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Originally posted by KingsGambit
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I've had my own thoughts on Communion for awhile, and I've considered starting a thread on it, but part of me has been concerned that it's just me trying to force my own personal preferences on everyone else, which I know I have a bad habit of doing. But I'll do it anyway.
I have read that the early church treated it as more as a communal meal than as where somebody takes one piece of bread and one sip, and if this is true, I don't see any reason we shouldn't go toward that. (But on the other hand, I know there are some people who think Christians should only meet in houses because the first Christians do that, and I think it's obvious that they did that more because they obviously couldn't openly worship in churches, much less afford their own buildings, at first, so I don't think it's necessary. So I use this as a caution toward the line of thinking that we have to do things exactly like the first Christians do.)
Having said that, my own church has begun doing communal meals and I have found it to be an exceptional means of fellowship. I'm sort of lucky in that I attend a very small church where that's even practical, but it seems like something I could see the earliest Christians doing.
I do think we should drink wine. I just don't see any good reason not to offer it. My own church offers both wine and grape juice out of sensitivity toward recovering alcoholics or people with allergies, and those two exceptions seem reasonable to me, but that seems like about it to me. It seems strange not to do exactly as Jesus commanded IMO. (I remember attending a youth service as a teenager where tortilla chips and Coca Cola were offered. That seems almost blasphemous to me in retrospect.)
I have read that the early church treated it as more as a communal meal than as where somebody takes one piece of bread and one sip, and if this is true, I don't see any reason we shouldn't go toward that. (But on the other hand, I know there are some people who think Christians should only meet in houses because the first Christians do that, and I think it's obvious that they did that more because they obviously couldn't openly worship in churches, much less afford their own buildings, at first, so I don't think it's necessary. So I use this as a caution toward the line of thinking that we have to do things exactly like the first Christians do.)
Having said that, my own church has begun doing communal meals and I have found it to be an exceptional means of fellowship. I'm sort of lucky in that I attend a very small church where that's even practical, but it seems like something I could see the earliest Christians doing.
I do think we should drink wine. I just don't see any good reason not to offer it. My own church offers both wine and grape juice out of sensitivity toward recovering alcoholics or people with allergies, and those two exceptions seem reasonable to me, but that seems like about it to me. It seems strange not to do exactly as Jesus commanded IMO. (I remember attending a youth service as a teenager where tortilla chips and Coca Cola were offered. That seems almost blasphemous to me in retrospect.)
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