The Bread of Life - Word and Sacrament

For the whole month of August this year, the Gospel readings from the Revised Common Lectionary come from the sixth chapter of John, which tell of the miraculous Feeding of the Five Thousand (men, not yet counting the women and children, according to the Synoptic Gospels). In the RCL, the Gospel readings every Year "B" (2012 is such a year) comes from the Gospel of Mark. However, John 6 is inserted at the point where the readings from Mark comes to the Feeding of the Five Thousand. After an interlude of an account of Jesus walking over water, the chapter continues with a very long discourse of Jesus being "the Bread of Life". This is perhaps because the Gospel of John does not contain an account of the Institution of Holy Communion--instead it has the account of the Washing of the Feet. But one could notice the the obvious Eucharistic language in the sixth chapter of John.

I wish to quote part of a paper I wrote during my days as a seminarian studying Master of Divinity at Union Theological Seminary:

How is the bread of heaven understood by your church? The Protestant churches have a poor Eucharistic devotion. It is celebrated only once a month; in other churches, quarterly or even once a year! Often, it is treated as a postscript in the worship service. For Protestants, the “bread of life” is the sermon. Meanwhile, in the Catholic churches (plural), the climax of the worship service is NOT the sermon but the Eucharist.

Generally speaking, the climax of a Protestant (or evangelical, born-again, full-gospel' & c.) worship services is the sermon. Among Protestants, the expository preaching of Word, where a passage is studied verse-by-verse or section-by-section is held in high esteem. Another popular form of sermon is the topical method, where a topic, e.g., salvation or tithing, is explained by various passages from Scripture. In the Philippines, a typical Protestant sermon can last up to twenty minutes to an hour(!).

Meanwhile, the climax of the Catholic Mass is not the homily (in the Philippines, homilies generally last for five to ten minutes) but the Eucharist. It is truly impressive to watch the Eucharistic prayer where the priest conducts all the manual acts (lifting up the bread and cup, et c.). In high Masses, the Eucharistic Prayer (indeed, almost the whole service) is chanted--giving an atmosphere of solemn celebration.

Among Protestants, Holy Communion is often treated as an afterthought: it is tacked at the end of the service once a month. (In one "mall church", Communion was served the near the beginning of the service. The Communion wafers were balanced on top of the "shot glasses" of grape juice.) The pastor rattles off the words from the hymnal or launch on an extemporaneous prayer which may be a patische of Scripture, often without the Words of Institution. Also, some people appear to consider Communion as an inconvenience: it makes an already long service even longer.

Continuing with my paper,

The Church impoverishes itself when it tries to put one over the other. The Church is nurtured by BOTH the Word and Sacrament, just as Jesus “opened the Scriptures” and was “made known through the breaking of the bread” to the disciples at Emmaus (Luke 24:13-32). Just as there are two wings on a bird, or two feet and two hands on a person, so the Church needs both Word and Sacrament. As for the Protestant church, there needs to be an appreciation of the Eucharist not just as a “memorial” but as an anamnesis, a dynamic “re-presentation” of the mighty acts of God of God in Jesus Christ. It is not a simple recollection, but a dynamic remembering in the power of the Holy Spirit as such that it is “made real” to us today. Hence, the Eucharist is not a mere “reenactment” but an encounter with the real presence of Christ.

John Wesley believed in both the preaching of the Word AND the practice of frequent Communion. (A lengthy discussion on the teachings of Wesley on the Eucharist and the decline on its practice among Methodists may be in order here, but let's reserve that for another time.) It is by BOTH Word and Sacrament that the Body of Christ--the Church--is nurtured.

Suffice it to say now that the Lord has given the Church the means of nourishment. Not tidbits to snack upon, like scattered verses here and there. Not fastfoods that taste good but are nutritionally worthless,  just like the "pep-talks" which masquerade as "sermons". But full, three-course meal with the reading from the Bible followed by an exposition of the Word. Then there is the Eucharist, where the Risen Lord makes himself  known and imparts grace to us all. The Word and the Sacrament both point to the Bread of Life himself--Jesus Christ.