Frequency of Communion?

[Haruo]

Monthly communion made better sense when you only had clergy available once a month, though personally I think a lay-administered Eucharist is hunky-dory.

[Tim Bonney]

[Cathy]

Tim I don't believe that I was ever in a Methodist church when communion was offered. How is it usually done in the UMC?

When I was in Dallas there was occasionally the offering of communion at tables against the wall around the room and a short printed text was displayed. It was in the Great Room where the contemporary service was held on Saturday evening and in Sunday morning. It seemed a very good way to do communion if one chose to do it weekly.

Having been raised in the SBC I prefer the passing of the communion trays and taking communion together. And I particularly liked it here when I went to the ABC church because it was served by the older women of the church with the pastor playing the usual Baptist style roll from the front. In Dallas it was always male deacons as they had only just elected their first women deacons.

[Tim Bonney]

[Lamar Wadsworth]

This seems to vary by region. My experience with SBC churches in GA, AL, and KY was that most observed it quarterly, either on the first Sunday of the quarter (most common) or on fifth Sundays. When we moved to Maryland in '89, all of the churches I was familiar with in the Maryland-Delaware convention observed it monthly on the first Sunday of the month. We had a woman in our church in Baltimore who grew up in a Baptist church in Wales. She grew up with weekly observance and used to remind me that Paul wrote "as often as you eat and drink," not "as seldom as you eat and drink!"

I have encouraged more frequent observance, and I like to do it in conjunction with baptism. When I was pastor of Hill City Baptist Church in Gordon Co. GA, we baptized in the creek, and we observed communion immediately after right there on the creek bank. We used the hood of Will Haley's Ford pickup as our communion table. I can still picture those white tablecloths spread across the hood of a green '70 Ford pickup. Ethel saw to it that Will washed the truck on Saturday if we were having baptism and communion at the creek the next day. I have always done communion at Maundy Thursday services, and I once baptized on Maundy Thursday, building the service around the theme of being baptized into Christ's death.

[Lamar Wadsworth]

deleted duplicate post

[John Sneed]

In churches where I pastored, it was our practice to have the Lord's Supper every time a month had 5 Sundays in it, on that 5th Sunday. That meant we had the Lord's Supper 4 times a year.

John

[Haruo]

It seems to me that it's much easier to read the Scriptures as supporting frequent communion than infrequent; indeed the fifth-Sunday bit seems very strange to me. Who thought it up, and what were their proof texts? The only infrequent frequency I could imagine a Biblical argument for would be once a year, in connection with Maundy Thursday. But I've never heard of a church doing that. Maybe some Messianic Jewish outfits?

[Tim Bonney]

[Haruo]

[James]

My home church had communion quarterly at which we recited the church covenant. Once my Missionary Baptist aunt and uncle were visiting us when communion Sunday occurred. They would not participate. I was young enough to be puzzled by this. My current church has communion monthly. I'm comfortable with that.

In my first year at SBTS, I mentored a HMB summer missionary from Arkansas from the Ozarks. She would not take communion at our little inner city mission where I was working. In her home church, communion was once a year. They did not even let members into the sanctuary if they did not have their invitation letter from the deacons designating them as good Christian members of the church. I think this might be a holdover from the Landmark Baptist movement.

I might have made it into the ministry except for my views on baptism and Lord's supper. I was interviewed by a committee from the Cincinnati (Ohio) Association. They started off with two questions. First, would I accept a position in a church holding to closed communion. I told them honestly that I do not hold to closed communion, but that I would not try to change them in a short term pastorate. That seemed to satisfy them. Second, would I baptize a three year old? I said no. The interview was over. At this stage of my life, I can think of one situation when I would baptize a three year old.

[Sandy]

I don't really see a scriptural reference that comes down either way regarding the frequency of communion, nor in describing specifically the way it is to be administered. "As often as you do this, you remember the Lord's death until he comes" isn't a prescriptive statement regarding how frequently communion should be offered. If you see it as a sacramental event, then it makes sense that administering it would require the presence of clergy, and you'd want to have it more frequently, since it provides some sort of assurance of personal purification. If you lean toward the symbolic view, then the frequency isn't as important, and the distribution is by someone who is serving, not officiating.

[Tim Bonney]

I don't think it is entire based on what we read in the scripture but an over all view of Church history that leads to the idea that communion was practiced weekly.

The UMC recommends to its local church that over time we move back to weekly communion as we only got away from it do to the historical situation of the early American circuit riders and not a theological reason.

The ABC/USA is open communion in its views as are United Methodists. I've not ever served as pastor of a closed communion congregation. The one SBC church I pastored was open communion.

As to baptism, I now baptize anyone of any age which the practice of my denomination.

[Sandy]

Of course, the structure of the SBC, made up of independent, autonomous congregations, doesn't provide for the denomination having the authority to make recommendations about theological matters, such as how often communion should be served. Having been raised, licensed and ordained in SBC churches, that perspective is quite comfortable to me. In the Alliance church to which I now belong, communion is part of the worship on the first Sunday of each month, and that's a local church, not a denominational, decision. While there are some differences in the denominational structure of the CMA, compared to the SBC, it is mainly related to ownership of property, not ecclesiastical matters.

I'm becoming more attracted to the more creative style of communion. Or perhaps I should say to the manner in which it may have been served traditionally, and in the early church initially by Christ. I like taking from the whole loaf, and dipping the bread into the juice or wine. It seems a bit more authentic than a small plastic cup with a shelf on the side for the square of bread. Maybe its because I'm getting older, but it's annoying to me to hear the click and rattle of plastic cups being put into the holders after having a spiritual moment.

[William Thornton]

Sandy, how do you like the disposable, prepackaged communion elements? You know, the ones where you peel and eat the wafer and then peel again and drink the juice? These can be distributed in a bucket because there's no danger of spillage.
Heck, you could toss a few in your pocket for private use later, assuming the minister already blessed the bucket and activated the whole lot of them.

[Sandy]

I haven't seen those. I'd probably just pass on that.

[Tim Bonney]

[Tim Bonney]

[Cathy]

[Tim Bonney]

Cathy, it sounds like your pastor was copying Methodist practice possibly with what he was doing. We don't say a blessing over persons receiving the elements but we have two services, one for the bread and one for the cup. The bread server says something like "the body of Christ given for you" and the cup server says "the blood of Christ given for you" or something similar.

The two servers can be the pastor and a lay person or both can be lay people. There is a part of the service that I'm required to officiate, that is the consecration of the elements by God seeking the presence of the Holy Spirit (epiclesis is the technical term) but much of the rest of the service can be led by others. Also what I do in the service is supposed to be with the congregation gathered. I don't consecrate elements by myself, it is considered an act of the whole church.

[Cathy]

His background was free methodist.

[Sandy]

[Tim Bonney]

[Tim Bonney]

Back on frequency. I'd not want to regularly attend a church that had communion less than monthly.