In his 1526 German Mass, Luther acted with a stroke of liturgical brilliance in giving us the post-communion collect. It is the genuine “eucharistic prayer” of the Lutheran liturgy. In it, we give thanks to God that he has refreshed us with the salutary gift of his Son’s body and blood, imploring him that he would “strengthen us through the same in faith toward You and in fervent love toward one another.” Faith and love are frequently paired in Luther’s writings even as he makes a necessary distinction between the two. As he says in his 1520 treatise on the freedom of the Christian, the Christian is drawn up in Christ by faith and lowered into the life of the neighbor by love. The duality of faith and love are given doxological expression in Luther’s 1526 liturgical order. The next year, when the plague came to Wittenberg, Luther reminded Pr. John Hess that this pestilence is a challenge to both faith and love.[1]
Might Luther’s communion prayer with its striking accent on faith and love as fruits of the sacrament not also guide us in our thinking about its right use in this pandemic, especially in times like these when the Lord’s Supper is not available? Of course, in cases of the sick, the injured, or the aged, the pastor comes to their home or hospital room and administers the sacrament. The church has a regular order, "Communion of the Sick and Homebound" (Pastoral Care Companion, 39–48). These times may not be used to defend novel practices of "tele-communion" or having individuals privately celebrate the sacrament.
Emergencies by their very nature will not endure forever. Baptism may and should be administered in situations where an infant is likely to die. But there is no such emergency with the Lord's Supper. Luther recognizes this in his 1523 treatise written to the Bohemians, “Concerning the Ministry.” In it he says:
For it would be safer and more wholesome for the father of the household to read the gospel and, since the universal custom and use allows it to the laity, to baptize those who are born in his home, and so to govern himself and his according to the doctrine of Christ, even if throughout life they did not dare or could not receive the Eucharist. For the Eucharist is not so necessary that salvation depends on it. The gospel and baptism are sufficient, since faith alone justifies and love alone lives rightly. (AE 40:9)
Novel practices offend against faith because they invite doubt. They also offend against love for they incite unnecessary divisions in the church.
Let’s examine each of these. First, there is faith. God desires to give his children certainty in the Lord’s Supper. Luther understood the battle for the Lord’s Supper was a fight for the Gospel. Here there is to be no wiggle room for doubt. Either Christ’s words are true or they or not. Either Christ gives and bestows what he promises in the Supper, namely, his body and blood for sinners to eat and drink or he gives nothing but bread and wine. Faith does not make the sacrament, but it is by faith alone that we lay hold of the benefits promised therein. In the Small Catechism we confess:
Certainly not just eating and drinking do these things, but the words written here: “Given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.” These words, along with the bodily eating and drinking, are the main thing in the Sacrament. Whoever believes these words has exactly what they say: “forgiveness of sins.” (SC VI).
We must exclude any liturgical practice that invites doubt that what is being celebrated is the Lord’s Supper. Because the sacraments are more than outward signs or marks of the community of Christians, AC XIII states: “Accordingly, sacraments are to be used so that faith, which believes the promises offered and displayed through the sacraments, may increase” (AC XIII, 2, Kolb-Wengert). In Lutheran practice the distribution, eating, and drinking are in close proximity to the consecration as FC SD VII demonstrates. The pastor is there, feet on the ground, not because he possesses exclusive sacramental powers, but because he is called and ordained do what Christ has mandated. This office is not given to Christians or even to heads of households. When new practices are asserted apart from Christ’s mandate, there can only be confusion and uncertainty. The very purpose of the sacrament is thereby undermined.
Second, there is the matter of love. While rites and ceremonies instituted by human beings are fluid and may fluctuate from place to place and time to time, it does not follow that we are chaotic and freewheeling in our life together. Paul stresses that all things are to be done decently and in order (1 Cor 14:40). In harmony (concordia) pastors are not independent of one another. What they do within the congregations they are called to serve has implications for their brother pastors who are bound with them by the same confessional vow in ordination. Simply put, it is neither edifying to Christ’s holy people nor an act of love for pastors single-mindedly to devise novel ways of administering the sacrament that at best create uncertainty and division and at worst contradict the Lord’s own institution. Vilmos Vajta reminds us that for Luther, “love and order belong together.”[2] It is a loveless abuse of the office for a pastor to act autonomously and without accountability to the whole church. While the apostle was dealing with a different mishandling of the sacrament at Corinth, his verdict in 1 Corinthians 11:20 (“When you come together, it is not the Lord’s supper that you eat”) has application here. No contradiction of confession or of love may be brought into the altar.
Christians hunger and thirst for Jesus’ body and blood. For a time now the conditions of this pandemic stand in the way of our coming together to receive it. Here our post-communion prayer again helps as we give thanks for the salutary gift we received as often as we did come together. We are confident this gift is still active and alive in those who cling to Christ’s promise; they have what his words declare: forgiveness of sins. The focus of that pastoral care should be on the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus and not on the invention of practices which call them into question.
Prof. John T. Pless serves is Assistant Professor of Pastoral Ministry and Missions at Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, IN.
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[1] Luther writes, “We should be comforted by our certainty that it is God’s punishment sent upon us not only to punish sin but also to test our faith and love—our faith in order that that we may see and know what our attitude is toward God, and our love in order that we may see what our attitude is toward our neighbor.” Luther: Letters of Spiritual Counsel, ed. Theodore G. Tappert (Vancouver: Regent College, 1960), 237.
[2] Vilmos Vajta, Luther on Worship: An Interpretation (Philadelphia: Muhlenberg Press, 1958), 175. Note Luther in his 1525 “A Christian Exhortation to the Livonians Concerning Public Worship and Concord” where he writes “Now when your people are confused and offended by your lack of uniform order, you cannot plead, ‘Externals are free. Here in my own place I am going to do as I please’ ” (AE 53:48).