1 Cor No.21 Self Examination

Therefore, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord. A man ought to examine himself before he eats of the bread and drinks of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without recognizing the body of the Lord eats and drinks judgment on himself.

That is why many among you are weak and sick, and a number of you have fallen asleep. But if we judged ourselves, we would not come under judgment. When we are judged by the Lord, we are being disciplined so that we will not be condemned with the world.

So then, my brothers, when you come together to eat, wait for each other. If anyone is hungry, he should eat at home so that when you meet together, it may not result in judgment. And when I come, I will give further directions.

I'd be grateful if you'd have your Bibles open at 1 Corinthians in chapter 11 as we continue our consecutive studies from this extremely practical letter that Paul wrote years ago to a group of Christians in the Greek seaport of Corinth. And we're at the point in our study when we are looking into the Apostles' teaching on the Lord's Table. I know I'm spending quite some time in this area, but it is the only epistle that actually mentions the Lord's Table.

And the table is, in one sense, very central to our worship as Christian folk. It is most important that we understand why we regularly present ourselves around the communion table and partake of bread and wine. So I don't apologize for slowing down the pace for a while and concentrating on this compact teaching that Paul gives us from the 17th verse and onwards in this chapter about the communion service.

In some circles, you come across the expression, fencing the table, fencing the table. You say, what on earth does that mean? Well, it means putting certain prohibitions around the table so that instead of allowing anyone who happens to be in a church service to partake of bread and wine, certain tests are applied. For example, there are some people from one of the denominations who would teach that unless you are baptized and by that is meant immersed in water, you cannot come around the Lord's Table.

It is fenced and unbaptized people cannot approach. In other evangelical, loosely understand that word, circles, there are those who insist on the part of a stranger who comes into a church that before they're allowed to the Lord's Table, they produce a letter of commendation, which has been written by the oversight of the assembly or church from which they come. And if the recommendation is good, then they are admitted to the Lord's Table and can take of bread and wine.

So you see the idea of fencing the table, of putting certain obstacles between an unknown outsider and the bread and the wine. Now here in the tabernacle, we don't have a closed table. We don't fence it.

We don't grill strangers who happen to be with us and test them as to their Christian profession, as to whether they're baptized or meeting with a Bible-based group of Christians. But that doesn't mean to say that we have here a sort of slack attitude towards the communion table. We don't believe that any type of person can come along and take bread and wine, at least not without doing themselves a great deal of spiritual harm.

But what we tend to understand from Scripture, as humbly we study it, is that the responsibility in presenting oneself before the table belongs to the person and not so much the church, organization, the board of elders, or what have you. So when you read our bulletin on a Sunday inviting you to the Lord's Table, or sometimes when I'm in the process of presiding around the table, there are certain words that are used saying that those who acknowledge Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior alone should freely partake. And sometimes these instructions, these prohibitions from Paul's letter to the Corinthians here in this eleventh chapter, are read out and we leave it to the individual.

Now don't misunderstand us. We appreciate here at the Tabernacle, as with many hundreds of evangelical churches in this country, the importance of the Lord's Table. It's central to our worship.

I wouldn't be pastor of this church if we did not come generally around this table every Sunday. Not that I would be legalistic, but it seems to me that this was the practice of the early church. There are two sacraments, two sacred things that Jesus has left with His church and whereby we announce publicly that we belong to Him.

One is once for all, the other is repetitive. The first one is baptism. You're only baptized once.

It's a public confession of faith and obviously your attitude to the Lord Jesus Christ must be explored by the pastor or elders or whoever is conducting the act of immersion. But that is a once for all thing. One of the two sacraments.

The second is the Lord's Table. That's a repetitive thing. Every seven days, perhaps more frequently, Christian folks should see themselves around this table.

Why? Well, it's here that we proclaim the Lord's death. You remember the apostles' comment in the 26th verse. You show again that you believe that Jesus died for you.

In one sense, you remember Calvary all over again. You enact it in your mind. You start to survey the cross and you, before this communion table, perhaps say or sing, Here I am lost in wonder viewing, whilst upon the cross I gave, loved I much, I'm much forgiven, I'm a miracle of grace.

You come before this table and it's like marriage to one degree. You don't come lightly. You don't come carelessly.

But rather you come seriously and with true affection and dependence on God. And you take this bread and you take this wine and you proclaim the Lord's death. Here you see there is an act of remembrance.

We recall what he has done for us on that green hill far away. I tell you young people, in my teenage days, one of the things that helped to keep me inadequately though I illustrate the case, one of the things that kept me as a young person working for the Lord Jesus was coming before this table week by week and ensuring that I was in a right relationship with him. It is a remembrance of all that he's done.

And even now, years later, having celebrated many an occasion around this table, I sometimes have great difficulty in even getting out the words concerning the cup and concerning the bread. They mean so much as I remember him. But here is not just a remembrance, here is an encounter in a most remarkable way.

We know that this bread, when it is taken, this wine when it is drunk, has such of the blessing of Jesus upon it that he ministers to us, he draws alongside us and we know his presence in a very wonderful fashion as we break bread and as we drink wine together. Now I say this all in introduction to Paul's teaching from this 27th verse and onwards. We don't fence the table here.

The responsibility is your own. We'll spell it out for you clearly, weakly, perhaps ad nauseam. We will speak about you having to confess Jesus as your Lord and Savior, but the responsibility is yours and our table remains and will remain an open table.

There are blessings in coming around this table. There are also testings which we have to apply personally before the former become ours. Well then, what is Paul's teaching concerning these testings? It seems to me that he introduces his argument from the 27th verse with the link word therefore or wherefore in the AV.

He's talked about taking bread and drinking wine and he goes on, therefore, and he speaks about certain tests. And it seems to me that one of the things, if I can summarize Paul's teaching here, one of the major things that he has in mind is this, that we should eliminate discourtesy. We should eliminate discourtesy.

Therefore, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord. That word unworthy has the connotation of being discourteous. You may remember that last November we had the problem in the press of one of our political leaders being criticized because it was said that his manner of dress outside the cenotaph in London when we were remembering the deaths of men and women in the First and Second World Wars was not becoming such an occasion.

I don't think that he meant to be discourteous, but nonetheless the allegation was leveled at him publicly. Now here is the same idea. When you take bread and wine, ensure that you have eliminated discourtesy.

Ensure that you are in a fitting state to take these particular emblems. You see, it's a serious thing to take bread and wine in an unfitting fashion. So serious, says the apostle later on in the 27th verse, that it amounts to the person being guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord.

What does that mean? Let me put it shockingly, but I'll guarantee this, you'll certainly understand it forevermore having heard the illustration. It means moving at Calvary from that little group of women alongside John who were sensitively looking towards the cross of our Lord Jesus with tears in their eyes and with hearts that were breaking and going to the crowd of the religious leaders and the Roman soldiers and other nondescript people who were hurling up their shafts of abuse to the Lord. They acted discourteously.

And a person who takes bread and wine in an unworthy fashion can be guilty of that. You get a similar sort of strong line taken by the apostle when in the eighth chapter, speaking of the weaker brother and exhorting us always to live in such a fashion that we don't cause another to stumble. Oh, the apostle says in the 11th verse, if you'll fall foul of my teachings here and this weak brother for whom Christ died is destroyed by your knowledge, when you sin against your brothers in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ.

Now that's exactly the same thing that Paul has in mind here, talking about the communion service. He wants us to approach this seriously, eliminating discourtesy so that in no sense could we transfer our allegiance from the women and from the disciple to the ranks of the hostile Roman forces and the Jewish priests who hurled mockery at our Lord. Now in one sense, of course, and hear me carefully or else some of you who are sensitive and thank God for your sensitivity will make a wrong conclusion.

In one sense, we're all unworthy. There's never a time when I presided over this meal when I have felt worthy. Many a time when I felt like resigning from my pastoral responsibilities because I utterly like the qualifications to come to the table inasmuch as I'm a sinner, all have sinned and come short of the glory of God that we always recognize.

And if you feel unworthy in that area, that's not what Paul is referring to. The sense of your sin, that's a wonderful thing to have when you come to this table because then it makes the sacrifice of Jesus stand out all the more. But you see, there is a manner, and this is what the apostle is getting at, and I wonder if I can explain it so that it's clear to you.

There's a manner in which you can come to this table and you're unworthy in the consequences that will follow what you do after you've taken the bread and the wine. In other words, there will be certain aspects of your life and your lifestyle and your relationships which will not be put in order. And if that is the case, then you are unworthy and you're using this table in a discourteous fashion.

I'll come back to that in a moment to make it that much more clear, I trust. But let me emphasize this, it's a very real danger. After the institution of the Lord's table in the upper room, Jesus went out to die.

And the disciples went, one to betray Him, another to deny Him, and others to forget Him and desert Him. And Alan Redpath, a great preacher who will be here later on this year, has this to say in one of his wonderful books. Often we have broken bread together around the Lord's table and then we have gone out to do just what those disciples did.

We denied Him. The first thing that Paul is teaching here, the burden of his heart as he sets down his instructions having described how to conduct the Lord's table, is that he wants us to eliminate discourtesy. Well, how do we do that, Paul? Well, he tells us in the 28th verse and following, by initiating an inquiry.

Eliminate discourtesy, initiate an inquiry, stay with the 28th verse, a man ought to examine himself. That's a very strong word, examine. It comes from a Greek word which really is plundered from the craft of the smithy.

You know what a smithy is, a man who works with metal. Now, it's a word that's taken from that particular profession. The smithy, the metal worker, he will examine his metal, he doesn't want any flaw, particularly if he's working with gold and silver.

Now says Paul, examine yourself. You don't want to be discourteous. Then take a good look at your life and engage in inquiry, in investigation.

And there are two ways in which this examination, it appears to me, from Paul's reasoning, is to be conducted. The first I will call upward, and the second is outward. Or if you like, the first is vertical and the other is horizontal.

You say, what do you mean? Well, back to the 28th verse and then we'll dip into the 29th. A man ought to examine himself before the Lord. A man ought to examine himself before he eats of the bread and drinks of the cup, both emblems standing for our Lord Jesus.

Here is personal examination. That's a good thing to engage in from time to time. We can't be introspective enough in certain areas of our discipleship.

Listen to Paul as he spells it out again in 2 Corinthians and chapter 13, as he advises us to engage in introspection to Corinthians 13 and the 5th verse, where we read, examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourself. Well, how do I examine myself when I come to this table? I reflect over the last few days, since I was previously in such a condition.

I think about my thought life. I examine that and say, oh God, there were times when I let you down, please cleanse me in the blood of Jesus. I think about the opportunities for evangelism and times when I missed some of them, and I apologize.

I think about my prayer life, and I have to come to grips with the fact. Am I really a prayer warrior, as I encourage other people to be? And I have to ensure that that's right before the Lord, or I've apologized and asked for strength. I think of my devotional life, of my study.

I think of handling my finances. Here is this inward searching, you see, between me and God. It's upward in the sense that I'm looking to the Lord, and I've only got myself in mind.

So I initiate an inquiry, and the inquiry is first of all upward. Now most of you knew that, and I haven't disclosed anything that is new. But have you thought of this, that your inquiry also has to be horizontal? It has to be outward.

You say, what do you mean? Well, drop to the 29th verse. Anyone who eats and drinks without recognizing the body of the Lord, eats and drinks judgment on himself. Now, what does Paul here mean by the body of the Lord? Is he referring, as he does in Colossians 1 and verse 22, to the physical body of the Lord? Or does he have in mind the spiritual body of the Lord, as he mentions in this epistle and the 10th chapter and the 17th verse? When referring to the communion loaf, he says this, because there is one loaf, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf.

You say, Mr. Sargent, I don't know what you mean. Okay, stay with me. Drop down to the 12th chapter, and it will become that much more clear.

Here is the apostle, from the 12th verse of the 12th chapter, speaking of the church of Jesus. And he says that the church of Jesus Christ is like a body. We are his body on earth.

He's going to engage in an analogy between the church and the human body, but more of that in the months that are to come. But when you drop right down that chapter, and you come to the final verses, you will discover in the 25th, is it, that Paul says there should be no division in the body, but that its part should have equal concern for each other. What might Paul be referring to when he talks about, back in this 11th chapter, when he talks about recognizing the body of the Lord? He could well have in mind, not just the physical body of Christ, but our relationships within the church.

How you behave to your brother. How you behave to your sister. What immediately you engage in is the subject matter of your conversation after you've taken bread and wine.

The biggest sin in evangelicalism in the 20th century is an untamed tongue. The highest category of crime that there is, if one can use that word, within evangelicalism is the crime of criticism. Do you remember I got so passionate some while ago, maybe too much so, I don't know, but I felt it deeply, when I preached right at the beginning of my series on Corinthians, that I believed that God was saying to the evangelical world, and particularly in this country, that the day has come to repair Joseph's coat, and Joseph's coat was torn by his brothers.

It was members of the household that destroyed the coat, and had it baptized in blood, and took it back to Jacob, and the old man broke his heart, do you remember? Now, when the Apostle Paul talked about preparation before we take bread and wine, he says that we have to be in a right relationship with God, and we've got to be in a right relationship with each other, and if you're not, then you have no reason to take the bread and wine. You're being discourteous. It is the body of Christ, brothers and sisters for whom he died, that we are identifying with as we take bread and wine, there is a solidarity within the Christian church, and here I'm not speaking just of the tabernacle, but the total Christian church around the world.

You destroy your brother with your tongue, you destroy your sister with criticism, then you have no right whatsoever to take all this bread and wine. This is a serious matter, my friend. I say it, it's serious here in the tabernacle, it's serious for myself, it's serious for everyone.

To realize this, you cannot handle these things, this is a sacrament. You cannot handle them lightly, carelessly, thoughtlessly, not like a young couple coming down the aisle who haven't worked out the seriousness of marriage. It is even more serious than being married, because this is our relationship with the Lord.

We are not to handle this in a fashion that shows immaturity or lack of concern. And I charge you, in the name of God, I charge you, when you take this bread and wine, be careful how you behave afterwards, in the evening service, in your conversation at home, as you talk about other people, ensure that your conversation is kind and gentle, and not destructive, not ripping, because if it is, then you have shown the utmost discourtesy to this table, and you've gone from the ranks of those who were sympathetic to the Christ, to the ranks of those who were hostile. Strong teaching, don't blame me, blame the Apostle Paul, blame the Holy Spirit, who inspired the Apostle.

But let's move on, because there's a third thing, and we can deal with this reasonably quickly. Why is this important? Well, why is Paul's teaching important? We've already outlined it, and it's so important because there is a tragedy that Paul wants us to avert. Let's drop down to the thirtieth verse, that is why, says the Apostle Paul, this is the reason for all my reasoning so far, because this is the reason why many of you are weak and sick, and a number of you have fallen asleep.

You see, there was a tragedy that befell the church at Corinth, there were folks who had untimely deaths, there was a plague of sickness that apparently was rampaging through the fellowship, and Paul says that the reason for that was mishandling the Lord's table and the emblems. Now, bear in mind, in New Testament times, God was very stern sometimes in His discipline. The Acts of the Apostles is at the fifth chapter, you find Ananias and Sapphira are cut down, they die, simply because they lied against God.

I think it was Campbell Morgan who said, and there wouldn't have been a tinge of humor when he said it either, that if God so dealt with people who lied with Him today, the funeral directors couldn't keep up with the business. When you move into 1 Corinthians 5, Paul is talking about a man who is sexually immoral, and he says that the discipline to this man should be such that his body, though it is destroyed, it would be exercised in a way that his soul, nonetheless, is retained for the Lord. You can check out the reasoning of Paul as you read that chapter again.

Now when he comes to the 30th verse, he does not blink at saying that the reason why many of these Christians at Corinth were sick and why a number had died untimely was simply because they had a wrong attitude to the Lord's table. Now let me say three things very quickly. First of all, people are not damned, as the Authorized Version seems to imply from the 29th verse, most unfortunate translation there, the word damnation.

People are not damned because they unworthily participate of the Lord's table. As Dr. Leon Morris, an Anglican theologian, points out, Paul does not mean that a person who communicates wrongly incurs eternal damnation, but that he comes under the measure of condemnation appropriate to the act. The Apostle Paul teaches that a man might fall under the judgment of God as a result of him wrongly handling the table.

That's why he says in the 32nd verse, when we are judged by the Lord, we are being disciplined so that we will not be condemned with the world. Paul's not saying you'll lose your salvation, not at all, but he is saying that spiritually you can be in a very, very difficult situation and even physically you can be chastened by the Lord because of a wrong attitude to this table. The second thing, being sick does not necessarily imply that you have fallen foul of Paul's teaching.

There are many reasons why people are sick, many reasons why God heals some and leaves others unhealed, but the fact that you're sick this morning, my friend, if that happens to be the case, does not necessarily imply that you are guilty in this area. Though when we are sick we are to examine ourselves again, always examine ourselves, just to ensure that this sickness has not been brought on because of any disobedience on our part before the Lord. And the third thing is that today, in as two thousand years have leapt by from when Paul wrote this particular injunction, today, if you mishandle the Lord's table, there are certain benefits that you forfeit as a result.

You may not physically be hurt, though it could well be the case, but I do believe that I have witnessed people who spiritually and who personality have been gnarled as an old oak tree, simply because of their lack of understanding in this whole area of requirements in taking the Lord's, in taking this bread and wine and coming around the Lord's table. I look for peace in their lives and I don't see peace. I look for joy, I look for a sense of enthusiasm and elation, and this I should look for, because Peter talks about a joy unspeakable and full of glory, and I don't find it there.

And I ask myself, how is it that they missed out on this? And I wonder if the reason was they forgot about these two injunctions, the upward and the outward, right with God and right with their fellow. And so they developed a gnarled attitude, a critical spirit. Bless God for so many older people who are a stimulus to my own life and preach far better sermons than I can ever preach in their lifestyle and their personality.

But my older friends, let me tell you this, and then I'll speak to the younger ones. I've sometimes found older people who have never done this at all, and they've been hard and bitter. They love the Lord, and that relationship is dead right, but the relationship at the horizontal level is completely skew and fractured, and I believe that they've forfeited many of the blessings of God as a result.

I could field you many an example, but perhaps that wouldn't be right at this point. And to my younger friends, I say this, this communion service is not an optional extra, and yet it's not a legal thing that's put upon you, that you're forced to do. Today's my wife's birthday, she'll probably tell me off that I've disclosed this, but I can't think of a better illustration.

I gave her a present this morning. I didn't have to force myself to do it. I mean, you know I'm not miserly anyway.

I wanted to. It was something that I couldn't stop myself doing anyway. As happens within a loving marital relationship.

So this table, you're not there because you're forced to be there. You're there because you want to be there, because you love Him. You don't want it fenced, because there's nothing wrong with your relationship up there.

There's nothing wrong with your relationship there, and if there has been, then it's put right. You see the point? It's so sweet, this teaching. It's so simple to grasp, is it not? Paul says, eliminate discourtesy.

And then he tells us to initiate inquiries to ensure that there's no discourtesy on our part as we come to this table. And then he says, by doing that you'll avert a tragedy. You'll not forfeit the blessings of the Lord, nor come under His condemnation.

Thank God for the sweetness of His word, for its practicality. You miss out on this at your own expense. Let's be sensitive enough to apply what Paul has to say to our own experience.

And God bless you. And blessed God, we thank you from full hearts for such a wonderful salvation. Help us in basking in its blessings, to respond also to the requirements that you place upon us, and intelligently and sensitively to live lives and to cultivate attitudes which bring honor and glory to your name.

For Jesus' sake, amen.