Would you like to have a more intimate connection with Jesus?
We can have a deeper relationship than we ever thought possible by learning about the Hebraic meaning behind communion.
There’s much more to what Jesus did on that last Passover night than we understand. Because we are not first-century Jewish believers, we have missed the Hebraic nuance and symbolism Christ used as He shared what we today call communion with His followers.
From no fault of our own, we do not understand the richness of the communion meal. It’s been lost in translation.
Communion is more intimate than drinking juice, eating bread, and remembering His crucifixion.
It is an intimate act we engage in with our Savior. It is an invitation from the One our heart loves to be in a covenantal union with Him for eternity.
Intimacy starts with prayer
Baruch Atah Adonai, Eloheinu Melech ha-olam, borei peri hagafen. (Blessed are You our God, King of the universe, who creates the fruit of the vine.)
Jesus prayed this prayer over the cup of wine before offering it to His disciples. Unless we speak Hebrew, we miss the intimacy of this prayer.
The word “Atah” means you, but so does the Vav at the end of the verb, making “Atah” (you-you). The doubled you in Hebrew makes “Atah” personal, and a word for coming together and drawing close to someone. When addressing God with the word “Atah” in the prayer, Jesus, and those who recite it, are expressing a deep, intimate relationship with God.*
Jesus understands the importance of intimacy—true intimacy. He has it with His Father and hopes for it with us as well. Prayer is the heart of communion.
Into-me-see
I’ve heard the word intimacy explained like this: into-me-see. Is there anything more intimate than being fully loved by the One who created us and knows everything—even the things we don’t say aloud and don’t dare post on social media?
Do this in remembrance
The last act a person does before dying is usually the most important.
Jesus’s last act was to institute communion with His followers. “Do this in remembrance of me” (Luke 22:19). Why was communion important? One reason is that communion reminds us that we are one in Him.
“Come union with me.”
The Heavenly Father desires to be one with you in a bond that cannot be shared with another human.
When speaking on the topic of communion with groups, I like to give them a communion cup of juice and an eye dropper with water. The juice represents Jesus’s blood that was poured out for us. The water, our lives. I ask them to release one drop of water into the cup.
What happens?
The water disappears into the juice. It has been completely enveloped until all that is noticeable is juice. The juice and water are now one.
Yes, Lord, let it be for me.
In taking communion, Jesus shows us what our relationship with Him can be. As Bernard of Clairvaux explained, “In a matter of speaking, we should lose ourselves as if we did not exist, utterly unconscious of ourselves and emptied of ourselves.”
Just as the drop of water mixed with juice empties itself and seems to lose its identity, we, too, melt away and are transformed to look like the person of Jesus.
Paul explained it this way in Galatians 2:20. “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”
And Acts 17:28—“For in him we live and move and have our being…”
In Him we live and move and have our being.
The intimacy of communion will happen when we no longer think about ourselves or our needs. It is when we lose ourselves in the rapture of His love that our soul tends to God fully.
We only see the juice. The water cannot be taken from it.
No matter how hard we try to remove the water from the juice, they will always remain one. Jesus taught His followers, “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand. I and the Father are one” (John 10:28–30).
Communion is a reminder of the intimacy we are meant to have with Jesus.
Sadly, we have lost the art of community. We long to be seen, accepted, and loved. We look for intimacy anywhere possible. Our fractured society makes intimacy with God difficult to imagine. However, it is within God’s power to give us such an experience. It is not because of our efforts, but our surrender. Only by losing ourselves can we be transformed into one with the Father.
As Christians, we have something the world cannot offer people: intimate communion with the One who created us all.
Stacy Sanchez and her husband, John have been married for over 35 years. She is a mother of four children and grandmother of nine. Stacy is a pastor, author, speaker, and business owner. Her passions include all things baseball (Go Yankees!), the beach, and teaching about the Hebraic roots of Christianity. Look for her new Young Adult devotional book, “Diamond Dust: Lessons from the Ball Field,” coming soon. Learn more about Stacy at www.stacysanchez.com.
