Is This What Jesus Had in Mind?

At our Lord's final meal with his disciples before going to suffer crucifixion for the sins of the world, he broke bread and shared the cup and said "Do this in remembrance of me."

Consider the moment recorded for us in the gospels and compare that to this communion service from an emergent church.

1. introduce yourselves, slips of paper with questions to ask each other

2. iconic candle making kit with a night light, strip of acetate with the last supper image on and two paper clips. give thanks for things that have happened this week.

3. text a confession on your mobile phone to the number prefacing it with the word confess (an absolution with the words you are forgiven is triggered by the keyword confess)- thanks to jason djang for the inspiration for this who had IM confession recently that he told us about, which i'll blog about separately when i get round to it.

4. read story of thomas - share stories of doubt and surprise

5. peace - toast glasses proposing a toast of affirmation to someone round the table

6. share what you are thankful for about jesus. share what you want to remember about jesus. use images of christ enclosed to spark discussion

7. share bread and wine round the table after listening to the prayer. a bottle of wine and bread were already in place on each table (duncan wandered around doing bill's
prayer).

8. invite the group to share concerns for prayer - take one of the night lights and light it for each prayer

9. go and collect a plate of hot towels (the kind you get after a curry - we got some from a warehouse locally!) - say a blessing and use the towel

Text message your confession to another cell phone? And receive absolution back on the phone? Use images of Christ to spark discussion? Prepare a toast of affirmation to someone round the table?

The report is that it "worked brilliantly" with "no leadership required." Yes, I can imagine so because I can't imagine any true spiritual leadership allowing this charade to substitute for communion.

No, I am not making this up. You can read about it at the TallSkinnyKiwi's blog, and at Jonny Baker's blog. This is the kind of stuff parodies are made of.

Somehow, the emergent's desire to recover an ancient faith rings hollow in the light of these trite and foolish observances of the ordinances of the church. Christ did not give these ordinances so that we could trifle with them through the use of technology. They were not given to be used by the creative minds of the church to see how we might incorporate text messages, communion, and imagination with affirmation, night lights, and hot towels.

I rather imagine the ordinance of communion was given to be a solemn time of remembrance, a simplistic time of worship, reflection, repentance to God, and celebration of freedom in Christ. Text messaging your confession to a person that did not die in your place so you can receive a programmed "absolution" does not seem to be "a remembrance of Christ."

This is pure silliness in the name of Christ. We might as well get together and gorge ourselves while others starve.