are weak and sick cannot come to the fellowship and participate in the meal. They cannot harm the image of our unity in the Lord.

and a number sleep - If weakness and sickness are not enough to keep them home then the Lord may take them home to be with Him in order to preserve His message to the world.

31 But if we judged ourselves rightly, we would not be judged.

But if we judged ourselves rightly - If we rightly judged the manner in which we participate in the Lord's Supper ...

we would not be judged - Then we would not have to be judged by God.

32 But when we are judged, we are disciplined by the Lord so that we will not be condemned along with the world.

But when we are judged - When we are judged means when we fail to reflect the unity of the image of the body (unity) of Christ.

we are disciplined by the Lord - Disciplined refers to those whom God has made weak, sick, and even killed.

so that we will not be condemned along with the world - We, as the body of Christ, the expression of His love, must stand out as light against the darkness of the world. If we blend in with the world, if we act like the world, then our lives must be disciplined so that we will again stand out.

Philippians 2:15

so that you will prove yourselves to be blameless and innocent, children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you appear as lights in the world,

33 So then, my brethren, when you come together to eat, wait for one another.

So then - Paul, here, begins his summary of his teaching on the Lord's Supper.

my brethren - Paul encourages those whom he has had to rebuke by calling them his brethren.

when you come together to eat - Paul describes the Lord's Supper as a coming together to eat. The point of the Lord's Supper is that we are a body united through the sacrifice of Christ which makes us all equal in God's sight. We are all saints or holy ones. There are no degrees of holiness in God's eyes and there should be no distinctions made in our eyes. Sharing a meal is God's chosen way to represent this unity because all sit at the same table and all eat the same food.

wait for one another - The Lord's Supper is a display of unity. Those would not wait for the entire assembly were hindering that display. It is probably the lower classes who were not able to be there on time so the wealthy were not waiting for the poor. The distinction between wealthy and poor was destroyed by the cross. One of the purposes of the Lord's Supper is to celebrate that Christ's death for both the wealthy and the poor has put an end to all such distinction.

James 2:5

Listen, my beloved brethren: did not God choose the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him?

34 If anyone is hungry, let him eat at home, so that you will not come together for judgment. The remaining matters I will arrange when I come.

If anyone is hungry - Isn't it ironic that physical food blinds us to the reality of the spiritual food provided for us by God through Christ's death?

let him eat at home - Isn't it ironic that our need to satisfy our physical hunger separates us and keeps us from satisfying our spiritual hunger?

so that you will not come together for judgment - Isn't it ironic that the Lord's Supper is a coming together to celebrate the fact that there is no judgment for those for whom Christ has borne judgment? Yet by making unholy distinctions we do, indeed, come together for judgment.

The remaining matters I will arrange when I come - I have no idea what these remaining matters might be. I guess the Corinthians would have known.