Proclaiming the Lord's death until He comes

The first Lord's Supper

(Photo created by AI)

Luke 22:7-13 CSB

“7 Then the Day of Unleavened Bread came when the Passover lamb had to be sacrificed. 8 Jesus sent Peter and John, saying, “Go and make preparations for us to eat the Passover.” 9 “Where do you want us to prepare it?” they asked him. 10 “Listen,” he said to them, “when you’ve entered the city, a man carrying a water jug will meet you. Follow him into the house he enters. 11 Tell the owner of the house, ‘The Teacher asks you, “Where is the guest room where I can eat the Passover with my disciples?”’ 12 Then he will show you a large, furnished room upstairs. Make the preparations there.” 13 So they went and found it just as he had told them, and they prepared the Passover.”

Luke tells us that Jesus’ death is a matter of divine necessity. Right off the bat, he said it was the day when the Passover Lamb HAD to be sacrificed. The Passover lamb symbolizes and parallels Jesus’ sacrifice.

PASSOVER IN A NUTSHELL

The Passover is one of the most important events in Jewish History and is supposed to be remembered and celebrated every year. You can find the story in the book of exodus. The Israelites were enslaved in Egypt for over 400 years until God called Moses to lead the people out of Egypt. The Pharaoh did not want to let the Israelites go, so God had to keep sending plagues to make him realize God wouldn’t take a no for an answer. God would send a plague, and the pharaoh would get scared and say the Israelites could leave, then change his mind and keep them enslaved people. So God would send a different plague, and the pharaoh would get scared, say they could go, and then change his mind. This happened nine different times until the 10th plague happened. 

The last plague was the plague for the firstborn, where God struck down all the firstborn children and animals in Egypt. But the Israelites were saved from this plague if they sacrificed a lamb and marked their doors with the blood from the lamb and by staying inside. The plague would “pass over” any house marked by blood. While this was happening, the Israelites were to eat a particular meal with unleavened (flat) bread, which is celebrated with a meal called the seder. This is the meal that Jesus and his disciples are preparing for. So the two disciples go and get everything ready.

Luke 22:14-16 CSB

14 When the hour came, he reclined at the table, and the apostles with him. 15 Then he said to them, “I have fervently desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. 16 For I tell you, I will not eat it again until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God.” 

The hour is not necessarily chronological, but saying, “the time is now.” It’s a memory of the disciples of the beginning of the most important and impactful weekends of their life. Jesus said he fervently desired to eat this meal with them, but he won’t. He gets everything ready and then doesn't eat it. He won’t eat it again until the kingdom has fully come and heaven comes to earth. 

Luke 22:17-20 CSB

17 Then he took a cup, and after giving thanks, he said, “Take this and share it among yourselves. 18 For I tell you, from now on I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes.” 19 And he took bread, gave thanks, broke it, gave it to them, and said, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” 20 In the same way he also took the cup after supper and said, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.

Drinking a cup after someone meant more to people in the first century than today. To drink after someone meant that you were entering a communal relationship with that person to the point that you were saying you would share the destiny with that person, for good or bad. Right off the bat, the disciples understood this meal was different from any other meal they had ever had with Jesus. Everyone at the table is saying when they drink the cup, that they will share in the destiny of Jesus and each other, for better or worse. However, they have yet to learn what that means. 

And then Jesus does something no one has done before. He takes the bread and the Passover cup and says they are him. He is saying, “this bread that you have been eating for years, this cup that your ancestors have been drinking for thousands of years, this is me. The bread is my body; the cup is my blood. The story of the Passover, that is about me. It was my blood that was spread on the doorpost that saved everyone who believed in me. The bread is my body; It was given for you. It was broken so that you could be made whole. I will be broken so that you can be made whole. The cup is my blood. It is poured out for you. I will be slaughtered so that you can live. I will pour out my blood so that you can find forgiveness and life, and peace.

Ephesians 1:7

"In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace"

And Jesus says to do this in remembrance of him. This doesn't mean a remembrance like you would find on a grave or monument or statue with an inscription "in remembrance of..." But like the Passover meal, remembrance is re-creating the moment that proclaims the saving act of salvation. It is not just remembering but reenacting and putting it into practice. Regarding Jesus, the past isn't supposed to stay in the past but to be re-lived now. The Passover meal they celebrated yearly was a reenactment that remembered God's deliverance from slavery. So communion is the reenactment of what Jesus did for all of us on the cross, bringing us salvation.

1 Corinthians 11:23-26 CSB 

23 For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: On the night when he was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, broke it, and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me." 25 In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, and said, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” 26 For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.

Doing this in remembrance is more than a tradition or ceremony; it is actively participating in Jesus' death and resurrection.  Proclaiming is more than announcing that this Supper represents that Jesus died for us -- Thats easy. It means living out the implication of Jesus dying for us. It means we die to ourselves every day. It means we say no to our flesh. We say no to unforgiveness, injustice, jealousy, impure motives, and any immorality or sin and say “Yes” to Jesus's way of life. 

The author Eugene Peterson writes, ‘Without the Eucharist it is very easy to drift into a spirituality that is dominated by ideas about Jesus instead of receiving life from Jesus. The Eucharist says a plain ‘no’ to all that. The Eucharist puts Jesus in his place, dying on the cross and giving us that sacrificed life. And it puts us in our place: opening our hands and receiving the remission of our sins, which is our salvation.’*

Pray

“Almighty God, I thank You for feeding me with the body and blood of Your Son Jesus Christ. Through Him I offer you my soul and body to be a living sacrifice. Send me out in the power of Your Spirit to live and work for Your praise and glory.”