Communion Exhortation

This is a reposting of the September Communion Exhortation at COTRM ...

I have been reading the book Story by Robert McKee about the principles of screenwriting for film and how to write a good story.

He explains the structure of telling a story

• Scenes make up Sequences
• Sequences make up Acts
• Acts make up the Story

Within each part of the structure of a story there is a value change like the change from a negative value to positive value or vice versa.

Some Examples:

• love/hate
• truth/lie
• freedom/slavery
• courage/cowardice
• loyalty/betrayal
• wisdom/stupidity
• strength/weakness
• excitement/boredom
• hope/despair

So, Scene by Sequence by Act the writer creates change from one value to another.

Each of these changes until you reach the end of the story can be changed back again. Like a couple falling in and out of love - again and again.

But in the last Scene of the last Act, the Climax of the story is reached. The value change in this last and final Scene is absolute and irreversible.

When Man was born, into the World, his story began. In the first Scene, in the Garden, man rejects God and is separated from Him. Man was sentenced to death.

But this change of Man from holiness to sin was in the first Scene of the story of Mankind. Man's condition could still be changed back again.

God was not finished with Mankind. In the Old Testament, we see the foreshadowing of a Savior who would remove sin. Man's story would continue.

Many Scenes later in the Bible, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, would come and pay our debt of sin. With His life, He bought us back from the pit of Hell. He rose from the dead and defeated our Enemy.
After Jesus rose from the dead He says this in Luke 24 (NLT),

“Yes, it was written long ago that the Messiah would suffer and die and rise from the dead on the third day. 47 It was also written that this message would be proclaimed in the authority of his name to all the nations, beginning in Jerusalem: ‘There is forgiveness of sins for all who repent."

The salvation Jesus offers in the last Scene of the final Act of His life can not be

• revoked
• dismissed
• altered
• reversed
• denied
• dissolved
• undone
• or changed!

It is Absolute and Irreversible!

Romans 8:38-39 (NLT)

38 And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. 39 No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Man changed from holiness to sin in the beginning of his story, but now, through Christ, we are able to change the value of our lives from sin to holiness.

As we look at the Cross and Resurrection of Christ let us remember what He has done for us

The Bread:

• Represents His Body,
• Broken for us,
• so we would not deserve death

The Juice:

• Represents His Blood,
• Shed for our sins,
• so we might be made holy again

Brett Stebbins