Eating in the Church Building
"Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment" (John 7:24).
Occasionally, someone poses the question: "Is it all right to eat in the church building?" Since we do not find any mention of church buildings that brethren owned or bought in the New Testament, this is rather a peculiar question. Why not ask if it is Scriptural to have rest rooms in the church building? How about a drinking fountain? Computers? Heating or air conditioners? A refrigerator? A stove? A comfortable chair or couch? A desk and file cabinets?
The church building itself, along with all the items mentioned above fall into the realm of expediency. We need a place to meet. Brethren in the first century met in a number of places. Jesus met with His disciples and taught them outdoors; in Troas, brethren met in an upper room (Acts 20:7-8). The New Testament says very little about the facilities the church used in the first century. Most brethren are in agreement that we have a command to assemble on the first day of the week but that the place is a matter of expediency. It could be a place that is rented, someone's home (Col. 4:15), or a building that brethren build or buy.
Since the place of meeting is optional, then what is included as furniture or comforts is a matter of expediency. If some brethren do not want to have running water or electricity, for that matter, that is their prerogative—so long as they do not try to tell other congregations that they are wrong for having those utilities.
Objections to Eating
With so much of the use of a church building being a matter of expediency in the first place, then why have some created a furor over brethren sharing a meal in one? The complaint comes from a misinterpretation in 1 Corinthians 11:22, where Paul says, "What! Do you not have houses to eat and drink in?" If one considers only that verse, the case is compelling, but the more the text is examined, the weaker the argument grows.
1 Corinthians 11:17-20
Paul tells these brethren that they are coming together for the worse—not the better. Why were they coming together? They met for worship, which is a good thing, since the goal is to glorify and honor God. But something they were doing when they came together caused Paul to make this assessment. He then states the matter more strongly when he affirms that they did not come together to eat the Lord's Supper.
That declaration must have caused the church to be astonished—because they did meet for that purpose (cf. Acts 20:7). What Paul means is that there was something wrong about the way they were observing the Lord's death. Yes, they met for that purpose, but by the time they bungled the seriousness of the observance, they had actually not done what they had intended to do!
1 Corinthians 11:21
So, what had they done to arouse the apostle's indignation? Three problems appear to be in evidence: 1) They did not wait for everyone to arrive before beginning; 2) They did not share what they had; and 3) They were not discerning the Lord's body (v. 29). Paul writes in verse 21: "For in eating, each one takes his own supper ahead of others; and one is hungry and another is drunk." Brethren in the first century did not do things the way we do today, and we cannot read 21st-century practices into those of the first century.
Sunday was not a special day in the Roman Empire; it only became special hundreds of years later due to the influence of Christianity. Many brethren may have had to work on the first day of the week, which would cause the church to meet in the evening. Transportation was not nearly as convenient then as it is today. They usually brought food for their one long meeting.
Nothing was wrong with them bringing a common meal and eating together—until they decided to have the Lord's Supper in conjunction with that meal. This in itself is not unscriptural, since Jesus showed His disciples how to remember His body and blood during the Passover meal. But they were not partaking of the Lord's Supper in the proper way. First, they were not waiting for each other to begin their common meal and/or to participate in the Lord's Supper. This practice led to some becoming filled up and sated while others had nothing at all due to the time of their arrival.
Second, the Lord's Supper should be partaken of at the same time by the congregation; in this way, the body would be unified instead of disjointed. If they are sharing a common meal, they should also wait for one another—unless someone comes inordinately past the usual hour. This point is emphasized again in verse 33: "Therefore, my brethren, when you come together to eat, wait for each other."
Third, they were apparently combining the two—the Lord's Supper with the common meal—and were, therefore, not discerning the Lord's body (v. 29), which caused them to be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord (v. 27). They were eating and drinking judgment to themselves (v. 29).
1 Corinthians 11:22
The solution to two of these problems would be to eat their common meals at home. Paul makes that suggestion in verse 22: "What! Do you not have houses to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the church of God and shame those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you in this? I do not praise you." By eating before coming to worship, brethren could avoid filling themselves fully while others did without and eliminate the problem of not discerning the Lord's body. In verse 34a Paul restates this principle: "But if anyone is hungry, let him eat at home, lest you come together for judgment."
In other words, if they could not conduct themselves properly in the way they shared (or didn't share) their food, they should not eat together at all. If they could not separate the Lord's Supper from a common supper, they should forever keep them separate. Eating at home and not having a meal when they met together would solve two problems. The third one Paul solved by admonishing them to wait for each other: "Therefore, my brethren, when you come together to eat, wait for one another" (v. 33).
What Was NOT Wrong
Notice that Paul did not say that it was wrong for them to eat a common meal when they met together. It was wrong, however, not to wait for each other or not to share their food. Second, the common meal would have been fine if they had separated the two meals. If the Lord's Supper were part of worship and the regular meal was after worship, the problem disappears.
The Real Problem
The real problem was not that brethren ate in the place where they met. Jesus set the precedent for that practice. In Mark 6:34, He taught a great multitude, but when the day was far spent, His disciples asked Jesus to dismiss the people so that they could go buy food. Jesus told them that they should provide the food instead. When they observed that they only had five loaves and two fish, Jesus performed a miracle so that, from that small amount, more than 5,000 were fed (Mark 6:35-44). Of course, this was an amazing event, but what we want to notice is that they ate in the same place that they were taught. Nothing was holy about the place where Jesus fed them.
The same thing occurred later. After three days, Jesus was afraid that the 4,000 who had been hearing Him teach would faint on the way home. This time the multitude was fed from seven loaves of bread and a few fish—in the same location Jesus had been teaching them (Matt. 15:29-38). God obviously has no objection to people eating in the same location where they receive spiritual nourishment—so long as they shared the food.
1 Corinthians was written about A. D. 57- or 58, according to most historians. Yet when Paul visited Troas at a time later than that (as he was concluding his third missionary journey), the brethren met together to break bread (observe the Lord's Supper). Yet he partook of a common meal while meeting with the church, also (Acts 20:11). Since the two were separate occurrences, Paul had no objection to what was done and participated in it.
Today
No church today combines the Lord's Supper with a common supper. Brethren conduct worship first, in which all have the opportunity to discern the Lord's body, and when that activity has been concluded, then, and only then, do we share the food that we all have brought. Most congregations have pot-lucks, and no matter how much or how little anyone has brought, all eat their fill. We even bring a little extra for visitors. So sharing is not a problem, and confusing the two suppers never occurs. Therefore, we do not have the problem that Paul was addressing in 1 Corinthians 11.
Anyone who tries to use 1 Corinthians 11 to prove that the church cannot eat in the place where they meet is guilty of greatly abusing a passage which is not difficult to understand. One may study it over and over; the conclusion will not change. Now, if some brethren say, "Well, we don't want to do it," well, no one is going to force them to do it anyway. All are perfectly at liberty to never eat a common meal together after worship has been concluded. Nothing in the Bible requires brethren to do so. However, for these Christians to insist that someone else cannot do so (upon penalty of withholding their fellowship from them if they do) is to go way beyond what the Scriptures teach.
That attitude infringes on the freedom that fellow heirs of the kingdom of light possess. Who gave us a right to render such a horrendous verdict toward the servants of the Lord? No one. The problem with some who think this way is that they think that the building is "holy ground." Of course, they would deny this, but think about it for a moment.
The same church that will refuse to eat in the building will go to someone's house after worship has concluded and share a meal. Sometimes they will only go upstairs in the same house. How does that differ from moving from one part of the building to another for a meal? Other times they will all go to a restaurant and sit together while they eat dinner. The same actions are occurring in all of these instances: 1) brethren worship together; and 2) brethren eat together afterward. The only difference is the location. If a restaurant and a home are all right, then what is wrong with the church building? Some think it is a holy place, which is not true. If eating physical food is done in the same place where Christians consume spiritual food, and the Bible does not condemn that, then what else can be the objection except that the building is somehow sanctified?
Expediency
Someone may protest, "But I think it's a waste of the Lord's money to build a kitchen, buy tables and chairs, and operate a stove and a refrigerator." Well, we all have opinions. The real questions are, "Does what the church spends money on violate a Biblical teaching" and "Is it authorized?" (Col. 3:17). The authority for a building resides in the fact that we need a place to meet. What goes into a building that we build or buy is a matter of opinion.
What kind of furnishings do we want—tile, carpeting, or hardwood floors? Do we want restrooms? Yes. If we can spend the Lord's money for toilets, sinks, air conditioning, padded pews, a microphone system, and songbooks, what exactly is wrong with a refrigerator? If we can spend money on insurance, for paint, roofing, copy machines, and light fixtures, why would someone complain about a microwave? Of course, the answer for some would be, "The appliances do not help us carry out the work of the Lord, and a large room (with tables and chairs) is a frivolous expense." Is that so?
One can only imagine what we would do for space without the room we use for dinners. It is an all-purpose room where we conduct Bible classes, host youth meetings, and do the bulletin mail-outs. Frequently, it is used for the production of educational materials, also, and it has come in handy for meals for family members after a funeral. It is probably used more than any other room in the church building, such is its versatility. As far as the expense for the appliances, many of them are often donated by someone. They are considerably less expensive than re-sealing the parking lot. The amount of money spent on them is dwarfed by the amount of money spent on any one of a number of other expenses.
The fact is that the elders or the men of the congregation (in the absence of elders) have the work of being good stewards over the money that the members contribute. We may not agree with certain purchases; we may not agree with how other congregations spend their money, but expediency gives them the right to do so, and that should be an end to the matter. Congregations of the Lord's church are autonomous—independent of one another. It is not one congregation's prerogative to police other churches and give them a cost analysis of where they went wrong spending the Lord's money. Each church is responsible to God for how it spends His money—not what everyone else does.
Fellowship among brethren is as old as the first century. How we choose to implement this blessing and how much money is spent on it is the right of each congregation to determine. All brethren should pray for wisdom in that regard. Many are the stands that churches must take with respect to genuine doctrinal matters. We ought to spend our time dealing with such errors and upholding the truth. This we can do more effectively if we leave non-essential matters where they belong—in the realm of expediency.