I hate to keep bringing out the guns like this (Narrator: No he doesn’t), but for so many years my evangelical pastors would tell me/warn me about the Corinthians (both of them, First and Second) who were breaking the rules of love (“sinning”) in their community meals (the “love feasts”) because some would bring a lot, some would bring little, and some would bring nothing—but those with much would not share with those with little.
The love feasts/community meals were part of their communion celebration—the eucharist, the paschal, the sharing of bread and wine to remember Jesus’ death, his body, and our common connections with each other as we believe in him and live to obey him and do his commandments.
So it was a holy thing to have these love feasts. They were part of remembering Jesus, the Lord and Savior of we who need a savior and a deliverer.
And yet . . .
There were some who could eat right at the altar of sacrifice and restoration with hearts so hard that they would deny food to their own brothers and sisters in community because “well, if they wanted to eat, they should have brought their own.”
I was taught this story as a sign of what it is like to sin in the presence of the Lord (and Paul warns about taking communion w/o a clear conscience in context with these circumstances). A warning to be care-filled to love and to think of our brothers and sisters who do not have what we have.
“How could those Christians be so selfish?” I asked. “Surely they were well-taught by Paul and were surrounded with so many faithful people who were near-contemporaries of Jesus.”
And yet they could not see that their actions, their selfishness, contradicted the faith and redemption that they were celebrating.
How could they be like that?
Well, now I see how that can be as I see my white evangelical friends explode in paroxysms of self-righteousness and anger that “those people are getting a handout!”
Dear brothers and sisters, you who have been faithful to Jesus should know that our Lord is an extravagant lord who will give generously to all. Rejoice that your friends and families and neighbors and co-workers and students are seeing some relief from their burdens.
You are so badly representing the person of Jesus right now. It is almost as if you don’t know him.