House Church Talk - Passion --> in remembrance of Me

[David Anderson]

The pain of separation would indeed be great, brother Dan.

To be excluded from a real meal meant that you might well have gone 
hungry. And to have been excluded each week - or each day, sometimes as 
it was in Acts - until you repented is a far cry from the system where 
the Lord's supper is "dispensed" only once a year.

What a contrast between then and now!

So good to hear from you.

   David Anderson

>David,
>
>When you wrote about how the sacraments were cut off from the
>"excommunicated," it got me to thinking. The real discipline exercised in
>the early church towards serious offenders was to deny them the privilege of
>eating with the family of God.
>
>While the threat of separation from God in the afterlife existed, the
>immediate loss was the fellowship of the brothers and sisters and the piece
>of heaven on earth they shared together!
>
>This loss was serious enough to bring one individual in 2 Corinthians unto
>true godly sorrow and repentance, which of course was the goal of the
>discipline!
>
>To be deprived of the presence of Jesus that is experienced in His Body
>would truly be painful.
>
>Dan B.