for our gathering this afternoon
is that we might once more observe the Lord's Supper together. Now,
we do conscientiously act in the pattern of the New Testament.
I realize this is not required in the New Testament, but it
is certainly the pattern of the New Testament. We observe the
Lord's Table every Sunday afternoon or every Sunday evening, just
as it was done in the Book of Acts. But these Sunday afternoon
services, after we have our fellowship dinners every fifth Sunday, I
try to set aside specifically just for the Lord's Supper. And so I want this afternoon
to focus our attention once more on this blessed ordinance. Turn
with me, if you will, to 1 Corinthians chapter 11 and verse 24. 1 Corinthians chapter 11 and verse
24. The Apostle Paul is giving inspired
instructions as to how this ordinance ought to be observed, and we
don't need to guess about it. We don't need to be the least
bit ambiguous concerning it. And then, as he wraps up his
instructions concerning the ordinance, he quotes from the Lord Jesus
on the night before he was crucified, and says, when he had given thanks,
he broke bread and said, take eat this is my body which
is broken for you this do in remembrance of me now that's
the title of my message this do in remembrance of me that's
what this ordinance is all about the lord jesus gave us just two
ordinances of worship Ordinances is the proper word, not sacraments,
ordinances. These are not means by which
God confers grace to sinners, eating this bread, drinking this
wine, or being immersed in water, will not automatically or even
incidentally confer grace upon you. These are ordinances of
worship. That is to say, they're simply
commandments laid down by our Savior, established while he
was upon the earth for the perpetual service of his church and kingdom
for the glory of his name. These two ordinances, of course,
of baptism, the believer's public confession of faith in Christ,
and the Lord's Supper, the believer's remembrance of Christ symbolically
in the bread and in the wine. Baptism, immersion in the name
of Jesus Christ, is the believer's first public act of obedience
to Christ. It is that means by which We
have drawn a line in the sand, as it were, and we say this is
the way we will walk in him. All our past lives, be they religious
or be they immoral, be they upright or be they perverse, all our
past lives we serve the lust of our flesh. Now, this day forward,
we serve our Redeemer, confessing him alone as our wisdom, righteousness,
sanctification, and redemption. confessing that we were crucified
with him, buried with him, and risen with him. And now, by the
grace of God, we have been raised up from spiritual death to spiritual
life, to walk with him in the newness of life. If you have
not yet confessed Christ in believers' baptism, if God has given you
life and faith in Christ, I urge you, do not delay. Arise, be
baptized, and wash away your sins. That is symbolically by
this picture. Testify to the world how sins
are washed away. And then we come to observe the
Lord's Supper. Now, the purpose of the Lord's
Supper is to keep the person and work of our Lord Jesus Christ
constantly before our hearts and minds. Through the centuries,
men have perverted this ordinance terribly. Some have made it to
be just a piece of idolatrous superstition that you've seen
on television now. These things have come out in
public. In these days of mass media, you'll see a priest in
the paper's church waving some kind of a silly thing dressed
up in a effeminate looking costume and saying mumbo jumbo and this
is supposed to turn into the bread and wine, supposed to turn
into the body and blood of Christ. And eating the bread and drinking
the wine, you automatically eat and drink the body and blood
of Christ. It's absurd beyond needing even recognition. make this, as I said earlier,
a sacrament. That is, they make it a means
by which many women receive the grace of God. That's just as
bad. That's just as bad. Eating this
bread is not in any way except symbolically eating the bread,
or eating the body of Christ. And drinking this wine is not
in any way except symbolically drinking his blood. That's all.
It is a symbolic representation of his flesh and blood. And those
who pervert the ordinance are without excuse. The scriptures
are not the least bit ambiguous, but rather conscientiously clear. When talking about the Lord's
Supper, nothing is said at all about a sacrifice, nothing is
said about an altar, nothing is said about a priest, nothing
is said about grace. Never. Nowhere in the scriptures.
When you talk about observing the Lord's Supper, In churches,
you know, when preaching wanes to nothing, they talk about this
table here. You know, it's got religious
significance everywhere, and this is looked at as an altar.
You got candles on it and crosses. An altar. I remember when we
rented a place down the road for Faith's wedding. Janitor
said, don't bother that, that's the altar. At the prices we were
paying, I said, I'll do what I want to with your altar. Altar. This is nonsense. That's nonsense. No, no. This is just a table
that holds bread and wine. That's all. That's the only purpose
for it. Nothing holy, nothing spiritual, nothing at all concerning
it. The significance is in what the
supper means. When this message is presented
in the scriptures, the Lord's Supper is always presented with
utter simplicity. It's a service of remembrance,
an ordinance of testimony, a time of communion. That's all. Remembrance,
testimony, fellowship. That's what it's all about. No
proper ceremonies involved with it. We're not told what posture
we're to have when we observe the Lord's Supper. In Mexico,
I recall the first time I was down there, I was just astounded.
I had never been in a heathen service before. Priest standing
down in front of one of those cathedrals, these poor, poor
peasants come and drop their money in their little box and
then they get on their knees and crawl down to the altar so
some priest put a wafer on his tongue and then another one pour
a little wine in his mouth. Just, that's so silly, so absurd,
so contrary to Scripture, so contrary to everything spiritual. We're not even told whether we're
to sit or stand, it doesn't matter. We're not told whether to have
one glass or a dozen glasses or a hundred glasses. We're not
told whether to have the bread presented as one loaf or broken
pieces. Those things are up to individual churches, congregations,
and pastors. They're not in any way prescribed
in Scripture. We're just given simple ordinance,
bread and wine, representing the body and blood of Christ
to remember him. Now, as you take the bread in
your hand and take the wine in his glass and you eat the bread
and drink the wine, I want us to remember. Always, always seek
to remember the Lord Jesus Christ. Seek to have your mind and your
heart set on Him. As I sit here and the men give
me the bread, someone else gives me the wine, I sit here and try
my best always to focus my heart and my mind on our Redeemer. I don't ever I don't ever want
to just sit and hear the word, Lindsay, and not pay attention
to it. I don't ever want to go through
a religious ceremony. I don't ever want to go through
just a religious service. And as we eat this bread and
drink this wine, I don't ever, oh God, keep me from ever just
mechanically going through a ritual, a meaningless ritual. We eat
the bread and drink the wine for certain specific purposes.
Now let me make some recommendations to you. With regard to this thing
of remembering Christ, I hope they'll help you to worship God
in this ordinance. Number one, it will help and
be profitable for us to remember a good many things every time
we come to the Lord's table. The primary thing, of course,
is to remember Christ. But remembering him, we also
remember some other things. Remember what you were, where
you were, when the Lord Jesus called you by his grace. Our
Lord tells us, look ye to the rock which you hid, the hole
of the pit from which you digged. Don't ever forget. Don't ever
forget. Don't ever forget. James Jordan,
we were rebels hating God, loving sin, and he snatched us from
the pit of destruction. It doesn't matter whether he
found you kneeling at an altar or whether he found you in a
brothel. We were the same thing. Just saved. Dailed, helpless,
lost. He saved us by his grace. I remember
well, oh how I remember when I first came to the Lord's table
and took that bread and drank that wine in remembrance of him. We might do well to remember
our friends who have gone on to be with him. I think of them
a lot. It may have something to do with
getting close to 50. I don't know, but I think of
them a lot. And I look forward to sitting with our Redeemer
and them in his kingdom and eating this bread and drinking this
wine new and properly and fully in his kingdom and glory. And
we certainly ought to remember one another. Turn back to chapter
10 of 1 Corinthians. Look at this. We ought to remember each other
with whom we break bread. Paul says, the cup of blessing
which we bless, and when he says bless, he's not talking about
pronounced a blessing, he's talking about giving thanks. The cup
of blessing which we bless, for which we give thanks, is it not
the communion, the fellowship of the blood of Christ? We take
this cup of wine and we drink it, and as we do, each of us
drinking of it, we are all partakers of the blood of Christ, symbolically.
and the bread which we break, is it not the communion, the
fellowship of the body of Christ? And then in verse 17, he says,
we're many, but we're all partakers of one bread, all partakers of
one body, we're all partakers of Jesus Christ. And as we come
together, let us come together as a family around the table
of the Son of God, with him sitting at the head, brothers and sisters
united in Christ. What the grace of God has done
for one another. I look at this congregation,
we have so many different personalities, so many different walks of life,
so many different backgrounds. And the reality is the only thing
we have in common is the grace of God. Oh, but what a common
denominator. What a common denominator. We're
one in Christ. Remember what the grace of God
has done for us and remember each one is useful and beneficial
in the church of God and remember one another's needs so that you
strive to meet one another's needs as God enables you. And
I would have you to remember something a bit more difficult.
Remember the apostates who used to be here with us. Think of
them often. Do you good. When our Lord Jesus
first served this bread and wine buddy to his disciples, Judas
was in the midst of them. He was right there with them.
And there are many who once sat here with us, who now have, for
one reason or another, departed from Christ, the gospel of God's
grace, and from us. So, Pastor, why should we think
about that? become presumptuous. Don't you ever become presumptuous. Don't ever neglect to recognize
conscientiously in your soul, conscientiously before God that
we're here worshiping God only because of his grace. And understanding
that as you eat this bread and drink this wine, in your heart,
consecrate yourself anew to God. Lord, I've been bought. I'm yours. Lock stocking down. Secondly, this ordinance is designed
primarily to turn our memories toward Christ himself. The bread
and wine are symbols of His body, telling us He's a real man. Placed
on this table before us, sitting here at the table, we have a
vivid symbol of our Lord's real presence with us. He is with
you. The Lord is at hand. He meets
with His saints. Where two or three are gathered
in His name, He's here in the midst with us. As we come together
in the church, we are indwelt by the Spirit of God. We are
His temple. Now Christ is present with us
and the broken bread and the wine poured out show something
of our Savior's suffering and death as our substitute. The
bread is broken. And our Savior, his body was
bruised. Not a bone of him broken, but
his body crushed. under the wrath of God Almighty
when he was made to be sin for us. The wine represents his blood,
the blood of the new covenant, the blood of atonement shed for
us for the remission of sins. And as the wine is squeezed from
the grape by the death of the grape, so the juice is squeezed
from the grape by its being utterly crushed. So our Lord Jesus Christ
shed his blood, willingly, yes, but his blood was spilt by the
sword of divine justice, spilt by the hand of God, spilt under
the wrath of God as he crucified and killed his son for us. The
two separated show clearly that Jesus Christ gave his life for
us. Now, we use unleavened bread
and we use wine for several reasons. Sometimes folks, the visitors
sometimes come here and just hears about it, that's not grape
juice. No, it's not grape juice. How come? Because the bread represents
his holy humanity. The wine represents his precious
blood. And so it is without any of the
impurities represented in leaven. And this bread and wine, as we
take it, is a picture of faith. Some of you here are yet without
Christ. And you've heard the gospel and
you say, well, what is it to believe on him? It is to take
him. by the hand of faith personally
and eat his flesh and drink his blood. You just ate some bread
downstairs. Nobody forced fed you, you ate
it. Nobody picked up and gave it
to you, you picked it up, put it in your mouth, chewed it up, it's
yours. And that means everything that's
in that bread that's of value is yours forever. Nobody's gonna
take it from you, can't be. You had something to drink, and
whatever there was in there of value is yours. It's assimilated
into your body and becomes yours. And I'm telling you that the
believer is a man or woman being called by grace who willingly,
with glad heart, takes the perfect righteousness and blood atonement
of the Son of God as his own. Believe in Christ. It's his forever,
and it can't be taken from him. It becomes part of them. Christ
and we are wed together. Here's the third thing. This
remembrance of Christ is needful. It's terribly shameful on our
part that we need it, but marvelously gracious on God's part that he
gave it. You see, This ordinance is given to help sustain our
faith in Christ, to stimulate our love for Him, to strengthen
our hope. Whenever you have difficulties
in your home, you men get a little out of sorts. Maybe sometimes
some of these sweet ladies may get a little out of sorts and
kind of have a little wall between you. A loving husband, a loving wife
stops to remember. Man, how could I treat her like
that? How could I do that? Wow, those shoe marks don't mean
that much. How could I get so upset with him? Insignificant,
insignificant. Memory is prodded to inspire
and stimulate and encourage love and devotion. And this bread
and wine is God's gracious means by which he prods our hearts
which are ever prone to want and stirs our memory, stimulates
our devotion. He calls us by these things to
our Savior. Our Savior spreads this table
before us and calls us away from the care and strife and labor
of this world, calls us away from ourselves to Himself. He
says, Arise, my love, my fair one, come away, eat the bread
and drink the wine with me. The object of our ordinance is
Christ, and the object is to keep Christ engraved upon our
hearts. One last thing. This blessed
ordinance, when it is properly observed, does exactly what it's
designed to do. First, it links that which is
material with that which is spiritual. We have a tendency either to
make things too spiritual or to make them too material. Here,
in the remembrance of Christ, we have a direct connection between
bread and wine, between flesh and spirit. Our God, who is infinite
spirit, actually did assume human flesh. And you and I shall dwell
with him in the spirit world, and yet we will dwell with him
in bodies of human flesh. These bodies, real as sin, shall
be with him forever in the world of the spirits. Now, I can't
fathom that. I can't grasp that. As a matter
of fact, the Apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians 5 tells us that
to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.
He says, when these earthly houses, these tabernacles are dissolved,
we have a building, a house not made with hands, eternal in the
heavens, a building of God. And somehow, while we shall be
perfectly spiritual, we'll yet be in this material body with
our God, just as Christ is right now. Christ, knowing our forgetfulness,
appointed this feast of love to keep our hearts clinging to
him, to keep us from forgetting him. How do I say this? We get so
wrapped up in nothing that we forget important
things. We just get wrapped up in a ball
game and forget about a date with your child or a date with
your husband, a date with your wife. You get wrapped up in something
and just forget. Just forget. Not really anything
blameworthy, and yet, how terribly blameworthy. You just didn't
think. You just forgot. And I have a terrible tendency. to get wrapped up in that lady
right there. Right? Grandbaby over in Lexington. Or what's going on in the world
around me. Or material things. You get wrapped
up and just forget. Thank God At least once in every
week, my God graciously taunts my memory
with this bread and this wine to remember. You see, this is
what I did for you. You forget me. This is what I paid for you,
and you forget me. By reviving the memories of the
saints, this ordinance has also been used of God to draw sinners
to Christ. Oh, may God be pleased to do
that today. Now, it's our privilege and our
duty as believers to observe this ordinance often. It is not something that's optional. It's sad, sad when churches and
preachers are blamed because preachers lead churches. have
made this ordinance to be a means by which they seek to govern
and manipulate people. If you've got any unconfessed
sin in your life, who doesn't? Now come on, who doesn't? Who
doesn't? You're not worthy to eat? Lord,
if you're worthy to call the name of Christ, you're worthy
to eat this bread and this wine. That's what it is. Our worthiness
is not in ourselves, it's in you. And our Lord doesn't say,
now take this bread, drink this wine, if you want to, or if you
feel like you're worthy of doing it, or if you're holy enough,
if you think you are holy enough, if you think you're worthy, if
you think you're good enough, don't do it. You don't yet know
it. But the believer discerns the
Lord's body. He understands, I'm a sinner. I have to have
a substitute. There he is, Christ the Lord. I can't produce righteousness.
Therefore, the Son of God assumed my nature, came here for me,
lived for me, died for me, put away my sin, and that's where
he came, I believe. The believer discerns the Lord's
body. He understands the necessity of redemption. And now, remembering
Christ, this is our reveille call. This supper is a prelude
to the great marriage supper of the Lamb. It is a matter of
glorious celebration. We've been redeemed, and it's
useful. But it's useful only as it reminds
us of Christ, only as it reminds us of him. Oh, eat the bread
then, and drink the wine, and remember who he is. Remember the price he paid for
you. Remember the grace he's given
you. Remember the promises he's made
for you. Remember the promises you've
made to him. And when he had given thanks,
he broke the bread and said, take, eat, this is my body, which
is broken for you. This do in remembrance of me. After the same manner also, he
took the cup when he had sucked, saying, this cup is the New Testament,
the new covenant in my blood. All the promises and blessings
of the covenant depend upon and have been fulfilled by my blood. This do ye, 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. I've often thought as we take the bread and the
wine, just a thought, just a thought. It doesn't really matter when
the Lord comes where I am, I'll be happy. But oh, how blessed
it would be that he should come while we eat this bread and drink
this wine. showing forth the Lord's death
to the God. Now, believers, as our deacons
come and serve the Lord's table to you, you take the cup and
take the bread that we will eat and drink, remembering Him. You who are yet without Christ,
watch carefully and ask God to give you faith in Him. Amen. All right, then you can lose.