We had communion this past Sunday. I love taking communion, its reminder of the very core of our redemption. If I were a poet, I would write something beautiful about how the bread sits on my tongue a moment longer than it needs to. I postpone sliding it between my teeth, hesitate before biting down on it. “My body, broken for you.” My inner ear hears the small wafer break; my jaw feels the crunch and the release, and I see and feel in a different way Christ’s body being smacked about by the huge, meaty hands of Roman soldiers, His flesh being torn and ripped by the multi-barbed whip, pierced by heavy nails. “My body, broken for you.” I am glad for the time our pastor gives before he prompts us to take up the plastic cup, filled with juice in my church. “My blood, shed for you.” I pour the grape juice into my mouth. It gathers bits of the cracker as it makes its way to the back of my throat and then down, down into my stomach. So much blood–shed in great beads of sweat, in flying droplets of red rain, in a head-to-toe-covering slick, and finally, in a gushing torrent, blood and water mixed, the elements of redemption and purification finally, ultimately provided from a pure, single source. “My blood, shed for you.”

So that we do not bite and devour each other, and ourselves, He was devoured. So that we do not bleed to death from the wounds of our sin, He bled.

Broken body, shed blood.

Amazing redemption.

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