1 Corinthians 11:20 - Printer Friendly

ESV: When you come together, it is not the Lord’s supper that you eat.

NIV: So then, when you come together, it is not the Lord's Supper you eat,

NASB: Therefore when you come together it is not to eat the Lord’s Supper,

CSB: When you come together, then, it is not to eat the Lord's Supper.

NLT: When you meet together, you are not really interested in the Lord’s Supper.

KJV: When ye come together therefore into one place, this is not to eat the Lord's supper.

NKJV: Therefore when you come together in one place, it is not to eat the Lord’s Supper.

Paul has received a report that the Christians in Corinth are mishandling the Lord's Supper. In fact, what they do is so off-target that it's worse than if they were not practicing it, at all (1 Corinthians 11:17)! Instead of coming together to remember the Lord's sacrifice in harmony, humility, and cooperation, they had turned it into a party. The food is being distributed unequally, and some are even becoming drunk (1 Corinthians 11:21). Rather than being unified by the experience, they were—most likely—dividing between rich and poor, and being raucous in the process.

With that attitude, it doesn't even make sense to call such a service "the Lord's Supper". Paul's reaction, shown in later verses, demonstrates how ridiculous this behavior is. While the practice of communion allows for wide variety of expression, what's happening in Corinth defeats the purpose of the sacrament. Their practice is so far off from how God intends a church to practice communion that it's not even right to call it by that name.

First Corinthians 11:17–34 contains Paul's rebuke of the church in Corinth for their application of the Lord's Supper. They had turned it into a gathering at which the wealthy ate and drank too much, leaving the poorer Christians hungry and humiliated. Paul warns that communion should be a time of sober self-reflection about our sin and Christ's sacrifice, as well as a time to unite the body of Christ, the church, while taking in representations of the blood and body of Christ. Some in Corinth were sick and others had died as part of God's judgment for participating in communion in an unworthy manner.

Paul confronts two issues the church in Corinth was failing to practice correctly. First, some women were not wearing head coverings while praying or prophesying in their meetings. Paul insisted they must do so, and that men must not, based on mankind's relationship to God and the social implications of that covering. Second, Paul describes the reasons for observing the Lord's Supper and how it should be done. The Corinthian Christians had brought God's judgment on themselves for practicing communion in a way which dishonored Christ's sacrifice for sin and humiliated the poor among them.

After concluding his teaching on meat offered to idols, Paul turns to two issues the church in Corinth was getting wrong. The first was head coverings when praying or prophesying in their meetings. Differences between men and women in that regard are because of both spiritual and social reasons. Paul also corrects the disastrous way in which they were practicing the observance of the Lord's Supper. They were dishonoring Christ's sacrifice for sin as well as the poor in the body of Christ, the church. Despite having more to say on communion, Paul will move on to the topic of spiritual gifts in chapter 12.

First Corinthians is one of the more practical books of the New Testament. Paul writes to a church immersed in a city associated with trade, but also with corruption and immorality. These believers are struggling to properly apply spiritual gifts and to resist the ungodly practices of the surrounding culture. Paul's letter gives instructions for real-life concerns such as marriage and spirituality. He also deals with the importance of unity and gives one of the Bible's more well-known descriptions of love in chapter 13.

Accessed 5/4/2024 12:29:23 AM