UNITY

Full Gospel Church in Saint John hosted our citywide ministerial today and we joined their gathering for pastors who are affiliated with Open Bible Faith Fellowship. The main speakers of the day were Rick Ciaramitaro and Ted Yukes. Rick is President of this fellowshp and takes no salary for givng apostolic undergirding to over 500 ministers. Check out their Statement of Faith. They seem to be Pentecostals but have a very balanced statement. And I have to tell you that I loved the spirit that Rick demonstrated as he spoke with us this morning.

What intrigued me most was the passionate appeal for unity among Christians. Men who we would once have thought of as radical and exclusive in outlook (remember our former days) are talking about and embracing a kind of unity that does not violate doctrinal distinctives but honors our kinship as brothers and sisters in Christ. Hallelujah. I found myself drawn to these men. Their simplicity and candor were refreshing. Rick pastors a large church in Windsor, Ontario and his story is incredibly inspiring. But the spiritual maturity and grace that he demonstrated was truly a blessing to me.

I found myself thinking that it just may be possible for the people of God to experience true unity in Christ without having to lose our diversity and distinctives. We are living in very interesting times. Is it possible that I will be alive to see the Body of Christ come together to face the common enemy of worldliness and sin in the face of the challenges confronting our world right now? I hope so...

The Lord's Supper

Yesterday, Sunday, we celebrated the Lord's Supper at tables with glasses of grape juice and a dozen rolls on each table. The rolls were in a round and had to be broken off for each individual. The tables seated 8 and some had only 3 or 4 people present. But there was community at each table. And there was butter and jam for the rolls. As I bit into my roll with butter and strawberry jam liberally spread, the explosion of sweetness and glorious flavor was very pleasant. I couldn't help but think of the Scripture that says something like - "Taste and see that the Lord is good." This bread is good, very good was the thought in my mind. And this bread is a symbol of Jesus, the bread of life. And He is good, very good. There was much joy and laughter at the tables as we shared a meal together.

Was this a bit more like the celebrations the first century church held? It is hard to imagine anyone getting drunk at our usual services with a thimble of grape juice (Welch's is the best). And it is even harder to imagine some getting too much to eat while others go hungry when all we offer is a half inch square of bread or a plastic wafer with no flavor or substance. I think the way we did this yesterday has ruined me for the usual thimble of juice and mini piece of bread. In fact, next time we may do a whole meal. Someone suggested a roast beef dinner would be good. I agree. What a great way for the people of God to gather on a Sunday morning. Maybe we will have church at noon that day. I hear a chorus of yay's from our morning haters who need at least one cup of java to even get out of their pj's.


I love the fact that when we built our gathering space, we didn't put pews in or a sloped floor. We can set up tables and do other interesting things in the space we designed for our assemblies. Hard to imagine doing supper in most of our church buildings. Maybe we should be building holy pubs or holy restaurants instead of holy sanctuaries. (Holy pubs would be coffee and pop or juice dispensers - like those new Starbucks with fireplaces and leather couches and chairs - sigh.) Or maybe we should create better gathering spaces in our homes so that we can have friends, Christian and non, over for a good meal complete with bread and wine, er, I mean, juice.