Here is our reading, verse 20
and following. Paul says to them concerning
their public worship, when you come together into one place,
this is not to eat the Lord's supper, for in eating everyone
taketh before other his own supper. One is hungry and another is
drunken. What? Have ye not houses to eat
and to drink in? or despise ye the church of God,
and shame them that have not? What shall I say to you? Shall
I praise you in this? I praise you not. For I have
received of the Lord, that which also I delivered unto you, that
the Lord Jesus, the same night in which he was
betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks and broke
it, and said, Take, eat, this is my body, which is broken for
you, this do in remembrance of me. And after the same manner
also the cup, when he had supped, saying, This cup is the New Testament
in my blood. This do ye, as oft as ye drink
it, in remembrance of me. For as often as ye eat this bread,
and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's death until he come."
And that is our subject and our text for the morning. The Corinthian
church, how many problems they had. Paul had been the instrument
of the Lord in preaching the gospel there, and in laboring
among them, and the raising up of a gospel church in the city
of Corinth. And he had labored there among
them a year and a half, or a year and six months, and had labored
to establish them in the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ
in spite of having heard the gospel from the most capable
minister of that day and time, and of receiving hours upon hours
of instruction directly from the mouth of this apostle unto
the Gentile. Despite all of that, there were
several eras and corruptions that entered into the church.
both moral and theological that Paul must address. When Paul
receives word of their errors, he writes them this epistle in
order that he might correct their faults. And one of the things
that he dealt with them was the manner in which they conducted
their public worship and in particular, their manner of observing the
Lord's Supper. We can tell by Paul's writing
that it had become so confused and disorderly that Paul actually
tells them that the Lord's Supper, by their action, had been robbed
of its character and of its true purpose, had been lost sight
of by the way that they had kept the supper of the Lord. If we
look at verse 20, he says to them, when you assemble together,
this is not to eat the Lord's supper, that is, they made such
a farce of the supper that it did not deserve to be called
by the name of the Lord's supper. Paul says to them, coming together
as you do. It cannot be called what you
are doing the Lord's Supper. One expositor that I was reading
concerning the Corinthian church called their behavior, quote,
disorderly and unbrotherly, unquote. In verse 21, Paul tells them
why the Lord's Supper had generally lost its character by their behavior,
in that they had mingle together a common meal with a supper of
the Lord. There are some expositors who
say that the Jews among them still desire to keep the Passover. Others wonder if it could have
been the agape meals that the early churches would share together,
or the love feast, as they're called in Jude verse 12, At any
rate, we see the contrast here. 1 Corinthians 11 and verse 20. The Lord's Supper. And in verse
21, His own supper. Every man brings his own supper. Gil called this an anti-supper,
and thus this anti-supper, the meal they had before the Lord's
Supper, became the reason why some of them came. And those
that came, some were well-to-do, and they brought their dainies.
Then they rushed to the table, and they gobbled down their dainies
before the others and the poor could come. And then they over-imbibed
on the wine that was provided there, that some were hungry
and some were drunken. as a result of the manner of
their observation. Gill said this about him, and
I quote, They confounded these suppers together, and they behaved
so badly at them, and ate the Lord's supper so unworthily that
it could not rightly be called eating the Lord's supper, unquote. So in verse 22, Paul rebukes
them. Eat your common meals in your
own dwelling, separate and apart, rather than tovert the ordinances
of the church of God. And in that process, you shame
and embarrass and humiliate the poor that are there among you. Paul says, I dare not praise
you in this. To some, this is a proof text
against eating in the church building or ever having a meal
in the church building. Such things must be considered,
however, in their overall context and the situation that was there
at Corinth at the time. Now, in verse 23 through verse
26, we devote the most of our attention. Paul reminds the Corinthians
that the Lord's Supper, this table, this cup and bread, was
a divinely instituted memorial. He reminds them, if they need
be, that this was a divinely instituted memorial. Instituted
by none other than the Lord Himself. And at no other time but in the
night before he was betrayed and on the eve of his death. When he was in the upper room
with his close circle of disciples and apostles, he kept with them
the Jewish Passover, first of all. And then that Jewish Passover,
by the ordination of our Lord, was made to melt into the supper
of the Lord. It is likely that our Lord took
some of the wine that was on the table for use in the Jewish
Passover, and some of the unleavened bread, and used it as the elements
in this first supper unto the Lord. Now, Paul claims double
authority in imposing the supper upon the churches. A. He said,
It was instituted by the Lord Himself personally. For He said,
the Lord took and said, Do this, and guided His disciples. Then
be Paul received the same by revelation. For in the twenty-third
verse, I have received of the Lord that which I also have delivered
unto you. On this claim of Paul, compare,
if you will, 1 Corinthians 15.3, also Galatians 1.11.12, that
he received divine revelation from the Lord concerning these
things. He did not learn it from the
other apostles or in the seminary. Now both the Lord and Paul mention
two elements in the supper of the Lord. Number one, the bread,
and the bread is almost always mentioned first. And number two,
the cup, or the wine, or the fruit of the vine, as it is called. And again, it occurred, remember,
while the Lord was with His disciples in the upper room eating the
Passover supper. The Lord was celebrating the
last Passover and for the last time. And even as they were eating,
even as they yet were eating and drinking, on the table before
them was the Passover lamb that had been roasted in accordance
with the command of God, was there unleavened bread, and cups
of wine that they might observe the Jewish Passover. And the
Lord at a certain point took bread off of that table, Matthew
26, 26, 1 Corinthians 15, 23, and 24. He took a loaf of bread
from the table and He broke it and He prayed, or blessed it,
or gave thanks, and He gave it unto His disciples, passing it
about unto them with this explanation. He said to them, Eat. This is
My body. And Luke 22, 19, the Lord said,
Which is given for you? And Paul says in 1 Corinthians
11 and verse 24, Which is broken for you? This is My body broken
for you. And then the Lord took the cup,
and He said of this cup, This cup is My blood of the New Testament. Drink ye of it. And He passed it about to the
disciples. Now, at this time and place,
there was a transition in God's ordinances in that the Lord Jesus
is become our Passover. 1 Corinthians 5 and 7. He is
our Passover sacrifice for us. And the Jewish Passover is no
more year by year. For Christ has died. He has died once. He will never
die again. Only His death is preached in
the gospel and remembered in the supper and when we preach
about that. Now, we need to be careful in
analyzing the words of the Lord. He said, This is my body, when
He gave the bread to those gathered in the upper room. He also said,
This is my blood of the New Testament, when He passed unto them the
cup. Now, a misuse or a misinterpretation
of these words have given rise to some horrendous errors over
the history of the church, in that some have come to make these,
or to refer to these, as a sacrament. And once they're elevated to
a sacrament, the status of a sacrament, it was then declared capable
of imparting some kind of grace into the soul. some kind or means
of grace was there attached to it when it became called the
sacrament. Then there came seven sacraments
in all by some of the churches. In fact, two strange doctrines
have grown out of a wrong understanding of the words of the Lord. This
is my body. This is my blood. One of those
doctrines is that one of consubstantiation. This is the doctrine that said,
held by Lutherans if I'm not mistaken, that there is a substantial
union of the bread with the body of Christ and the cup with the
blood of Jesus. Secondly, another doctrine has
come This one is called transubstantiation, and it teaches that the bread
and the wine actually become the body and the blood of the
Lord Jesus Christ. That a priest is able to actually,
in the Mass, change them so that they actually become the body
and the blood of Christ in the Mass. Charles Spurgeon, I think,
was right to say on this subject, quote, if one adds a little,
another one will add more. And if one alters one point,
another will alter another point, and then there is no telling
how far we shall get from the truth, unquote. How true. The Jews in John 6, 51 through
56, misunderstood the saying of the
Lord when He said, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man,
and drink His blood, ye have no life in you. Verse 53, And
whosoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood hath everlasting life. That's verse 54. And he that
eats My flesh and drinks My blood dwells in me." That's in verse
56 of that chapter of John. But it should be clear that this
refers to a spiritual drinking and eating that it is done in
faith. In Luke 22, 19, twice in 1 Corinthians
11, 24 and 25, it is said, do this in remembrance of me. Or,
this do, for my remembrance. This do in
memory of me. Now the broken or the torn bread
is a figure and a symbol representing the Lord's body, bruised and
beaten upon the cross. And the cup is a figure and a
symbol and a representation of the blood shed for many for the
remission of their sin. Dr. Gill writes on this very
large volume, in his very large volume, The Body of Divinity,
some things. Number one, this ordinance was
by the authority of Christ behind it. It was instituted by Him
personally and directly. It was not an apostolical institution,
though that would have had authority. Nor did it take its rise from
any accident or tradition. That is, some church decided
to do it, and it just caught on and spread to the other. It
was not the directive of any church council. No, not at all. But by Christ the Son of the
living God. The second thing, this ordinance
is unique to the age and dispensation of the gospel, not the law. It came not until Christ was
to die upon the cross. It came not in conjunction with
the law and animal sacrifices, but it came in conjunction with
the dispensation of grace and of the gospel, the dying and
death of the Lord as our sacrifice upon the cross. And the third
point that Gil made is this. It is a standing ordinance in
the churches to continue until the Lord comes. It is a standing
ordinance. Now consider verse 26 of 1 Corinthians
15. As often as you eat this bread
and drink this cup, you do show the Lord's death until He comes. It is a standing memorial of
Christ's dying shedding His blood for the salvation of His people. It is to be done by us in remembrance
of Christ. Verse 24 and 25. And the Lord said in Luke 22
and verse 19, This do in remembrance of Me. And by such shall the
Lord's death, His dying, His agony, suffering and death upon
the cross. You show the Lord's death until
He comes again, not by wearing a cross, whether it be plastic
or whether it be gold. How easy do some come to outward,
tangible things which they can touch or feel or kiss and think
them to be spiritually profitable, said one of my favorite old-time
writers. The Puritan writer Stephen Sharna,
quote, the Lord's Supper is chiefly instituted for the remembering
and the showing forth of the death of Christ, unquote. Nor is this a historical commemoration
like we sometimes have in our societies and countries. It is
not a historical commemoration simply to remember that a man
named Jesus did live and did die. It is a spiritual celebration
for those who have a spiritual interest in the death of Christ. Nor did the Lord die a martyr's
death. They did not take Him out, drag
Him out against His will, and nail Him unto a cross. He voluntarily
laid down His life as a sacrifice for the sin of many. He plainly
said He could have resisted. He could have called legions
of angels, but He laid down His life voluntarily for us. None took it from Him. I lay
it down. I have this authority for my
Father and to take it up again. And this is a mighty evidence
of the love of Christ for His elect. So that the Lord's death,
therefore, was not a common dying. It was a special dying, and it
had high and glorious ends to be accomplished by it. And as
such, it has a special memorial attached unto it, instituted
by the Lord Himself, as a remembrance of it. Again, it was Sharnock
who wrote, quote, The God that appointed memorials of His favor,
and the most prominent of them was that of the Passover in the
Old Testament. Sharnock's point is, The Lord
at times did appoint memorial of His great works and of His
favor to be there for the people to remember them by. The most
prominent, I repeat, was the Passover Supper. It was kept
once a year by the Jews as a memorial of God delivering them out of
the land of Egypt and Egyptian bondage. Listen to Exodus 12. And this day, that is the Passover
day, shall be unto you for a memorial, and ye shall keep it a feast
of the Lord throughout your generations by an ordinance forever. Listen again to Exodus 12 and
17. Therefore shall you observe this
day in your generations by an ordinance forever, that is, the
Passover. Exodus 12 and 24, and ye shall
observe this thing as an ordinance forever. And even after they
were entered into the land of Canaan, they were to, quote,
keep this service in this month, unquote. Exodus 13 and verse
5. Now I'm making a point here that
is relative to that of the death of our Lord. In Exodus 13 and
verse 10, Thou shalt therefore keep this ordinance in his season
from year unto year. Not only so, but the Passover
afforded them what our socialist president called, quote, a teachable
moment, unquote. that when their children saw
their parents keeping the Passover, when their young children saw
their parents putting all leaven out of their houses and dwelling,
when they saw their parents take a lamb and kill it and roast
it with fire, when they saw their parents using hyssop and putting
the blood upon the doorpost of their dwelling then their young
would ask them." Exodus 12 and verse 26. What is the meaning
of this? Why do you do these things, mommy
and daddy, mother and father? Why are you observing this? Exodus 13-14, when your young
son asks, what is this? Then in Exodus 12 and verse 27,
Ye shall tell your children, it is the sacrifice of the Lord's
Passover, who passed over the houses of the children of Israel
in Egypt when He smote the Egyptians and delivered our houses." This
is in remembrance of that. Again, in Exodus 13 and verse
8, And thou shalt show thy son in that day saying, Because of
that, the Lord did unto me when I came forth out of Egypt." One
more thing, in Exodus 13, verses 11 through 16, when they were
put in the land of Canaan, when God's promise had been fulfilled,
there was to be a special consecration of the firstborn of their cattle
and of their children when they were settled in the land. Verse
12, set apart unto the Lord all that opens the matrix, and every
firstling that comes of the beast that you own. The firstborn of
the clean beast were to be sacrificed unto God. The unclean firstborn
were to be redeemed by a sacrifice or their necks be broken and
they were to be killed. The firstborn child was to be
redeemed. And again, it would be expected
that the young child would be curious when they saw these things
and ask in Exodus 13, 14, what is this that is being done? It was another teachable moment,
if we may look at it. that God slew all the firstborn
in the land of Egypt, and He spared us, our houses and family,
in passing over that night. Exodus 4.22, Israel is my son,
even my firstborn. Now that has power and influence
all the way through. The specialness of being the
firstborn. Our Lord being the firstborn
among every creature, and we being the firstborn unto Him. Matthew Henry wrote that God's
special propriety in their firstborn and all their firstling was founded
in His special preservation of them from the sword of destruction. There was to be therefore a dedication
of the firstborn unto God. Israel is my firstborn, my son. And the firstborn of every Egyptian
house was smitten. And so why then do we partake
of the Lord's Supper? Why the bread and the wine? What if our children or even
untaught adults should ask, what is this? Why do you do it? What does it mean? What is it
for? These little cups, this white
sheet, these trays that we pass about, what is the meaning of
all of this? Then may we say in a teachable
moment, the Lord Jesus Christ is our Passover. He is the firstborn
of every creature. He has redeemed us with His blood. He has borne our sin in His own
body on the tree. He has endured the curse of the
law. He was bruised and He was wounded
and He was beaten for our transgression. And this broken bread that we
have before us, this redness in the cup, are representative
symbols of His body bruised and of His blood shed upon the cross. This is a memorial of His death. By it we do remember Him and
we show forth the Lord's death until He comes. He has ordained
this as a standing memorial to show forth and to remember that
special, special death which He died. It is done, remember,
brothers and sisters, in remembrance of Him. When we see the bread
broken and torn, we are to think of the body which hung upon the
cross. Often it had been beaten and
chastised. A crown of thorns had been pressed
down upon His head. Nails were put in His hands and
in His feet, and eventually a sphere thrust into the side of our Lord,
whereby there came out blood and water. And then when we take
the cup, we think not just of His blood, but as it is the blood
of the new or the everlasting covenant. This blood that is
covenant blood, the blood of Christ, the blood of the everlasting
covenant by which sin is cleansed, by which atonement is made, and
though it is not a means of grace. And Paul says something in closing,
1 Corinthians 10 and 16, if you want to flip back there, which
is just about above my head. I did not get into it deeply,
but he said that the cup is the communion of the blood, the bread,
the communion with the body. He says this in the context of
the pagan feast, and we need to understand that. That when
they took of the pagan feast, they were actually having fellowship. Well, Paul says the same thing
of the Lord's Supper. The cup is the communion of His
blood. By the way, it's the first time
I believe that the cup is mentioned first. And the bread, the communion
of His body. Therefore, it is something spiritual. It is something blessed unto
the children of God. It is the communion of His blood,
the communion of His body. So, let us dwell on Christ's
blood and body as we partake of the supper of the Lord. With
this reminder, the supper means nothing unless you have a saving
interest in Christ. The supper means little, except
you have a saving interest in the Lord Jesus Christ. This is
my body broken for you. This is my blood shed for many
for the remission of sin. At this time, I'd like to ask
the brethren to come, three brethren that I've asked to come forward.