In this Supper, all the benefits of Christ’s death are sealed for those who partake in faith. This includes everything He has done for us: forgiveness, justification, reconciliation, and infinitely more. We have our conversions renewed and ratified before God as we partake. We have our covenant relation to God renewed as we partake.
This renewal is not renewed like a lease about to expire, but is a renewal more akin to the renewal that food provides, or sexual communion in marriage. But it is renewal nonetheless, and it is renewal of what you have already received from God, all that you have received from God. In this meal, your salvation is growing to maturity. How is this accomplished? The answer is by faith, faith alone, from first to last.
But faith receives the grace of God with eyes wide open. Realize that your salvation is growing to maturity alongside all your brothers and sisters gathered here. So look around as you partake. Do not curl up into a little holy ball, content to go to heaven by yourself. God is renewing covenant with all His people. Look around, and as God gives faith, you will also see the saints around the world doing the same thing, together with the saints in heaven.
And for those who come without faith, trifling with holy things, they do incur the chastisements of the covenant. They defile the body and blood of the Lord Jesus, trampling it underfoot. But we fence the Table for the sake of the defilers, not for the sake of the Lord. The altar did not need protection from Nadab and Abihu. The ark of the covenant did not need protection from Uzzah. The Supper of the Lord did not need protection from greedy and drunken Corinthians.
Although we say this, we are confident of better things in this instance. You are coming in faith, and you are being restored and built up. Rejoice in it, and be glad. This is the day that the Lord has made. Go, eat your bread with a merry heart, for God has accepted you in Jesus Christ our Lord.