Communion in the Bible

Communion, also called the Lord's Supper or the Eucharist, is the ordinance Jesus instituted on the night before His crucifixion to proclaim His death until He returns. On that night, as recorded in Matthew 26:26, "Jesus took bread, and blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is my body." In Luke 22:19 He added the charge that gives the meal its enduring purpose: "This do in remembrance of me." Communion is therefore both a memorial and a proclamation, a tangible sign of the new covenant sealed in Christ's blood. The apostle Paul gives the church its fullest teaching on the table in 1 Corinthians 11. There the Lord's words over the bread (1 Corinthians 11:24) and the cup (1 Corinthians 11:25) are repeated, and Paul interprets the whole act: "For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do shew the Lord's death till he come" (1 Corinthians 11:26). The Supper looks backward to the cross, upward to the risen Lord, and forward to His coming. It is not a private devotion but a confession the gathered church makes together. Communion is also a participation in Christ and a bond of fellowship. Paul asks in 1 Corinthians 10:16, "The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ?" The one loaf signifies that believers, though many, are one body in Him. Approaching the table calls for self-examination, gratitude, and faith, that we might discern the Lord's body and feed our souls on the grace He freely gives.