Paul is staring to an extended teaching on the Lord’s Table here. He starts kind of subtly but eventually he will give a full teaching. In the next chapter we see that the Corinthians had totally wrecked the Table. They were coming for a feast of eating and drinking. They had forgotten the meaning of the Table. The rich would have plenty, but the poor could go hungry. It was a mess that sorely needed sorted.
Paul begins by stressing the need of unity. He said that we are all partakers of the same bread and the same cup. We are in fact ‘one bread.’ We all come to share the same bread and the same drink because we are one.
One body, one bread, one juice – the symbols of the Table are a powerful reminder. No wonder that the Table was seen by the early church as the most important time of the week.
This ‘one bread’ concept is why we can share in the Table wherever and whenever we meet with the body. We are one with Christ and the Father and we are one with each other.
As the opposition gets worse and worse we are going to need each other more and more. The Lord’s Table is a great reminder of that oneness as we, one body, one bread, all partaking of one bread which is the communion of Christ.
What a gift we have in the Table.
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