Love God More: A Communion Meditation
/Your name is probably not Ishmael. And your mother’s name is probably not Hagar.
But you have spent time in the wilderness. You have been rejected and betrayed by those you trusted. You took the scraps of bread and water with you, alone, and those scraps ran out. The water ran out. You were ready to give up. You gave up. You had nothing left.
And maybe, when you joined the community of Christ, you don’t remember “dying.” But you have found, over time, that you really need to push certain ideas, practices, or people away from you, because you realized that they weren’t what God had in mind. You knew that, to make space for the miraculous life of the Spirit, you had to clean house, to cut ties.
You probably haven’t been called a “prince of demons.” But someone has insulted you because of the living, breathing commitment you have made to follow Christ. Maybe it was someone in your family. Or someone else who was close to you. You loved them, deeply, immensely. That love never faded. But the pain was just as great as the love.
When you are rejected, God hears you, and gives you what you need.
When you submit to Christ, and die to sin, God is present with an endless fountain of life.
When you are insulted, the Holy Spirit is with you in it.
God is trying, always working, to draw you closer. He allows and uses these hard, sometimes very hard, things to pull you to Him, so He can hold you. And heal you.
He doesn’t ask you to hate those you have loved. He asks you to love Him more. And He fills you, to empower you, to do just that.
One of the ways He fills you is this invitation, to this table. He offers Himself, body and blood, for you. We, the empty, the betrayed, the broken, the isolated and alone, are invited to His table, which is set for us wherever we might be. He draws each of us to Himself, in love. And in doing so, He draws us together.
For this is what the Lord himself said, and I pass it on to you just as I received it. On the night when he was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took a loaf of bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, "This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me." In the same way, he took the cup of wine after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant between God and you, sealed by the shedding of my blood. Do this in remembrance of me as often as you drink it." For every time you eat this bread and drink this cup, you are announcing the Lord's death until Jesus comes again.
Offering Meditation:
God has been working to create and redeem from the very beginning. That vibrant, creative, exciting work will continue until all His purposes are accomplished. But He doesn’t leave us on the outside of that work. He invites us to join Him in it. Maybe you have money you can give to the work He’s doing here, in this congregation. But that money isn’t a substitute for your participation in His work. It’s just a small part of you. And that’s what He really wants: you.
So if circumstances these days mean you don’t see any way to give money to this congregation, that’s fine. We trust that God will provide what we need. Start with yourself. Give yourself to God, listening for His guidance like a trust fall, leaning all that you are into His strength, provision, joy, and love. He will let you know what He wants you to give.