Eucharistic meditation

1 John 3:17: Whoever has the world’s goods and beholds his brother in need and closes his heart against him, how does the love of God abide in him?

John insists, as we’ve seen, that love must take specific, concrete form among believers. Love is not just fellow-feeling, or sympathy, or well-wishing. Well-wishing without action is faith without works, James says, and this kind of faith cannot save us. If we do not assist our brothers in need, the love of God is not in us; and if the love of God is not in us, then we remain in death, and are Cainite murderers.

Jesus is the great example of this kind of self-giving, self-sacrificing love. Though He was rich, for our sakes He became poor; He was exalted, but for our sakes He humbled Himself; though equal to God, He took on the form of a servant; though lord, He became slave of all; He had all the world’s goods, and when He beheld us in our desperation and need, He did not close His heart against us. He is the revelation of God’s eternal love; He is Love Incarnate.

That’s the gospel we celebrate at this table every week, the gospel of the self-giving Son of God. This table is an extension of that love. God has shown His generosity in sending His Son, and now manifests that generosity again and again by welcoming us to His table. This table displays the hospitality of God.

But this table is not only a celebration and remembrance of that gospel. It’s an enactment of that gospel. This table trains us to enact the love of God toward one another. You receive bread, and you pass it on; you receive wine, and you give it to your neighbor. The world’s goods are given into your hands, and you give it to your brother in need, not closing your heart against him. As we pass the bread and wine from hand to hand, we are ritually enacting the economy of God’s people, the economy of generosity, the economy of gift, the economy in which we all come to share in the hospitality of God.

This table can be belied by our actions. If we pass the bread and wine to our brother, but then ignore his needs when we see him begging on the street tomorrow morning, we have become liars. This table is to shape and reshape our relationships with one another, training us to be open-handed and open-hearted not only here but everywhere.

You have benefited from the hospitality of God; go and do likewise. Freely have you received. Freely give.