“The cup or the contents?”

Sunday, February 05, 2017

There is no question that Christians need to remember the Lord’s death every first day of the week by taking the Lord’s Supper (Acts 20:7; I Cor. 11:23-26). When gathered, should Christians use just one cup though? After all, Jesus did take “the” cup and give it to His followers (Matt. 26:27).

The need for consistency is clear. If Christians are to uniformly do exactly like Jesus did, then we had better be consistent across the board. Should one person pass the cup to seated recipients as Christ did? Should they follow Jesus’ pattern of picking up the cup first, praying, passing it, and then saying what it is for? (Matt. 26:27-29).

Let us not forget about the bread when dealing with this question of consistency. We read in the previous text that Jesus took the bread in His hand, gave thanks, broke it and then passed it around (I Cor. 11:23-24). There is no mention of a plate or even a table to set it on.

My point is that questions of consistency can be taken so far that people fail to see “the forest for the trees.” Essentially, we can lose focus on what Jesus was emphasizing. For example, Jesus breaking the bread logically left pieces in His right and left hands. He then said “take, eat.” Should we eat the piece in His left or the piece in His right? It does not matter – both represent His body.

Concerning “the” cup, should we just use one cup when serving the Lord’s Supper? If more than one cup is allowed, should the Lord have picked up two or three cups? If the number of cups was a specific instruction, Jesus would have said “These are the bloods of the new covenant…” or at least “These are the blood…” Obviously, He did not say either of these things.

Do we see that Jesus was focusing on the contents of the cup? Look at I Corinthians 11:27. “Therefore, whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord…”  Notice “this” bread, even though Jesus broke the break in Matthew 26 into multiple pieces. Notice “this cup” even though they did not consume the cup itself, nor did they break off pieces of the cup as it was passed around. Again, the focus is clearly on the contents.

In Luke’s account, the fruit of the vine is “divided” up before it is consumed just as the Lord did with the bread. In Luke 22:17, Jesus said to take the cup and divide it among yourselves. He then takes the bread and gives thanks (verse 19). He finally takes a cup while all of them had their own in hand and gives thanks for it (verse 20).

Moreover, do we think that when Jesus said “this” cup that he meant a particular cup? If we used a single cup this Sunday, someone could correctly say, “Hey, that’s not the cup the Lord used!” Keep in mind that the brethren at Corinth were just one of many churches that gathered to take the Lord’s Supper (I Cor. 11:23-26; Rom. 16:16; Acts 20:7). Logically, Jesus must have authorized the use of many different cups to be used in the future.

These questions are not foolish – all Christians should seek to be as consistent and respectful as possible concerning the Lord’s Supper. Ultimately though, we have scripturally demonstrated that there is nothing wrong with having more than one vessel containing the fruit of the vine. We must discern the Lord’s body while partaking or else we will be sinning (I Cor. 11:27-30). There is no doubt that Jesus was focusing on the contents and not the container.

                                                                                               Chuck

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