Sermon Series - The Local Church - The Lord's Supper Part 2

I) IN REMEMBRANCE OF JESUS

Luke 22: 15-20
15 And He said to them, "I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer; 16 for I say to you, I shall never again eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God." 17 And when He had taken a cup and given thanks, He said, "Take this and share it among yourselves; 18 for I say to you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine from now on until the kingdom of God comes." 19 And when He had taken some bread and given thanks, He broke it and gave it to them, saying, "This is My body which is given for you; do this in remembrance of Me." 20 And in the same way He took the cup after they had eaten, saying, "This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant in My blood”

DO THIS IN REMEMBRANCE OF ME

This word for remembrance in the Greek is the word Anamnesis and has a very multifaceted meaning. It includes the idea of remembering a past event but it also carries with it an idea of brining that event forward into the present. In other words it meant becoming a participant in that event.

This word was in use in regards to the Passover during the time of Jesus.
During the Passover feast during the time of Jesus, many times one of the younger children would ask the Patriarch of the family, “Why is this night any different from any other night?”
The father of the family would answer and say something to the effect of, “Because this is the night when our God, the Holy One, blessed be He, came down and saved us from the Egyptians.”

The ceremony interjected the term ‘we’ even though they were many years removed from the actual event.

This idea illustrates the concept of REMEMBRANCE in the sense that it is used in this verse.

Just like the example of the birthday party, we are celebrating a past event but we bring that reality forward and celebrate it in the present.

When we gather around the table, not only are we taking our mind back to Calvary and remembering that historic event but we are bringing the reality of Christ’s redemption to our day.

ALTAR vs. TABLE

This can best be understood in terms of Altar vs. Table. In the past history of the Church many wanted to make the Lord’s Table an altar. In the Scripture it has always been described as a Table. This goes back to the history of sacrifices in Israel. In the sacrifices of the Israelites they would offer the sacrificial victim as an offering for their sin and then would eat the meat from that sacrifice in celebration of their atonement in the presence of the Lord. When they ate this celebratory meal it was for the reality of already being redeemed by the sacrificial victim. As a matter of fact, the eating in the presence of the Lord was one of the major parts of this sacrificial system in the Old Testament.

If we apply that to our situation it all makes sense. Jesus is the true once and for all sacrifice for sin.

Hebrews 10: 10-14
10 By this we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. 11 Every priest stands daily ministering and offering time after time the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins; 12 but He, having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time, SAT DOWN AT THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD, 13 waiting from that time onward UNTIL HIS ENEMIES BE MADE A FOOTSTOOL FOR HIS FEET. 14 For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified.

The Altar is the Cross of Jesus

The Table is the fellowship of God’s people eating in the presence of God because of our Redemption.


As Christians our altar is the cross of Christ. It is not the Lord’s Table. The Lord’s Table is a place to come in celebration of our redemption. We come to literally eat in the presence of God to bring to the present this reality of our salvation. To proclaim to the world what Jesus has done for us through His cross. It is in this that we find the real significance of the idea of doing this in Remembrance of Me. We are the ones redeemed, we come to His Table, the Table of the Master, with confidence because of the once and for all sacrifice of the Cross.



II. COMMUNION

The second aspect of the Lord’s Table that I would like to discuss this morning is the idea of Communion. This brings about the idea of the present reality. The present reality is that God has called us to be in communion with him through Jesus.

The Greek word in the New Testament that we get the term communion from is the word “Koinonia” which can be translated in some passages as ‘fellowship’, ‘partake’, or ‘share’.

Since the Fall in the Garden God’s main objective is to bring man back into Fellowship with the Triune God. This idea of communion finds one of its most intimate expressions in the Lord’s Supper.


1 John 1: 3
3 what we have seen and heard we proclaim to you also, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ

The word for fellowship used in these passages is the same word used for Communion in the Greek.

The apostle John is telling the brethren that we are to have fellowship with one another but that fellowship is bound up in our fellowship with the Father and Son. This fellowship takes on a Trinitarian shape because we are also told in 2 Corinthians about the fellowship with the Spirit.

2 Corinthians 13: 14
14 The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all.

God as Father, Son, and Spirit wants us to have communion and fellowship with Him. In this we find our true fulfillment from the beginning. We were made in God’s image and the only way to repair that image that has been marred by sin is through true communion.

I Corinthians 10: 16-18
16 Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ? 17 Since there is one bread, we who are many are one body; for we all partake of the one bread. 18 Look at the nation Israel; are not those who eat the sacrifices sharers in the altar?

Paul applies this message of fellowship, communion with God, or as he puts it sharing in Christ. This word for sharing in the Greek is the same word used for Fellowship in the prior passages and could also be translated as communion. Paul is letting us know that the Lord’s Table is a time to celebrate our communion with one another that is linked with our communion with God. He makes the point that Israel shared in the altar by eating that which was offered on the altar. We share in the gift of redemption through the cross of Christ and that celebration finds its expression in the Lord’s Supper.

We are here on Sunday and Christ is our host. He may not be visible but He is just as much or host this morning as he was in the upper room 2000 years ago. When we eat of the bread and drink the cup this morning we do so in the presence of God as we celebrate what was done for us on the cross.

This event of the Supper is a proclamation to the world of our fellowship and communion with God.



III. Future Hope

Returning to our motif of the birthday party, we always look forward to what the future has. We look at our young daughter and we dream of what God has in store for her. In the same way the Lord’s Supper has a future element to it too.
1 Corinthians 11: 26
26 For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes.

Paul the Apostle tells us that there is a future element to the Lord’s Supper. When we come together on the first day of the week we proclaim to all that Jesus will return. He will come again in a visible manner.
In the Lord’s Supper we see a tension at work, a tension of ALREADY and NOT YET. Jesus is already present with his people and is the host at the Lord’s Supper every Sunday. Even though we cannot see Him, He is with us and acts as the host of the Supper. One day the veil will be torn back and we will see Christ as He is in His glorified risen body. The good news is that we will also have glorified risen bodies.
The Bible gives many images of Heaven but I love the one Isaiah gives us in Isaiah 25
Isaiah 25: 6-9
6 The LORD of hosts will prepare a lavish banquet for all peoples on this mountain; A banquet of aged wine, choice pieces with marrow, {And} refined, aged wine. 7 And on this mountain He will swallow up the covering which is over all peoples, Even the veil which is stretched over all nations. 8 He will swallow up death for all time, And the Lord GOD will wipe tears away from all faces, And He will remove the reproach of His people from all the earth; For the LORD has spoken. 9 And it will be said in that day, "Behold, this is our God for whom we have waited that He might save us. This is the LORD for whom we have waited; Let us rejoice and be glad in His salvation."
The Bible describes this time as a great banquet feast. It is human nature for us to have a great time of feasting and fellowship when we celebrate events in our lives. It is, I propose, a foretaste of what that great banquet feast might be like. A fellowship meal where all mistrust is broken down, all sickness is gone, all of our loved ones that have gone home to be with the Lord are there at the table dining with us and best of all we are there with the risen Jesus.

This is the image that Isaiah proposes, an image of feasting and happiness.

Throughout the OT we find this image of the messianic age as one that will flow with wine and feasting, a time of celebration. We are to come to the Table on Sunday not just with a heart in memory for the great price that was paid but also with great joy for what is to come.

The Lord’s Supper is AN ADVANCED SIGN of that great age to come. It is a little of taste of the messianic feast that will occur when we are face to face with Jesus.

It is much like the spies in the wilderness wandering that brought back fruit from the Promised Land that the Israelites could sample before the actual conquest began. IN the same way we are on this side of the Resurrection but can, in a way, experience a little taste of what is to come. The Lord’s Supper is like that wilderness sampling of the fruits of the age of Resurrection, Restoration, and Restitution.

THIS SUPPER GRAFTS US INTO GOD’S COMPLETE STORY OF REDEMPTION:



There’s an unusual occasion in Matt 8 where Jesus runs into a Roman Centurion, a Gentile… after having healed a man of leprosy. The Centurion is so impressed he asks Jesus if he can heal his servant. Jesus offers to go home with him, but the Centurion says,

Matthew 8: 8
8 But the centurion said, "Lord, I am not worthy for You to come under my roof, but just say the word, and my servant will be healed. 9 "For I also am a man under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to this one, `Go!' and he goes, and to another, `Come!' and he comes, and to my slave, `Do this!' and he does it."

Jesus was so impressed with this man’s response that Jesus talked about this future Kingdom Banquet.

10 Now when Jesus heard this, He marveled and said to those who were following, "Truly I say to you, I have not found such great faith with anyone in Israel. 11 "I say to you that many will come from east and west, and recline at the table with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven; 12 but the sons of the kingdom will be cast out into the outer darkness; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth."

One day this unity that we find from gathering around this table on Sunday morning will come to a fulfillment in the grafting in of all kinds of people into the family of Abraham. The promise of made to Abraham that all nations will be blessed through his seed will find its final manifestation in this great Kingdom banquet where all peoples of the Earth are welcome that place their trust in Jesus.

Each Sunday this is what we proclaim to the world in this act of worship. We proclaim that the Lord will return and that this meal will find its ultimate fulfillment in the final consummation of the Kingdom when the final enemy of death is conquered.