The Lord's Supper: A Covenant of Grace and Salvation

I was at a graduation ceremony this week and part of the ceremony was they had people sing the National Anthem and say the Pledge of Allegiance. And when they were singing through the National Anthem, I was thinking about the circumstances under which it was written. Francis Scott Key was in the harbor on a ship and he was looking at the fort where it was under attack. And there at the evening, when the evening came, the flag was flying. Overnight, the British military was fighting bombing this fort. They had flares up in the air and they could see the flag a little bit. They had bombs bursting and when the light came, they could see the flag a little bit. And all night, they wondered, will it still be there tomorrow? And then the song says, when the light of the day began to strike, they could see the stars and stripes were still there. When I sang the song and thinking about the circumstances of it and I got to that part, just kind of chills came over me, thinking what it would be like to think your country was on the very urge of destruction and then to be able to see that the flag was still there. The event that Jesus is encountering here with his disciples is sort of like remembering the birth of their nation. The time whenever they were thinking back about the people of Israel in Egypt for 400 years and now brought out of Egypt to be formed into a nation, they were slaves before but now they would be formed into a nation. They would become the people of Israel. The Passover celebration was a time in which these events of the Passover were recounted, their exodus from Egypt. And all of the events of the Passover reminded them of that and the story was told and they must have been stirred by that but even in a way different than we are about our country because in this event, they were talking about personal actions of God. They were so powerful, they would never ever forget them. Maybe we could sympathize with this if you think back in your own life about a time in which you were in trouble or in need and you prayed to God and in some kind of dramatic and powerful way, he extended his hand to you. If you could kind of combine that spiritual high in your life with this patriotic event that took place, you might get some sense of the excitement that takes place with these people at the celebration of the Passover. It was a time of great patriotism, spiritual patriotism. It was thrilling to them as they recall it once a year, this great activity and power of God. So Jesus was going through the disciples, going through the elements of the Passover with his disciples, talking about each of these events and then he gets to the last of it and he changes the pattern. Each time there was a glass of wine that would be consumed and at that last place, Jesus then, the third cup of wine, he stops here and this is what takes place, Matthew chapter 26 verse 26. Jesus is describing for them the events of the Passover in history and now he moves in a little change of direction. He doesn't complete the normal Passover celebration as it's usually done but he turns it in a different direction as if he's saying even though these things were wonderful and terrific, you haven't heard anything yet. While they were eating, Jesus took bread and gave thanks and broke it and gave it to his disciples saying, take, eat, this is my body. Then he took the cup, gave thanks and offered it to them saying, drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. I tell you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it anew with you in my father's kingdom. When they'd sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives. Here, Jesus gathers his disciple for this very last time to eat with them. It's a meal and then finishes with this Passover discussion and here he stops at the end of it and says, getting a piece of bread, breaking the bread, he gives thanks for it and then he passes it out to each of the disciples to be able to break a piece off for their own and he says, this is my body. Now when Jesus said these words, it would have been in Hebrew just this, my body. No connecting verb would have been necessary for them but that's what he meant, this is my body. Jesus was reminding them of the sacrifice that he was giving for them, that his life was laid out for them. He came into the world for the people who were around him. He knew their desperate need for spiritual redemption and change and he came and gave himself completely and totally for them and their lives. He wanted them to understand that just as if his body were taken and broken into little pieces and distributed, so his own life had been broken into little pieces and given to all the people that he met and certainly to those 12 he had with him. That brings me to remind us about who was sitting at this table. This wasn't a collection of people off the street. It wasn't that Jesus opened the doors and said, y'all come. It wasn't that Jesus invited everyone. At the 5,000, in fact, he had broken bread and passed it out before but it wasn't the Lord's Supper. It was just Jesus feeding people. This was different. It's what we call the Lord's Supper. That time when Jesus shared with his disciples something very important and here he is saying to these people, this is my body given for you. Now, the group that was gathered there were all people Jesus had chosen. He came to them and said, come and follow me and I'll teach you to be fishers of men. I'll give you a new purpose for your life. I'll give you something to live for, something that will give you a meaning and value and purpose to your life. A lot of people work hard all their life at a job and it has their purpose and when they retire, they lose that. This is a purpose that never stops. Until the very end of your life, no matter of your physical condition, you can still be a fisher of people. Jesus called them to this task. They left their jobs to do this. They left their homes and families to do this. They left everything in the world to come and follow Jesus so he might shape their life and its future and its destiny. They started off by beginning to learn who Jesus was. They walked around with him. They listened to what he had to say. They learned from him. They were allowing their minds to soak in all these things that Jesus was telling them about how they should live and how they should think of God and how they should pray. All the things necessary to be able to live the spiritual life to which he was directing them. These people had devoted themselves to following Jesus. Nothing in this world would turn them aside from that. They didn't always get along with each other and they didn't always get along with Jesus. There were times when Jesus had to turn to some of his disciples and say, you're out of line. One time he said to his chief disciple, the devil's got a hold of you. I don't encourage you to use that in church. It might offend people if you told them the devil's got a hold of your life and it probably offended Peter. But it didn't stop him for one single step of living in obedience to what Jesus asked him to do. Why? Because there was something more important than his own feelings and his own nature and his own needs. And it was the father had called him to follow Jesus. The disciples were just ordinary people like we are, going through all the same problems that we go through. But one thing was permanent with them. They had said to Jesus, we will follow you. That was the group of people that were here. The Lord's Supper, you see, is not made for all the people in the community to come and celebrate with us. It's not made for everybody to come and enjoy eating the bread and drinking the drink. It's made for those people who have made a promise to God. I give my life in submission to your authority. It's given to us for the same kind of people Jesus had here. Now there were a lot of followers who listened to Jesus. He didn't invite them. He invited those he knew had made this promise to be his people now and forever. And so he says to them, you are mine because I've given my life for you. Now I'm asking you to give your life for me. Then Jesus turned and took the cup. He took the cup and gave thanks and offered it to them saying, drink from it, all of you. Now when the scripture uses the word cup, it could mean simply a physical vessel that you might hold. But in the story of Jesus' life, the cup has a very prominent place. In fact, just previous to this story, Jesus was talking to his disciples and two of them came up and said, when you enter your kingdom, we would like to be very helpful to you and important to you. Could we be one of us on your right-hand man and the other be your second-in-command or third-in-command? We want to have places where we can really serve you. Jesus knew what they were asking and he said to them, can you drink the cup that I must drink? They didn't understand what Jesus was talking about. And they said, you bet, we'll be glad to do that. He said, well, you will. And they did. He was talking about the painful life that he was going to live and the death that he was going to experience in obedience to the Father. And he called this sacrifice of his life a cup. Now, just after this event takes place, Jesus is in the Garden of Gethsemane. He's on his knees praying to the Father because he knows the end is very close. And he says to the Father, I want to ask if it's possible that this cup would be removed from me. He wasn't talking about a physical vessel that you could hold in your hand. He was talking about the trial he would go through in which his life would be painfully taken from him in obedience to the Father. This is the role that you've given me. That's the way we might say it. This is the responsibility you've given to me. That's the way we might say it. Jesus here uses the word cup. It's symbolic, it seems to me, that Jesus took this one cup and he filled it and he passed it to the disciples. After all this was over, when they read, when they were talking about what Jesus did and someone told them the story of Jesus kneeling and his friends reminded the group that they had once asked him about serving him and they all talked about the cup, this experience must have taken a brand new, powerful meaning. We did drink of that cup. We did drink the drink that he gave to us. We've made a pledge and a promise that we would be faithful to him all the way to the end. Drink it, he said, all of you. Sometimes in the observance of the Lord's Supper, some people the pastor drinks it and the other people don't get to drink it. Here, Jesus makes clear for his disciples that everyone has to drink it. It is not my responsibility to do all the work in the church and accept all the pain and responsibility in the church. It's everyone who's a part of the kingdom has a part of that. There's not one cup for Jesus, another for me and then you guys can sit and watch. Everybody drinks the cup. Everybody says, whatever you ask of me, I will give. Specifically, Jesus said, here is the cup. All of you drink it. Jesus was talking to a group of people who had made the pledge that they were prepared to drink the cup. It didn't matter what God asked. They were prepared to drink the cup. Drink it, all of you, he said to them. This is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for the remission of sins, forgiveness of sins. What Jesus is talking about when he uses the word covenant, it's kind of our same word as contract. He's talking about a passage in the Old Testament in Exodus chapter 24 when the people of Israel came up out of Egypt and they gathered at Sinai and God gave them the Ten Commandments and all the laws of Deuteronomy and Leviticus to tell them how they should live. He gave them those instructions and Moses was given those and he came down and read them to the people and God said, I want you to call all the people together and I want you to tell them what I require of them. And then I want you to ask them if they're prepared and they're willing to do it. In chapter 24 of the book of Exodus beginning with verse 3 this is the story. When Moses went and told the people of the Lord's words and laws they responded with one voice, everything the Lord has said we will do. Moses then wrote down everything the Lord had said. He got up early the next morning and built an altar at the foot of the mountain and set up 12 stone pillars representing the 12 tribes of Israel. Then he sent young Israelite men and they offered burnt offerings and sacrifices, young bulls as fellowship offerings to the Lord. Moses took half of the blood, put it in bowls and the other half he sprinkled on the altar. Then he took the book of the covenant, that is the book that he'd given the law, the Ten Commandments, Deuteronomy and Leviticus. He had the blood in the bowls, he took the book of the covenant and read it to the people. Again they heard in detail what he was asking them to do. Now this wasn't a five-minute deal to read all the book of Leviticus and Deuteronomy, it's a long, long story. They stood there for a long time and listened to him to read it. Then when it was over they responded, we will do everything the Lord has said, we will obey. Moses then took the blood and sprinkled it on the people and said, this is the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words. The blood was a symbol from God of his affirmation of his part of the covenant. They were to do everything he told them and he would be God for them. He would guide them, provide for them, protect them, give them meaning and value in their life. And the blood was a symbol of God's great gift to them. So when Jesus was talking about the covenant blood, he is saying my blood represents that same kind of covenant that God made in the Old Testament. This is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. Now Jesus wasn't talking about the Old Covenant. The people who were there knew about the book of Jeremiah. In the book of Hebrews it tells us through a repeat of the story of what happened in the Old Testament. Chapter 8 of the book of Hebrews beginning with verse 7, this is what the writer of Hebrews said, for if there has been nothing wrong with the first covenant, no place would have been sought for another. He's saying the first covenant Moses made, if there's nothing wrong with it, then no repeat would have been necessary for it. But God found fault with the people and said, the time is coming declares the Lord when I will make a new covenant, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their forefathers when I took them by the hand, excuse me, you have the page to turn. I don't have to work harder at it. To lead them out of Egypt because they did not remain faithful to my covenant and I turned away from them declares the Lord. This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time declares the Lord. I will put my law in their minds and I will write them on their hearts. I will be their God and they will be my people. No longer will a man teach his neighbor or a man his brother saying, know the Lord because they will all know me from the least to the greatest. For I will forgive their wickedness and I will remember their sins no more. By calling this covenant new, he made the first one obsolete and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear. So a new contract God is making with these people there that he makes with us. Now chapter 9 of the book of Hebrews beginning with verse 13. This is what the writer said. The blood of goats, bulls, and the ashes of heifers sprinkled on those who are ceremonial unclean sanctified them so they were outwardly clean. In other words, in the old covenant something was put on the outside to make you ceremonially clean. How much more then will the blood of Christ who through the eternal spirit offered himself unblemished to God cleanse our consciences from the acts that lead to death so that we may serve the living God. For this reason Christ is the mediator of a new covenant that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance now that he's died as a ransom to set them free from the sins committed under the first covenant. In the case of a will, it's necessary to prove death, the death of one who made it because a will is in force only when somebody has died. It never takes effect while the one making the will is living. That's why even the first covenant was not put into effect without blood. When Moses proclaimed every commandment of the law to all the people he took the blood of calves together with water, scarlet wool, and branches of hyssop and sprinkled the scroll and all the people. He said, this is the blood of the covenant which God has commanded you to keep. In the same way he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle and everything used in its ceremonies. In fact, the law requires that nearly everything be cleansed with blood. Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. Now back to what Jesus was talking about. They knew all this, you see. They knew what this story was about. So Jesus said to them, this is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. That's why he said to each one of them, all of you must take and drink for this blood has been spilled, poured out on the ground for you for the forgiveness of sins. All of us come into the world, Paul says, and are guilty of rejecting the authority of God over our lives. And when that happens God puts on us this tag, sinner, condemned, unclean, forever. But the blood of Jesus Christ is given to us so that those who place their trust in Christ as did these disciples to say, we will live in obedience to you whatever you ask, whatever it takes. Then the blood of Jesus is given for them that their sins would be forgiven. I read an article, a guy had committed some kind of sexual perversion and was arrested and put in jail. I think he had stuff on his computer. He was a staff member at a church. And he said, I was told by my mentor, there's something changed about you. You have a new name. Your new name from now on the rest of your life is felon. When you come into the world and you choose to rebel against God, you have a new name. And your name now is sinner, enemy of God. And you can never get rid of it. No matter how hard you try, no matter what you do, you will always have that tag. Accept that the blood of Christ cleanses you of all sin. You can go to jail and serve your time for your crime. But what this man was saying is even when you get out, you'll still be called a felon. With Jesus Christ, the forgiveness not only forgives us of our sin, but erases that title for us. We are now, because of the blood of Jesus and our trust in him, children of God. A new title. No longer does this term, enemy of God, apply to us. For we have been changed by the blood of Jesus Christ. The new covenant, you see, is based not on the blood of animals, but on the blood of Jesus that forgives us of all sin and cleanses us so that we have righteousness. This wasn't enough. Jesus then said to his disciples, I tell you, I will not drink of the fruit of this vine from now on until the day when I drink it anew with you in my Father's kingdom. Well, he said to every one of them, I want to guarantee you that you're going to heaven. I'm going to be in the kingdom with my Father, and I'll tell you that you will be with me. It wasn't because they took this meal, or if it was just taking the meal, they'd have to keep taking it all the time to have this. It was because of their trust in God. Their commitment to say, we will do all the things you tell us. Just like the Israelites at the Mount Sinai had to say. This commitment of trust and faith in God brought them together in the room as committed to Christ, and he could say to them, because of your commitment to me, I can guarantee you, you will be with me in heaven. That's one side of what he said. The other one, he said, I want to promise you that I'm not going to let anything take place. I won't even drink the last cup of the meal, the fourth one they were supposed to take. My vow, and in the Old Testament, people used to, in the New Testament times too, if they made a promise, they would say, Lord, I'm going to promise this to you, and I won't cut my hair till I get it done. Lord, I promise this to you, and I'll never drink wine until the day I get it done. The way of making a vow and having a promise to make beside it. Jesus makes a promise. I'm going to give my life for you, and I won't even drink of any wine until the day I've done my job, and I'm there with you in heaven. He made a promise as to what he would do for them, and he kept it, and he made a promise as to what would happen to them to guarantee that the contract would be kept. The Lord's Supper is a powerful, powerful thing. To take it in your hand and to see this as a symbol of the body of Jesus, and to take the cup and hold it in your hand and see this representation of the very blood of Jesus himself, and to ingest it as to say, Christ is coming into my life. I have given myself to him. It's a powerful, powerful time. It's not for everybody. It's for those who've said to the Lord, I give myself to you. It's those who've said to God, I'll follow you no matter what you ask, and I'll never quit. It's to those who've said, you take first place in my life over everything, my job, my family, everything. You are more important than anything in my life. And to them, Jesus said, this is my body. Take and eat it. He said to them, this is my blood given for you to change your life so that you'll no longer be called an enemy of God, but a child of his. Take this. I promise you, because of your trust in me, you will stand with me forever in eternity. We were at a wedding Friday, Saturday afternoon, and the couple made vows to each other. I think this is similar. The Lord's Supper is sort of like that. It's kind of like a couple that have been married 60 years and want to renew their vows. Every 60 years, they renew them, whether they need it or not. And this is a renewal of a vow. We don't do it every Sunday. You know, it can kind of be routine. If you renewed your vows every week, it might get kind of old after a while. We do it once a quarter, the last of this month, the last Sunday of this month. We want this to be a really special time for you who've committed your life to Christ. You renew that promise. I may not have been doing all those things you've asked me to do, but I search my heart and say, Lord, if there's something undone, show me, I'll do it. And the Lord says, I want to guarantee you that your sins are forgiven, and I'll see you in heaven. And that renewal of his promise to us, and the renewal of our promise to him, encourages us to take that step to live life as God directs it. Would you bow your heads, please, for a moment? The most important question, is you ever made this contract with God? Will you say to him, I know that you are the creator of the universe and the ruler of all that there is. I recognize that. I want to make this promise to you. I'm going to live in obedience to you as best I know how. I'm going to learn what you want me to do. And when I learn that, I'm going to live in obedience to you and when I learn those things, I'm going to try to put them in practice in my life. I'm going to ask you how you want me to serve you and other people around me. And when I learn that, I'm going to do it no matter what it takes. You have my life, now and forever. If you've never made that promise to God, then I'll tell you what happens to you. You get in trouble and circumstances where you don't know what to do. Sometimes you lose hope that your future has any good in it because you don't have confidence that the power of God is with you. And sometimes you look at yourself and you are ashamed of who you are because you feel unworthy. You need exactly what Jesus can do for you. You say to him, I know my life is broken and it's not been perfect, but I give it to you. And he takes off of your life broken and heals on it, child of mine. And that can happen to you today. What I'm asking you to do is to say to God, Lord, I recognize you as the ruler of the world. And today I make this promise to you. As best I know how, I will live in obedience and faith in you for the rest of my life. This is between you and God. His spirit is in your mind and the thoughts you're thinking, he's listening to. So you just have to think these things to God and mean what you say. Maybe you've made the promise to God, but for some reason or other, you get turned off or turned away by different things that happen. And you can look and see that your life is not really living up to what you promised God it would. There are a thousand reasons for it. All of them are really good ones. To human beings, they're good. To God, they make no sense. Do you really love me with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind? If you do, then you'll do what I tell you. Whatever objection comes to your mind, forget it. You listen to me. What is it that God wants from you? Have you given it freely? In a moment, we're going to sing a hymn of invitation. What I'm inviting you to do is to say to God what you need to say. What we're offering to you is an opportunity to come and say openly and publicly God has asked something of me, and today I've heard him, and today I want to say yes to him. It's a way of openly declaring to the world the promise you've made to God so we can all hold each other accountable for doing what God has asked us to do for each other. You'll know that God wants you to do this because inside of you, you'll think, I should do this. I should go to the front of the church and tell these people the promise that God wants me to make. The moment you think of that, Satan will say, well, my goodness, that's embarrassing. You can do that right. He'll give you a lot of reasons not to, but this is your test. Will you do what God tells you? It's the difference between life and death. Not a casual thing today. That's the difference. So, Lord, so, Lord, I've tried to say to these people what you've asked me to say. I ask you and trust you that if there are words that are meant for people here that you would make clear to them that these words are for them, and I pray that your Holy Spirit would say to them, this is what I want you to do about this, and I ask that you'd give them the clear confidence in you, even though it might be difficult to say, okay, God, if that's what you want from me, I'll obey you. In the name of Jesus Christ, I ask for your power and your spirit to be upon us now. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Would you stand, please, while we sing? And God has talked to you about something he wants you to do that you're free to come and share with me the promise that God wants you to make. Hazi will be here with me if you want to come and share with him the promise that you know God wants you to make, and this is your time. ♪ There is a place of quiet rest near to the heart of God ♪ ♪ A place where sin cannot molest near to the heart of God ♪ ♪ Oh Jesus, blessed Redeemer, sent from the heart of God ♪ ♪ Oh Jesus, blessed Redeemer, sent from the heart of God ♪ ♪ Hold us to wait before thee near to the heart of God ♪ ♪ There is a place of comfort sweet, a place of rest near to God ♪ ♪ Near to the heart of God, a place where we our Savior meet ♪ ♪ Near to the heart of God, oh Jesus, blessed Redeemer, sent from the heart of God ♪ ♪ Near to the heart of God, oh Jesus, blessed Redeemer, sent from the heart of God ♪ If you do not feel near to the heart of God, there's only one reason, rebellion, disobedience, and sinfulness. Remove all those, and God will be right next to you. So if you leave with that feeling of distance from God, this is his remedy. Come to me in obedience and faith, and you will find this peace. And so Lord, we lay claim to this. Let us know by your spirit if the peace that you give is ours because of our trust in you, or help us to understand that this restlessness and uncertainty and conflict and distress is a sign that we're not near you. We ask that you wouldn't leave us alone, but constantly remind us that there is a way to be near your heart, and that is a commitment of trust to you as Lord, Savior, and Redeemer. Dismiss us in your love, your mercy, and your grace. In Jesus' name, we ask this. Amen. Amen. When I look out, I see a whole lot of beautiful people because Jesus makes us beautiful. So, Something Beautiful, 623. ♪ Something beautiful ♪ ♪ Something good ♪ ♪ All my confusion He understood ♪ ♪ All I had to offer Him was brokenness and strife ♪ ♪ But He made something beautiful ♪ ♪ Of my life ♪ We have a guest today that I want to introduce, Cecil Dale. Cecil, hold your hand up if you will. He's the other guy here with a suit on. He is our new Director of Missions in our association, and I'd like for you to get a chance to meet him. He'll be working with all the churches and central association to assist us in the work that we're doing. And he was in the service of the church and the mission of the church. He'll assist us in the work that we're doing. And he was in the service over there, so I introduced him there and kind of forgot it here. But, Cecil, we're glad to have you. God bless you and direct you as you help us to be faithful servants of His in central Kansas. Thank you. Dismissed. ♪♪ ♪♪