remember Me!

There is no question that the entire week before Jesus died that His mind was focused upon the cross.  When Mary anointed Him in that beautiful act of love and worship on Wednesday, Jesus said that she was already preparing His body for burial.

Now on Thursday, His disciples had already come to Him and asked where they should make preparation to eat the Passover meal.  This Passover would be the last Passover His disciples would eat.  That night, as He would eat the meal that celebrated God’s redemption, Jesus would give it a whole new meaning; and the new meal and the new meaning would all center on the cross. (Mt. 26:17-30)

​The Passover was a meal given to the Jews to help them remember God´s redemption of them from their bondage in slavery in Egypt.  On the typical table set for Passover were many items, including unleavened bread, four cups of grape juice (probably also unleavened), a bowl of paste called charosheth (a mixture of mashed dates, apples, pomegranates, and nuts that pictured the clay used by the Hebrew slaves to make bricks for Pharaoh), a plate of bitter herbs to remind them of the bitterness of their slavery, and a bowl of salt water as a remembrance of their tears. 

The most important item on the table though was the roasted lamb.  The lamb reminded them of the lamb slain by each family, the blood of which was smeared upon the doorposts and lintels of their homes, so that when death descended upon all the firstborn dwelling in the land of Egypt, it would pass over those who were covered by the blood.

Of all the ingredients available from the Passover Meal, Jesus chose only two to use in the meal He would institute as a meal to help believers remember how He redeemed them from bondage to sin: the unleavened bread, a cup of grape juice.

​WHY THE BREAD?

• The bread itself means that Deity became human. Jesus had said,

John 6:48-51 NKJV   48 I am the bread of life. 49 Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and are dead. 50 This is the bread which comes down from heaven, that one may eat of it and not die. 51 I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world.

• The lack of leaven means the Son of Man lived a perfect, sinless life.
• The breaking of the bread means that the Exalted One humbled Himself, even to the point of a humiliating death on the cross. 
• Eating the bread means that by grace through faith, the Living Christ has come into our lives.

WHY THE CUP?

• The cup means the Perfect Sacrifice shed His blood to pay for our sins.
• The cup means the new covenant has come. 
• Drinking the cup means that by grace through faith, we have entered into that new covenant with God. 

Ephesians 2:8 NKJV   For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God,

WHY NOT THE LAMB?

• Because Jesus is the Lamb.

John 1:29 NKJV   The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! 

• Because there is only One Lamb of God, sacrificed one time.

            Each Passover many lambs were sacrificed, and new ones every year.
            But the Lamb of God only needed to be sacrificed one time.
Jesus said, “Do this in remembrance of Me.”

I do not know of any single worship service that has ever been more meaningful to me as a follower of Christ or as a pastor than when we celebrate The Lord´s Supper.  I look forward to that time that we are re-gathered as a church to worship the Lord.  Soon after we are able to meet together again, we will eat this supper together as a church, and we will remember the Lord Jesus until He comes again.