Transcript

First Corinthians chapter 11. And you know, when you get to chapter 11, you’d think, my goodness, what else in a church needs to be corrected? Paul is just dealing with issue after issue after subject after subject. You name the area and Corinth messed it up. He’s finally come to public worship, and he’s already been dealing with the problems in public worship. And the first one he dealt with was the fact that the ladies were coming to the place of worship without a veil on their heads, and this was a day when Jewish and Gentile women commonly wore veils as a symbol of their submission to the authority of their husbands or to men in general, and the Christian ladies, excited and genuine, yet immature, and their exuberance and their liberation in Christ. We’re taking the veil off. And Paul, really sternly reminded them and taught them as we come into First Corinthians chapter 11, that, God’s line and structure of authority and God’s unique role for men and women hasn’t changed when you get saved. And so he corrected that problem, which was associated with public worship.

And then he comes to the Lord’s Supper and he deals with a real significant problem they were having with the Lord’s Supper. And that is they were taking it very lightly. They were coming in order to just gorge themselves and be full. And the wealthy, rich members were showing up early and eating all the rich, nice food and many of the poor members —and you know, this was a day when they had slaves— some of the slaves would barely make it to the church meeting, and there’d be no food left. And they would leave hungry. And so you had hungry, poor saints meeting wealthy, well-fed saints who many of which were intoxicated there at the Lord’s table. And Paul firmly rebukes them about this, and he straightened that aspect up.

And now we come to another aspect of the Lord’s Supper. We saw the problems. Now let’s look at what Paul says is the purpose of the Lord’s Supper. And that’s the title of this message, the purpose of the Lord’s Supper. 1 Corinthians 11:23-26. Paul says, “for I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus, in the night in which he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, this is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. In the same way he took the cup also after supper, saying, this cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.”

Look at verse 23, and let’s use verse 23 as an introduction to the main body of the text that I want to share with you. First of all, Paul begins by making it clear to the Corinthians that the Lord’s Supper and the ordinance, and the way he’s guiding them about it, is not of his own invention. That’s why he says the first part of verse 23, “for I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you”. Very simply, he says, I want you to know what I’m about to give you is not my idea. It’s not my institution. I did not come up with it.

Now, very interesting. The scholars tell us that the book of First Corinthians was most likely written before any of the four Gospels. So that means this is the only written divine revelation about the Lord’s Supper to date. So the only guidelines that was in any written form that came as far as divine revelation is concerned is this that the Apostle Paul is pinning to the church at Corinth? So this is the standard for the day.

Now he continues there in verse 23 and says, “in the night in which he was betrayed, he took bread”. Now Paul did not say that it was the eve of the Passover, which, of course it was. But he wants to emphasize to this non-Jewish Gentile audience the contrast that is being said. And he heightens the contrast by saying, on the night the Lord did such a wonderful thing for us, or the night before he did such a wonderful thing as dying on the cross — that is when he was betrayed. So, setting the beauty of the supper against the backdrop of the betrayal shows that beautiful event and a much brighter array. This black backdrop makes what he did all the more beautiful.

So Paul says “it was the night when the Lord was betrayed”. Now the Lord has given the local church two ordinances. Now they are not sacraments, though that word has been used in various ways. Generally, the word sacrament, has the connotation that some saving merit is contained in it. And our churches that teach when you partake of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, saving grace is imparted to you as you go through that right in ritual as the priest of the church oversees it. As you go through the ritual of the sacrament, they would say, of baptism, saving grace is administered to you in that way and shape.

So we do not call them sacraments, because no saving merit is obtained by you going through those rights or rituals. They are what we would call ordinances, ordinances that symbolize a greater spiritual reality, ordinary common things being immersed in water. Ordinary common things, eating bread, drinking juice to symbolize greater spiritual realities. Now both of these ordinances were instituted and commanded by the Lord. Therefore, we as Christians ought to take them very seriously and approach them very soberly of spirit.

Now, it’s important that we understand the historical context of the Lord’s Supper. And that’s something of what Paul was setting in verse 23, when he says, “it was that night in which the Lord was betrayed”.

Now we know that night was the night of the Passover feast, when the Jews would gather together, each in their family units, and they would partake of a great Passover meal. It was quite an elaborate meal. And, well, the point of the meal was to commemorate and memorialize the great deliverance God had given the nation of Israel from Egyptian bondage. And God did that through putting a plague on Egypt. Egypt held the nation of Israel in slavery and in bondage. And finally, to get Pharaoh to release the people. God sent the death angel on the nation of Israel, or nation of Egypt. And God told the Israelis, if you will take a spotless, four legged literal lamb, and you’ll slay that lamb and take a hyssop branch, and dip the hyssop branch in the blood, and take the blood of that spotless lamb, and apply it to the door post and to the lintel. Then when you apply that blood and the death angel comes by in the night, he will pass over your house, but strike all the houses where the blood is not applied.

So after that event, God gave the Jews this precious memorial meal to remember and commemorate or recall, that great, work of deliverance God did for Israel when he passed over their houses, but struck the firstborn child of all the houses of the nation of Egypt, where the blood was not applied. Matter of fact, Orthodox Jews still today, once a year, have this Passover meal, and once again an Orthodox Jew will recall that historic deliverance from slavery. But tragically, the Orthodox Jew misses the greater deliverance that the Passover meal and the deliverance from Egypt foreshadowed and pointed to. And that was the deliverance to the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. That’s what it all pointed to. The Lord’s Supper, therefore, that we partake of it commemorates. It’s a memorial. It speaks of the deliverance out of bondage that we have into the kingdom of God’s beloved son.

Matter of fact, let me just share Colossians 1:13 that beautifully speaks of this redemption and this deliverance that we have. He says, “For he delivered us”, redeemed us, that is, “from the dominion of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved son.” And literally, what happened? This was the Lord our, not the night. Our Lord rather was betrayed. This is the night of the Jewish Passover feast. And the next day, when the Jewish families were bringing their little lambs, the little four legged lambs, to be slain on the altar at the temple, that was the very hour and the very time that the Lord Jesus Christ was hanging on Calvary’s cross, and becoming the sacrificed lamb for our sins.

And so in that night that he was betrayed, Jesus had those 12 apostles, those Jewish men around him, and they were celebrating the Jewish Passover. And at a certain point he transformed the Jewish Passover and transformed it into what we call the Lord’s Supper. He took the ancient feast of the Passover and transformed it, giving it new meaning. You see, because Calvary has superseded the deliverance from Egypt as the greatest redemptive event in history. Today we do not look back and recall and remember blood on the doorpost in Egypt today we take the supper and look back and remember the blood on a cross outside of the gate of Jerusalem.

Still sort of painting the historical context, let’s talk about the earliest observance of the Lord’s Supper. Matter of fact, why don’t you turn there with me to Acts chapter two. When the first church had the supper, we get a few little insights about how they did it. In Acts 2:41-42. Acts 2, verse 41. “So then those who had received his word,” that means they were saved, listening to the preaching of Peter out in the streets there in Jerusalem “were baptized. And there were added that day about 3000 souls”. So we see that one ordinance of the church baptism. Now, verse 42, “and they were continually devoting themselves to the apostles teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayer.” Now I’m convinced that the phrase breaking of bread was a statement about the Lord’s Supper.

So you see three things here. First of all, as they got saved, they were baptized and became a member of a local New Testament church. Believers baptism when they believed, then they were baptized and became a part of a local church. And then as a regular occurrence, they were fellowshipping, taking their meals together and listening to the apostles teaching. That’s the equivalent today of the apostles teaching us Bible teaching, because the apostles were the man chiefly used by God to write the New Testament. And so in addition to that, they were having the Lord’s Supper together.

Now we know that in this setting they always had the Lord’s Supper in connection with the meal. And the reason for that was because they were always together. At this point in time, the church was made up chiefly of pilgrims who had come to Jerusalem from other areas of the world. And of course, many Jews that lived in Jerusalem were being saved. And so many of these pilgrims didn’t have a job, didn’t have a place to live, didn’t have money, didn’t have anything. They had probably run out of the resources early on. And also there are many poor slaves that were saved. And so these guys had nothing in the church for a limited period of time, pooled all their money together, and people were staying with one another. They were taking their meals off together and so regularly, on a daily occurrence, they’d have the Lord’s Supper after a main meal.

And so when the gospel later was spread to the Gentile churches, the Gentiles were used to a pagan feast, a pagan love feast. And when they got saved, they just transformed the love feast over to an agape feast, a celebration of Christ. And they also tagged the Lord’s Supper on to the back of the meal. That was very common.

So we see here from the New Testament text, was not this real, rigid, structured, binding way to observe the supper. There was different things done in different settings because it was convenient and because it fit in their background. And from what they were used to.

So that sort of sets the setting in the historical background of the Passover meal and the early Lord’s Supper ordinance in the early church.

Now let’s go to our main text back in First Corinthians chapter 11 and speak of two things concerning the purpose of the supper. Two things. Number one, the supper is given to remember him. The supper is given to us so that we might remember him. In verse 24 says, “and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, this is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” Verse 25. “In the same way he took the cup also after supper, saying, this cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”

Now let’s follow this beginning in verse 24. The first phrase says, “and when he had given thanks, he broke it”. Now there’s more to that phrase. He broke it than meets the eye. Because remember the the Corinthians were one of the major problems they were having, as they didn’t take the bread and break it to distribute it. They just took it and ate it. And there are a lot of folks showing up didn’t get anything. And so Paul makes the point when Jesus celebrated the first Lord’s Supper with his apostles, that not when he transformed the Passover into the Lord’s Supper, he broke the bread and distributed it around. Then verse 24 continues, as Paul is giving this divine revelation that the Lord gave him concerning the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper. And he says, “he broke it and said, this is my body, which is for you”. Jesus was saying, in essence, as bread is health to the body. So the body of Christ is spiritual health to us. What he did through his body on the cross brings spiritual healing to us.

And then he says something that just penetrates our soul. Three [Four] short words in the New American Standard, “which is for you”. I can’t fathom that. I can’t take that in. That the Son of God, perfect and holy and righteous, would totally and without reservation said my body “is for you”. I’m telling you, I just as Paul’s there in silence, I think it’s very good for us — Him, literally, God incarnate. The one who knew no sin. Perfect and righteous and sinless, said, this body is about to be totally surrendered and given over for you. “This is my body, which is for you”. And what unbelievable love and sacrifice.

Look at verse 25. “In the same way he took the cup also after supper.” That means this was instituted toward the end of the Passover supper, saying, “this cup is the new covenant in my blood.” What a beautiful picture! And there at the end, he takes the last cup of several cups used during the Passover feast. He says, “now this cup is the new covenant in my blood.” You could say it’s the new promise. God promised his people one thing under the Old Testament dispensation, and they sacrificed the blood of animals to ratify that covenant. But now there is a new covenant, and he’s saying, I’m soon going to ratify a brand new covenant with man. And that covenant is not through the blood of turtledoves and goats, our bullocks, or literal four legged lambs. That covenant, this new promise between God and man, will be ratified by my blood.

The old covenant, ratified through the blood of animals. The new one through the blood of Christ. This blood, this ratification of the covenant has much the same meaning that we have today. When we sign on the dotted line and obligate ourselves in a contract today. In that Old Testament dispensation, God spoke to the nation of Israel there in Egyptian bondage. And he said, if you’ll sign on the dotted line by putting the blood on the doorpost, then I will deliver you from Egyptian bondage. And Lord Jesus, using that analogy, is simply saying to us, I’m going to sign on the dotted line tomorrow afternoon for you with my own blood.

The old covenant required continuous sacrifices. They’d come to Jerusalem for the Passover one year, and have to come again, and have to come again, and have to come again and bring another lamb and another lamb and another lamb and another lamb. But the book of Hebrews says, Christ is infinitely “superior” to all of those sacrifices. “He was slain once and for all to take away our sin”.

So Christ is saying, as glorious and as wonderful as it is for the Jew to remember the blood on the doorpost, and how God passed over those homes and delivered you from Egyptian bondage. Now that blood is replaced by the blood of the cross.

It’s interesting that they used Juice, or in that day wine was used to cover a lot of items that could make an intoxicating type drink. It could mean a drink that had very, very, very mild intoxication, or it could just mean, drink with absolutely no intoxicating, intoxicating effect. But it was nonetheless juice of the vine or juice of a grape. And the Lord was showing by using that, that just as the juice of the vine was pressed out in the wine press, so the blood was pressed out of his precious body, under the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, just as a wine press would push down on the grapes and and rupture the skins, and the juice would flow forth. So Christ was pointing to them that tomorrow evening I’m going to be crushed, in the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, and my body will burst forth, and my blood will be shed to institute a new covenant with you.

The supper, he’s saying, is for remembering my suffering, remembering what I’m about to do for you, but not only remembering my suffering, but remembering the result of my suffering, that I have freed you from the curse of the law when I die on the cross. I’ve taken the barrier away. Friend, we were locked up under the law. The Bible says all men are guilty before God. Jew and Gentile. Those who had the law. Those who did not have the law. It was as if we were locked in an iron bands on our hands in iron bands around our ankle and chains wrapped all around us and bolted to the back of an iron cell with steel and concrete walls around us and a steel impenetrable gate on the front and we were locked into the law. But Christ says, when I die on the cross tomorrow I’m going to free you from bondage to the curse of the law that’ll be in your past. So when you take the supper, he says, do it remembering me. Remember my body. Remember my blood. Remember what I’m accomplishing for you.

Well now, on a more practical note there in verse 25, we get an insight on how often do we partake of the supper. That is, the $64 million question. I mean, how often do you take the supper? We says there in verse 25, one of the last phrases “do this as often as you drink it”. The phrase literally means as many times soever. So the emphasis is not on a certain day and a certain time, and a certain frequency of taking the supper. It just says, when you do it, when soever you do it, do it like this. So perhaps we should say, when did the early church take the supper? Well, we can go back to the first occurrence there in Acts chapter two. And you know what? We find out that the early church, the very early church, took the Lord’s Supper daily, and they took it at the end of a great meal. So they were partaking of the Lord’s Supper every day.

And then we look a little further to Acts chapter 20, and we find that now the church is settled. They’re not all living together, and all taking their meals together and all pooling their money together. At this point, they’re becoming more settled. Perhaps the guys who stayed in town were getting jobs and finding places to stay on their own, for their own families. And then the Bible says they came together weekly. And when they came together weekly, they took the Lord’s Supper because it was the most convenient time early on, when they were all together, every day, all day long. It was convenient to take it daily. Later on, as they settled in their routines, that it was convenient to take it weekly.

Now, what is the point? The point is, obey the Lord Jesus Christ and participate in the glorious privilege of the supper and honor him when you take it. Matter of fact, if we really want to be biblical, if we want to say we want to get to the earliest practice of the church, the most biblical text, and if you want to have a legalistic spirit about it, you would say, well, you got to take the supper daily. You have to take it after a meal and you have to take it in your homes. That’s what the early church did. But it’s not a legalism. It’s not a law element to this. Again, the point is obey the Lord. Participate in the wonderful privilege of the Lord’s Supper. Now here’s an interesting point. The supper memorializes and celebrates our freedom from law. Yet there are some today who want to make the supper a law. Don’t make the supper a law that binds man and condemns man. It’s a supper celebrating our victory over the curse of the law. Don’t make it a law. Just observe it properly. And it’s the right meaning. And for God’s glory and for man’s good.

That’s the point Paul is making. So first of all, he says here the supper is to remember him and his death for us, but also it is to proclaim him, to proclaim him. He says that very clearly in verse 26, “for as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.” The word proclaimed there means an outward proclamation. You see, salvation is a private thing. Salvation is between you and God. Only you know if the Holy Spirit has convicted you of sin. Only you know if the Holy Spirit has convinced you of Christ. Only you know if you’ve truly rested and placed your faith in Christ and what he did, I mean, that’s between you and God in your heart.

But then after that happens and you are saved, then you’re to be baptized. That’s a public thing. Baptism makes a public statement. And so the Lord’s Supper also is to be a public event. It’s to make a public statement. Let me mention a five things about proclaiming him. First of all, we proclaim his death to ourselves when we take the Lord’s Supper. We’re saying to ourselves a fresh he’s my Savior. He gave his precious body for me. He became sin for me. He was crushed under the weight of the judgment of God for me in my place. His blood was spilled for me and I have victory. It’s a public statement to our sins.

Also, we do it to make a statement to God. It’s a public statement from us to God. We’re saying, God, we believe in your son, the Lord Jesus Christ. We’re not ashamed to call him our Savior. We believe he was truly God incarnate. We believe he actually and literally was hung on a cross. We believe he actually and literally took our judgment there on the cross, and all of our punishment was laid on him. We believe he literally died and rose again on the third day. Father, we want to tell you we believe in your son and his death, his burial, and his resurrection.

Also, we partake of the supper to show it to our fellow Christians and proclaim his death therefore, to our fellow Christians. We’re saying one to another, come, let’s take the supper together with one heart, one man, one spirit, united in one love, all on equal ground before Calvary’s cross. All with gratitude in our hearts to him. Fourthly, we also proclaim it to the world when we take the Lord’s Supper. We’re saying to the whole world around us that we’re unashamed to call Jesus Christ our Lord. We’re not ashamed to name him as our King. We’re not ashamed to say that we are unworthy sinners. And it was the death of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, that cured our sin problem. We’re not ashamed to humble ourselves and tell the whole world that we’re worthless sinners, except that Jesus has cleansed us and forgiven us and given us life.

And lastly, we proclaim it to sinners as we partake of the Lord’s Supper, especially in a church of this size we’re very mindful that there are some with us who have not received the Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior, and we have the attitude of prayer as we take that supper. Lord, I pray that that person that’s here that is not confess their sins and receive Christ would be saved today and come to know all that you’ve done for them. Just like you’ve done it for us. You shed your blood for them. You became sin for them. You took the judgment of God for them. You died in their place and they too can know freedom from the curse of the law. They too can leave the building today and know that they’re not in the guilt and condemnation of the law any longer. They’re free now because you took all that away on Calvary’s cross.

So we proclaim it when we take it as sinners. We proclaim it to ourselves. We proclaim it to our God. We proclaim it to our fellow Christians. We proclaim it to the world, and we proclaim his death to sinners. So the Apostle Paul and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit says, I’m going to give you not what I thought of, but what the Lord says. The supper is so that you might remember him and all that he’s done, and that you might continually proclaim him until he returns. That’s the purpose of the Lord’s Supper.