A Musical Meal

As we come to this meal, there are a number of things we do together. We sit, we reflect, we observe, we take and eat, we take and drink, and we love one another. This is a meal of covenant partaking, and the Greek word that sums up that partaking, that sharing, that blending, is the word koinonia.

But there is something else we do together in this meal that typifies the whole thing wonderfully. When Jesus instituted this meal with His disciples, He also did this same thing. “And when they had sung an hymn, they went out into the mount of Olives.” (Matt. 26:30).

This is a musical meal. We sing together as we pass the elements to one another. And there are few things that provide a better specific instance of the whole meal than what happens in congregational singing. We have many voices and just one song. These voices are all voices together, but the timbre of each voice also varies. We have bass and baritone, tenor, alto and soprano. We also have the voices of children. Just as the one loaf is broken into many pieces in order to come back together into a different kind of unified loaf, so also many disparate voices were created in order unite together again in one song.

But the unity is even deeper and richer than that. Christian unity is not a monolithic slab, but rather something that is textured and intricately woven. The one song has different parts written for it, parts that are designed to receive the contribution of each kind of voice, and at the same time to blend with and complement what the other voices are doing as they bring their contributions.

Now just as the emblems of bread and wine are supposed to picture this kind of unity, so also singing in harmony embodies it. But this also is simply a sign pointing to something else. That something else is the love you actually have for one another.

So come, and welcome, to Jesus Christ.