Since this issue is very important to you. Let me give you some provoking thought concerning the matter.
And he took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” And likewise the cup after they had eaten, saying, “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood. Luke 22:19-20
As I understand it, the passover meal or the “breaking bread” meal after the ascension of our Lord Jesus was a full supper meal. It was not just bread and wine but also olive, some fish and perhaps some kine of kosher meat like chicken, beef or lamb.
Jesus, being the smartest person ever lived took that Lord’s supper occasion to give special meaning to two staple foods, that was the bread and the wine. His intention was clear. Every time believers were to gather together in a meal, they should take the occasion of breaking bread as remembering His body broken for them and also as they drank the wine, they should remember His blood that was poured out for them to cleanse them of their sin.
How did the disciples follow this instruction?
And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, (Acts 2:46)
On the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread, Paul talked with them, intending to depart on the next day, and he prolonged his speech until midnight. (Act 20:7*)
Therefore, historically the early church believers did not have a special ordinance or sacrament for Eucharist. Eucharist was done as part of the common meal in the home of believers when they get together. I should not say “the common meal”, but “the special common meal” because it is where believers of Jesus gathered together for a meal. Special because when believers of Jesus gathered together, the Real Presence of Christ was among them.
For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.” (Mat 18:20)
So the Real Presence of Christ was among the believers, just not physically in the bread and wine.
As I mentioned above, this special common meal was a full supper meal. In some modest home, there may be just bread and wine with olive and perhaps a fish or two. In some richer homes, there might be lamb or beef. However, the important thing to remember was the staple food of bread and wine took on special meaning for believers because they were to remind the believers of the life and sacrifice of Jesus. So perhaps they started the meal after saying grace by breaking that loaf of bread with perhaps a word or two about how that loaf of bread took on a new significant meaning as remembrance of the body of Christ broken for me. The same perhaps was applied to wine. The believers then can enjoy their full special supper meal with joyous heart and fellowship knowing that the Real Presence of Christ was among them.
so, who participated in this special common meal? Every believers that gathered of course including their families, wives and children. This is a family meal after all. There were left over bread everywhere in the house and if they were not careful, some might even get drunk drinking too much wine on that occasion as was warned by Paul. There were perhaps no sacred ceremonies how to eat the bread or drink the wine. They were just part of the meal after all and consumed as other common meal.
This special common meal apparently happened every time believers gathered together. Some met once a week on the first day and some perhaps more often and as often as everyday after the excitement of the revival in the pentecost where thousands new believers joined the faith.
I read that this kind of special meal was the norm during the first century. Only in the second century AD, the Church started to have a special ordinance apart from that special common meal. After 6th century AD, there were no more such special common meal among believers and they were replaced by the special ordinance or sacraments.
Another issue I want to touch on is from the council of Jerusalem with their decision concerning gentile believers.
For it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay on you no greater burden than these requirements: that you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols, and from blood, and from what has been strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. Farewell.” (Act 15:28-29)
The council of Jerusalem happened around 20 years after the Lord’s ascension. The prohibition is clear and simple as the apostles did not want to make it hard for gentile believers but also not to offend the jewish believers. One of the prohibition is abstain from blood. Did the apostle know the command of Jesus in John 6:53? Of course. It was unthinkable for the apostles to give the prohibitions of blood if they were actually drinking the real blood of Jesus every week. At the very least, if that was their understanding of drinking the wine as drinking the real blood of Jesus, they should perhaps put an exception of drinking wine during that special common meal just to make it clear to the gentile believers. No such exception.
Another point from me personally is this. I don’t see one single benefit spiritually or even physically for the doctrine of transubstantiation or even consubstantiation. Please enlighten me if you do experience some spiritual revival or growth or peace that a memorialist like me is lacking.
At then end of this, I am not trying to win you over. Thru my years of living, I know that once a person is set on believing something, it is somehow set in stone. I respect your belief and accept you as such. I won’t see you any less christians or whatsoever even if I don’t share that belief. The plea of Unity does not come from me, but from our Lord King Jesus himself.
“I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me. (John 17:20-23)
