Covid & Communion
April 9, 2020, Written by: Pastor Tim Elmore,
These unprecedented times are not lost on the church. Pastors, elders, and church staff around the world are considering and reconsidering what it means to gather the people of God for corporate worship. Some may argue that plagues and pandemics have providentially hindered the church from gathering in the past so that the church has precedent to look back on. This is true, but only in part. What is unprecedented is not the pandemic nor is it the isolation that comes with closing a church. What really sets this occasion apart is the technology that we have available for virtual gatherings.
Some churches have chosen to live-stream their services. From the beginning, we, at MBC, have opted to pre-record. Some are recording their songs, but we have chosen to embed performances into the “Worship Service” page on our website. These decisions come down to things like available resources, weighing the pros and cons of video quality, potentials for disruptions, and a desire to reach out to as many people as possible. In the end, we know that what we are doing is good, but it’s not the “same”. That is to say, it is not really a worship gathering of the church.
It seems, at this point, like it could be June before we are able to come back together with any form of normalcy. This means we are going to miss communion Sunday a couple of times before we reconvene. We have already missed communion for April, and Good Friday is coming up quickly. So, what will MBC be doing for communion?
Every month, we recognize communion as an ordinance of the local church. We gather and partake as a remembrance of the commitments we made in our baptisms, the sacrifice of Christ on the cross, and a recognition of our unity as the church under Christ the head. The Lord’s Supper consists of three elements. There is the bread that represents the body of Christ, the cup that represents the blood of Christ, and the church gathered to receive these symbols of the New Covenant. Since we are unable to gather as the local body, we don’t feel that it would be appropriate for us to instigate a virtual form of communion.
Under “normal” conditions, we would discourage small groups, Bible studies, youth groups, or any other fragmentation of the church from practicing communion apart from the gathered body. Our ordinances - baptism and communion - are not like the other elements of worship (preaching, teaching, singing, prayer, and giving). While the latter can be effectively done alone or in smaller groups, the ordinances are public professions of the unified church. These are declarations that we publicly make to God, each other, and the onlooking world. This requires us to be together.
To be clear, this is not a universally shared opinion. There are other churches, even other FEB churches, that would disagree. They believe that zoom meetings are reasonable, virtual gatherings of the body. While we may not agree, we would not go so far as to begrudge their decision. When there is no clear directive in the Scriptures, it is left to each church to apply discretion in accordance with prayerful and well-studied convictions.
Our conviction is to wait. While we wait, we will mourn our absence from each other and long for the day when we can come together again—when we will gather together at the table and celebrate our union.
