11:20 When ye come together therefore into one place, [this] is {g} not to eat the Lord's supper.
(g) This is a usual metaphor by which the apostle flatly denies that which many did not do well.
11:20 When therefore ye come together in one place. When they assembled these heresies and divisions were manifest. There was a Paulite group, an Apolloite group, and a Petrine group, who sat apart from each other. See PNT 1Co 1:12.
[This] is not to eat the Lord's supper. Coming in such a spirit they were in no fit mind to eat the Lord's supper.
11:20 Therefore - That is, in consequence of those schisms. It is not eating the Lord's supper - That solemn memorial of his death; but quite another thing.
11:17-22 The apostle rebukes the disorders in their partaking of the Lord's supper. The ordinances of Christ, if they do not make us better, will be apt to make us worse. If the use of them does not mend, it will harden. Upon coming together, they fell into divisions, schisms. Christians may separate from each other's communion, yet be charitable one towards another; they may continue in the same communion, yet be uncharitable. This last is schism, rather than the former. There is a careless and irregular eating of the Lord's supper, which adds to guilt. Many rich Corinthians seem to have acted very wrong at the Lord's table, or at the love-feasts, which took place at the same time as the supper. The rich despised the poor, and ate and drank up the provisions they brought, before the poor were allowed to partake; thus some wanted, while others had more than enough. What should have been a bond of mutual love and affection, was made an instrument of discord and disunion. We should be careful that nothing in our behaviour at the Lord's table, appears to make light of that sacred institution. The Lord's supper is not now made an occasion for gluttony or revelling, but is it not often made the support of self-righteous pride, or a cloak for hypocrisy? Let us never rest in the outward forms of worship; but look to our hearts.
