Remembrance

As we enter the Passover and Resurrection season, it brings to my mind our experience in Communion, the Table of the Lord. Our Communion comes directly from the Passover Seder, which Jesus shared with His disciples the night He was arrested. He showed His disciples the presence of Himself as the Messiah, the Redeemer, the Deliverer, contained in the Passover of the LORD*.
The Passover commemorates the LORD's miraculous deliverance of His people, the children of Israel, from the bondage of Egypt (siege, entrenchment, enclosure, siege-works, rampart, to shut up, enclose, to show hostility to, be an adversary, treat as foe, assault, beset, besiege, bind (up), distress), and began their journey to the land of promise. The Passover is to be kept in all generations as a memorial or remembrance of this great deliverance.

Jesus, the Pesach Lamb of God who was crucified on the Passover, fulfills this same miraculous deliverance as His body and blood, His death, burial and resurrection, freed us from the bondage of darkness, sin, and death, and established a new covenant of everlasting life.

Jesus said that whenever we partake of Communion (intercourse, fellowship, intimacy), we do it in remembrance (to remember, to weigh well and consider) of Him (Lk. 22:19).
The Apostle Paul, who was not one of the original twelve disciples, was taught the Communion in a revelation he received from the Lord. The Lord used the same words in revealing the communion to Paul: "Do this in remembrance of Me...this do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me." (1 Cor. 11:23-25). Paul explained to the Church:
"For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim (KJV-shew) the Lord's death till He comes." (v. 26).
As you can see, there is a proclamation attached to partaking of the Communion of remembrance. The Greek word used here means as a messenger, or angel coming down in place or time. The Hebrew word for "proclaim" is kara which means "call out, recite, cry out, proclaim, utter a loud sound, to summon, invite, call and commission, appoint, give name to: from the root word meaning to encounter, to meet".
As we partake in Communion, Paul warns that we are to do so in an attitude of self-examination. It is not done as a religious ritual, but as a powerful place of unity with the Lord. It has great importance to those in the Body of Christ. Our redemption from the bondage of sin and death came at a great price which was the body and blood of Christ, broken and poured out:
"For you were bought at a price; therefore, glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's."   1 Cor. 6:20
Part of our partaking in Communion involves "discerning the Lord's body" (1 Cor. 11:29). This involves, I'm sure, considering the Lord's physical body sacrificed in great pain for me, for us. The phrase "the Lord's body" also means to me, fellow members of the Body. We, collectively, are "the Body of Christ" with Christ as the Head of the Body:
"...so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another."    Rom. 12:5 (and also Eph. 4:15-16).
This concept of the Lord's body is what I would like to look at, and share with you. On a certain occasion, I had thought to bring and have Communion with a man of faith who was in the hospital. However, before I could arrange the visit, he was discharged, and I could not physically be with him. I was troubled that I had not been able to act upon this strong desire to share Communion him. I felt that I had missed carrying out what the Holy Spirit had been moving me to do. I then heard the question in my spirit, "Do we only do things in the natural?". I answered, "No, of course not." So I assembled the elements here in my home, and began to have Communion as a form of intercessory prayer for this person who needed miraculous healing. I also included others for whom I had been praying, but with whom I could not physically be present. "We" had communion together in the Spirit as co-members of the Body of Christ, remembering the death of Christ till He comes.
I believe through this special occasion of prayer and Communion, the Lord taught me something about "discerning the body". It is about discerning my connection to the Lord, and His sacrifice for me, but also about becoming aware of my spiritual connection to, and interdependence upon like members of the Body of Christ. What do you think? If you agree, perhaps you will consider this joining of intercessory prayer and Communion as part of "discerning the body" the next time you come to the Table of the Lord, whether in church, or in your private tabernacle. 

"Do this in remembrance of Me."

*Christ in the Passover, presentation of Jews for Jesus