“Our Lord Jesus
Christ, on the night when He was betrayed, took bread, and when He had given
thanks, He broke it and gave it to the disciples and said: “Take, eat; this is
My body, which is given for you. This do in remembrance of Me.”
In the same way also He took the cup after supper, and when
He had given thanks, He gave it to them, saying, “Drink of it, all of you; this
cup is the new testament in My blood, which is shed for you for the forgiveness
of sins. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.”
-From Luther's Small Catechism
The last four or so months, our
Elders have been discussing the Lord's Supper in accord with the District Presentations on Closed Communion. We
discussed many of the ins and outs of the Lord's Supper, using the What About Fellowship in the Lord's Supper article written by former LCMS President
Dr. A. L. Barry.
After looking through that
document, and attending the circuit forum on Closed Communion, our elders and I
decided we would like to include a communion statement in our bulletin. As we worked on it, we had several goals in
mind:
- To let people know what we believe we are receiving in the Lord's Supper - namely, the very body and blood of Jesus in, with, and under the bread and wine for the forgiveness of our sins.
- To let people know we also believe that the participation in the Lord Supper is an intimate thing, in which we publicly declare that all who come to the altar are in one mind about our doctrine and practice. In other words, it is a profession of unity.
- To warn people that receiving the Lord's Supper wrongly can hurt their spiritual health.
- To encourage and invite people to become members so that they might attend the Lord's Supper in the future.
- To base our statement off of what Scripture clearly says, and to include those references in the statement.
- To do all of the above things in as kindly a way as possible.
As you can imagine, accomplishing
the task above was not easy. To help us
in formulating our statement, we looked at statements from 20 other LCMS
churches, both in North Dakota, and in other states. (Ask Pastor if you'd like a copy of those statements) We also
examined the communion statement model provided by the LCMS. We talked about and used parts we thought were good, and we talked about and didn't use parts we thought weren't good.
In examining all of the
statements, and to meet our requirements as concisely as possible, we came up
with the following statement for our bulletins.
It will be a supplement to the statement on our communion cards. It is perhaps a bit longer than we'd have
liked, but it does state what we believe as clearly as we could.
In our Parish we follow the historic Lutheran practice of closed communion. This is nothing new, nor a novel innovation of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. Rather, for many centuries, this was the universal practice of all of Christendom, and to this day, is still practiced by the majority of the Christian Church.
We observe closed communion because the Lord’s Supper is a public profession of our unity of faith. (1 Corinthians 10:16-17)
We believe Christ’s body and blood are truly present in the bread and the wine for forgiveness of our sins. (1 Corinthians 11:23-25)
We observe closed communion to protect people in body and soul from taking the Lord’s Supper to their judgment and harm. (1 Corinthians 11:27-32)
Our practice is prompted by our love, care, and concern for all people. If you are not a communicant member of a congregation of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, please do not commune today.
However, please know that we look forward to having you at the Lord’s Table soon. We sincerely invite you to visit with Pastor Moline about the joys of Holy Communion. He will offer you instruction about our Lutheran faith and this sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, so you will be ready to stand with us and partake of this wonderful meal.
We would like to talk about this
statement some in Bible Studies in the future as well, to explain all the
reasons we have included the things we have included. We would be happy to field any questions
about the statement you might have as well.
Feel free to talk to Pastor or an elder about the statement at any
time.
