{"id":1106,"date":"2020-04-01T22:09:00","date_gmt":"2020-04-01T22:09:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2020-07-18T16:11:19","modified_gmt":"2020-07-18T16:11:19","slug":"the-virtual-communion-of-saints","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/pastorgabe\/the-virtual-communion-of-saints\/","title":{"rendered":"The Virtual Communion of Saints?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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As the threat of the COVID-19 coronavirus continues to loom large, many local governments have put stay-at-home orders in place to prevent the rapid spread of this pandemic. Most of America’s churches have ceased gathering regularly to comply with these restrictions and as a matter of wisdom. Many of these churches have put their services online, live streaming the Sunday singing and sermon through social media like Facebook or YouTube.<\/p>\n

This has caused us to ponder ecclesiology (the study of the church and its practices) in contexts we haven’t had to think about before, most notably in the observance of our ordinances: baptism and the Lord’s supper. Can we witness a baptism online? Is it still a legitimate baptism? Can we partake in the Lord’s supper online? In other words, can we have a virtual Lord’s supper?<\/p>\n

Prior to the coronavirus, we were already debating about whether a person can truly go to church on the internet. Spoiler alert: you can’t. As Dr. Albert Mohler has said, YouTube is a really bad place to go to church. Before anyone says it, the church is people, not a building\u2014that is true. But what defines that people as the church? Our answers to these questions regarding the church and its ordinances are found in God’s word, the Bible.<\/p>\n

Through WWUTT, I have received several questions about “virtual ordinances,” which I have decided to respond to in this blog entry. Rather than answering a whole range of questions, permit me to simplify this down into one, and that question is this:<\/p>\n

Can you partake in the Lord’s supper privately at home? <\/b><\/p>\n

Consider what the Apostle Paul said about the proper practice of the Lord’s table in 1 Corinthians 11:17-34. (It is a large enough section of text that you will pardon me for not typing out the whole thing.) Five times here, the apostle says “when you come together” (verses 17, 18, 20, 33, and 34). So the Lord’s supper, or communion (which literally means “common union”), happens among the ordered gathering of the saints who come together to worship God.<\/p>\n

You must understand that we’re not merely talking about a bunch of professing Christians getting together, and then someone says, “Hey, let’s eat some crackers and drink some juice!” The formal practices of the church are not to be observed so haphazardly. As Paul will say in the same letter, “Let all things be done for building up,” and, “For God is not a God of confusion but of peace” (1 Corinthians 14:26, 33).<\/p>\n

Consider the commandments and practices that define the church. The church is:<\/p>\n