We will come at the conclusion of this service to the Lord’s Supper. Too often this Table has been made the occasion for disputes, but this has happened because one aspect of the Table has been neglected. We need to learn to think of this Table as a central arbiter of all disputes.
Too often we want to resolve (or perpetuate!) conflicts by arguments, wranglings, cold shouldering, or various forms of pressure. Not surprisingly, when we grab at our disputes (often with both hands), the result is usually just more jangling. But how can this Table arbitrate disputes? All of us instinctively know about this authority in the Supper, which explains our treatment of the Table in the midst of disputing. Just as an athlete committing a foul tries to have his back to the referee, to the arbiter, so many believers try to position themselves so that their back is to this Table.
In practical terms, if you are involved in disputes with husbands or wives, children or parents, brothers or sisters, hear this. The disputes may be personal, they may be doctrinal, or they may be practical. It does not matter. If you are involved in such a tangle, and the one with whom you are entangled is also here, and is also coming to the Table, and this makes you want to shrink back, or to turn your back, then know beyond any doubt that a certain part of the problem is within you.
Your turning may not be acted upon, but merely desired deep within your heart. You may refuse the bread and wine overtly. You may avoid church because of this. Whatever the manifestation, it is a sign that something has interfered with your communion with Christ—this is His Table, remember? It does not belong to the one with whom you have this dispute. It is the Lord’s Table.
You may be troubled by this and think it simplistic. You may believe that the one with whom you are disputing should be the one avoiding the Table, and because he does not, you must. But other servants answer to their own master. What are you doing? Whose fellowship are you really avoiding?