Lesson this morning will be taken
from Luke 22, verses 17 through 20. We've been looking at the Passover
and what the Passover was. And today we'll look at the fulfillment
of the Passover, where the Lord instituted the Lord's Supper.
So let's read these verses together. Luke chapter 22, verse 17. And he took the cup and gave
thanks and said, take this and divide it among yourselves. For
I say unto you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until
the kingdom of God shall come. And he took the bread and gave
thanks and break it and gave unto them saying this is my body
which is given for you. This do in remembrance of me. Likewise also the cup after supper
saying this cup is the New Testament in my blood which is shed for
you. Now there's five things that
I want us to learn or at the very least be reminded of concerning
this blessed ordinance. First of all, I want us to focus
on who instituted the supper. This is not an ordinance derived
by a committee or denomination. or system of any kind. This is
something our Lord did. Nobody was expecting this. They
came to eat the Passover. They had no idea, although He
had told them plainly several times, they had no idea what
was about to happen. And yet, He instituted their
supper. The Passover was called in Scripture
a feast, the feast of unleavened bread. which is called the Passover. And Christ is the founder of
it. He's the one who instituted it. He instituted it way back
yonder in Egypt. And now he's about to fulfill
it. It was all about him back then. It's still all about him. And he's about to fulfill it.
And even so, when I think of the fulfillment of it, should
I think of it in lesser terms? It's a feast. We're going to,
Lord willing, take the Lord's Supper here in a little while.
But you can see these little bits of bread that you can't
hardly look at that and think about a feast. But it's not the
bread that's the feast, it's the Son of God. That's the feast. And my soul, anything, anything
a sinner could ever want is in here. No one suggested to our Lord
to institute this ordinance. He simply got up and did it.
And then commanded them to keep it. The church has no business concerning
the Lord's table or baptism except to keep them. That's the church's
business concerning baptism and the Lord's table. It's not to
be fenced or assigned to a certain day or limited to a certain number,
nor is there to be anything attached to it. Our Lord is the founder
of the feast and we're to keep it exactly as He exampled it. And then the second thing I want
you to see here is an explanation of the ordinance. These blessed
disciples had no more idea of what was coming about They had
no idea that he was going to go and be rejected and suffer
beatings and pain and be nailed to a cross as a common criminal. They had no idea, even though
he told them. And I know it's the same thing
for many of us. There was a first time to see
him. There's a first time. bread and
wine as a child because I professed faith, and so they gave me the
bread and the wine, and I drank it and ate it. But I had no idea
what I was doing. I had no discerning of it. It was just something
to... Sunday, I guess, we'll go to
church. But I didn't have any understanding of why or what
I was going there for. And same thing with the bread
and the wine. There's a first time to see it and a first time
to actually partake of it and a first time for me to enter
into it. They were there to eat the Passover
lamb with unleavened bread and so they did. And then to their
surprise, this man arises and passes around a cup of wine.
Wine, not grape juice, not Kool-Aid. not punch. He passed around wine and told them what it symbolized. He said in verse 20, this cup
is the New Testament in my blood which is shed for you. Let me
read you something over here in Hebrews chapter 13. Hebrews
13 Now the God of peace that brought
again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of
the sheep, now listen, through the blood of the everlasting
covenant, make you perfect in every good work to do His will,
working in you that which is well pleasing in His sight, through
Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen. The new covenant is the old covenant. It's the original covenant. It's
the everlasting covenant. Well, why would he call it a
new covenant? Because it was newly manifested. It was newly revealed. The everlasting covenant of grace,
and he calls it new because it's newly manifested. Made known
in the light of Christ, the surety of it, and by his death and by
his blood. And he is, in a symbolic way,
giving us an explanation of this blessed ordinance and of his
death, which was about to happen. The old supper had drawn to a
close. It had served its purpose, reached
its goal. And standing with the bread and
the wine was he that was about to fulfill it. He tells us that this table is
symbolic of his broken body and his shed blood. In the account here in the book
of Luke, I didn't go check all the other ones, but I'm pretty
sure all the rest of them say this is my body which is broken
for you. Luke says this is my body which
is given for you. It's given to be broken. And as the Passover was eaten
physically, the Lord's table now pictured a spiritual feast.
Over in John chapter 6, Verse 53, the Lord said, Verily, verily,
I say unto you, except you eat of the flesh of the Son of Man,
and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Understanding him to be talking
about cannibalism, many of his disciples walked away. And they
said, he's went off the deep end. It was good for a time,
but I have to draw the line here, you know. They said this is a
hard saying. Who can hear it? Believers. Believers hear it. They understand
it. He said the words that I speak
unto you, they are spirit. They are to be spiritually understood. This eating is a spiritual act,
not a physical act. The Catholics talk about the
Eucharist. The wine, when it goes into your
mouth, actually turns into the blood of Christ. And bread actually
turns into the body of Christ. Well, if that were so, it would
be cannibalism, wouldn't it? It's just ridiculous. This whole
thing is symbolic. This whole thing is just picturing
what the Lord is doing. It's the spirit that quickeneth
the flesh, profiteth nothing. And the words that I speak unto
you are spirit and they are life. And notice in that passage there
in John 6.63, the word spirit is not capitalized. He's talking
about spiritual understanding. Paul said, but the natural man
receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, their foolishness
unto him. There's no magic involved in
this. There's no transformation of anything. Salvation doesn't
come through eating the bread and drinking the wine. And then the third thing I want
us to see here, he tells us what this feast is all about. And then the third thing I want
us to see here is the simplicity of the ordinance, bread and wine. What could more fully set forth
Christ to us than the heavenly bread? I am the bread. That's
what he said. I am the bread of life. He that
cometh to me shall never hunger. He that believeth on me shall
never thirst. Paul said for me to live is Christ.
That's my bread. Spiritually speaking, he's my
daily bread. And bread is to be eaten, taken
within. We draw nourishment from what
we eat. the same spiritually. I don't know the science behind
our dietary needs. I'm not a doctor. But as these
things pertain to a natural man, but I do know that his words
are spirit in their light. He said this way, way back in
the Old Testament. Moses wrote this. Man does not
live by bread alone. He does live by bread. They ate
the manna that came down from heaven. They took it, they prepared
it, and they ate it. They took it within them. Took
the nourishment from them. But man does not live by bread
alone. He lives by every word that proceedeth
out of the mouth of the Lord. That's what he lives on. And
even so, we're going to take this bread here in a little bit.
And we take that bread, there might be some little nourishment
in it, I don't know, I don't know the science behind those
things, but there's nourishment in it spiritually. His righteousness is revealed,
he said, from faith to faith, as it is written, the just shall
live by faith. Faith cometh, he said. He didn't talk about faith came,
he said faith cometh. It continues to come. It flows
by hearing. And hearing by the word of the
Lord. Faith must be fed. What's it feed on? The bread
of life. And wine, wine symbolic of the
blood of Christ. I was reading this in a dictionary. Every now and then I get interested
in something, I look it up in a dictionary. The dictionary
says fermentation enhances preservation. It enhances preservation. And
consuming such can also boost beneficial bacteria and probiotics. And naturally speaking, wine
has many beneficial effects, improved digestion, better immunity,
and even weight loss. Now if that's so naturally speaking,
how much more spiritually? And in everything I just mentioned,
spiritually, you think about that. Just in the light of these
few things, can you see the parallel in these spiritual benefits?
Paul said, though our outward man perish, yet our inward man
is renewed day by day. That outward man, he's forever
hurting. I'll tell you, getting old is
not for wimps. It hurts. And though his outward man perish,
yet that inward man, he's not touched by these things. He's
renewed day by day. And there's a spiritual simplicity
in these ordinances. There's a simplicity in the elements
of it. And secondly, there's a simplicity
in the arrangement of it. Natural man likes to dress up
these simple ordinances, don't he? He likes to add a little
pomp and pageantry to it. He'll have a priest in full getup. And he'll come around, and he
has some altar boys, I suppose is what you call them, and they're
dressed up. And here they come, and they've
got these things with them. And then the priest, he has a
tongue suppressor, and you kneel down. Everybody kneels down,
and he holds your tongue down, and then he takes those tongs
with all the Greek writing on it, and he lays that little wafer
on your tongue. Man loves to dress things up,
doesn't he? The Lord took a cup of wine. He didn't pour it into
little glasses like we got. He had a cup of wine. He said,
here, divide it among yourselves. Everybody got a taste. And then
he told them what it was all about. Why would men do that? Why would
they add all these things to it? Because they don't have anything
on the inside. The less you have on the inside,
the more you have to have on the outside. Is that right? Yeah. You've got
to have the stained glass windows. You've got to have the insects. You've got to have the aura when
you walk in and the big pipe organs and elevated pulpits way
up in the air and all this kind of stuff. The bread and the wine
is symbolic of what Christ has done for us. and what he's now
doing. And if we have little or no Christ
within, then visual and physical is all that we have. And we're
crazy. We pour out a little bit of wine
in these small containers and break the bread up and pass it
out. And we're not told anywhere in the Scripture to come up with
something on our own to say. Did you know that? I went back
and read as many references as I could find to this supper.
You know what they said? Exactly what the Lord said. Huh? Nobody come up with their own
slogan. Nobody come up with their own ideas. Nobody come up with
an improvement. They said the night he fasted
out, he said, take and eat, take and drink. In 1 Corinthians 11, when Paul
is talking to them about communion, he repeats the words of Christ,
and this he does by the inspiration of God the Holy Ghost. And he
said, Take, eat, this is my body which is broken for you, this
do in remembrance of me. This is the New Testament in
my blood, this do you as often as you drink it in remembrance
of me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup,
you do show the Lord's death, What did the Lord say? That very
thing. That very thing. Alright, here's
the fourth thing we need to consider. The recipients of it. Who's to take it? Who is it that needs to keep
this ordinance? Who's commanded to keep it? Disciples
of Christ. Followers of Christ. Believers. were his death for all men, then
this ordinance would be for all men. Had he come into this world
to save all men, then all men would have an interest in this
bread and this wine. People that eat this bread and
drink this wine have an interest in him of whom these things represent. If he was a universal high priest,
than a universal priesthood would be engaged to keep it. The Lord's
Supper is called in 1 Corinthians 10, 16, the communion of the
blood of Christ. That word communion means common
union. That's what that means. We all
have a common interest, a common union with Christ, all His people.
We're one with Him. And the bread is called the communion
of the body of Christ, for we being many are one bread and
one body, for we are all partakers of that one bread, which is Christ. There can be no remembering of
his broken body or shed blood by those who don't know anything
about it. What will you remember? This ordinance is for believers.
people called to the Son, called by His grace, born of His Spirit,
made meet to be partakers of the inheritance of enlightened
saints. And you cannot remember what
you've never known or celebrate what you've never seen. You see
what I'm saying? And then lastly, what's the qualifications
of it? Boy, that's a big thing in churches,
isn't it? Some religions do what they call
fencing the table. They literally build a fence
around it. You're going to have to come
up to their specifications or you can't take it. That's what
it means to fence the table. If you're not a member in good
standing of that particular church, you don't qualify to partake
of it. It's a closed communion, they say. Some go as far as to
examine the lives of those coming to the table and then refusing
some privilege because they're too big a sinner. You know, I wonder, do people
ever read the scriptures? Salvation is for sinners. If you prove me to be the biggest
sinner in the world, all you've done is qualified me for the
grace of God. You qualified me for it. I'm
not excommunicated. I'm not blocked from it. You
just made me qualified. The whole don't need a position. And I love this. Our Lord said
something when he instituted the supper that I hope I never
forget. I never will forget the first
time I read it. And I hope it's indelibly stamped
on your mind when you hear it. Here it is. Luke 22, verse 20. Likewise, also the cup after
supper, saying this cup is the New Testament in my blood, which
is shed for you. Now listen. But, behold, the
hand of him that betrayeth me is with me on the table. Our Lord knew who Judas was,
didn't he? He knew what Judas was going
to do. He told him ahead of time. He told him ahead of time. Had
not I chosen you twelve and one of you the devil?" He told me
he knew exactly who Judas was and exactly what Judas was about
to do. But our Lord come over and broke
the bread and said, here Judas, here's the cup, here's the bread. Now how silly would it be for
me to go around to each one of you and make you, well I heard
a little something on you. Really? I'm surprised you didn't
hear more. Oh, my soul. He knew who the betrayer was.
He knew what he was going to do and when he would do it. And
yet it did not bar him from the table, but himself gave Judas
the wine and the bread. Turn with me to 1 Corinthians
11. Let me show you something over here. There was not a more troubled
church in the New Testament than the Corinthian church. They had
all kinds of trouble. And Paul speaks to them on this
very subject of being worthy or unworthy to partake of the
suffering. Verse 26, For as often as ye eat this bread,
and drink this cup, you do show the Lord's death till he come. Wherefore, whosoever shall eat
this bread, and drink this cup of the Lord unworthily, shall
be guilty of the body and the blood of Christ. But, are you
listening now? Let a man examine himself. Let that go on to you. He's not
telling me to examine him. He said, let a man examine himself
and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup. It was
never charged to the pastors to examine men and women to whom
this ordinance was passed out. nor to deacons, nor church committees,
nor denominational bylaws, or anything else. It's to be set
before the congregation through the preaching of the gospel,
and then served to those who have examined themselves in the
light of that gospel. Verse 29, 1 Corinthians 11. For
he that eateth and drinketh unworthily eateth and drinketh damnation
to himself. Now watch this. not discerning the Lord's body. The body of Christ is that by
which we're reconciled. You can read about it over at
Colossians. And you, he said, that were sometime
alienated in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled
through the body of his flesh through death to present you
faultless before the presence of his glory. Here's the one thing that makes
a man unworthy. He can't discern the Lord's body. He don't understand why he had
to die. He don't understand the satisfaction
involved in it, the sufficiency of it, nothing to have to do
with it. He has no understanding about
the death of Christ. Salvation is for sinners, and
sinners have found hope in the body and blood of Christ. And
if he's not died in our place and satisfied God's justice and
righteousness in his death, then we have no hope. We have no hope
whatsoever. Just as Paul said, we know whom
we have believed. We understand his death. We understand
the necessity of it, the reality of it, the eternality of it,
the sufficiency of it, and the satisfaction of it, and we rejoice
in it. And when we examine ourselves
for worthiness, it's not an examination of our good works or dedication
or consecration or any of these things. It's to see, do I discern? Is this my hope? The broken body
and shed blood is all my hope in Him. Do I understand that? This blood is the blood of a
substitute. His body is the body of a representative
man. And we who were sometime alienated
and enemies in our mind by wicked works, yet in the body of his flesh
through death he reconciled us. Reconciled us. And he tells us
if, there's an if attached to that, he said, if we continue
in the faith grounded and settled and be not moved away from the
hope of the gospel. That's the Lord's table. It's
so simple. You know when the Lord did things,
a child could understand them. What makes these things so complicated? I'm telling you, when you start
studying theology, you have to get a dictionary just to read
the men who wrote books about theology. What makes it so complicated?
Men. Men. Our Lord rarely used more
than two syllables in a word. And usually just one. And all of His parables, they
were so simple. And baptism. I mean, what does
baptism represent? And they've got so much Attached
to baptism, you can preach on it from now on. It's the simplicity of it. The
bread is his body. The wine is his blood. And you
do it. Why do you do it? So I can taste
his body? No. We do this in remembrance
of him. In remembrance of him. All right.
Thank you.