Reading the Gospel of John Together
Earlier this week, I wrote about our church meeting last Sunday. (see my post “Meeting Around the Table of the Lord“) After publishing that post, I remembered that there was another time 3 years ago that we had the bread, then a meal, then the cup as part of our meeting. But, that time was a different kind of meeting. That was a meeting set aside to reading through the entire Gospel of John in one night. Here is what I wrote about it 3 years ago in a post called “Reading John“. (By the way, as we’re finishing our study of the Gospel of Matthew, we’ve talked about getting together to read through that entire Gospel in one sitting also.)
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Last night, our family gathered with about 40 other brothers and sisters to read the Gospel of John. The family that hosted last night also hosted a reading of the Gospel of Luke in December. Our family was not able to attend the reading of Luke, so this was our first time to sit through a community reading of a gospel.
We started by breaking bread as part of the Lord’s Supper. Then, we all shared a meal. After the meal, we sang a song and began reading John. One person read each chapter (the chapters had been assigned as people arrived). After each group of seven chapters, we took a fifteen minute break. During the breaks, we would eat and sing songs again. After reading all twenty-one chapters, we shared the cup of the Lord’s Supper.
This was a very special time for us. It was amazing to hear the Gospel of John read in one sitting in a community of believers.