The Gift of the Eucharist

Last Sunday one of our family’s favorite songs was our recessional: “We Will Feast in the House of Zion.” This song, with its verses full of the realities of life as a people called to follow the Suffering Servant and its chorus painting such a beautiful picture of the coming Kingdom, is an apt telling of the arc of this world – beginning and ending with glory, with glory always throughout. We have been made by God and we are going to God, and as Paul reminded us in our New Testament reading from Ephesians, “But now [now!] in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.” 
 
We have been brought near, near to the one in whose presence there is fullness of joy. In the shadow of death our God is with us; he prepares a table before us. Indeed, as he did for his sheep on the side of the mountain in our Gospel reading from Mark, our Lord continues to make us sit down on the green grass that he might feed us. Jesus, we are told, endured the cross for the joy set before him. You and I also can endure, by the grace of God and in the power of the Holy Spirit, when we keep our eyes fixed on the joy set before us—even the wedding feast of the Lamb in the new heavens and the new earth! Can you imagine? Every sheep of the Great Shepherd, none forgotten or overlooked, with our resurrected feet under the table of the Lord, the Firstborn from the dead. We can say with Job, “I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth.  And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another.” 
 
But as Julian, our Honest Abe, pointed out the other day, how do we know God is with us? You can’t see him, I can’t see him, maybe he’s on the other side of the galaxy! This surely is a truth that is hard to hold onto on our own. But we are not alone! When we come together in worship, we are brought into fellowship not only with one another but with all the church on earth and all the company of heaven, into the very presence of our Father. And there he feeds us, every Sunday morning (or afternoon, as in our case) by his Word and the body and blood of Jesus, and in this feast, we are reminded and pointed towards the coming Feast.
 
Next Wednesday evening will be the potluck and instructed Eucharist. Come to learn more of how we are gathered into the presence of the Lord in our service; come learn how we can better usher one another into his presence! As Paul said to the Ephesians (and to us!), “In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.” Our liturgy, the way we prepare for, receive, and respond to our Lord giving himself to us in the Word and Sacrament, is a beautiful tool for the building up of the Church, a real gift. Avail yourself more fully of it by coming to learn more of what it all means, to ask your questions and hear answers to the questions you wouldn’t think to ask. Come to feast with your brothers and sisters as we will one day feast in full joy and peace!
 
Hannah