You Will All Be My Witnesses - or, what do you do when "something happens" to you @ the Eucharist?

So I've begun my work at Centenary United Methodist Church in Smithfield, NC and my primary work will be among youth, young adults and (partly) children.  HOWEVER, as a condition of my being hired, I asked that I be allowed to assist in leading some of the various regular worship gatherings - primarily Sunday mornings and Wednesday nights.



Without fail, my first Sunday and Wednesday I was one of the "celebrants" in the Eucharistic gatherings held on those days.  On Wednesday night, I was called upon (without notice) to assist with the Eucharist.  While our pastor, David, was reading from the Methodist hymnbook...

"The Lord be with you..." "And also with you..."

...it was my job to prepare the bread and the wine for the Eucharistic meal.  So, on cue, when David said the appropriate words...

"On the night in which he gave himself up for us, he took bread, gave thanks to you, broke the bread, gave it to his disciples and said, "Take, eat; this is my body which is given for you.  Do this in remembrance of me."

...I held the bread before the small group gathered together and I broke it.  Before anything else was said.  Before the eucharistic meal was finished.  Before anything else happened, I felt inwardly transformed.  Something happened to me while I was breaking the body of Christ for the benefit of those gathered there that night.



And the question remains for me, "What do you do when 'something happens' to you in the Eucharist."  How do you explain such a transformation?  It wasn't as though I had a mystical experience or some sort of epiphany.  I simply knew that somethingi was different.  Call it real presence, call it a "spiritual experience," call it whatever you like - I prefer to call it a gift.



Often, I approach the Eucharistic meal with a sort of reverence and awe (feigned when I'm tired or when the day hasn't gone as I'd have liked).  Indeed, I approach the table as though I'm approaching the very body and blood of Christ - and for most of my life (even my time among the Southern Baptists) I've managed to believe that the bread and wine actually are the body and blood of Christ.  I've always believed this but never in my life have I felt or believed that my life - my mind, my heart, my sense of who I am as a person, a minister, a husband and a father - was fundamentally changed during the Euchairst.



That is, until now.  It probably sounds crazy - especially to some of my Baptist friends out there - but I believe that, in that moment when I broke the bread and presented to cup to those Christians gathered before me, God issued a calling clearer than I've ever felt before.  I'm called - just as all people are called - to be lifted to God.  I'm called to experience the life of the Triune Mystery in an imperfect community of people with whom I may not otherwise associate.  I'm called to live - as all people are - with the needs of my brothers and sisters in mind.  I'm called to point others to the communion of the Three-In-One God and to live my life - a life of peace, gentleness, humility and failure - in service to all those "Others" for whom such communion is not yet possible.  I am called to be a minister.  And because it could have just as easily been you serving me at the Holy Banquet, You are called to be a minister.