TNT-Cell

Saturday, January 27, 2007

10:24 PM

Good day everyone! The weekend's finally here and I presume that as I am typing this entry, the guys are probably watching S'pore versus M'sia on ESPN (or maybe they actually paid 2 bucks to watch it live at the stadium). ;)

Anyway, I was reading the previous entry posted by Rachel about the Lord's supper and it reminded me of a conversation I had with a friend a pretty long time ago about the bread and wine, and what they represent. His priest shared it with him, so I've decided to share it with you guys! It's just one intepretation though, so you don't have to take it all in.

Bread represents two things. First, bread is seen as food which provides nourishment to our body, because it fills us up. Likewise, Jesus is our nourishment to our spiritual bodies, and we need Him. Bread also represents unity because it is made from mixing various grains together to form a loaf of bread. The parallel meaning is that we need to be constantly united with God.

Bread is also referred to as the Bread of Life. To think of it, money is much better than bread, and money can get you (almost) anything you want, but bread just fills you. The point is, no one can ever get enough of money, but once someone has eaten bread, he'll be so full till he can't take in anymore - he's satisfied. Jesus is like this. He comes into your life, gives you the best, and fills you up completely, and there's so much of Him that you're totally satisfied.

Wine, on the other hand, also represents two things. First, it represents suffering. Why? Because in order to produce wine, grapes have to be pressed and crushed. Contrastingly, it also represents joy because wine is usually drank on celebratory occassions. So here's the parallelism: Are you willing to deny yourself and follow Christ? Giving up everything you have to follow Him may seem like a big sacrifice - a suffering, but it actually brings you the greatest joy, just like how the grapes are 'sacrificed' to produce good wine for joyful occassions.

Bread and wine together represents the coorporation between human (Man) and the divine (God). God is not a supreme being that is out of reach and uncontactable, but rather, God + man = 1.

In the process of making bread, you need the wheat - which is from God because He created it, and we (Man) process it to form bread. Similarly, grapes are from God, and we crush them to form wine. Without the wheat (from God), we can't produce bread. Likewise, without the grapes, there's no wine.

"...If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing." - John 15:5

Yes of course we know that God himself can turn wheat into bread and grapes into wine without our help, but the things is, He wants us to be part of this transformation because He wants to change us in the process. Why? Because He loves us so much! The call of discipleship = the call of sinners - people who need a change in their lives.

"Jesus answered them, 'It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.'" - Luke 5: 31-32.

He loves us so much that He wants to change our lives so that we can change the rest of the world - just like the 12 disciples did. And this involves the coorporation between God and Man. It can't be seperated. In whatever we do, we can never seperate the works of God, or else our deeds will be futile (i.e bread representing nourishment and unity). Also, allowing God to change us means sacrifice on our part. In order to experience God's miracles and blessings, we have to lay down everything at the foot of the cross, and follow Him wholeheartedly (i.e. wine representing suffering and joy).

Yeah, so that's what I had to share. Hope it helped you guys in some way! :) Anyway, Fely had her water baptism today! *clap* *clap*. Haha. Here are the pictures I took. Please pardon me for my lousy photography skills and 1 megapixel camera phone.