"Herein lies the main weakness in Protestant and evangelical theology: it terminates the gospel story at the resurrection and ascension, so that the church is seen solely as the agent to retell or restate a story that ended with Christ's resurrection­.The story of the church is what it is because it is the story of the Spirit who constitutes it, the continuation of the triune economy of salvation."

Liturgical Theology pg.35-36 by Simon Chan

"The important thing, then that in the simple but powerful action of plunging someone into the water in the name of the triune God, there is a real dying to the old creation and a real rising into the new---with all the dangerous privileges and responsibilities that then accompany the new life as it sets out in the as-yet-unredeemed world. Baptism is not magic, a conjuring trick with water. But neither is it a simply visual aid. It is one of the points, established by Jesus himself, where heaven and earth interlock, where new creation, resurrection life, appears within the midst of the old."

Surprised By Hope pg.272 by N.T. Wright

"And on the day called Sunday, all who live in cities or in the country gather together to one place, and the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, as long as time permits; then, when the reader has ceased, the president verbally instructs, and exhorts to the imitation of these good things. Then we all rise together and pray, and as we before said, when our prayer is ended, bread and wine and water are brought, and the president in like manner offers prayers and thanksgivings, according to his ability, and the people assent, saying Amen; and there is a distribution to each, and a participation of that over which thanks have been given." Justin Martyr c.155AD

Beyond Smells and Bells pg.62 by Mark Galli

"Past and present come together. Events from long ago are fused with the meal we are sharing here and now. But it isn't only the past that comes forward into the present. If the bread-breaking is one of the key moments when the thin partition between heaven and earth becomes transparent, it is also one of the key moments when God's future comes, rushing into the present. Like the children of Israel still in the wilderness, tasting food which the spies had brought back from their secret trip to the Promised Land, in the bread-breaking we are tasting God's new creation, the new creation whose prototype and origin is Jesus himself.

That is one of the reasons why he said "This is my body" and "This is my blood". We don¡¯t need elaborate metaphysical theories with long Latin names to get the point. Jesus, the real Jesus, the living Jesus, the Jesus who dwells in heaven and rules over the earth as well, the Jesus who has brought God's future into the present---wants not just to influence us, but to rescue us; not just to inform us, but to heal us; not just to give us something to think about, but to feed us and to feed us with himself. That's what this meal is all about."