17. Misuse of the Supper is assembling to detriment rather than benefit.

19. “Necessary,” dokimoi: Is Paul accepting the necessity of divisions, or is he using these terms ironically? Elsewhere in the context, dokimos refers to those who are proven covenantally faithful, e.g. v 28; contrast with 9.27, where Paul disciplines himself so that he does not become adokimos. But here he is surely ironic, as v 18 clearly implies that the divisions are a bad thing, and divisions are not necessary for the manifestation of proven faithfulness.

20. When you come together it is not to eat the Lord’s supper – implying that is the stated purpose of assembly. But that purpose is lost in the Corinthian situation, because they are treating it as “their own,” i.e. as an instrument to perpetuate division and class strife.

21. The food imbibed involved each bringing his own supper, thus highlighting the haves and have-nots. Cf the ironic dokimoi reference above. Here, the “approved” becomes the socially-approved and well-off rather than the covenantally faithful.

22. Do you not have houses? I.e. if you’re going to eat your own food and keep it for yourself, then do it in your own house. Or to you despise the church of God, and put to shame those having nothing? Clauses are parallel: to degrade the destitute is despite to God’s Church. Shall I praise you? I do not praise you in this. Again, carrying on the dokimos theme reintroduced in v 19, and related to the putting to shame mentioned in the previous sentence. Those seeking approval through flaunting their wealth and shaming the poor are in fact the ones demonstrating their own shame. (The statement also stands in contrast to the items for which Paul praised them earlier; cf v 2.)

23-25. Over against what the Corinthians are doing, Paul contrasts the institution of the Supper by the Lord.

24. Jesus took bread and broke it, saying this is My body, which is for you. The food was Himself, and thus the food was for sharing with His people. This do as My memorial – in Greek, a parallel to Lev 24.7 LXX, where the frankincense on the bread of the presence will be “for a memorial.” Cf Num 1010: ascension offerings (“burnt offerings”) and peace offerings will be a “memorial” of Israel before God. As with the rainbow sign, where God sees the rainbow and remembers His covenant promise to every living creature on the earth that He would never again destroy the earth with a flood, so here too memorials function to remind God of His covenant with His people and to act in terms of that covenant. This covenant is defined by Christ and His work (“My memorial”).

Thus the phrase usually translated “in remembrance of Me” is not primarily about remembering Christ and is certainly not focused on creating mental pictures of the anguish Christ went through on the cross. The memorial is a memorial before God primarily, but of course it also calls for a reciprocal covenantal response from His people – the covenant involves promise and demand. Thus when God’s people call upon Him to remember His covenant with them, they are implicitly recalling that covenant themselves – for better or worse.

In Exodus 2-3 (e.g. 2.24), God remembers Israel and His covenant with her, and delivers His oppressed people; thus the memorial background implies why the Corinthians’ coming together is detrimental rather than beneficial: God’s covenant relationship entails a vindication of the poor and oppressed, and as foretold by the prophets and echoed in Rom 10, those who call on Jesus will not be “put to shame” (cf the putting to shame of those who have nothing in v 22).

25. This cup is the new covenant in My blood. The covenantal overtones of the memorial become explicit and reinforce what Paul has already said and implied. Again backed up with: This do, as often as you drink, as My memorial.

26. For whenever you eat this bread and drink the cup, the death of the Lord you proclaim until He comes. As the “for” indicates, a memorial is a proclamation, a public act. As “My memorial,” this act is a public proclamation of Jesus’ death. In this death, the old creation has died (cf Gal 6.14), so that the Lord’s Supper itself pronounces judgment on the fleshly divisions the Corinthians are perpetuating in their very “celebration” of it.

27. So that whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily, shall be liable for the body and the blood of the Lord. “Unworthily” is an adverb and refers to manner. It must be understood in context of the dokimos theme. Those eating in a manner which vitiates faithfulness are making themselves liable for the Lord’s death, because they are perpetuating the fleshly order which Christ’s death pronounces judgment upon. They are warring against Christ. This is why Paul says that the Corinthians are not eating the Lord’s Supper. To be sure, they were doing so in some formal sense, but their very manner of conducting it was waging war against the purpose of the death of Christ, of which the Supper is a proclamation and memorial.

28. But let a man prove himself, and thus from the bread let him eat and from the cup let him drink. The usual translation of “examine himself” is not quite to the point. The problem in Corinth was not a lack of self-evaluation. Rather it was that the Corinthians were abusing the covenant. The term used here is dokimazeto, and thus related to the recurring dok- theme of 9.27 and the sarcastic/ironic usage of 11.19. The sense is not “examine, and then eat;” the term is houtos, “in this way” and stands in contrast to the “unworthy manner” of eating referenced in the previous verse. Thus the point is that eating and drinking must be done on the memorial’s own terms and according to its own covenantal purposes. At issue is not the ability to engage in a certain level of self-aware reflection (as the anti-paedocommunion argument assumes); at issue is whether or not the Supper is being treated as the Lord’s memorial or as some “talismanic” act of the old creation or perhaps worse, as a transparent instrument for oppressing and shaming the poor.

29. The foregoing observations are underscored by the follow-through: For the one eating and drinking, judgment to himself eats and drinks [if he is] not discerning the body. “The body” here is the Church; the omission of “and blood” is intentional. In 10.16-17, Paul passes from the usage of “body” to refer to Christ’s own (physical resurrected) body to a usage referring to the Church (“participation in the body of Christ… we who are many are one body”), he does likewise here. In context, the Corinthians (or more particularly the wealthy and “approved” in the world’s terms) are dividing the body rather than discerning it. To discern the body entails accepting and embracing what Paul has said concerning it in 10.16-17: those who eat together are one body (cf Gal 3.28). Christ died to fashion for Himself one body, and to have divisions in the assembly, at the very memorial table, is a despite, not only to the poor but to Christ who died to include them in His new creation body. This opposition to Christ’s purposes is an invitation to judgment.

30. On account of this many among you are weak and ill and a number [even] sleep.

31. Now if we would judge ourselves, we would not be judged. Paul employs the middle voice of the verb used in v 29. Here we come a bit closer to the notion of self-examination so commonly linked to v 28, but even here the point is not about introspection, but engaging in a self-judgment that first of all evaluates one’s covenantal conduct at the table; i.e. the Corinthians should be judging their own practice of shaming Christ’s people, and this self-judgment will prevent them from being judged as in v 30.

32. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined, in order that with the world we may not be condemned. Even the judgment of v 30 is not a final judgment; it is the Lord’s discipline aimed at bringing the sinners to repentance. Thus although the liability mentioned in v 27 is startling and serious, even so Christ employs temporal judgments in order to recover His people for Himself. Yet we should not look at this as a promise that temporal judgment automatically negates eternal condemnation, since Paul says that it is a discipline-in-order-that. That is, the destiny of such unfaithfulness genuinely is condemnation with the world, and discipline is a corrective aimed to avoid that “proper” outcome. Those who harden themselves against that discipline thus have no hope offered to them here.

33. Therefore, my brothers, in gathering together to eat, welcome one another. Given the context, the term probably means welcome, or receive, rather than the more usual “wait for,” unless underlying this is that the rich and self-sufficient were eating before the poor and slaves (who worked or worked longer) could arrive. But even that does not seem satisfactory, as Paul has said they were eating their own food rather than sharing. Thus it seems more likely that he is making a call to share if they are going to make a meal of this.

34. If anyone is hungry, in his home let him eat, so that you do not gather together for judgment. Probably implying that if someone is so hungry that he cannot be satisfied with the shared meal, the assembly is not the place for it.

What therefore happens is that the congregation becomes an audience, and inclusion in “the action” requires getting up on stage (and yes, that is actually what the platform is frequently referred to as, which I think is telling). But all this means is that (1) people are performing, many of whom aren’t really qualified to lead worship in a meaningful way; and (2) those not semi-skilled enough to do that are essentially non-participants; they are “outside the action.”

But worship is something that the whole congregation actively does, and giving bit parts “at the front” is a poor substitute for understanding that “the action” doesn’t happen on stage. The action occurs within the dialogue between God and all His people. When the proclamation of forgiveness, the sermon, and the benediction are given, that is God’s time to speak, and we all engage in hearing Him; when we pray, sing, and confess our faith, it is our time to speak, and He hears us. And when we commune, we eat together with one another and with God. In short, biblically speaking, we are all involved in the action, and for the whole properly-ordered service.

Just an observation triggered by a blog comment by my friend Rogers, as well as by a discussion we had last night in Bible study.

Yesterday, William Hill of the online Covenant Radio did an interview with Venema on the subject. The audio is available here.

In turn, I’ve written this response. Enjoy.

There’s plenty of Bible in our services, from the beginning (call to worship) to the end (benediction).

But there is a particularly Word-centred section with multiple readings and a sermon that aims at unpacking at least one of those readings.

What are we doing in the service of the Word?

In the ancient offering rites of the old covenant, following the laying on of hands – which had to do with the transfer of guilt, and thus with receiving pardon, as we have just done moments ago – after that, the animal was chopped up and placed on the altar.

Remember that the animal represented the worshipper. The worshipper was, in effect, being chopped up, rearranged, set in order, so that he could become fit for ascending to God as a “burnt offering.”

That is what the Word does to us: It “chops us up” – it rearranges us, interprets our lives, challenges us for fitting service to God. So says Hebrews 4.12:

For the Word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, of joints and marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intents of the heart.

Surely it is no mere coincidence that this appears in the NT book which says more about sacrifices than any other; nor is it mere coincidence that immediately after this, Hebrews goes on to speak about ascension: that is, it talks about our great High Priest who has “passed through the heavens.”

We are being rearranged here, so that we can ascend with Christ – ascend to feed with God, just as the sacrificial animal was arranged on the altar, and then went up in smoke to be consumed by the glory cloud.

Therefore, we are not hearing the Words of Scripture, only to take in information. We are no here to master a set of data, but to be mastered by the One who speaks, who is God Himself. Let us hear the Word with open ears, ready to be changed.

Thank you for your question. I am glad to see that you are concerned to
follow the Bible in this way. I hope you don’t mind if I take a few
paragraphs to talk about this.

Paul mentions baptism which includes infants in 1 Corinthians 10.2. Of
course, he is referring to an Old Testament event, but as he continues, we
find that he says that the Red Sea and wilderness partaking of water from
the rock and manna were of the same pattern as baptism and the Lord’s
Supper. To be more precise: he uses the language of “tupos” in verses 6 and
11, which is more than “example;” it refers to a pattern or matrix. And this
pattern of Israel was set for “us” (new covenant believers, including
Gentiles), who partake of the Lord’s Supper (1 Corinthians 10.16-22).

The overall context of the passage has to do with faithful living, and Paul’s
point is basically this: Just as Israel was baptized and ate and drank
spiritual food and drink, and yet came under judgment when they tested
Christ, so too with us who fit into the same pattern: we are the body marked
by baptism (see 1 Cor 12.12-13), and we eat and drink spiritual food and
drink, but we must not provoke the Lord to jealousy as Israel did, or we too
will be subject to judgment.

So Israel (including the little children) experienced baptism in the event
of the exodus.

Baptism started long ago, under the old covenant. In fact, Hebrews 9.10
refers to the washings in the Mosaic law as “various baptisms.” Under the
old covenant, in the case of males, circumcision was an entrance into
cleansing, which granted one access to the tabernacle (later, the temple).
(The case was slightly different for females; instead of circumcision -
which obviously belongs to males – they were cleansed through the
purification of their mothers. I can’t go into that here, but it’s based on
Leviticus 12.) That cleansing could be lost in various ways (e.g. sin, as
well as contact with “unclean” things such as dead bodies etc) but was
restored largely by way of these washings. Part of the point of the fact
that under the new covenant there is “one baptism” (Ephesians 4.5) is that
that complex structure of cleansing is no longer necessary under the new
covenant. Rather than circumcision plus baptism after baptism after baptism,
there is now only one baptism.

With regard to your question, the point is that this one washing (new
covenant baptism) does not do away with the infant participation that had
always been the case with old covenant cleansing. That’s why when Peter
preaches on Pentecost, he proclaims baptism in the terms already known. He
says, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ,
for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy
Spirit.” And he grounds that statement with this promise: “For the promise
is for you and *for your children* and for all who are far off – everyone
whom the Lord our God calls to Himself” (Acts 2.38-39). That is an echo of
Old Testament passages such as Genesis 17:7 (where God says, “I will
establish my covenant between Me and you and your offspring after you
throughout their generations”). Peter’s hearers, familiar with the way God
worked throughout the Old Testament Scriptures, would have understood
clearly that God was continuing to work under the new covenant in terms of
believers and their children, just as He did under the old.

It is to be noted that this way of God’s working is not only for people with
Israelite ancestry. Israel was never strictly about blood; Gentiles often
joined with Israel even under the old covenant. In particular, when Israel
left Egypt under Moses, they left as a “mixed multitude” (Exodus 12.38),
meaning that many of those people were not of ethnic Israel. In connection
with 1 Corinthians 10, which I mentioned above, it is also important to note
that shortly after the Exodus, the people in the wilderness were living as
Gentiles in many basic respects. There was no circumcision between the
exodus and the entrance into Canaan 40 years later (see Joshua 5.2-5), and
even Passover was only celebrated the first year after the exodus. (Males
could only participate in Passover if they were circumcised.)

So it is no accident that Paul draws a parallel between Israel’s experience
in the exodus and in the wilderness and the experience of the Gentiles in
Corinth. They were both baptized with water, and their “spiritual” food was
bread (Israel’s spiritual food would normally include meat; for example, the
Passover lamb). As I said, while in the wilderness Israel was functionally
Gentile in many basic respects; and the inclusion of a “mixed multitude”
then pointed forward to the great “mixed multitude” that has come into the
people of God since the Pentecost after Jesus’ ascension. God is the
covenant God of believers and their children, now in the new covenant for
Gentiles, just as much as under the old covenant with Israelites.

That’s why it’s no surprise when the New Testament says that a household
head was baptized along with his/her household (for example, Acts 16.15,
33). So in 1 Corinthians 7.14, Paul describes the children of believers as
“holy ones” – “saints,” whereas the children of unbelievers are “unclean.”
You see that the term “unclean” draws from that old covenant language,
referring to those not eligible to worship God at the tabernacle; the
children of believers, on the other hand, are those who are cleansed for
worship. Which fits completely with everything we have already seen
regarding baptism above.

I apologize if that seems like a rather long and complex answer, but the
Bible is a very rich book, and must be read in terms of its own story, not
in bits and pieces. So I hope that is of some help. I can refer you to an
online essay I wrote about infant baptism if you ever wish to read more:

http://www.biblicalstudiescenter.org/ecclesiology/infantbaptism.htm

I don’t have time at the moment to deal with this document of my alma mater at length. But for now, I’d like to offer a handful of very brief points….

1. Douglas Wilson has engaged the Mid-America faculty on the issue of the ninth commandment, and how the Testimony violates it. This doesn’t seem all that clear to the MARS folk, which I find a bit mystifying. If one identifies a group or groups, and then proceeds to identify a series of errors, surely it is natural to assume that all the errors in view are indeed held by real people, and indeed by the preponderance of the best-known representatives of said groups. Yet the document in question names things that I’m not aware of ANYONE holding, much less anyone among the so-called FV (“big guns” or not). And that is the underlying issue with the failure to name names. Yes, you can omit specifics if everything you say is clear and universal – but that is far from the case. And the result is, of necessity, the defaming of real men with real ministries. How is that not a violation of the ninth commandment?

2. Even aside from the horrible inaccuracies in the Testimony regarding what those associated with the so-called “Federal Vision” conversation actually hold, the Testimony, while claiming simply to be upholding the confessional Reformed faith, advocates some rather curious positions as outright necessary to faithful testimony to the gospel. Here are a few examples of absurdities in the “denials” section of the Testimony (which begins thus: “By way of summary, the various proponents of the current set of errors, which find their focus in an erroneous and moralistic doctrine of justification, teach some or all of the following errors:”):

2. that gospel precedes law in the divine/human relationship before the fall.

What exactly does this mean? “Gospel” = good news. If “gospel” is taken to refer to the post-fall redemption in Christ (as the Testimony later goes on to speak of in Art 26), then this clause is a tautology – nobody thinks Adam needed “gospel” in that sense. On the other hand, if it is a denial that Adam was given favour prior to being laden with commands, that’s just silly. Before God told Adam to do anything, He formed him from the dust, then “glorified” him by breathing into him by His Spirit, and then moved him from the ground from which he was created and placed him in the Garden. So this objection is either meaningless or plain wrong.

3. that, before the fall, grace circumvents God’s law in this relationship; or that, prior to the fall, for God to demand obedience and righteousness from humans in order to enjoy fellowship with him is works righteousness.

(See also 4.) Not quibbling here with the substance – this is an error that ought to be rejected. But just a note to unwary readers: although I think this is a position held by someone in contemporary scholarship, no one associated with the Federal Vision holds anything like it. (In fact, I don’t think it’s held by any prominent NPP folk either.) And that brings up the further problem here: by naming a few scattered movements and mixing up a bunch of errors, this Testimony cannot help but bring innocent victims under fire. This is made even worse by the introduction above, which calls this a “current set of errors,” which would seem to imply they are related in some way.

5. that there was no probationary period or test of man’s obedience in paradise;
6. that the pre-fall covenant in paradise contained or implied no eschatological promise.

Again – not aware of any FVer who denies these.

That’s just a sampling. I’m not going to go through these point by point (which really could be done, since most of the time, the Testimony is firing at nobody I’m aware of, and I’m pretty conversant with both the Federal Vision folk and the very much distinct NPPers), but I do wish to take note of a couple egregious errors.

28. that justification is incomplete, and that there will be a final or second justification on judgment day.

The Testimony here thus asserts that there will be no final or “second” justification. Trouble is, Scripture everywhere teaches that there will be a final judgment, both for the believer and for the unbeliever. But if that is so, there of necessity will be final justification and condemnation. To assert otherwise is tantamount to denying a final judgment.

We affirm the perpetuity of God’s law in the divine/human relationship—pre-fall, post-fall, in redemption,
Doctrinal Testimony Regarding Recent Errors 23
and in glory, for God is unchangeable and he does not deny his justice in order to save his sinful people (HC, Q/A 6, 9, 11, 12, 16-18, 86, 90-91, 115; BC, 14, 20; CD, III/IV:4; WCF, 4:2; 15:2; 16:1-2; 19:1-2, 5-7; 20:1; LC, Q/A 17, 86, 91-97).
We deny that God’s law is set aside in order to save sinners, as if Christ’s meritorious and redemptive work of salvation is not the strict fulfillment of the law of God on behalf of his people.

The notion of “the perpetuity of God’s law” is fundamentally wrong. Now, of course, the issue is not one of God letting down His righteous standard to make things easier for sinners. But any careful reading of Scripture shows that His standards for human beings have changed. Arguing from the immutability of God is a non sequitur. The issue is not God’s immutability, but the changing circumstances into which God places His creature. The new covenant obligations are frankly not the same as the Mosaic law, and that’s a great deal of what Paul is on about in a number of his letters.

Then further, the Testimony makes Christ’s redemption the “strict fulfillment of the law of God on behalf of His people.” What does that mean, exactly? My guess is that it’s about the imputation of Christ’s active obedience as defined by the law. For my response to that idea, see the link below to my letter on IAO.

We deny that Christ purchased any temporal saving benefits for the reprobate, even those that are members of the visible church, such that they would be redeemed, effectually called, justified, and sanctified only for a time; and, conversely, we deny the teaching that some of the chosen can perish and do in fact perish eternally, with no decision of God to prevent it (CD, I, rejection of errors 6).

I understand and agree with the general concern here, but the above was written recklessly. The reprobate cannot be said to be “redeemed”? Why, God says that He redeemed all Israel from Egypt. More to the point, Peter says that those who fall away deny the Lord who bought them (2 Pet 2.1), which is presumably how the term redeemed is being employed here. Likewise, Hebrews 10.29 implies only a temporary sanctification for those who trample the blood of the (new) covenant. And we could multiply texts which show that various facets of “salvation” are afforded to those who fall away.

We affirm that the covenant of grace, as to its saving purpose, is a bequeathal by Christ the Testator, and therefore is testamentary in character and made with the elect in Christ alone (WCF, 7:3; LC, Q/A 31; FCH, 4-5, 13-14).

The covenant of grace is made with the elect alone? Ouch. Very much an unfortunate narrowing of the Reformed tradition…. Or what sort of weight is being placed upon that phrase, “as to its saving purpose”? Not helpful.

We deny that the non-elect are ever united or engrafted to Christ, share in his saving benefits, and enjoy fellowship with God through the blood of Christ.

The non-elect are never united or engrafted to Christ? Isn’t the language of “engrafting” drawn from John 15, which surely implies otherwise?

We deny that God imputes faith itself, the act of believing, or any other obedience as the believer’s righteousness (WCF, 11:1; LC, Q/A 72-73; BC, 22; HC, Q/A 61).

Here again is one of those conundrums. We certainly believe that Jesus is our substitutionary lamb. He is indeed our righteousness. But still… in Romans 4 (John Piper notwithstanding), citing Genesis 15, Paul quite clearly says that God counts faith as righteousness. Rather than simply making affirmations and denials, someone has to be more careful and nuanced and try to figure out how all of this fits together.

Much of the MARS Testimony is convoluted, exceedingly misleading as to what real people teach, and is generally unhelpful as a succinct exposition of the biblical gospel.

I do not wish to suggest the Testimony is all bad. In truth, there is a great deal in the Affirmations section which is plain vanilla Reformed teaching, and can be agreed upon by all of us. (It’s just too bad that there is an inevitable underlying air that a lot of the basic stuff is not in fact shared by all of us.)

In particular, I appreciate this: “We deny that the doctrine of election is rightly conceived when it is preached in a way that calls into question the promise and call of the gospel in the Word and sacraments.” Now, that is helpful.

For those who may wish to follow through on some of what I have written on related subjects, take note especially of the following:

Letter on the imputation of Christ’s active obedience

Denial of monocovenantalism, while espousing a relational typology which denies any sort of merit scheme for Adam

More thoughts on how faith is necessary throughout salvation history, and is grounded in the Trinity

It is interesting to read this attempt at an alternative reading that will supposedly deflate the paedo case.

I have devoted an entire chapter to 1 Corinthians 11 in Feed My Lambs, as well as articles online, so I won’t explore all the facets here. But there are some pertinent things to say with regard to Clark’s post that I think I should address.

Note first of all that Clark frames things in a vertical versus horizontal/sociological cast. Now, this places a certain colour upon the discussion from the outset, since the implication is that the Church is simply a horizontally related body, an object of “mere sociology” (Clark’s own dismissive phrase).

But of course his opponents do not think that way at all. We believe, as Paul himself writes in the preceding chapter, that the bread and cup shared are our mutual participation in Christ Himself. The whole vertical/horizontal structure is suspect to begin with. While we clearly must distinguish Christ from His people, nonetheless Paul writes, the Church is Christ’s body, “the fullness of Him who fills all in all” (Eph 1.22-23). To speak of a Church-oriented interpretation as having to do with “mere sociology” is an affront, not merely to paedocommunion advocates, but to the Church of the living God.

Second, Clark correctly, but nonetheless rather astonishingly, writes this: “In its nature, the Supper is Christ’s covenant with his people.” That is exactly right, and follows very nicely from the analogy to Genesis 17. But I say it is astonishing, because if this is the case, Clark’s anti-paedocommunion position entails the denial of the covenant to the children of believers, whether elect or non-elect, regenerate or not. In effect, the covenant is for adults, or at least, those old enough to profess faith to his satisfaction. This is not the Reformed position, and never has been.

Third, Clark attempts to isolate “what is signified and sealed” in the Supper as the point at issue with the reference to the body of the Lord in 11.29. He assumes that this is the logical course of interpretation, simply because the crucified body of Christ has been mentioned in the preceding. He writes,

If, in n v.24, “body” means “the risen, glorified, natural body of Christ,” then there is no reason for us to think that it now means “the congregation.” The meaning of “body” has already been established.

However, Clark overlooks the fact that in the preceding chapter, Paul has set all of this up in precisely the same way, and has no problem moving back and forth (in an even more abbreviated span) between the body of Christ which was crucified and raised, and the body of Christ, the Church (10.16-17). Thus there is a prima facie case to be made for understanding the “body” reference (sans mention of the blood) in 11.29 to have to do with the Church.

Nonetheless, what is even more significant is that I suspect most paedocommunion advocates do not interpret 1 Corinthians 11 as narrowly as Clark assumes; much less is it the case that we must interpret the passage in such a fashion for our position to “work.” In Feed My Lambs, I point out that no matter how strongly we interpret 1 Corinthians 11 as a whole – indeed, in its component parts, even to the point of adopting Clark’s “vertical” model as one aspect or at least application of the text – the chapter simply does not bar paedocommunion, because it stands wholly in accord with the long-established shape of God’s covenant and its rites.

This is why Paul lays the groundwork for the whole of 1 Cor 11.17-34 in chapter 10 (actually, the passage commences in 9.24ff), when he appeals precisely to the old covenant history. The judgment spoken of in 1 Cor 11 (most specifically and explicitly in 29-32, 34) is a live eschatological example, a realization of the set of judgments laid down in the matrix (tupos) fashioned in Israel’s history. That is the significance of the Pauline typology in 10.1-11.

The point once again is that Clark, as with anti-paedocommunion teachers generally, has avoided the sticky issue, which is simply this: Paul has placed the matters of judgment, of covenant-keeping, of (sacramental) memorial within the context of an existing covenantal structure – a structure which clearly welcomed children to the covenantal table and counted them as qualified participants. The old covenant too required “proving” (or, if you will, “self-examination,” in that sense), as I – again – showed clearly in my book, from numerous Old Testament passages (e.g. Isaiah 1.10-17; Amos 5.21ff). There is nothing new in this passage which all of a sudden changes the landscape and debars children. That can only arise out of a prejudiced reading of the text, a reading that demands a new standard of prerequisites for sacramental participation in the new covenant, and finds it only because it presupposes it.

To be sure, I recognize that on the face of it, my “nothing new” appears a rather extravagant claim. Ready to hand is the substance of Clark’s own discussion: the body and blood of Christ. I do not believe in an eternal incarnation or crucifixion; Christ became man – enfleshed and “enblooded” – at a given point in history. Indeed, those who have read much of my material regarding Paul and Torah will know that I tend to stress the progression of the covenant, the newness of the new covenant, more strongly than do many Reformed theologians.

However, it must be recognized that precisely at the point of the structure of the covenant relationship (the relational typology, if you will), and specifically in connection with the sacrament, Paul affirms continuity explicitly. That is the point of his citations in 1 Corinthians 10, both of Israel’s history and of the realities connected with the altar. By appealing to “our fathers” as “types” (1 Cor 10.6, 11) and connecting their experience to the new covenant sacraments (as he does by using baptismal and eucharistic language in 10.2-4), he reveals that he sees that history as providing a controlling matrix for our own.

In addition, it is to be noted that, while Christ was obviously not yet made flesh during the wilderness rebellions of which Paul speaks, and although he speaks apocalyptically regarding the Church’s place in covenant history (we are the ones “upon whom the ends of the ages have come,” 10.11), the apostle nonetheless does not shrink from saying that Israel drank from Christ Himself (10.4). Moreover, he adds that under the law, those who eat the sacrifices are partakers of the altar (10.18). If, therefore, it is suitable to understand 11.29 to be a call to discern the sacrificed Christ (a reading which remains highly debatable, but let’s grant it for the sake of argument), rather than as a reference to the Church, it is much plainer that the sort of discernment called for in chapter 11 was already required of Israel, both in her partaking of Christ in the wilderness, and in her participation in the sacrificial altar. In short, even if we take 1 Corinthians in the fashion Dr Clark suggests, we have nothing new in the relational typology. But that means that any inference which necessitates the barring of children from the sacramental table is illicit. If the same realities in the covenant’s relational structure did not bar children under the old covenant, neither do they bar them under the new.

To conclude: It is no accident that Clark says that the Supper in a real sense is the covenant. And the truth, whether wittingly or unwittingly, has come out: the entire logic of the anti-paedocommunion position is that the children of believers simply are not members of the covenant.

That is the inescapable tangle that the anti-paedocommunion position entails. If the table is, as Paul says clearly, the table of the body (1 Cor 10.17), then those denied the table are implicitly denied membership in the body.

What the opponents of paedocommunion must face is simply this: their position does not derive from 1 Corinthians 11. Paul’s own logic stands wholly in accord with the covenantal matrix to which he has appealed, and he provides not a whiff of a hint that he wishes to challenge or alter the longstanding covenantal inclusion of the children of believers. The anti-paedocommunion position remains, at its heart, a denial of the rightful place of believers’ children in God’s gracious covenant. It remains a claim that the covenant is really only for those who have reached a certain natural capacity, and that God’s covenantal grace is null, or at least severely restricted prior to that point. (If this is not a form of salvation by works, it is at least a form of salvation by native capacity.)

In short, the anti-paedocommunion position remains a denial of the very thing that it claims to guard: the Reformed faith. Much more importantly, it is a misuse of the biblical text and a denial of the norms Jesus Himself gave us: “Let the children come unto Me, and do not forbid them… for of such is the kingdom of God.”

As I’ve noted elsewhere, in the Gospels “the kingdom of God” is specifically a new covenant term, which is why, in Matthew 11.11, Jesus says that the least in the kingdom is greater than John. Thus, when Jesus says that “of such is the kingdom of God,” He is saying very clearly that new covenant membership belongs to believers’ children.

The new covenant table, therefore, does as well.