While they were eating, Jesus took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying, "Take it; this is my body." – Mark 14:22

 Today's Scripture Reading (December 26, 2020): Mark 14

I am a Baptist. All that probably means is that I belong to one of the most rebellious Christian denominations ever invented by Followers of Christ. To be brutally honest, we will not let anyone tell us what to do – even other Baptists. (Unless it has something to do with what we do in the bedroom when we are not sleeping. Then we seem to have many forced opinions on each other concerning what we believe – ah, but that is a story for another time.) What amazes me, sometimes, is that there are so many different flavors of Baptists. This rebellious group of Christians who will allow no one to tell them what to do, seem to be continually dividing over the question of what is allowed – and I admit that I haven't quite gotten that part of being a Baptist figured out.

I am a Baptist. My particular flavor of Baptist belief has separated from other Baptists over women's role in the church. There are probably other reasons, but this is the one that seems to stand out the most. And even within my Baptist flavoring, there are quarrels over what is allowed. At least on paper, and unlike some of our closest Baptist relatives, we are egalitarian – which simply means that we believe that anything a man can do, a woman can do. (And all my woman readers are welcome to add the word "better" to the end of that statement.) It is part of the identity of who we are.

But there is another part of our identity, and it is a specific rebellion against the Roman Catholic Church. When we celebrate the Lord's Supper, we stress that the bread is a symbol of Christ's body – that the wine (or, in our case, the grape juice) is a symbol of Christ's blood. It is a rebellion against the view of the Catholic Church called "transubstantiation," a belief that teaches that the bread and the wine used in the Lord's Supper actually changes and becomes Christ's body and blood during the celebration, even though according to our senses the bread and the wine appear to remain unchanged. For the Baptist, this does not happen. The bread and the wine symbolize Christ's body and blood. Sometimes, in our celebration of the ritual, we will downgrade this even further by stressing that the bread and the wine are "merely" symbols. We don't want anyone to get any ideas about what is happening.

However, I was reminded recently that this is not what the Bible says. The words of Jesus recorded by his disciples say absolutely nothing about the bread and the wine being "merely a symbol" of Christ's body and blood. The biblical record states that, according to Jesus, he said "this is my body" and "this is my blood." And this is a significant oversight for a religious group that has many within its fold that hold to a literal understanding of other biblical teachings. The literal interpretation would seem to support transubstantiation. This leads me to conclude that "I am a Baptist, which means that sometimes I am wrong."

The Roman Catholic and the Baptists are probably both wrong when it comes to what Jesus meant when he described the bread of the Last Supper as his Body. Jesus was perhaps looking back to something he had said much earlier in his ministry, "Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day. For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink" (John 6:54-55). Jesus is not teaching about communion here; the last supper is still months in the future. In the popular language of the day, "eat my body and drink my blood" was an invitation to total commitment. The phrase's meaning was never intended to be literal, as is true with "transubstantiation," but neither was it meant to be "merely a symbol." Jesus's invitation to "take it; this is my body" (Mark 14:22) is an invitation to commitment. Jesus invites us to be fully committed to him (the political meaning of "eat my flesh and drink my blood" in Jesus's day), and that complete commitment would be symbolized by the act of taking and eating the bread and the wine.

Therefore, every time we share in the Lord's Supper ritual, our actions are not "merely" anything. We are committing ourselves anew to the person of Jesus Christ. We are indicating that we are fully committed to the cause and person of Jesus. And that nothing will stop us from carrying out His will here on earth. And that purpose does not change depending on whether we call ourselves Catholics or Baptists.

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Luke 22

See also Matthew 26:22