LET US DRAW NEAR

“Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” (Hebrews 4:14-16) 

Did you have family dinner time when you were growing up? Did your family gather at a table at the end of the day and eat a meal together? Do you have fond memories of that time, or no memories of doing it at all? For me, I have two different kinds of memories—the memory of dinner time at my dad’s house and dinner time at my mom’s house. My parents were divorced when I was really young, so I have two separate (and somewhat polar opposite) memories of dinner time. 

At my dad’s house, dinner time was strictly for eating dinner; not a time for conversation, but simply consumption. In fact, when my siblings and I would begin to talk more than we ate, I can still hear my dad telling us to talk LESS, and eat MORE. (Now, to be fair, I have to tell my kids similar things today, lest they choke on their food while talking.) Growing up, to me it seemed like my dad viewed the dinner table, and the time spent there, simply to eat food. 

At my mom’s house, things were starkly different. Almost without fail, we had dinner together every single night. We ate our food together, but we talked A LOT while we ate. It was LOUD, and somewhat chaotic, during dinner time at my mom’s house. For my siblings and I, while we ate dinner, we laughed at things and often yelled at each other. Dinner was a time to converse, while we consumed. 

Our church celebrates the Communion Ordinance once a month, on the first Sunday of every month. So this coming Sunday is a “Communion Sunday”. We have a normal service, and then at the end of the service one of the men in our church shares a short devotion and then we take the communion elements together. But twice a year we have a Communion “Emphasis” service, where we dedicate the entire service to intentionally thinking about and slowing down our participation in communion. 

When Jesus first instituted Communion, it was part of a larger meal; it was a ‘dinner time’ with Him and His disciples. Even today, often churches refer to the taking of the bread and cup as ‘coming to the communion table.’ Though the symbolism isn’t always as clear to those who have yet to become fully “initiated” into the norms of church life, communion in a service is meant to reflect, even in a small way, coming to God’s dinner table, having been invited in by Jesus. 

In the passage above, the author of Hebrews has been speaking on the coming salvation rest that God has promised for His people. He reminds those who are reading his letter of the importance of “striving” to enter God’s rest (Heb. 4:11), and the consequences that will come to those who don’t. But as the author of Hebrews concludes that section, he writes the words in verses 14-16; and he focuses in on Jesus. The point that he is making, at least there, is that we will only be at rest, when we find our rest in Jesus Christ. And one of the great truths that is communicated in these verses is that the only One who can give us true rest has graciously invited us to rest in and with Him. 

For some, Communion is strictly for taking the elements in obedience to Christ’s command, for others it is for conversing with and confession of sin to God, lest we take of communion with unrepentant sin. Both of those things are truth, both are necessary (and many more things!), but neither one are meant to be the focus of Communion. The focus is the Host, Jesus Himself. He has invited us into His home, to His table, to enjoy His Presence. 

So, let us draw near to the throne of grace, for that is there where we find Jesus, the Son of God, who gives “grace to help in time of need.”