Well, last we come to our third and final message on the Lord's Supper in our series on reforming worship. This morning, we are going to look at the covenantal power of the Lord's Supper. But before we do that, in order to review, let's remember that in week one, we looked at the Lord's Supper as a memorial meal. It's a memorial meal where we remember the life, death, resurrection of Christ. I gave you those three Ps. We remember the passion, Christ's sufferings. We remember the promise, how Christ's sufferings for us was part of God's promise going all the way back to Genesis 3 in the garden. And then we looked at the parousia, the coming again, so that when we celebrate the Lord's Supper, we are remembering God's covenant grace, past, present, and future. So it's the Lord's Supper as a memorial meal. And then last week we looked at the Lord's Supper as a mystical participation in the body and blood of Christ. We, if you remember, looked at John 6 and how Jesus says, if we do not eat his body and drink his blood, we have no part in him. We have no life. But those who do, we abide in Him and He in us. And we expounded the very mysterious nature of that as it is then celebrated in the Lord's Supper when we experience true koinonia. We saw that in 1 Corinthians 10, how when we participate in the Lord's Supper, we are participating in true spiritual fellowship. Even as Paul said there in 1 Corinthians 10.18, are not the participants or those who eat of the sacrifice participants in the altar. That there is a spiritual sense in which we are participating in the sacrifice of Christ in a spiritual way when we partake of the Lord's Supper. So week one, I gave you the key word, remember. And in week two, I gave you the key word, participate. And now here in week three, the key word will be discern, discern. And I hope these three words will help you when we celebrate the Lord's Supper together, they can be something that reminds you of what we should be doing when we participate in the Lord's Supper. So this week, we're gonna look at the Lord's Supper as a covenantal fence. a covenantal fence. And as I said, the key word will be discern. Now, why do we look at the Lord's Supper as a covenantal fence? The reason is that we must look at the Lord's Supper as a covenantal fence because God works the power of His grace as well as judgment through the Lord's Supper. There is a power in the Lord's Supper. It is a means of grace and it is also a means whereby God will execute at times judgment. This is what we're going to unpack this morning. We're gonna see how worthy receivers eat and drink the grace of Christ, the spiritual koinonia, while unworthy receivers eat and drink the judgment of God. It is an experience of God's judgment and wrath before the great day of judgment. And therefore pastors and churches must fence the table And you must discern the body of Christ and examine yourselves before partaking. So to unpack this, we are going to examine 1 Corinthians 10 and 11, which we read for our scripture readings this morning. We're gonna do that to understand what worthy and unworthy reception looks like. And then we'll talk about how we fence the church in the PCA, as well as our churches, First Presbyterian Church of Norway. So we'll look at 1 Corinthians 10 and 11, and then we'll talk about how we practically fence the table here as a church. So let's begin with 1 Corinthians 10 and 11 to examine worthy and unworthy reception and God's grace and judgment therein. In order to understand how God works both grace and judgment through the Lord's Supper, we need to understand the Old Testament background, which Paul gives to us in chapter 10. All of these chapters, chapter 10, chapter 11, and going back even to chapter eight in 1 Corinthians, it's part of a larger argument that Paul is making. And in chapter 10, Paul sets the stage for the Lord's Supper and he comes back to it in chapter 11. So please keep your Bibles open there to chapter 10. We see in verses one to 11, a profound and somewhat startling background for understanding the spiritual nature of the sacraments today. And let me read that for us again, verses one to 11. Paul says, for I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud. and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. Nevertheless, with most of them, God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness. Now these things took place as examples for us that we might not desire evil as they did. Do not be idolaters as some of them were. As it is written, the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play. We must not indulge in sexual immorality, as some of them did, and 23,000 fell in a single day. We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did, and were destroyed by serpents. Nor grumble, as some of them did, and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now these things happen to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction on whom the end of the ages has come. So what can we learn about the sacraments and sacramental life as the body of Christ in these verses? There's a couple things. First, let's look at verses one to four. Here we see that the covenant community participated in God's sacramental grace. In the Old Testament, man, woman, child, and infant were baptized into Moses in the wilderness, passing through the sea. The whole covenant community passed through. And as Paul says, they were baptized into Moses. Moses was God's appointed leader. He was their covenant head at this time. And they were all baptized into him as they moved through the wilderness. So the entire community was baptized as it were. In other words, we see here baptism foreshadowed as God's covenant people pass through the sea. Likewise, we also see here that the whole communant family, they ate the same spiritual food, and they all drank the same spiritual drink. And what Paul is referring to is the man in the wilderness, as well as the miraculous episodes where water was provided for the people, where they thought they were gonna go hungry and thirsty and die, and God provided for them. And we see in verse four, the spiritual reality. What were they really drinking from? Paul says that they drank from the rock that was Christ. So in a spiritual sense, they were in a Old Testament foreshadowed way also drinking from Christ and feeding on Christ. So Paul gives us this marvelous parallel of these great acts of deliverance and provision in the Old Testament, particularly here in the wilderness and the Exodus from Egypt. And he's saying these things are all foreshadows of baptism and foreshadows of the Lord's supper. And the whole community, particularly these things, and the significance of these things are the same as they are today. They point to Christ. It's being spiritually nourished by Jesus. So that's the first thing we can get here. We see baptism in the Lord's Supper foreshadowed, the spiritual realities, the sacramental grace of it. But now in verses five to 11, we see that it didn't all turn out as well as we might have hoped. Indeed, they fed on Christ, but God overthrew most of them. We see in verse five, nevertheless, with most of them, God was not pleased for they were overthrown in the wilderness. We see here a fundamental nature of the visible people of God. that while the whole community is baptized into Moses, God's not pleased with all of them, and he overthrew many of them. Indeed, even today in the church, the visible church is a mixed community of believers and unbelievers. Even of those that have been baptized or those that partake of the Lord's Supper, the reality is that we are a mixed community. of believers and unbelievers, just like the Old Testament. And so Paul gives some serious warnings here when he says here in verse 6, Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did. So the Old Testament was written down for us. so that we might not pay the same, this sounds too trite to say it this way, but the same dummy tax as the Old Testament people. That's too trite of a phrase for these people who were spiritually lost. But these things took place as examples for us that we might not desire evil as they did. Why did God overthrow most of them in the wilderness? Well, we see a number of examples that Paul gives us here in verses five to 11, but in short, they loved evil. They were people who were part of the community of God, circumcised, partaking of the Passover, And yet they loved evil. These are visible people in the covenant community who nevertheless loved evil. And Paul points out a number of examples of idolatry, of revelry, of sexual immorality. Paul says that they put Christ to the test. Even in the Old Testament, before the Word of God was made flesh, they put Christ to the test, the second person of the Trinity. They grumbled. They groaned. They continually did not trust God. So Paul gives a number of very specific illustrations. For example, he hearkens back to the golden calf in Exodus 32, four, when Moses went up on the mountain to receive the law and the people demanded that Aaron make a visible image of Yahweh. And so he makes a golden calf and says, behold your God. And this was most abominable for a host of reasons. One, that the golden calf represented the pagan God of Bolek, of whom they would sacrifice their children to. And in which in some very horrible chapters of Israel's history, they actually did. They wanted to take on the way that the pagans worship in their worship of the true God. Also, the golden calf incident, Paul notes the revelry that was going on here in 1 Corinthians 10. And then here in Exodus 32.6, we know that the Israelites were most likely participating in a fertility cult orgy. The word used in Exodus 32, 6 to speak of revelry, of partying, is a word that speaks to what was going on in pagan worship when you would have intercourse with a cultic prostitute. to earn the favor of God and to have an abundant life and all of these things. And Israel was likely participating in that in Exodus 32. But elsewhere, Paul points us back to the story of Baal at Peor when Israel in Numbers 25 were practicing sexual immorality where they were worshiping the Baal there in Peor. And we have the story where Phinehas actually raises up and kills somebody who walked in the midst of the congregation to participate in this vile sin. It said there in Numbers 25 that Israel whored with the daughters of Moab and they yoked themselves to Baal. Israel, God's covenant people, yoked themselves to Baal. What we're seeing here then is that God was displeased with his people because of flagrant public sin. flagrant public sin and God judged them for it. In the Golden Calf, 3,000 men fell as they are commanded to slay those with the sword who were participating in this. At Baal, at Peor, 23,000 men fell. When they rebelled against Moses, Even more fell. God sent serpents. And when they rebelled in the wilderness, God forbade them to enter the promised land. And he said that every one of you, 20 years and older, will die. They were destroyed by the destroyer, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 10. So they received death by sword, death by plague, death by serpents, and death by the destroyer. And in the context of Corinth, you have all of this stuff going on. You've got people participating in prostitution at the temple. They're partying at the temple, which is kind of where people would gather to party and have fun and get drunk and gorge themselves on food. People in the church, in the visible church in Corinth are doing this. And so Paul is writing to remind them of what God does with such people. So that takes us then to Paul giving more of a specific exhortation then in 1 Corinthians 11, 17 and following. There's, I mean, all sorts of problems. I mean, Corinth is like the church plant from hell. I mean, literally speaking, if you think your church plant's going bad, you've heard me say this before, just look at Paul and his churches. Can you imagine what the devil was trying to do to destroy the churches that the apostles are planting? And Corinth is a nightmare church. Significant division going on. Significant politics and party spirits We see in verse 21, selfishness. We see verse 22, they're humiliating others, basically by making themselves look rich and wealthy when the poor people who didn't even have food to bring to the Lord's Supper meal were going hungry. And they're humiliating people. I mean, more than that is in the larger context, the significant spiritual pride. Paul alludes to that and he says, you're actually infants in Christ. He actually threatens, do I need to come down there with a rod and beat you? I mean, what kind of place does your church need to devolve into where the spiritual leader has to threaten to beat you with a rod? I mean, this is bad. What we have here is a picture of pride, a picture of arrogance, a picture of significant and public, self-centered, selfish behavior that is abominable in the sight of God. spiritual pride, party spirits, politics, saying, I'll follow this leader, you follow this. Well, I was baptized by this person. Well, I was baptized by this person. It's just terrible, petty, infantile behavior. So just like in the Old Testament, when God judged those unworthy receivers, he's doing the same thing remarkably here in chapter 11. we see that God is judging them by, here in verse 30, sickness and death. Look there in verse 30 of chapter 11. That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. Now, I think as 21st century people raised kind of as functional materialists, if you will. What do I mean by that? That really, I'm not saying we believe this, but we're raised with the notion that all that really exists is what we can see and taste and touch and that there's an empirical explanation for all things, right? But I don't think the New Testament allows us to have such a narrow view of reality. And here, God is actually the one making some people sick and even some people die who are taking the Lord's Supper in an unworthy manner. manner. Now that is not to say then that all, every time you're sick, God's judging you. We live, I mean, in a sense, all sickness and all death is a result of the fall, isn't it? Of the general judgment of creation and of flesh. So that we all, whenever we get sick, whenever we have sin, when we experience any misery of any kind, it's a result of sin and God's judgment in a general way. But it doesn't mean that every time you get sick, it's because you specifically did something wrong. But there is a sense here when you partake of the Lord's Supper and you're caught up in flagrant rebellion against God and his word and his moral law. that a very dangerous judgment can fall upon you if you take the Lord's Supper in that state. So let's look then at what worthy participation looks like in the Lord's Supper? What does a worthy recipient look like? Let's look in verses 28 and 29. Paul says, let a person examine himself then and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. We see two principal things in respect to worthy participation. The first is you must have the ability to examine yourself. The ability to examine yourself simply means that you have the ability to discern your own sin. to discern your own rebellion, to discern if you are in or not in good standing with God. And, of course, we know from the wider context that we are called to a life of faith and repentance. To be a worthy receiver does not mean that you are perfect, and the entire New Testament speaks against that idea. But to be a worthy receiver means that you come to the Lord's Supper with a humble heart, you come with faith, and you come repenting your sins. That's worthy reception of the Lord's Supper. And sadly, most in Corinth are far from that kind of heart and disposition. So when we come to the Lord's Supper, we examine ourselves. And we, I mean, we sin daily in thought, word, or deed. I mean, more than that. So we come confessing those things to the Lord. We come giving him thanks for his grace. We do these things in humility. We don't come like the Pharisee, as it were, who pointed to the poor man and said, thank you that I was not born like that, right? That's just the sign of arrogance and pride. So we come in faith. We come with repentant hearts in humble dependence on the Lord. And in fact, if you're feeling weak and far from God, there's no better thing you can do than to come and feast on the body and blood of Christ in the Lord's Supper. Coming with your weakness. That's what we should be doing. And that's worthy reception in the sight of God. So we're also called to discern the body. It's the second thing that Paul says. And it is my belief, there's different interpretations of what the body means here. My belief is that Paul is speaking about two things that have to do with the body of Christ. One, that we are discerning what Jesus did for us. as we celebrate this as a memorial meal, the body of Christ, that we remember what He suffered for us. We remember His intercession for us even now at the right hand of the Father. We remember His covenant faithfulness that goes all the way back to the beginning, indeed before the beginning of time, when He chose us before the foundations of the earth. And we remember that he's coming again and we remember to live in light of that reality. But I also think the body of Christ also speaks to the church. I think that context is very clear in the Corinthian situation because there is rank division. and rank pride and rank party spirits in Corinth. And they have no ability to discern that they're actually violating, harming, humiliating other members of the body of Christ. And they have no ability to even discern that. That's how infantile they are. And so that also, before we partake of the Lord's Supper, we should be able to discern, am I in good standing with my brothers and sisters in this church? or do I need to repent and ask their forgiveness before approaching the Lord's Supper? So I think that Paul is meaning body in two senses, both to discern what Jesus has done for us and both to discern our conduct and our standing with one another in the church. Those that are able to do that are considered worthy receivers and should not be in fear of judgment when you partake in the Lord's Supper. God wants us, when we approach the Lord's Supper, to be people of humility and love and gratitude for what God has done for us in Christ and the family of God He's given to us through Christ. And as soon as we start thinking we're better than others, we've missed the entire point of the Gospel. which saved wretched sinners like us, and who are called holy only because of Christ, not because of what we do. So that's worthy participation. But if we don't, as Paul says in 27 and 29, we are guilty of the body and blood of Christ. and we eat and drink judgment on ourselves. Let me read that. Verse 27, whoever therefore eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. Essentially, you are then attributed as one who nailed Christ to the cross. guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. In verse 29, for anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body, eats and drinks judgment on himself. This is a serious thing when we approach the Lord's Supper. There is a spiritual power in it. I think the point is this, unrepentant church members desecrate the Lord's Supper because they live in contempt of the reason for which Christ died. Let me say that again. Unrepentant church members desecrate the Lord's Supper because they live in contempt of the reason for which Christ died. So to give you a definition of worthy and unworthy receivers, worthy receivers are those who examine, discern, come with repentance and faith, and they're members in good standing of the church. They're not caught up in division and sin. And unworthy receivers are those who approach the Lord's Supper with pride, with unrepented sin, with vice, and they eat and drink judgment on themselves. So Paul gives us some very profound things to think about. I mean, we've just scratched the surface, really. I'd encourage you to study 1 Corinthians 10 and 11, particularly when we approach the Lord's Supper as a as a church family. I'd like to end this message by talking about how we fence the table in the PCA and specifically here at First Pres. There are a couple things that we should note. And if you want to read about this, you can look at the Book of Church Order, Chapter 58, Paragraph 4. That's where I'm going to be speaking of this. And you can access that stuff on the denominations website. So number one, that the Lord's Supper sets forth the communion of saints. What we mean by that is that the Lord's Supper shows by those who participate in it, those who are in good standing with the church. Those who are not a member of the church, or haven't made a profession of faith, are not allowed to come to the table, as well as those who have been disciplined from the church because of unrepentant sin. So you walk an unrepentant sinner through the Matthew 18 process, and if they continue to be unrepentant, they would be excommunicated, so communion, excommunioned from the church. And so in a very real way, the Lord's Supper is a fence Even as in 1 Corinthians, those that were participating in an unworthy way were actually being sick and dying from participating in it. It was God's sign of who was in and outside the communion of saints. Secondly, the Lord's Supper is for communicant members at First Presbyterian. What do we mean by communicant members? So in the PCA, we have two basic levels of membership, and we got to see it today, that for adults who come in and make a profession of faith, and they were baptized or are baptized in that process, we call them communicant members, meaning they are able to participate in the Lord's Supper, as well as they have all of the rights and privileges of a full church member, including participating in the offices of the church if they're so called and meet those qualifications. We also have non-communicant members. And non-communicant members are children who are baptized into the church. So they are considered members of the church, but they are not to partake of the Lord's Supper until they themselves have made a public profession of faith. And in some ways, when you look at both Baptist practice and Presbyterian practice, there is a two-step process. with both traditions. In the Baptist world, they dedicate their children. I call it dry baptism. I didn't come up with that term, but they dedicate their children. And then when they're baptized, then they can participate in the Lord's Supper, right? For us, we baptize our children. They're part of the covenant, just like Abraham gave his children the sign of his faith. But then they're not allowed to participate in the Lord's Supper until they have made a public profession of faith. So then they would move from non-communicant to communicant membership. Usually we encourage that to be no earlier than the age of 10 to 12. Really what we're looking for is their ability to do what we just talked about in 1 Corinthians 11. And I'll flesh that out a little bit more here. But before I do that, we also, as a policy at our church, allow anyone to participate in the Lord's Supper who is a baptized member in good standing with an evangelical church. So if you're part of an evangelical church and you've been baptized and you're in good standing, meaning you've not been disciplined from the church and are running from that discipline, then you're welcome to approach the Lord's table as well. I want to just talk about, though, an invitation to non-communicant members. So what are we looking for for you to move from non-communicant to communicant membership, particularly children who have been born into the church like mine that are right here? What are we looking for? First, we're looking for a basic, age-appropriate ability to demonstrate repentance and faith. That's age-appropriate. They don't need to pass a theological exam. Just like coming into membership, you don't need to pass a theological exam. We're just looking for an age-appropriate profession of faith. Second, obviously they need to be baptized. Third, we're looking that they have an ability to examine themselves. They have an ability to know if they're living peaceably or unpeaceably. I think a good kind of age test for kids is when they're able to go through a day without getting into constant fights with their siblings, right? I mean, the Corinthian church, they were spiritual infants and they were fighting all over. They didn't have the ability to do that. So we're looking for a basic ability to live at peace with others in a way that is worthy of the gospel and to examine their sin and to understand sin. We're also likewise looking that they can discern the body of Christ. Are they living in good standing with others as far as they know and live at peace in that way? So these are basic things, but important things. And we fence the table because I do not want anyone to desecrate the table of the Lord, nor do I want anyone to eat and drink judgment on themselves. I believe that that same power of judgment in Corinth's day It works today as well. So we want to fence the table for the glory of Christ so that our witness in the community is sound, that we don't have just like known church members who are living like the devil. in the world. We don't want that reputation. We want to guard the purity and glory of Christ and our witness. And we also want to protect you as well. We want to protect you as well. So to summarize, this three-part series on the Lord's Supper. I think we have seen from Scripture, I hope we've seen from Scripture, that the Lord's Supper is far more than a mere memorial. Though it certainly is a memorial meal. We fleshed that out on week one. We've seen with Paul that in 1 Corinthians 10 that we are participating in a spiritual but real way in the sacrifice of Christ, when we participate in the Lord's Supper, even as the Old Testament saints were true participants in the altar when they ate of the sacrifice. And we also saw, as we did this morning, that the Lord's Supper is a covenantal fence. So to answer our question, what is the Lord's Supper? It's a memorial meal. It's a mystical participation. And it's a covenant fence. And when we do this together as a church family in faith, we are experiencing real fellowship with Christ. and all of his grace and benefits. We're experiencing real fellowship with the entire body of Christ, past and present, and looking into the future, those on earth and in heaven, because we are united in Jesus in that same koinonia. And when we participate in the Lord's supper, we are also participating in something that we will continue to do till the marriage supper of the lamb. And we will do that world without end. Amen. Lord, we thank you for your grace. We thank you that you have not left us without hope. That while you declared yourself to be the bread of life, that whoever eats of your body and drinks of your blood will not die, but shall live forever. And that whoever does that will abide in you and you in him. We thank you that you have given us that means through faith and through the Lord's Supper as a memorial meal, as a spiritual, mystical meal, as a meal that shows what we really are and are not. I pray that as we participate in the Lord's Supper as a church family here, that you would build us up in the grace of Christ and that you would give us that eschatological taste, that taste, that heaven and earth taste and the end time taste of heaven as we partake of it as pilgrims on earth. I pray that it would persevere us in faith, that it would build us up, and that we would not forsake the assembling together and the partaking of it and all the more as the day of Christ approaches. We pray these things through our Lord who shed his precious blood for us. Amen.