- One Bread and Body
1 Corinthians 10:16, 17 The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? For we being many are one bread, and one body: for we are all partakers of that one bread.
The cup of blessing (the wine) and the bread we break (the bread) is a communion of the blood and the body of Christ. Every time we receive the bread and wine in Holy Communion we are communing (uniting) with the blood and body of Christ. This fantastic promise takes our sins away and gives the righteousness of God to us. This amazing trade occurs anew when we participate in the Lord’s Supper. Communion = union with. When we partake we are united with Christ in the shedding of His blood and the death of His body. Christ died for our sins, and in Communion we could not be more assured that He died for my sins, and He is uniting with me in the closest and most intimate union possible. We are One, and we could not be any “one-er.”
Union with Christ means that my sins, mine, all of them, have been fully punished at the cross. The penalty of sin is death: in Christ I died. Union with Christ, or being in Christ, is not something that we can readily understand or explain. It is a deep truth that we believe. And it is beautiful. What happened to Christ happened to us: We died with Him, we are buried with Him, we rose with Him, we ascended with Him, and we are sitting and reigning with Him.
The second part of the “one bread” truth is that we are also one with every other believer in Christ. We exhibit that unity with every other brother and sister in Christ when we partake of that one bread, one body in Holy Communion. We are many, we are individual and separate from one another, we are different, we are unique and distinct from each other, but those “many” are “one” bread. The unity and oneness we enjoy with other believers is much stronger than the differences. The metaphor of the body helps us see the reality: the eye looks and acts nothing like the foot, but they are still a part of one body despite appearances.
The promise of being one bread and one body also clearly indicates the fact that the bread in Holy Communion is the body of Christ; this also is contrary to appearances, but it is to be believed, since God says so.