Evangelicals & the Eucharist (Part 1)

The Cripplegate, New Generation of Non-Conformists ^ | May 23, 2013 | Nathan Busenitz, professor of theology at Cripplegate's The Master’s Seminary

[dartuser]

Scripture is very clear that mankind is no longer made in the "image" of God..after the fall in the garden we lost the image of God

What do you believe the image of God in man is? There are passages that clearly state that we are still created in the image and likeness of God even after the fall.

Genesis 9:6
1 Cor. 11:7
James 3:9

Man is still a personal being, he still is a moral being, he still communicates with God, and he still projects the rulership of God over the earth. The passages above clearly demonstrate that the image has not been lost ... but it has certainly been corrupted. We no longer naturally desire to be holy in our fallen state, but we possess a conscience. The aspects of our personality (mind, will, emotions) are retained ... yet each of these is marred by sin. We as men have poorly ruled over the earth ... but we still rule over the animal kingdom.

We still possess the image ... but that image has been tainted ... not destroyed. When we are regenerated by the reception of the gospel, we being the transformation of that image into one that reflects God perfectly. This is why Paul tells us in 2 Cor. 3:18 & Col. 3:10 that (through progressive sanctification) the image of God in us is being restored.

[CynicalBear]

>>Later, Paul led the movement to put aside ALL of the Jewish ritual law—even circumcision.<<

Later??? The meeting in Jerusalem was ABOUT circumcision and about what the requirement for New Testament Christians was to be.

>>So, what was determined by the Council of Jerusalem was a compromise. It was not for all time.<<

So show where it was rescinded.

>>Also: the reference to not drinking blood concerns ANIMAL sacrifices,<<

Oh please Arthur. Acts 15:29 says "to abstain from things offered to idols, and blood, and a strangled thing, and whoredom.

Nowhere would you find a reputable linguist that would claim the blood and the idol are tied in that passage.

Even if the above were not true, which it is, you are still assigning sin to Jesus if the last supper was true flesh and blood. Jesus and the apostles were Jews born under the law and still subject to it. If Jesus had tempted the apostles to actually drink blood and in fact drink it Himself He would have been sinning.

>>St. Paul writes about receiving the body and blood of Jesus in the Eucharist.<<

You still have Jesus sinning.

[CynicalBear]

>>The prohibition on drinking the blood of the victim existed for a certain reason—that the victim’s life belonged to God.<<

Proof from scripture please.

The prohibition against eating blood was NOT just for the animals sacrificed.

[Col Freeper]

That was a good read.

Thanks for posting it.

[Springfield Reformer]

1.Jesus told the Jews they had to eat his body and drink his blood to have life, and that his flesh is real food and his blood real drink.

And what part of that would any Reformed or Southern Baptist or non-denominational store front church member disagree with?  God is real, but God is a spirit.  Love is real, but you cannot ingest it bodily.  We are to live not by bread but every word from God's mouth, but no one I know of is eating pages from their Bible.  Real does not have to be corporeal to be really real.  Am I being real clear? :)


2.Furthermore many of His disciples stumbled at this teaching, were offended, and left Him. Had this teaching merely been that the Cup of Redemption and the Afikomen (the third cup in the Passover Seder and the matzah hidden as a game for the children, handed down to us today) that was meant to symbolize Him, even if the actual Seder differed, it seems strange to imagine the Jews, including some of his disciples stumbled over obvious symbolism. To the contrary, they interpreted Him literally, as the scriptures indicate, and did not have the faith to believe His words.

There was an argument in the crowd, a dispute among themselves.  They didn't know what to make of what he was saying.  That doesn't prove He was teaching Eucharistic realism in the sense of Aristotelian substances.  It does prove, I would suggest, that they weren't listening very carefully to what he said before He got to the hard part:

Then said they unto him, Lord, evermore give us this bread. And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.
(John 6:34-35)

In which coming to him is in parallel with believing in him, and carries the same meaning, a classic Hebraic couplet, the meaning of which clarifies the entire passage, that the way we consume this Bread of Life, the means by which He comes to satisfy our hunger and our thirst, is by us believing on Him.  This was a disappointing answer to those whom He had just fed by the miracles of the loaves and the fishes.  They were so into their own bellies that they were spiritually deaf to his very straightforward teaching here.  Of course His body and blood are real, as they had to be to be given in sacrifice for us.  But they become the all-satisfying food of eternal life to us who believe, simply because we believe in Him.  Just as He said.

But even after lighting up the field so they could easily avoid the pitfall of raw materialism, what do they do but show their blindness and fall in anyway. They were blind because they did not believe, and they did not believe because the Father had not drawn them.  

As to His core disciples, they did believe.  Peter makes it clear;

Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away? Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God.
(John 6:67-69)

And what is Peter focused on?  Does he say, "Yes, Lord, I'm willing to eat your physical body and blood?"  No. He looks right past that, because he has understood: it's about belief in Jesus.  He gets it.


3.Tradition testifies against it. We see about two millennia of holy communion unlike the Passover Seder, and unlike the bread and grape juice shared in Evangelical assemblies. Indeed, it is telling that the founding fathers of the Reformation famously split over whether Messiah was present in the elements or it was only a memorial. Notwithstanding the argument that there should be a common tradition to accompany an unbroken chain of the holy catholic apostolic church, none of the churches, denominations, sects, or faith groups have historically used the Passover Seder as the Lord's Supper. Whilst some can try to recreate or reform the Christian faith yet again, this time in a rabbinic Jewish context, and celebrate the Passover and Lord's Supper at the same time, and only once per year, it does not maintain continuity with almost two millennia of Christianity. It is a restoration attempt, without an Apostle, much less twelve genuine Jewish Apostles who lived, learned, and ate with Jesus. There should be a historic visible tradition of the Lord's Supper over the millennia, and there is.

The point of this thread is that there is a body of early tradition that supports a non-Aristotelian understanding of the elements of the Lord's Supper.  One could look to a platonic sense of archetype to type to understand how realistic and anti-realistic language could sometimes occur side by side, without resort to Aristotle's view on substances. I would further argue that multiple strands of understanding survived well into the medieval period, as evidenced by the debate between Ratramnus and Radbertus over the nature of the Eucharistic presence.  So presenting that there has always been a monolithic Trent-like view of the Eucharist from day one is an ahistorical argument.  It has rhetorical pizazz but falters on facts.

However, having said that, divine truth is not determined by majority vote.  One of my favorite lines of Scripture is this, let God be true, and every man a liar.  It doesn't matter if the number of the faithful is only eight when the ark is boarded.  It doesn't matter that when Jesus comes on the scene he finds at first only a few faithful, and almost none among the leadership.  It doesn't matter that a major world-wide religion professes to honor Jesus if it denies the truths Jesus taught in the Gospels.  I refer of course to Islam.  None of that matters to the project Jesus is carrying out, the building of His Ecclesia.  As long as there has been at least one person alive somewhere who carried forward the torch of the true Gospel (though I am sure it was never that few), whether within or without man-made institutional boundaries, then the Ecclesia has survived, and has no need to be restored, only to become more well known, which necessarily means error must be refuted.


4.I understand someone saying that he does not have the faith to literally believe Jesus' teaching, just as so many did not have the faith to believe in the First Century as recorded by John. The proper response at that point is not to argue against the teaching, as some of them did, but to say, "Lord, I believe, help me with my unbelief." Become as a little child with respect to faith, so to speak.

But this begs the question. We do believe what Jesus is literally teaching.  "Literal" means "according to the letter," and according to the letter of what he taught in the Bread of Life metaphor, we can have eternal life, our deepest spiritual hungers and thirsts met, if we come to Him in faith, if we believe in Him. Converting this passage into artificial support for a much later developed theory of Aristotelian substance swapping is hardly being faithful to the strict "letter" of the text.

Peace,

SR

[lupie]

(Warn her about that crotchety ol’ Elsie; too!) Lol

[lupie]

:)

[af_vet_1981]

And what part of that would any Reformed or Southern Baptist or non-denominational store front church member disagree with? God is real, but God is a spirit. Love is real, but you cannot ingest it bodily. We are to live not by bread but every word from God's mouth, but no one I know of is eating pages from their Bible. Real does not have to be corporeal to be really real. Am I being real clear? :)

I assume you reject the Catholic, Orthodox, and Lutheran view of the Eucharist. Do you believe
1. those who receive the elements with faith can receive the actual body and blood of Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit which works through the sacrament (Calvin: Receptionism), or
2. there is no form of any physical or spiritual presence of Jesus in the bread and wine; it is just a remembrance (Zwingli: Memorialism)

[Elsie]

Perhaps nothing.

Perhaps?

What does the CATECHISM say?

[Elsie]

...as he says in John, Chapter Six.

In John, Chapter Six; some fellows asked a VERY direct question.

I would HOPE that Jesus' answer was complete in it's simplicity.

---

 

John 6:28-29

Then they asked him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?”

Jesus answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”

[Elsie]

You must distinguish between the moral law and ritual law.

To WHOM were these various laws given?

Does one have to follow the speed limits established in Jerusalem while driving in Denver?

[Elsie]

Jesus is NOT the Passover lamb. Jesus is prefigured by the Passover lamb.

BEHOLD!

The Lamb of GOD!

[RnMomof7]

I hope you are aware that the New Covenant differs from the Old Covenant.

I do not think Rome knows the difference Arthur..

When Jesus sacrificed himself, he gave his life as a gift to US. Jesus commanded us to drink his blood precisely as a sign that he gave his life for us.

Arthur I know you really believe that you have the power and authority to put the Savior into a piece of Bread where He is then held captive.. and locked in a golden box to "keep Him safe"

The foolishness and pride involved in that doctrine is actually sad

Arthur did the apostles eat the actual flesh of Christ?? Remember He was wearing it..so did He lie to them?

[RnMomof7]

The council of Jerusalem instructed Christians to abstain from the flesh and blood of ANIMALS that had been sacrificed.

And Jesus was that Lamb..

Are you saying that they had to abstain from the blood of animals..but human blood was ok?

[RnMomof7]

Worshiping the Eucharist is idolatry if it is a fraud.
If it is not a fraud, then worshiping it is pleasing to God.
The fact that it is worshiped is not proof that it is a fraud.

Ya know Arthur, the pagans believed their idols were really gods too.. What you "believe" is irrelevant ..it is what God knows that is ... and no where does he tell us to kneel before a piece of bread no matter what we think it is.

[RnMomof7]

Springfield Reformer

No, true

[RnMomof7]

I was beginning to think that no one else had noticed that SETH was made in Adam's image; in HIS likeness: Genesis 5:3

All one has to do is look around them ..it is clear as day :)

[RnMomof7]

Bingo

[RnMomof7]

John 6:28-29 Then they asked him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?”
Jesus answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”

I do not think that is in the Catholic John 6

[RnMomof7]

False. In the Mass, JESUS offers himself to the Father. Jesus is the priest and victim.

He already did that Arthur ..on Calvary. He does not need to do it over and over ..

Hebrews 9:26
Otherwise Christ would have had to suffer many times since the creation of the world. But he has appeared once for all at the culmination of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself.

Hebrews 9:28
so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him

The OLD covenant has been replaced by the NEW covenant.

I would be interested in what difference a Roman sees in the Old and the New Covenants