An Evangelical Theology Of The Lord’s Supper

Some evangelical Protestants have reappropriated central elements of the pre-Reformation church's understanding of the Lord's Supper: a memorial of Christ's death that is also a genuine means of grace and Christ's ontological Real Presence. They insist also that God's sovereignty be affirmed and that the Lord's Supper be understood as pointing toward the ultimate banquet in heaven. Laden with such profound meaning and power, this sacrament requires careful preparation to keep it from being trivialized or routinized. Evangelical Reappropriation of the Catholic tradition With the triumph of Enlightenment rationalism in Western society, evangelical churches in general have tended to discard the sacramental and mystical dimensions of the Lord's Supper, thereby reducing it to a bare memorial rite or an agape meal. But another strand in the evangelical movement is concerned to retrieve the higher view of the sacraments espoused in the magisterial Reformation as well as in early Pietism an…