Agree or disagree?

We ought always to provide that no meeting of the Church is held without ...the dispensation of the Supper

- John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion 4.17.44

Should the Lord's supper be celebrated each week?

(This is one thing that distinguishes the church that my parents currently attend from the CanRC)

Comments

There's nothing wrong with celebrating the Lord's Supper each week, but there's also nothing wrong with doing it less often. Christ said, "Do this in rememberance of me," but didn't say how often.

Logistically there would be some problems with celebrating each week. Currently, some ministers deliver a shorter sermon during the service in which Lord's Supper is celebrated. I've even seen where there was no sermon at all because the congregation was so large. To celebrate the Lord's Supper each week without making any other changes would detract from the preaching of the Word, except in churches where a full sermon is delivered and the overall service is longer (sometimes twice as long as usual). I don't know which is the majority, but for arguments sake I'll only discuss churches with abbreviated or no sermon. In these cases, the natural suggestion from someone such as yourself would be to make the service longer (because we all know how much you love to suggest that). Churches with short lunch breaks would probably have to change their service start times, which may not be convenient for any members who are required to work on Sunday (police officers, doctors, nurses, etc). Another possibility would be to turn it both services into a continguous event with lunch served at church. Maranatha has had congregational lunches a few times to improve fellowship and the congregation really likes it.

A few more logistical issues: the various cups need to be washed every week instead of every other month. Would you volunteer to do that? Bread costs will increase by a factor of eight, and wine costs will increase by a factor of between four and eight depending on how many bottles they go through each time. The budget watchers will be complaining.

It's one of those issues where there's nothing wrong with the way it's being done and nothing wrong with changing it. Doing nothing is the path of least resistance, so you'll need to come up with a solid argument in favor of changing if you want to make it happen.

The miniscule cost increase of bread is nothing to speak of - and wine isn't incredibly expensive - particularly for a church. I haven't attended budget meetings yet, but finances for a church should not generally be a problem. Furthermore, washing the cups (and plate(s)) takes an extra 5 minutes...not even a factor.

Also, just because something is not on the path of least resistance does not mean it should not be done. There wouldn't be Reformed (or, for that matter anything other than the RCC) if everyone took the path of least resistance. Change is NEVER on the path of least resistance.

For this to take place on a weekly basis, I suspect that the forms would likely be shortened. The next question would be, do you need to drag everyone up to the front of the church for this? (it can go reasonably fast otherwise).

n these cases, the natural suggestion from someone such as yourself would be to make the service longer (because we all know how much you love to suggest that).

I don't really care if it would be longer or shorter - I only mention that just as an indicator that this is not necessarily an argument for the purpose of spending the least time in church possible (as one possible counter-argument might charge)

Weekly communion is done in our church in Blue Bell. It's also done in several of the United Reformed Churches in California.