Reawakening Communion's Power to Guide Us Through Life's Storms In record numbers the faithful are leaving the church to find healing. They're on their way to therapists and twelve step programs, seeking places where they can confess habitual patterns of sin amongst others who can help them. But is this what God wants? His people leaving the church to find healing? I believe He has given us the most effective program available for maintaining emotional and spiritual health: Communion. Yes, Communion. If that's true, why has this ceremony become the almost mundane weekend ritual that it has for most?
In record numbers the faithful are leaving the church to find healing. They're on their way to therapists and twelve step programs, seeking places where they can confess habitual patterns of sin amongst others who can help them. But is this what God wants? His people leaving the church to find healing? I believe He has given us the most effective program available for maintaining emotional and spiritual health: Communion. Yes, Communion. If that's true, why has this ceremony become the almost mundane weekend ritual that it has for most? Could it be that overemphasizing grace and underemphasizing self-examination has compromised Communion's power to shatter these sin patterns? Has largely ignoring its mandates to confess, repent, and reconcile actually driven the faithful to worldly solutions and away from the church? Has something powerful been lost by hurriedly observing it in large groups with little time for thoughtful reflection and interaction? Has partaking unworthily led the church into judgment in the form of spiritual "weakness, sickness, and sleep?" The Lost Supper compares the biblical foundations of both Old and New Testament Passovers to the popular twelve step programs that have delivered so many from addictions. It demonstrates them to be, in both practice and theory, identical. Through restoring the balance of grace and confession in the small group setting, the self-examination process so critical to unleashing Communion's power can again be realized. By putting into practice the principles in this book, a measure of healing can be brought back to the church through the regular practice of the ceremony God gave His people to facilitate confession and intimate fellowship. Of all the moments Jesus shared with His disciples, He said exclusively of His Passover, "I have earnestly desired to do this with you." Read The Lost Supper" and find out why!
