Life at the Table

I can’t explain it. I just know that I live for it. And I live from it.”

She is fresh from the table of grace, misty eyed. But this was more than an emotional encounter. Something is happening in her. She is increasingly alive with the life of Jesus. She is experiencing personal revival. She connects her revival to the table of grace. Although she can’t explain it, she knows that she lives for what happens at the table and from what happens at the table.

An article about revival popped up in my news feed. The title was “Seven Steps to Revival.” I clicked out of curiosity. All seven of the “Seven Steps to Revival” begin with “We must…” All seven are good and healthy practices. All seven have biblical basis. It would be hard to disagree with the importance of any of the seven. All seven are things that we must be doing. The article and the author, I have no doubt, are well intentioned. But does revival begin with what we must do?

Revival means to make alive again. We humans are clearly incapable of making ourselves alive. We need the Living God to meet us where we are to make us alive. This is the role the sacraments serve, particularly the sacrament of Holy Communion. Could the revival we long for begin at the table of grace?

The Wesleyan revival within the Church of England in the eighteenth century combined evangelical and sacramental streams. This was one of many ways John Wesley opted for both/and instead of either/or. In his mind and heart, there was beauty in the blending. His focus on heart change and inward growth did not cause him to diminish the importance of the sacraments. In fact, by synthesizing evangelism and the sacraments, Wesley emphasized the powerful presence of God in the sacraments that brought evangelical revival.

In one of his communion hymns, Charles Wesley highlighted the availability of God’s life-giving power in the bread and cup:

Come, Holy Ghost, thine influence shed, And realize the sign; Thy life infuse into the bread, Thy power into the wine. Effectual let the tokens prove, And made, by heavenly art, Fit channels to convey thy love To every faithful heart.(1)

The Church of the Nazarene’s Articles of Faith describe both sacraments as “means of grace” that do the work of proclaiming. Article XIII says that in The Lord’s Supper, “… Christ is present by the Spirit. All are invited to participate by faith in Christ and be renewed in life, salvation, and in unity as the Church.”2

Unfortunately, many pastors and local churches settle for a low view of the sacraments as mere memorials or testimonies. Sacraments are sometimes peripheral and infrequently practiced. When they are practiced, human obedience is often emphasized more than God’s saving and sanctifying activity.

In studying our Wesleyan roots and our Nazarene theology, we can recover a rich understanding of the sacraments in which God in Christ, through the power of the Spirit, makes himself really present to us. Receiving the sacraments is not another “we must” like the list of seven steps. The sacraments are not primarily about what we do. The beauty of the sacraments, in part, is that our roles are secondary and responsive. God is the Primary Agent. In the sacraments, we encounter the Living God and avail ourselves to God’s prevenient, saving, and sanctifying grace. Something real happens in the sacraments precisely because God is really present In the sacraments, God claims, saves, energizes, heals, blesses, transforms, and much more.

Many of us hunger and pray for revival. We want revival that is authentic and widespread. We long for revival that is transformative for ourselves, our communities, our denomination, our country, and this world. What if the starting place for revival is in the sacraments? What if the life we long for begins in the bread and cup?

May we become increasingly alive with the life of Jesus. May we live for our encounters with Christ at the table, and may we live from those encounters. In doing so, may we experience revival.

Rev. Daron Brown lives and pastors in Waverly, Tennessee, with his wife, Katie, and children, Kendall, Parker, and Macy.

(1) Wesley, Charles. “Come Holy Ghost, thy influence shed.”

(2) Church of the Nazarene. Manual. Nazarene Publishing House, 2023