The Best Laid Plans of Mice and Sermons Often Go Astray

Sadly, because there was no single point at which the community could
draw on as the institution of such a meal, many interpretations
developed within the community.

Even more sadly the meal was turned into a restricted meal where only "the baptized faithful"³ are allowed to partake of the communion in the liberation of God. These restriction and arguments are the shackles keeping the communion of Christians from the liberation of Christ.

The idea of God as liberator is found throughout Hebrew and Christian Scriptures. It is a theme that is so common to our heritage as Christians we often times neglect the notion and devote much of our time on issues that separate us from the humanity of God. I believe Walter Brueggemann speaks to this idea of liberation in his work The liturgy of abundance, the myth of scarcity.⁴ This "liturgy of abundance" that Brueggemann speaks of is the heritage of liberation to which I speak. Brueggemann speaks of the Hebrews being set free from Pharaoh's fear of scarcity,⁵ of God's love coming to the Hebrews in the wilderness as manna⁶, of Joshua and the generosity of God,⁷ and finally of the Jesus Christ.⁸ All of these stories point directly to the generosity of God towards a people in need. That is to say, these are stories of God liberating a people from the bondage of societal structures built and building the notions lack, sin, and death. This liberation can be found connected tothe celebration or 'thanksgiving' of a meal shared in the abundance of God. The meal is a Worship of the God who frees, a thanksgiving, a Eucharist! All these meals are truly the Lord's Supper.

The communion "meal" that we celebrate today in many of our Christian churches is a far cry from the shared common meals of the first century Christians.⁹ There is not much information on an institution or even general guidelines for the type of Eucharist attended by the early Christian communities, but from the writings in Scripture and other early Christian documents, we can see that the Eucharist meal was not a small portion of bread stuff and an even smaller portion of wine or juice. The early Christians celebrated a full meal in which some could even get drunk¹⁰ with the amount of food and drink that was available. Dennis E. Smith and Hal E. Taussig write extensively on this subject in their work Many Tables, The Eucharist in the New Testament and Liturgy Today.¹¹ The authors bring to light the fact that Jesus never instituted or commanded his followers to hold a meal. This work also destroys many of the notions held about the proper model for the Eucharistic meal. The early Christians, according to the authors, were as divided about the meaning and mode of the meal as we Christians today.¹² Dissenting from Smith and Taussing slightly, I believe there was something common within all of these meals and that was the celebration of the abundance and the liberation of God bestowed upon the people. Even today among the many faceted Christian Denominational Church, we see this common thread in our celebration of the Eucharist. We celebrate, we believe in Christ and thus we believe and celebrate with the Eucharist meal. Even though we have this common thread as the first century Christians did, there are some within the body of believers who will deny those from other faith traditions the sharing in the celebration of God's liberation.¹³ We have turned the celebration which binds all humanity together into a binding of our hearts and minds and separating us from others because of social and semantic differences.

We are a divided people though we are prayed for by Jesus "that [we] all may be one"¹⁴ It has been our own arrogance that has led to the division. We have not trusted in God's abundance and liberation to set us free from the chains of despair. As such we have become frightened of others and other's views so we must assert our own bias views against others which causes more division. Our brokenness is not all the Church's fault. Many of our prejudices have stemmed from the fears within the society and community we live. Iris Young points out in her work Justice and the Politics of Difference¹⁵ that many social groups oppress others simply because they are "others" and part of a group that is hated by society.¹⁶ It is these fears or this "belief in the myth of scarcity"¹⁷ that has caused many deep wounds within the joining together of humanity generally and the Church particularly. We have barred entrance to the table of the Lord simple because we are afraid. God has set us free, has liberated us from the beginning our our awakening and yet we still do not trust in the abundance of God and let ourselves be set free.

It is a sad and pathetic state in which the Church of God is in today. When walls of division are built up day by day, what hope do we have? Our hope must be in the Lord, in the freedom and liberation that has been offered by God. It is not enough to say we are liberated we must rise up and tear down the walls surrounding the table of the Lord. The Lord has called many and we are not the ones who have authority to turn them away. We should be the ones turned away for we live in fear and scarcity. What right do we have to celebrate the abundance and liberation of God when we do not know or believe in God's abundance and liberation? We must turn from our division and celebrate all of humanity with God as free. Just as God called his people out of Egypt, so to are we called away from our hatred and fear. We must break free from the shackles we have place around our hearts and the Eucharist and celebrate the Lord's Table with our true liberation of being connected to God and all of creation. We are imago dirt and God has touched our being.

 
1. Exodus 11:1 - 12:30
2. Luke 22:14-15
3. Book of Order, W-2.4006, Office of the General Assembly Presbyterian Church (USA), Louisville, KY, 2002
4. Brueggemann, Walter, "The Liturgy of abundance, the myth of scarcity", The Christian Century March 24-31, 1999
5. ibid. p 342
6. ibid. p 342
7. ibid. p 343
8. ibid. p 345-347
9. Smith, Dennis E. & Taussig, Hal E., Many Tables The Eucharist in the New Testament and Liturgy Today, Trinity Press International Philidelphia,1990, p38
10. ibid.
11. ibid. p. 68-69
12. ibid. p. 69-70
13. ibid.
14. John 17:21
15. Young, Iris Marion, Justice and the Politics of Difference, Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ, 1990
16. ibid. p 58-61
17. Brueggemann, "The Liturgy of Abundance and the Myth of Scarcity", 1999