When I was first invited to lead in Communion and reflect on the meaning of the Lord’s Supper, I did some homework; I borrowed, from the old Evangelical Library, a very large book with explanations from each denomination of their different approaches to Communion, and the justification for their various doctrines and traditions.
But for me, nothing there captured the vital significance of this meal.

However, I did find much of interest from that library in the writings of Corrie Ten Boom.
When very young, she asked her father why we can’t be given a full understanding of the bible, instead of just a little more each time we read it.

He explained, “Imagine you are on a very long train journey, with hundreds of stops.
Would you want the conductor to announce all the remaining stops at each station?
No, you only want to know the next few stops; hearing the full list would be too much to cope with.
And as God guides us through this life, we are given enough understanding of his word for each stage of our journey.”

And I think it is similar with the Lord’s Supper.
As we live by faith in Jesus, and experience his forgiveness and presence in our lives, this meal becomes ever more important to us.
But I suggest the importance of this meal does not lie in any meaning we attach to it.
It lies in what God does.

When we trust in Jesus and his victory on the cross, God changes our hearts, and fills our lives with meaning and hope.
I read the true meaning of the cross can only be seen through tears of repentance.

When we realise that without God, our lives have gone astray, that nothing we do can restore things to how they should be, and we hunger and thirst for God and his goodness, then we find this meal points us to all we need.
The bread and cup signify the body and blood of Jesus, shed when he suffered and died on the cross.  We believe it was for our sins that Jesus suffered, as he took sin’s penalty of death, due to us, upon himself, so that we may be forgiven and judged as righteous before God, and acceptable in his presence.

And in rising from the grave, Jesus defeated the power of sin and death over us, so that we are freed to share in new and eternal life in him.

This is a free and undeserved gift of God, simply received through faith in Jesus.

The significance of this meal is given by the true meaning of lives transformed by Jesus.  For as we live each day by faith in what Jesus has done for us on the cross, we are born again to a new and real life in Him.