ken_sylvania wrote: ↑Thu Mar 28, 2024 9:19 pm
Judas Maccabeus wrote: ↑Thu Mar 28, 2024 9:04 pm
ohio jones wrote: ↑Wed Mar 27, 2024 10:55 pm
I don't know how else to parse this:
I suspect you will only hear crickets here.
OK yes you're right.
Friends,
I was raised in the "Church of Christ", we had weekly Communion, and a lot of people showed up once a year for Easter Sunday, just like MaxPC said.
We sung acapella without instruments, and had no central church hierarchy, and we really thought we were totally opposite from the Catholic religion.
But looking back, and after I attended a Catholic church once, it was surprising how much the Catholic church had in common with the "Church of Christ".
The first time I doubted that "Communion" was really started by Christ was after reading a ridiculous "Jack Chick" comic book, so ridiculous as to be laughable, but with enough truth in it to make you ask questions about the whole "Communion" idea. Here is the tract, called "The Death Cookie":
https://www.chick.com/products/tract?stk=0074
Another friend said that if "Communion" really was the "Lord's Supper" , then it was not the "Lord's Snack" or the "Lord's Finger Foods", it was a full blown meal shared between Christians. At the time, I thought what he said was terribly sacrilegious, but he had to hit me over the head with this statement to make me study and find out the truth.
Yes, he was right. It really was a full meal in the 1st Century (Jude 1:12, 1 Cor 11:21), and we remember Christ when we share food as a body of Christ together. Communion only became a "symbol" with a tiny wafer and sip of wine in the 4th Century. It changed from sharing food with the poor to bring them to Christ, to a ritual that shows who is allowed to be a member of the group. It is a control mechanism.
Every Christian Denomination is a splinter, or "reformation" of this 4th Century church. Each denomination may have addressed some of the problems with this 4th Century church, but not all of them. To find the "truth", we would have to drop everything and start over with just the Bible as our guide, and not follow church traditions or the doctrines of men.
To do that, you will always be alone. No church follows the Bible as the only authority. And no one wants to leave the safety and comfort of the "group."
But as God was with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as they walked in the desert, so God walks with us when we are alone, with Him.
So I never do "Communion" now with my family. We celebrate Passover, but lately with a lot less "ritual" and a lot more "obedience" to how God told us to treat each other, following Hosea 6;6
(6) For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.
Christ quoted this passage twice, in Matt 9:13 and Matt 12:7, and told us to understand what it means, namely that obedience and taking care of our fellow man is more important than any ritual or activity, like keeping a "perfect sabbath", or not associating with sinners to help bring them to repentance.
Thanks,
John