As we break bread at communion we hear the words of Jesus, “This is my body, broken for you.” At a recent house fellowship we were gathered with two children in our midst. They have only attend a few times, but they love the time we break ‘Jesus bread’ at the start of the meal and share ‘Jesus juice’ at the end to celebrate communion. On this occasion, Phil lifted up the bread and began to pray. Every time he said a few words, 6 year old Sophia interjected with a question or an insight. All that would be a story in itself. It took a long time to get to get through all the words and prayers!
Finally Phil said, “Jesus took the bread and gave it to his disciples saying this is my body, broken for you…” but he didn’t get any further because Sophia interjected again. “Actually,” she said. “If that is Jesus body then that His is heart too. And his heart was broken for us because he loves us so much.” And Sophia went on, “Did you know that the heart has a protector around it (she knew but couldn’t remember the word ‘pericardium’) and that’s a bit like God because Jesus heart was broken but God keeps it safe so it keeps on loving us.” We all sat in complete awe.The Holy Spirit transformed our act of remembrance into an opportunity to encounter the presence of the living Jesus sitting with us at the table, with a heart broken and healed for us.
