HOW OFTEN SHOULD WE
OBSERVE COMMUNION?
Commonly
referred to as Communion, the Eucharist, or even the Great Thanksgiving, the
Lord’s Supper is one of two ordinances of the church and, thus, must be
considered a serious and sacred act of worship. I recently had a conversation
with another worship leader who said to me that the Lord’s Supper is not an act
of worship. I was stunned, to say the least. If Communion is not an act of
worship, what is it? Contrarily, not only is Communion an act of worship, it is
also a vital sacred act of fellowship in the body of Christ. To neglect the
Lord’s Supper, is to disobey Christ’s institution of and command to partake in
it. Doubtlessly, believers should prioritize the Lord’s Supper. A good question
then is this: how often should a church observe the Lord’s Supper? There are
varying opinions on this matter. Communion was a crucial aspect of my doctoral
studies so I have four thoughts regarding the interval between a church’s
Lord’s Supper observances.
There Is No Specified Interval of Time in Scripture
Try as we
may, there is not a biblical prescription for how often a church should observe
the Lord’s Supper. The command Christ gives is to take Communion in remembrance
of him until he returns (1 Cor 11:23-26). If we are not careful, we could grow
prideful in our observance of the Lord’s Supper, as if how often we observe the
sacred act indicates our spirituality above churches who may not observe it as
often. This is certainly one end of the spectrum on which we should not aspire
to be. To claim that a weekly (or any other interval of time) Lord’s Supper is
a specific command is to effectively add to Scripture. We should be mindful to
observe Communion in a worthy manner but not use it as a instrument of pride.
The Early Church Observed Communion Each Week
In stark
contrast to the prideful approach just discussed, we should never neglect Communion.
The early church and indeed the church throughout the centuries observed
Communion on a weekly basis.[1][2]
The historic order of worship has been a fourfold order consisting of
gathering, word, table, and sending.[3]
Where most current Protestant traditions would consider the sermon to be the
pinnacle of the worship service,[4]
historically, there was not a pinnacle or most important part; the Lord’s
Supper was of equal importance to all other aspects of the weekly gathering of
God’s people. From the early church and until around the 19th
century, the Lord’s Supper was a weekly part of Christian worship. Some have
argued that Communion occurred each day in the early church based on their
breaking bread each day (Acts 2:46), though the language does not necessarily
imply Communion but rather general meals of fellowship together. Nonetheless, Communion
has been vitally important throughout the church’s history whether in an
ordinal or sacramental tradition. The weekly observation of Communion is not a
new idea; nor should it be considered wrong or meaningless ritual when early
Christians practiced Holy Communion on a weekly basis during their corporate
worship gatherings.
Doesn’t the Act Mean Less the More Often We Observe It?
One form of
pushback I often hear regarding weekly Communion is, “Doesn’t it become
meaningless if we observe it weekly?” The short answer is no. We utilize many
acts of worship weekly, e.g. sermons, congregational singing, and prayers. If
the logic is that it becomes meaningless the more we do it, why not also get rid
of everything else we do weekly?
Additionally, if it does indeed
become meaningless, the issue is not with the act itself but rather with the
individual participating. Ritual has never been wrong in and of itself. In
fact, if a sacred act of worship becomes mere ritual to an individual or a
group of individuals, it could be that those believers should examine their own
hearts rather than assume the act is the problem. Personally, churches with
which I have worshiped who have held Communion most reverently have been the
ones who observe it most often. The concept of an act becoming less important
the more it is observed is bad logic. On such a principle then, we should not
assume that a routine act is bad in and of itself; we should instead examine
our own hearts so that the Lord’s Supper is perpetually realized in our lives
and churches as a vital part of the worship experience.
It Is One of Two Ordinances of the Church: Why Not Observe It More?
In matters
of corporate worship, we regularly ask the wrong questions. While we might ask
why we observe the Lord’s Supper so often, we should instead ask ourselves why
we do not observe it more, for it is certainly not a bad act but a holy and
sacred one. My guess is that believers would not complain about the ordinance
of baptism each week; why then would we dare complain about the Lord’s Supper
each week? We could even consider baptism and the Lord’s Supper to be two
different manifestations of one ordinance: namely Jesus Christ; baptism is
Christ realized and the Lord’s Supper is Christ remembered. The same could also
be considered in sacramental traditions.[5]
Communion
is to be observed as a corporate act since it is an ordinance of the church,
i.e. it should not be observed between a couple in a wedding ceremony or in a
youth ministry camp or meeting. It is of vital importance. Nevertheless, many
churches neglect the importance of the Lord’s Supper. While there is no
prescribed interval of time between its observances, there exists great
historical and spiritual substance for the Lord’s Supper’s weekly observances,
though no matter what a local congregation decides, to neglect the Lord’s
Supper or its importance is to disobey Christ’s command to partake in
remembrance of him.
[1] Didache 7:14.
[2] Justin Martyr, Apology
I, 67.
[3] Robert E. Webber, Planning
Blended Worship: The Creative Mixture of Old and New (Nashville, TN:
Abingdon Press, 1998), 21.
[4] Falsely assumed to be the word, the sermon is a mere
portion of the service of the word.
[5] I claim ordinances because I believe that baptism and
the Lord’s Supper were both ordained and instituted by Christ as a visible
symbol rather than a means of imparting grace.
