Ben Zornes

Living and Dying to Show the Preciousness of Christ

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Elbows on the Table

Elbows on the Table

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God is and always has been jealous for His sacramental signs. In ancient Israel He rebuked them for misusing the sacrifices and offerings. His jealousy flared when His people treated such ordinances as ways to buy God off. The vain heart thinks that offering a pure lamb upon the temple altar would put God at arm’s length. God is angry with sin. Quick! Let’s make some sacrifices in order to chase off our God, whom we’ve angered.

These sacrifices, when misread, became a greater damnation upon God’s people. He tells them by the prophets that He never desired rivers of blood. The burnt offerings were meant to be the means of assuring Israel that God had drawn close to them, not the way to get Him off their case. The pagans viewed sacrifices as ways to appease vindictive gods. They didn’t want the gods to come down from their celestial mountains, for then only mischief and heartache would be left in their capricious wake. 

But Israel’s God gave these sacrifices for quite an opposite purpose. He gave them as a covenant feast to be enjoyed between a benevolent and merciful King and His beloved and loyal people.

We must not fall into a similar trap. This is a meal. A feast. A supper inaugurated by Christ in the warmth of an upper room with His inner circle. This isn’t a way to keep God happy with You. For if you are in Christ, God rejoices over you. God spreads His banner of love over His elect people.

This is why you must come with certain faith. Draw near. Pull up a seat. Put your elbows on the table. This isn’t fast food. This isn’t a visit to the principle’s office. This is a feast where God speaks to You the steadfast Word. And that Word is Christ, given for You.

So come in faith and welcome to Jesus Christ…

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Comfort ye my people

Comfort ye my people

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Isaiah foretells that the coming of the Messiah would be comfort to God’s people. Throughout the Gospels those brought to Jesus for healing are told to, “Be of good comfort.” In Paul’s epistles, the Spirit is called the Spirit of comfort, and the Word of the Gospel is to be used by the saints as a means of comforting one another. 

In English the word comfort might simply conjure up the comforts of modern life: AC in the summer, extra legroom in our cars and planes, light at the flick of a switch, phones that can face-time almost anyone in the world at anytime. But this isn’t what the older meaning of what the word comfort would convey. The Latin root word there is fortis which means strength.

The comfort of Jesus, the comfort of His Spirit, the comfort of His Gospel Word imparts strength. It doesn’t pamper us in our sorrows, as if eternal sulks were what the Fount of every blessing ordained for us. He made us in His image, after all. And through Christ we are restored to that image. By His Spirit we are strengthened more and more to resemble Christ our Savior. By comforting one another with these words we press one another onward in Christ-likeness.

This meal, then, is a true comfort. But only if you receive it by faith. Christ gives to us, through this meal, the covenant assurance that we share in His Resurrection Life. Your mortal body is wasting away; it will soon be planted like a seed. But because of Jesus, your mortal body will be raised into immortal strength. So, then, lift up your chin. Know that your tears will soon be dried by the everlasting life which is the inheritance our Lord Jesus procured for us. This is true comfort.

So come in faith and welcome to Jesus Christ…

Go Make Some Trouble

Go Make Some Trouble

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This is a table of peace. So, you should eat from it and then go make some trouble. You aren’t reconciled with God in order to continue fellowshipping with the world. Rather, you are consecrated by His Word and communed at His table in order to be commissioned to go make holy war on evil.

Those in Christ are at peace with God but at enmity with the world. Resolve it in your mind that this is just the way it is. You serve the Lord Jesus who was crucified for you to have peace with God. But He invites you to carry a cross. His disciples are called to be staunch in living for God’s glory. But living for God’s glory is not about having warm fuzzies during a morning quiet time, or a tingle down your spine during a wonderful hymn. Glorifying God smells like the sweat and dust of battle. You eat this bread and drink this wine in order to be strengthened to go forth to defile the modern altars of Moloch, and to bring about righteous justice.

As you go forth to make trouble, remember that compromised kings will most certainly accuse you of being Israel’s troubler. But trouble it you must, for Baal is worshipped there. Where is there idolatry in your own heart? There is your battleground, and you must be ruthless. Where are the oppressed and enslaved? Go, by grace, and deliver in Christ’s name. Where is there injustice in your dealings, in your family, or in your nation? Look to the Word, and apply the Scriptures to the entirety of your life, home, and country.

This side of eternity we feast as the church militant. Do not begrudge the battles that lay before you this week. Be heartened by this meal, be spirited by this wine, and go tear down strongholds of evil.

So come in faith and welcome to Jesus Christ…

Think More About God

Think More About God

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The Puritan writer, Thomas Watson, said in his book The Great Gain of Godliness: “Some complain that they have no joy in their lives; and truly, no wonder, when they are such strangers to heavenly contemplation.” This is very true. All our woes, all our sins, all our discouragements arise from lowly thoughts of God. The Psalmist taught this same truth when he describes the wicked man: “God is not in all his thoughts (Psalm. 10:4).”

If God is in all your thoughts, He will also be in all your actions. If your mind does not dwell on God, your actions will wander into sorrowful paths of lust, fear, envy, and anger. So God, in His great mercy, faithfully sets the glory of His Son before you. If you will learn your heavenly Father’s lesson, your mind will be filled with three simple signs. Water. Bread and Wine.

Are you fearful? Think that God has removed His wrath from you because you are baptized into Christ. Is your soul cast down? Drink this wine of God’s innumerable tender-mercies to you. Have you felt the pull of carnal cravings of improper sexual desires, or greed for earthly gain? Then eat this bread of heaven. This bread satisfies, for this bread is a sign of covenant union with Him that fills heaven and earth with His presence.

The Lord is your shepherd. He summons you to green pastures of His provision & peace. He lays a joyful feast before you, in spite of surrounding armies of enemies. You must muse upon Christ. You must fill your meditations with the Gospel. You must look upon the salvation signified here. By thinking upon these immense glories, all rivals are expelled, all idols cast down, and all heathen altars in your heart are burned to ash. 

So come in faith and welcome to Jesus Christ…

Dining at the Conqueror’s Table

Dining at the Conqueror’s Table

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We must get it into our minds that this table is a royal banquet. You do not arrive at this table as paupers or beggars. This table is as long and high and wide and deep as the love of God which He has shown to us through Jesus Christ our Lord. There’s room for each saint to pull up a chair. We sit on the shadowlands side, while those who’ve gone before feast on the other side of the table. But we all partake of one holy food. 

And though the sign itself and this table itself are small things, what they represent to us is the boundless storehouse of God’s kindness to the sons of men. You are forgiven. You are welcome through Jesus. As the prophet Hosea promised, you are no longer called “not my people,” but rather God through Christ calls you, “my people.” 

All of this is gloriously true because Christ ascended on high. His ascent is yours, as much as His death and resurrection are. Our weekly feast together here is a commemoration of that fact. So, by faith, see this table in the midst of Heaven’s banqueting hall. The Spirit raises us up into that hall and we’re regaled with the wonderful story of Christ’s conquest as found in Scripture. Our songs, in a manner of speaking, are joyful toasts unto the heroic acts of Jesus. And around this table we are brought in on the joke that is His overthrow of evil. 

I mean, what’s more ridiculous than evil seeking to kill God? Or that we who were once sinners are now holy ones through Christ. So rejoice. For the Christ who died and rose again, is now the Lord of heaven and earth, and this is His feasting hall, and this is His feast.

So come in faith and welcome to Jesus Christ…

Three Views of the Lord’s Supper

Three Views of the Lord’s Supper

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There are effectively three approaches to the Lord’s Supper. Big words go along with each one. The first is often called transubstantiation, which takes Jesus’ statement “This is my body” with rigid literalism. By the proper accompanying rites of a priest, the substances of bread and wine are transformed into the substance of Jesus’ physical body. This position is refuted by noting that at the Last Supper, when Jesus inaugurated this covenant meal, His body hadn’t been broken nor His blood spilled yet. Plainly, He was speaking of the bread & wine as physical symbols of spiritual realities.

The second position bears the name of its most prominent Reformation era representative: Zwinglianism. In some respects, Zwingli’s position is an example of reacting to one error by falling into an error in the opposite direction. Sometimes called memorialism as well, it teaches that this meal is nothing more than a reminder. It’s a memory aid of the most important thing that ever happened, but nothing more than a memory aid. This position is found lacking by simply digging a bit deeper into what Paul meant when he commanded us to take this meal in remembrance of Christ and His death.

Which brings us to the third view. At the time of the Reformation to call someone a Calvinist was to describe their view of the Supper, not their soteriology. The Calvinist view, which we hold, teaches that Christ really is present in this Supper, but by His Spirit. The Spirit takes the sign of bread & wine and makes it effectual in a few ways. He builds up our faith; He makes our partaking into a potent covenant memorialization of God’s grace to His chosen people; and He assures the saints, whether feeble or strong in faith, that Christ is theirs and they are His.

So come in faith and welcome to Jesus Christ…

A Short Case for Weekly Communion

A Short Case for Weekly Communion

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“Habitual” is often used as a pejorative, especially when used to describe Christian worship. American culture has placed freedom of expression on high. We must be allowed to do whatever pleases us, feels right, and doesn’t make us uncomfortable.

However, weekly observance of the Lord’s Supper directly assaults this unhinged self-expression of American evangelical culture. The average Evangelical may yelp about the dangers of traditionalism and throw labels like legalism and formality our direction, but we should take a minute to survey what informs our commitment to weekly communion.

Paul says that as often as we observe this meal we proclaim the Lord’s death; but Paul didn’t say how often. Most Christians would agree we should observe the Lord’s Supper, but are uncertain on what Scripture teaches regarding frequency. 

First, weekly observance arises from a dedication to conform our corporate worship to, and this might be radical, the Bible. If we trace the Bible’s story, we see that when God meets with His people He concludes those meetings with a feast. Most clearly this is seen in the OT Peace offering where God, the priest, and the worshipper share a meal. The Lord’s Supper declares that Christ, our Great High Priest, sacrificed Himself to reconcile us to God and establish His dominion of Gospel Peace.

Second, Acts shows a progression from daily bread-breaking in the early church, to weekly Lord’s Day assembling for the express purpose of breaking bread (Acts 20:7). The ecclesia (the gathered) were brought together weekly to feast upon the Word in sermon and sign.

Lastly, this meal becomes the high point of our week. It’s a feast of Christ, on the day of Christ’s new creation work, lavishly given to all those who are in Christ. We’ve gathered to meet with God Most High, and as always, God fills the humble with good things but He sends the proud away empty.

So come in faith and welcome to Jesus Christ…

Ben Zornes