May 4, 2008 Message by Steve Wiens
Practice:
This week, repeat this phrase throughout each day: “Jesus sustains me for all that is required of me today.” At the end of the week, take some time to journal about how doing this practice affected you.
Experience:
Gather with a group of people and celebrate the Feast of Jesus together. Have a meal complete with great food, your favorite drinks, and intentional conversation. Then, sometime during the meal, stop and together take the traditional elements of bread and wine or juice. As you receive the elements, say the following phrases aloud. Feel free to add thoughts or prayers that you think may fit.
We lift the bread and cup, and see that God raised Jesus and made Him new, and we declare God’s desire to do this for the whole world.
We break the bread, and see that Jesus is with us in our brokenness, and we declare that we will also be with each other in our brokenness.
We hold the cup and see the extent to which we are forgiven, and we declare that we will forgive each other.
We eat the bread and drink the cup, and see that we are sustained in all that we do by Jesus, not by our own attempts to control our lives. And we see that Jesus is enough.
Questions:
1. What are your memories of taking communion as a child? What one word or phrase best describes your experience?
2. Steve said that we are blessed by inviting the poor to “our feast,” in part because they give us the gift of realizing that we can be content with what we have. Do you agree or disagree with that?
3. Steve said that the Feast of Jesus is meant to reflect the society of Jesus, even to be a microcosm of it. What does that mean for you?
4. In what specific ways do you feel that the church (in general) can do a better job at being the society of Jesus in the world?
5. Steve asked you to examine your “out there” to see what dividing walls of hostility might exist. What comes to mind, and what can you do about it, if anything?
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The Feast of Jesus
