July 21 – LD 29, Day 6: Worshiping Christ in Heaven and Not on
Earth
by Rev Arie den Hartog
Read: Colossians 3:1 - 11.
The church
of Rome believes that in the Lord’s Supper, the bread and wine are changed into
the literal body and blood of Christ. Because of this imagination, it is the
practice of the church of Rome to worship Christ in
the elements. When a person comes to the communion rail and receives the wafer
from the hands of the Roman Catholic priest, he or she is taught to bow before
the consecrated wafer. Wherever the remains of the consecrated elements of the
mass are kept in the church, the members of the church are taught to bow in
worship. There have been times in church history when the transubstantiated
elements of the Lord’s Supper have been paraded through the streets and Roman
Catholic devotees lining the streets have bowed before them in adoration. There
were also times when the consecrated elements were kept under glass some where
in the church and people came to worship before them.
There are statements in
the decrees of the council of
The Reformed Church
declares the practices of the church of Rome to be
accursed idolatry. Idolatry is giving honor to someone or something other than
God. The honor of worship is only due to God. It is idolatry to worship the
elements of the Lord’s Supper for they are in fact ordinary bread and wine and
they are in no sense God or Jesus.
Christ Jesus is now not
bodily on earth. The church of Rome is wrong in its teaching on the Lord’s
Supper to insist that Christ’s literal body and blood are present in the
consecrated elements of the Lord’s Supper and there to be worshipped.
We know from God’s Word
that Christ is now in heaven. He is there as the glorified Lord sitting at the
right hand of the Majesty on high, even God the Father.
When we celebrate the
Lord’s Supper, we do not worship the bread and wine in the Lord’s Supper, nor
do we have any superstitious regard for them. They are but ordinary bread and
wine. They have no power in themselves to bless.
Rather, when we celebrate
the Lord’s Supper, we lift up our hearts through His Spirit in our hearts. We
lift up our hearts to worship Christ who is now enthroned in glory in heaven.
He alone is worthy of our worship. He appears now in heaven as the Lamb of God
who by His sacrifice atoned for all of our sins. We worship and adore Him, giving
Him all the thanks of all our hearts for His loving sacrifice and perfect
obedience whereby we have the forgiveness of sins and righteousness and eternal
life. We look by faith to Christ as He is now in heaven as the source and
fountain of all the blessings of salvation. No one else, nothing else beside
the blessed Triune God is worthy of worship. Jesus along with the Father and
the Holy Spirit, is worthy of our worship because He is the Son of God in our
human nature.
Think about these great
truths every time you celebrate the Lord’s Supper!