Only once a week?

I look forward to the Sabbath day all week long.  Many people look forward to Sunday because they can go golfing, or rest from their regular work a day week, but for me it is an opportunity to participate in the greatest meal served each week.  I go to take the sacrament at my Sunday service.

Many churches have disbanded the sacrament, aside from the Catholics and Episcopalians, through their Eucharist. The Latter-day Saints offer this precious meal to the parishioners that come to church.  But it isn’t just the ritual practice of partaking of bread and wine, or in my case bread and water, that brings me to this holy ordinance.  It is much, much more.

I love Jesus Christ as my Beloved.  He was the only begotten son of the Father, and he was beloved by the greatest that has ever existed.  How can I not love Him as much?! 

When I partake of the sacred emblems, I know they are symbolic of the flesh and blood that was sacrificed for me.  I cannot begin to comprehend what the Savior felt when he knelt in the Garden of Gethsemane and experienced the pain and grief and sin of every living soul that had lived or would ever live on this earth.  I am having a hard enough time getting from day to day at my age.  To think that I have been loved so perfectly that even a God would consent to descend to this earthly plane so that I could get the necessary help to be lifted back up to the presence of my Father in Heaven is incomprehensible to me.  I wouldn’t do it.  In fact, I couldn’t do it. I haven’t got the capacity or physical strength to lift luggage, let alone even my smallest, youngest child.

Could I show up to a meal that has been given in His honor once a week to recognize that act in my behalf?  Absolutely.  Do I recognize that each time I partake of this meal I am fasting from the world while I quietly ponder the simple, yet powerful words of the prayer in my behalf?  I certainly hope that I do. I pray most fervently that Christ will show up to this feast in His honor.

I have spent many long hours studying certain physical properties in the Gospel that have such great and powerful symbolisms behind them.  One of the most astounding one was water.

Many people have shown how water will take on a particular quality if exposed to certain beautiful music, and especially how words affect the ability for the water to form gorgeous crystals that demonstrate spectacular hexagonal crystals; an art form only known to God.[1]

Christ is constantly teaching us about miracles and physics through his simple teachings.  He tells us so much in his ‘I Am’ statements, as well as the gifts that he gives us.  He taught about ‘living water’ and that he was the giver of such a gift.  He also called himself ‘the bread of life’.  Why would he say such a thing, and present those items as the sacred symbolic elements for the most regular feast we are invited to on a weekly basis?  Just to teach us?  I don’t think so, though that might be the plane of comprehension we are on for a very long time.

As I look back, I have had such little reverence for the sacrament as a youth and even most of my adult life.  I loved the ritual, as well as the beautiful hymns prepared to be sung by inspired, loving men and women specifically for this event, but I didn’t grasp the greater part of this feast set out in my behalf.  And to think that it is only a small piece of bread and a sip of water that makes this the feast what it is.

This is a feast that reminds me of an action I chose to participate in as a little child of only 8 years of age.  I do not remember much about that day.  I do remember sitting on a cold, hard, folding chair looking at the baptismal font.  I was sitting in a row with other young children, giggling and swinging their legs under their chair, waiting their turn to go into the font with their fathers.  But other than the white jumpsuit I wore, I cannot remember much else about the event.  Had I known at that young age the power of this small meal I could feast on each week, I doubt that I would have given it any more thought.  But as I studied the power of words on water, and the power of the name of Christ on all matter, my experience in partaking of the holy emblems of the sacrament feast have altered not only my reverence for the ceremonial ritual, but have forever changed my relationship with Christ.

What does it mean to take upon us a name?

When I was born, I was given a name; A first and last name, which reflected my heritage. Genetically speaking I looked very much like my father’s side of the family.  In later years I was to take another name when I married.  My husband is a great man; he is kind and generous and caring.  When we married, I took his name as an identifying title. I am very grateful for his name. 

When I got baptized, I took on a new name also, one that I was asked to take because it would help me to pattern my life, and provide me with the ability to put on the qualities of God.  It would provide a path for me to follow, without any question of what I should do or whom I should follow.  What a blessing to have that direction.  I have not always followed that direction.  I have grieved for my loss of direction greatly when I veered from this path.

Since the pronouncement of words have such a profound effect upon the water they are spoken upon, I began to understand the power of this weekly feast much better. I have altered the words of this pronouncement slightly only to demonstrate the personal and singleness of the sacrament for me.

Oh God, my Eternal Father, I ask thee in the name of thy Son, Jesus Christ, to bless and sanctify this bread to my soul as I partake of it; that I may eat in remembrance of the body of thy Son, and witness unto Thee, o God, my Eternal Father, that I am willing to take upon me the name of Thy Son, and always remember him, and keep his commandments which he hath given unto me, that I may always have his spirit to be with me. Amen.

What does it mean to sanctify something?  How does eating a small piece of bread and a sip of water or wine keep us in remembrance?  How can I witness that I have done this thing? How do I show that I am willing?  How do I show that I have indeed taken His name upon me?  How it is manifest that His spirit is always with me?

 

Do I believe I can only renew this covenant through this small feast once a week?  I do not.  I believe this is a teaching tool that has the ability to ignite a fire in anyone who wants to become like Jesus Christ.  I believe it to have the ability to bring us to a state of greater hunger for the source of all love and joy and happiness and bliss possible for a human being to experience.  This is an opportunity to literally change life—ours and everyone else who wants it.  In the interim it keeps me on task to show up to this feast once a week to partake of this ordinance.  The question to any is how we show up to make this a reality.  Do we just put on our Sunday best and sing the songs and eat the little piece of bread and drink that little bit of water?  Or do we have the desire to possess the qualities of Christ?  Have we decided to love His Father with all our hearth, might, mind and strength?  Do we truly have any comprehension how to love our neighbor as ourselves?  Isn’t that what it would mean to become like Christ? 

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[1] For more information on this, you may want to study the works of Masuru Emoto, the author of The Hidden Messages in Water.