Last time we talked about the basic structure by which Christians have celebrated the Lord’s Supper for 95% of church history. Now we’ll begin to flesh out some of the details of how this structure can be implemented in a free-church setting.
Taking
Bring the bread and the cup into the worship space. I think in general this is preferable to having them already set out on the table beforehand because, as Robert Webber frequently points out, the Service of the Table ought to stand apart from the Service of the Word, in which the Bible is the central symbol. Still, I wouldn’t have a fit if the elements were already present from the beginning of the service (as I have even seen done at a small weeknight service at a Roman Catholic church!).
Blessing
The Lord’s Supper is sometimes called the “Eucharist” (Greek for “thanksgiving”) precisely because there is a prayer of thanksgiving centrally featured. Can you conceive of a church dinner at which no one said grace? Then don’t ever skip the Eucharistic prayer when celebrating the Lord’s Supper. Sometimes free-churchers do just that, I’m sorry to say. Not on Sunday mornings, to be sure, but I have seen it done about three or four times in the past ten years at “special” services. (So special we can be even more minimalistic in our observance, apparently!)
At the very least, bypassing the blessing is the height of ingratitude: we thank God for our food, but we think it’s trendy or creative to fail to thank him for Jesus? Nor does skipping the prayer give people (1) time to spiritually prepare to receive the bread and the cup or (2) a theological framework in which to interpret what they are about to do. I love the Eucharistic prayers of the ancient church precisely because the best of them rehearse the span of God’s saving acts. They proclaim the gospel in its fullness every time the faithful gather at the Lord’s Table.
Apparently from the end of the first century, the standard manner of blessing or consecrating the Eucharistic elements was to offer a single prayer over both the bread and the cup. This is seen in the Didache (ca. 100 if not earlier), in Justin (ca. 150), and in all known Eucharistic prayers from subsequent eras in every part of the Christian world. This prayer is called the anaphora in the Eastern churches (e.g., the Anaphora of Saint James) and the canon in the West (e.g., the Gelasian Canon).
The exact wording of the Eucharistic prayer was quite fluid in the earliest church, and that will suit free-church Christians just fine! Justin reports the “president” prayed “according to his ability,” and elsewhere he noted that the minister prayed “at great length” (First Apology 65)‚ although there are also examples of rather brief forms of Eucharistic prayer. There are a few early possible outlines such a prayer might follow
Praise and Thanksgiving
The simplest form of blessing would be a prayer of praise and thanksgiving for God’s saving acts in Jesus Christ. Some scholars believe that some of the ascriptions of praise with which many ancient anaphoras begin were originally stand-alone Eucharistic prayers of a very primitive type. One likely candidate is the preface to the Third Anaphora of Saint Peter, an early Syrian prayer. Furthermore, the prayer in Didache 9 largely falls into this category.
Remembrance
Another form of Eucharistic prayer might be a simple remembrance of Jesus’ words and acts at the Last Supper. In later medieval theology, this “institution narrative” was seen as the moment at which the elements were transformed into the literal body and blood of Jesus. Martin Luther, still influenced by this theology, pared back the elaborate Roman Canon of his day to a simple preface prayer followed by the institution narrative: the bare minimum for a valid sacrament.
In the Apostolic Tradition (attributed to Hippolytus, ca. 215), the remembrance section not only recites the words of institution but frames them in terms of the significance of Christ’s death and resurrection:
And when he was betrayed to voluntary suffering
that he might destroy death,
and break the bonds of the devil,
and tread down hell,
and enlighten the righteous,
and establish the limit,
and manifest the resurrection:he took bread and gave thanks to you, saying,
“Take, eat, this is my body which shall be broken for you.”
Likewise also the cup saying,
“This is my blood, which is shed for you.
When you do this you make my remembrance.”Remembering therefore his death and resurrection,
we offer to you the bread and the cup,
giving you thanks
because you have held us worthy to stand before you
and minister as priests to you.
Some early anaphoras, especially from eastern Syria, did not include a full recitation of the institution narrative but rather a summary statement that what the congregation was doing in celebrating the Eucharist was in fulfillment of Jesus’ command.
Invocation
Finally, there is the prayer in the form of an invocation for God (usually the Holy Spirit; in Egypt sometimes the Logos) to come. Some early Gnostic and semi-Gnostic sects constructed elaborate prayers that were nothing more than appeals for God, under various names and titles, to become present. So, in Acts of Thomas 133, we find:
Bread of life, those who eat of which remain incorruptible;
bread which fills hungry souls with its blessing;
you are the one thought worthy to receive a gift,
that you may become for us forgiveness of sins,
and they who eat you become immortal.
We name over you the name
of the mother of the ineffable mystery
of the hidden dominions and powers,
we name over you the name of Jesus.
Let the power of blessing come and settle upon the bread,
that all souls which partake of it may be washed of their sins!
The earliest forms of invocation (the fancy theological word is epiclesis) ask the Holy Spirit to become present in the worshipers to bring holiness, faith, etc. Later forms ask the Holy Spirit to become present in the elements to transform them into the body and blood of Christ. Egyptian and Roman Eucharistic prayers have both kinds of epiclesis.
All of the Above
Later Eucharistic prayers included all of these elements, in the order given above. Some, like the prayer found in the Apostolic Tradition, did so in a form that is still relatively brief. In fact, the Jewish birkat ha-mazon or table grace consists of three paragraphs, each corresponding to one of the above mentioned prayer movements:
(1) The first paragraph, beginning with the word “Blessed,” focuses on praise.
(2) The second, beginning with “We give thanks,” focuses on remembering God’s saving deeds.
(3) The third, beginning with “Have mercy,” focuses on supplication.
None of the Above
This prayer from Acts of Thomas 158 doesn’t really conform to any of the above approaches, but I’d love to see an eloquent African American preacher go to town with this model 
:
Your holy body which was crucified for us we eat,
and your blood which was poured out for us for salvation we drink.
Let your body, then, become for us salvation,
and your blood for remission of sins!For the gall which you drank for our sakes,
let the gall of the devil be taken away from us;
and for the vinegar which you have drunk for us,
let our weakness be made strong;
for the spitting which you received for our sakes,
let us receive the dew of your goodness;
and for the reed with which they smote you for our sakes,
let us receive the perfect house!Because you received a crown of thorns for our sakes,
let us who have loved you put on a crown that does not fade away;
and for the linen cloth in which you were wrapped,
let us be girt about with your unconquerable power;
and for the new grave and burial
let us receive renewal of soul and body!Because you did rise and come to life again,
let us come to life again
and live and stand before you in righteous judgment!
Next: Breaking and Giving
technorati tags: acts of thomas, anaphora, apostolic tradition, communion, didache, eucharist, lord’s supper
