Meaning & History of the Lord's Supper

hey everybody I'm pastor Jeff Durbin with apologia Church I want to thank you all so much for watching the content right here on apologia Studios channel well you're about to watch is a sermon a message from apologia church's worship service and again I want to thank you all so much for watching for liking for commenting for sharing the sermon itself we truly believe that it's important for the Christian Church to have an engagement in the public square with the Word of God so we thank you so much for partnering with us to send this out across the world I just wanted to say something before you actually watch this and that is that I'm not your pastor though I'd love to be I am NOT your pastor and it's very important as you're watching this you know that it's God's design for individual Christians to be part of a local Christian Church under the care of qualified faithful biblical elders and so as much as we love all of you watching these sermons and we're thankful to God that God uses them to bless you to encourage you I do want to encourage you as a minister of the gospel to get plugged into a local body of believers particularly I think important a reformed church would be it would be best but we want to encourage you to get plugged into a solid biblical church where you can fellowship where you can worship where you can serve where you can be connected that is vitally important and actually a biblical command and so as much as again as we love for your participation your partnership and we are so thankful to God that he's using these in your lives we want to encourage you to get plugged into a local church you can though actually partner with apologia church as we proclaim the gospel and provide a defense of the biblical gospel all around the world you can do that by going to apologia studios.com you can partner with us by becoming all access when you do you help to make all of this possible and you get all of our TV shows our after shows and apologia academy all of that and you're a part of all that God is doing with us in the world to proclaim Herald the gospel of the kingdom you can partner with us and I want to say one last word about that do make sure that none of your giving and partnership towards apology a chirp Church interferes with your giving your worship your tithes your offerings to a local body of believers in your area so thank you again so much for watching these and sharing them god bless you I remember very clearly when I was baptized I was 7 years of age and people told me later that all they could see was the top of my head so I don't think I think I would have been alright and there I'm not sure but but it was Bible Baptist Church in Sharman's town Pennsylvania and they said that pretty much all they could see was was that and I I do remember that we sang up from the grave he rose it's a good baptism song and but what's interesting and I had not thought about it literally until today move that over there I don't remember the first time I / took of the Lord's table I remember the baptism but I do not remember the first time I partook at the Lord's table and what it reflects is there was not in my more fundamentalist background much of an emphasis upon the Lord's Supper anybody else from a background like that anybody would say yeah it was pretty much okay not many of you not many of you that's interesting in most Baptist churches non reformed in the United States the Lord's Supper is celebrated once per quarter on a Sunday night at the end of the service and so that would be a you know four times per year sometimes made to sync up with some type of holiday celebration for Christmas sometimes with some candles and stuff like that for the Christmas service whatever it might be but in general the Lord's Supper was just that one time per corridor when you were not going to beat the Methodists to Tastee Freez Dairy Queen does that work better he's dating himself over and over again if there is any poor man yes it was not it was not a central aspect of worship how did we get there how did we get there because when you think about we're gonna be looking in Matthew chapter 26 if you want to turn there we will get there but when you think about the Lord's Supper historically that is not how the Lord's Supper has been viewed by Christians from the beginning in the early church even during the period of persecution remember the churches begins to encounter official Roman persecution as early as the sixth decade of the first century there is often on sporadic imperial persecution of the Christian Church really kicking off toward the end of the first century you've certainly got Nero's persecution or in the seventh decade but especially in the 90s you start getting more Imperial persecution across the Empire it's always spotty it's not all the way around it can be very severe in certain places for a number of years and it's not until the 250s you get empire-wide persecution everywhere from the middle to 50's into the piece of the church in AD 313 so you've got about 60 years of very bad the worst persecution right there at the end of that period when then you have the conversion of Constantine the Peace of the church in 313 which by the way is not when the Roman Empire technically becomes a Christian Empire if you could ever really use that term that happens in the three 80s under Theodosius so during that time period during the persecution you would have individuals who would literally risk their lives just to go to church you've heard the stories about using the the fish as a symbol of the where the meeting place was going to be and how Christians would would hook up with one another and and yet it was still dangerous and just as we have many believers in the world today that face the same type of a situation where you might have people gathering together with you if you don't know everyone there might be people there who are there to spy out on you and to turn you in to the Roman authorities and there were many many many martyrs that were made across the Roman Empire during those centuries and that's happening in the church even to this day in many places and yet there was this incredible desire for Christian Fellowship which included very importantly the partaking of the Lord's Supper that symbol of fellowship and unity and people were willing to risk their lives now it is important to note that for example if you were too sick to attend they would take the elements to you but keep something in mind how many here would say that you are you at some point in your life have been part of the Roman Catholic Church okay that's a whole lot more than the fundamentalists were and so you know that in Roman Catholicism today the elements of not what's called the Lord's Supper but of course the Eucharistic sacrifice of the mass are considered sacred in the doctrine of transubstantiation the idea is that the the very body soul blood and divinity of Jesus is not just represented in those elements but there is a miracle that takes place called transubstantiation which which changes the elements not the accidents which is the outward appearance but the inward essence of the the substance technically it's an Aristotelian distinction the substance has changed in the body soul blood and divinity of Jesus while the accidents remain the same it still looks like wine still tastes like wine so it looks like bread still tastes like bread but it isn't what makes it what it is it's substance has been changed that was not the doctrine of the early church oh the the people near the church did believe that Jesus was present with them but you want to know why how you can prove that the early church did not have the doctrine of transubstantiation till about 1000 AD it's real simple those of you who are former Roman Catholics if this was a Roman Catholic Church as you came in the back what we were supposed to do you've got the holy water back there you're supposed to the sign of the Cross but you're what do you what is the focus of the attention well in the church somewhere is something called a tabernacle or a monstrance or a ciborium there's different names that are given to the various types of these containers into which consecrated hosts are placed and so once the priest elevates the hosts and he says in the old latin anyways doesn't say it this way after the 1960's though there are latin mass churches that still continue to do this Hoke s corpus meum this is my body because of the ordination of the priests the miracle of transubstantiation takes place and that wafer becomes divine it becomes the incarnation of Jesus and so you keep consecrated wafers in the tabernacle there's a light on in front of it in most Roman Catholic churches and when you come in you bow you genuflect because God is physically present in the room that's why you do them the early church would take the elements they would take the bread and the wine and they would go to those who were sick who could not come to the fellowship and they would distribute those elements to them but they would never then venerate them or store them up in any special way once that was done it was done that proves they did not believe in the doctrine that came became prevalent at the beginning of the second millennium the doctrine of transubstantiation but there was obviously especially after the period of persecution ends that celebration of the supper now you have many people coming into the church who are not coming to the church because they have repented of their sins and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ but because that's now the fashionable thing to do Andy ventures as said under Theodosius it becomes the official religion of the Empire well folks the church has never done real well when it's be been governmentally promulgated I was just in the Netherlands and Holland was a place of deep Calvinistic orthodoxy in centuries past what has become of most of that is something you and I would not even recognize in fact in many churches and what's called the Bible Belt in Netherlands today well earlier today anyways because it's a good eight hours earlier there in those churches you might have this many people gathering in one place in a Reformed Church but then when the Supper is offered you might have ten people who would partake of the supper and that wouldn't even include all the elders why well it's not because of a change in the theology of the supper particularly it's because of a perversion of reformed theology to the point where they have so hyper defined things like repentance that no one can do it and so they have no assurance of salvation without an assurance of salvation don't partake of the supper and therefore it's almost like jehovah's witnesses the Jobos witnesses gather once per year for the memorial supper and the only people to partake of the people who claim to be of 144,000 which means in 99% of all congregations the elements are passed up and down the aisles and nobody / takes any way sad when you think of what Jesus actually said to his disciples it's sad in light of what we are going to do in only a few minutes in this room but that's what has happened there in the Netherlands now what happens once you have a lot of unbelievers coming in is you start to emphasize elements within the worship service that are more common in human religion you see the Supper is a place where we are all equal there is one food there's one table there's one Savior we all have the same need for him it's the great equalizer you had the rich and the poor slave owners and slaves Jews and Gentiles they all come to one table and we don't have one table over here for one kind of person one table here for another kind of person but once the nature of the church starts changing then people start bringing in their traditions and you've already had the development of a priesthood by the time of the turn of the millennium you have a allegedly celibate priesthood which was almost never celibate but that's what it happened and you have Sasser totalism sacramentalism the idea that the priest has the power in and of himself by the his ordination to do special things the the number of ordinances sacraments to the church has ballooned up until the the current Orthodox seven amongst Roman Catholics but then when you get the idea of transubstantiation then everything starts change everything starts changing so once that becomes popular one of the rules that comes up is if you spill the wine and that could happen here we've got little ones and sometimes I've seen someone just come right through here trip fall hit one of these tiny little things and the wines gonna be all over the place isn't it well if you think that that is God literally what are you gonna do how do you clean God up and so the rule was passed because they didn't have carpet back then obviously the rule was passed that the priest had to get down and lick God up yeah so it didn't take long till the cup was withdrawn from the laity and only the priests would commune with the cup and when you came forward all you got was the bread and so and and this is this was it's not very all that long ago they stopped doing this but you would see for a very very long time you'd come forward and the priest would place the small little wafer on the tongue but there would be no drinking of the cup and that then developed a whole new theology because when he keep changing stuff you got to keep changing your theology and that developed a whole new theology the Jesus was equally present body soul blood and divinity in both the bread and the wine because it was sort of obvious that the the wine represented the blood of Christ and the bread represented the body of Christ's have you only getting the if you're only getting the bread then you're only getting part of it and so they developed the idea that no G is equally present in all of it and it really doesn't represent any particular aspect which of course it does in Scripture so much so that one of the problems that developed was that you know standard sort of superstitious people would go well if the wafer is God then if I take a wafer if I steal one while the priest isn't looking or if I don't actually swallow it but I you know just put in a napkin this thing might be able to bring me good luck and so one of the favorite stories that I even used it in a debate a number of years ago I was debating Robertson Genesis on the mass one of my favorite stories that Philip Schaff tells in the portion on medieval history in his multi-volume church history which I highly recommend to you was of a man who stole a he was a beekeeper and so he stole a wafer and he placed it in his hive thinking that this would make the bees make more honey than anybody else made but then all of a sudden he goes out and he discovers to his horror that the bees are no longer making honey at all and so he runs and he finds the priest and he says you're not going to believe what has happened and he confesses to having stolen the wafer and so the priest comes and they open up the hive and what has happened is that the bees have taken the wafer me and they have created an altar and they are surrounding the altar and worshiping the wafer on the altar and no longer making honey and so the priest has to come and take the wafer from the bees and then they take it in procession back to the church so that the bees can get back to making honey I guess this is the kind I mean there are all sorts of stories of bleeding wafers where the wafer would bleed because it's the body soul blood and divinity of Jesus this is the medieval world this is the superstitious world in which this kind of theology was thriving all the way up to the time of the Rev formation and it wasn't an overnight thing it wasn't like November 1st 1517 that was all done with the Reformation took time and some would argue is continuing to take time and needs to be a continuous process semper reprimand always reforming but historically even between 1517 and our confession of 1689 you still got a hundred and seventy some odd years in there in which there is development and thought and consideration and there was tremendous struggle what do we get rid of what's biblical what's not biblical so let me tell you a story about what happened in Vinton burg some of you have seen a video it's sort of a bucket moment for me and I'm closer to the bucket than most of you are but one of those things that I'll never forget Lord willing but you may have seen the video where I got to preach in the castle Church in Wittenberg the very church where the Reformation began where Martin Luther posted the 95 theses and and Martin Luther is buried there if you stand in the high pole but there you got to go up the circular stairway you're up way up above everybody much higher above everybody then then I am here and you can see the entirety of this beautiful church and if you look right over the front of the pulpit like this you can see Luther's grave right down there and I think I mentioned to you once the fact that we had a little bit of a buzz in the sound system at the beginning it cleared up later on but I afterwards with some of my friends that the that sound was Luther spinning in his grave because the Baptist was preaching from his pulpit because I can assure you in the days of Martin Luther that would not have happened no way I could tell you some stories about Luther and Baptists and they are not friendly stories for it's urban comes to mind but that's another story we can tell for another time but most of you know the story you know Luther's appearance after the beginning of the Reformation in 1517 which nobody knew that anything had begun then at that date is is something we've assigned later but he has finally called to the diet of worms which was not a weight loss methodology but was a gathering in the Holy Roman Empire in the city of Verne's to appear before Charles the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire you've heard the story you know that he is told he must recant from what is in his books he says he cannot do that he does ask for 24 hours to consider but finally when faced with a decision to make he says he cannot do so he cannot go against conscience and then of course you have that famous saying that some historians question but it seems to have a decent pedigree he says here I stand I can do no other god help me and then he's kidnapped on the way home by his protector Duke Frederick and he's taken to the Vaart burg castle and there he takes on the identity of night George and there he translates the Bible the New Testament into German eventually the Old Testament as well but that's ok longer he knew Greek better and he did Hebrew while he is hidden the Reformation goes radical in bitten burg under Antonius Karl stop Karl Scott stops wearing the vestments the clerical vestments and then he announces that for New Year's Eve he is going to make the Lord's Supper all of it available to everyone anyone who wants to participate will be welcome to partake the Lord's Supper well Duke Frederick is like timeout no you're not this is going too fast we need to we need to slow down and consider things and so Carl Stott as the faithful obedient citizen doesn't do it on New Year's Eve he does it on Christmas Eve because he had only said you're not gonna do it on New Year's Eve it's not quite what I think obedient really is supposed to mean now I want you to picture what takes place in the castle Church in Wittenberg it's easy for me to do I stood there larger than then this room I'm not sure yeah I think it's probably about the same width actually interestingly enough maybe a little bit narrower I'm not sure certainly goes up higher but there are similarities except the statue part lots of those we don't have any of those and all of the we do have some stained glass but not nothing compared to what you have in the castle Church but the place is packed filled because people have been promised that they are going to be able to partake of the bread and the wine and they surge forward and some people are scandalized because as they're reaching the cup is tipped and some of it spills and still there's that thinking in the back of the mind God is being spilt on the floor but and Luther's theology has not yet developed on this and so this is the background of the people but here you have the people who for so long have had to watch somebody else doing this now being told you get to do it and there is such a longing and a hunger to do it I think about that and then I think about the Lord's Supper in most churches today where that longing and desire ago for most people it's just something gets in the way fast-forward to 1550 to leave Germany go over to Geneva Switzerland canton of geneva and now you have a french pastor by the name of john calvin and calvin has developed a much more consistent doctrine of the lord's supper and in fact I mentioned on Facebook this week if you wanted to read through section 30 of the of the London Baptist confession of faith most historians can see a very deep influence on the part of our confession of faith as it defines the supper from John Calvin and you know if you've been here before that we guard the table that does not mean that Zach and Luke stand down here and look very mean as you're coming forward as if they can see into your soul or something what we mean is that beforehand we give instructions if you are not a follower of Jesus Christ this meal is not for you talk to us about how you can become a follower of Christ then it will be but it's not for you until you have bowed the knee and repentance and faith to Christ but also if you are under the discipline of the church and the church has said you have sinned you are under discipline and there are unresolved issues do not partake of the supper that comes from Calvin that comes from his recognition of the importance of doing this and so in 1552 Calvin was not loved in Geneva Calvin was there as you may know william farrell struck the fear of God into him he was a rather retiring French scholar guy who want to go to Strasbourg and read books and Farrell said God wants you here and he will he will curse your studies if you do not stay here in Geneva he and Farrell only lasted a couple years for the jeevan's kicked him out and eventually Calvin got to Strasbourg and he loved it there and he was pastor of a French congregation there he was a wonderful pastor he was a courageous pastor the plague came through Geneva while he was there he didn't run for the hills like most people did in those days he stayed with his congregation and ministered to them in the midst of the plague just as Ulrich Zwingli did swingley actually got the plague when it came through Zurich he survived but he loved his time there but eventually the Geneva pnes wrote to him and said we made a mistake we can't keep the Reformation going here in Geneva it's falling apart and we need you back the funny thing is Calvin was a expositional preacher and he had begun preaching verse by verse when he was first in Geneva and so the first Sunday he says all right comes back to Geneva he didn't want to he didn't want to but you know what he does the first Sunday back what would you do your first Sunday back after you got ridden out on a rail nobody gave you any goodbye parties you didn't get nice little watch they wanted you out so what would you do when they've come back to you hat in hand please please come back what are you gonna do do a little gloating maybe find a few Bible passages that you can sort of go with he gets into the pulpit and he opens his Bible to the verse after the last one he had preached on the last time he was there and just continued on that's why you have Calvin's commentaries by the way that's what they are that's the fruit of his years of ministry there but it's not like things got got real nice and in fact until 1555 he is having to fight every day he has people at night at night people will will get their sing body drunken songs outside his window to try to keep him awake he'd wake up in the morning to a musket balls in the wall above his bed it was not a wonderful situation that he was in and one of the things he dil dealt with is a group called The Libertines who refused to submit to the application of God's moral law and how they dressed and behaved in Geneva and Calvin said as the lead pastor of the church Geneva these people will not be allowed to partake of the Lord's Supper even though the the council and the politicians wouldn't support a minute he said I don't care I am the pastor of the Church of Geneva and these people will not partake of the supper so it came to a head and one day Calvin had to go to psalm pierre primary church there in geneva fully expecting to face swords when it came to the partaking of the Lord's Supper now in God's mercy the other side back down but Calvin was willing to stand right there in the face of armed men and say you will not partake now the question is why would they want to partake so strongly because to not partake was exclusion it was an exclusion from the community now we today we look at the centuries that have passed and we can see a massive shift a massive shift in my own upbringing as I said once a quarter if you miss it and there was no emphasis upon its centrality its importance the fact that it was specifically ordained by the Lord Jesus Christ why especially amongst us we we read history we we read the documents we know for example that that the early Reformed movement was split over this issue if you ever heard the Marburg call it colloquy in 1529 where there is danger that the Reformed people the Lutheran's and the swingley ins and that they were gonna split into little groups and hence could be gobbled back up by Rome and and so people wanted to get together Luther gets together swingley gets together it swingley wants to be there Luther does not lose it is not like Zwingli swingley was considerably more mature than Luther is in his dealing with things like this they agreed on 14 out of 15 items but the one they couldn't get was the supper and they had no agreement everything can you imagine agreeing on everything else but one item and it was the Lord's Supper now it's mainly because Luther's stood there going all cash corpus meum this is my body this is is is not represents and so on and so forth and all the argumentation that went through there but the point is that our predecessors our forefathers in the faith have seen the subject of the Lord's Supper as vitally important vitally important definition so and yet how many churches today are even am i identified on the basis of what they believe about this ordinance of the church I remember when I first went to reform Baptist Church I mentioned to my dad that we guarded the table and he was like I had never heard of before I was in seminary the first time I heard of what a reformed Baptist was I had to go to a bookstore and get a handbook on denominations and look up Reformed Baptist because it sounded like d-formed Baptist I wasn't sure if there was a much of a difference I had no idea I never heard of anything about it I didn't know and so when it was explained to me the idea of guarding the table that sounded weird and when you've never heard of something before if it's weird it's probably wrong at least that's how we think right but then what was explained to me and then when I talked to my dad about it I was like well think about it we guard the baptistry don't we it's like what do you mean we ask for a statement of faith a confession of faith and repentance in the Lord Jesus Christ before you can partake in baptism we examine someone we guard the baptistry but in our tradition there was nothing said about the subject of being under church discipline or anything like that in fact in many Protestant churches today the Supper is viewed as an evangelistic outreach type thing everybody come on along don't worry about that repentance stuff very few people today when they're looking at a church ask anything about what that church believes about the Lord's Supper now you're probably aware that most Baptists are associated with the idea of pure Memorial ISM the idea that the the Lord's Supper is purely a memorial of the death burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ and obviously Jesus said to this remembrance of me so there you go but if you read the London Baptist confession if you read section 30 you got down to the some of the last few paragraphs it might have gone hmm there's something more here and there is there is we're not pure memorials and there's a reason for that and we'll get into it but isn't it amazing that something that once fundamentally defined fellowship that would keep Luther and Zwingli from being able to unite and to survive the onslaught of the Holy Roman Empire is not even thought about by the vast majority of those in evangelical churches today now obviously we partake of the supper every Lord's Day that is not normative the church that I came from we did it third third Sunday of each month so it was monthly you'll find all sorts of different examples there's all sorts of people who do it on the Lord's Day every day but some people meet twice on the Lord's Day so it's not in every service but for us since we only meet once it's in every service so for us knowing what it is we are doing and knowing why during the entirety of the service that is right there right in front of where we're preaching I think is extremely extremely important and I've already mentioned in other sermons how I feel that having a proper theology of the Supper is one of the most important ways of understanding the nature of Christian unity and what unites us as believers in Christ it can't just be something that we just assume everyone's gonna pick up as they go along it needs to be something that we focus upon and that's why I want to do this series so I want to look at the key texts and so we're gonna look at Matthew 26 this evening this afternoon whatever time it is will do first Corinthians chapter 11 the next time because that is very key and then we'll look at the confession itself so I'm not sure exactly how long this will take I sort of figure I'm just following Jeff's example it could take years no I want but you get the idea I'm not gonna rush there's no reason to there's no reason to now we can look at Matthew we can look we can look at the synoptic Gospels as they present this I'm not gonna be going through all the questions you can have and ask about well when did Judas leave and you know trying to put together a complete harmony of the Lord's Supper that's not my intention here that's a that's a very worthwhile study it's been done you can you can access those types of materials what I want to do is I want to see I want to put the initial celebration of the Lord's Supper into its proper context this evening which will then give us the foundation two weeks from now next Lord's Day I'll be preaching in Tucson the Lord's Day after that we'll have my official installation service here as an as an elder of this church and I will also preach and we will pick up with first Corinthians chapter 11 at that at that point in time having the gospel background there so that'll help us to cover the New Testament evidence before we get to the the confession of faith itself to have that proper foundation I think it's very very important to go that direction but here in Matthew chapter 26 remember what's going on here remember what's going on here it's vent this is so important there's been a I wouldn't call it a revival but there's a lot of people running around doing Passover Seder 'z and things like that in Christian churches these days and unfortunately a lot of that has ended up morphing into some weird stuff or people end up going back under the law and things like that but it is very useful to recognize the Jewishness of the context of the Gospels and we don't know exactly what the Passover would have looked like in Jerusalem in the very beginning of the fourth decade of that of that century so around 30 to 33 we don't know exactly what like we we have documents called the Mishnah which was collected about two hundred and fifty years after the birth of Christ and we know from the Gospels themselves that many of the traditions that we can read in the Mishnah existed in the days of Jesus the korban rule for example that Jesus specifically condemned when he brought that up is found in the Mishnah so there's one that there's a direct connection but we can't automatically assume that just because it's a Mishnah means it was being practiced in exactly that same way in the first century but we've got a pretty decent idea what we do know even from Old Testament sources is that the Passover was a rich period of symbolic representation of the redemptive work that God had been doing amongst the people of Israel it reminded the people of Israel of their intimate connection to every generation that had come before them and so everything the Passover represented something there were bitter herbs on the table and the bitter herbs represented the the bitter suffering of the people in Egypt and then came over time to represent the bitter suffering of the people of Egypt people of Israel in their exile to to Babylon and then after the structure of the temple that's going to be expanded out to just the whole concept of Jewish suffering as a whole Beach thing had a meaning to it this is important because once we read Jesus's words when he says this is my body this cup is the New Covenant in my blood many would say to read that literally is to believe in transubstantiation because he said is that's what Luther did now the way Luther got around this we I don't even have time to explain to you and I'm not sure anyone really fully understands because I'm not sure Luther ever fully understood to be perfectly honest with you but I have done debates go go listen to the first debate I did with Mitchell Pacwa on the subject of the mass here's a man who reads and speaks 12 languages who is sitting there emphasizing is is is this is my body demanding that literal meaning the problem is if you're there at the Passover everything on the table is something those bitter herbs are the suffering of the people of Israel well okay no they're not they represent it they bring it to mind and that's the whole point Jesus chooses that context to establish something absolutely unique and we would be very very unwise if we did not stop for just a moment and go wait a minute wait the Passover was established by Yahweh himself commanded in the law of Moses and it's supposed to define the very identity of the people of Israel so what are we really seeing when Jesus comes along and adds to it actually supersedes it what does that tell you about Jesus's authority it's not very often that Christians think about the fact that when we partake of the supper when this line forms down this center aisle here each one of us we know from first Corinthians chapter 11 we're doing what we are proclaiming the Lord's death until he comes right that's what I like about how we do it is you can't hide when you're in it you're just sitting there you know sort of hunched over in the in the in the pew you know you can sort of take the bread and it's sort of hard to proclaim very very loudly in that situation no place to hide when we're in that line you're proclaiming the Lord's death until he comes but there's there's something else Jesus commanded us to do this and we are obeying him 2,000 years later you want a repeated example of his authority being extended across the earth folks we're going to be partaking of the Lord's Supper in a spot where there there wasn't really anybody living here 2,000 years ago and yet now we build buildings in which hundreds of people gather to obey the lordship of Jesus is that not amazing I'm glad somebody was still awake out there good it's stunning the Lord's Supper will be observed on every continent on this planet on this day that's an amazing thing that's a fulfillment of Christ's own promise and that should be something that encourages you and I every day every day because I don't know about you but I get up in the morning and if I dare fire up anything I am overwhelmed with the flood of garbage and rebellion and sin and depravity it's real easy to start off the day going oh it's much better to start off the day going Christ is Lord and he's building his church and here is a fulfillment of it and so if you look at the context what has happened is Jesus has pointed out that Judas is the betrayer and boy we can spend a lot of time on Judas it's amazing the silly stuff that is out there about Judas oh my goodness we don't have time for that and when Judas in verse 25 says surely does not I rabbi Jesus said to him you have said it yourself and so when we look at John it appears that it between verses 25 and 26 in Matthew 26 Judas goes out to do his deed so verse 26 so while they're eating and so that the Passover meal has sort of taken place and so it's it's all the symbolism is already there it's not it's not done beforehand but it says while while they were eating Jesus took bread just bread but of course what bread would be on a Passover table unleavened bread what we call matzah but unleavened bread and blessing it he broke it and gave it to his disciples and so there's one chunk of bread that he breaks he blesses it and he gives it to his disciples and he says take eat this is my body now the apologist in me requires me to take the moment to emphasize how any Jewish person in the first century sitting there would have understood these words they were not Aristotelian philosophers they had never heard of substance and accidents they didn't think in those categories and if you're wondering wait a minute how could the Roman version work here because Jesus hasn't died yet believe it or not they still believe that Jesus performed the miracle of transubstantiation right here even before he died in anticipation of his death so that the body so that what he gave them was transubstantiated and that in so doing he ordained the Apostles as priests of the New Covenant that's a whole lot to stick inside those words but remember Rome doesn't believe in Sola scriptura so look at everything Rome is crammed in the words of marry in the New Testament you can put entire mountains of theology on teeny-tiny little words when they're not your ultimate authority and Rome denies Sola scriptura so it's not their ultimate authority so he takes bread he gave it to his disciples saying take it this is my body that's a command that's what amazes me about what I've learned by being over in the Netherlands you can let your traditional understanding of things become so overwhelming that the direct command of the Lord you don't do yeah he said to do that but there's all this other stuff no take eat this is my body and taking a cup he gave thanks that's different than blessing this is a beautiful word that has been stolen from you and I it's been stolen from us Eucharist oh the Eucharist those of you who are former Roman Catholics know exactly what I mean because that's what the Lord's Supper is called the mass is called the Eucharistic sacrifice in Roman Catholic theology it's been stolen from us and don't miss something the D emphasis upon the supper amongst us over the past number of hundred years has been a direct reaction against Roman Catholicism and amongst conservative Bible believing Christians we see Rome we see how far she's moved away from biblical truth and so if you're in a game of tug of war you're pulling this direction while they're pulling the other direction and if you're on this side you can't remain balanced you can't remain standing straight up you've got to go the other direction and that's what's happened when you see an overemphasis and an abuse of something the tendency if we are not firmly rooted in the scriptures and practice Sola scriptura is to go too far the other direct that's why every generation is called to agonize to contend earnestly for the faith to constantly be reforming to constantly be examining we all are influenced by cultural changes and everything else that's why we need an unchanging Word of God and so taking the cup he gave thanks you Christa oh and he gave it to them saying drink from it and IFIF it it's fascinating all of you now why is that fascinating well because of what would eventually happen in the withdrawal of the cup from the people I'm not gonna sit here and try to argue that it's a prophetic refutation of what was gonna come but God knew what was coming God knew what was coming and the point is for the disciples this is not an optional thing drink from it all of you why for this is the blood it's literally my blood of the Covenant which is for many pour it out unto the forgiveness of sins sort of literal not overly smooth but this is again in the context just as this is my body this is this is my blood this is my blood but then immediately the Covenant ol blood the blood of the Covenant now obviously if we were to look at these in parallel you will see that during the transmission of the text down to the centuries there was a real effort and it may have been unconscious but there was a real effort to make Matthew Mark and Luke say the exact same words and so some will include the word New Covenant and and and and things like that and and we could get into all that we don't have time to do that right now it's an interesting study the point is that he emphasizes that they all must drink of this cup for it is the blood my blood of the Covenant which is poured out for many not to make something possible but to actually accomplish something for the forgiveness of sins now we can expand a lot at this point but I won't the point is that the Supper in Jesus's own teaching is directly and intimately connected with your doctrine of atonement and how you have peace with God Romans 5:1 therefore having been justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ how through his atoning sacrifice that's why this is for those who have embraced that sacrifice not that you're embracing it actuates it but by embracing it you're showing that you have believed and have repented and bowed the knee to Christ the sacrifice is made by the son to the Father the only one we need to worry about accepting the sacrifice is the father not us it amazes me that so many people have that completely backwards that the the the offering is made to us and we get to make it effective by what we do with it oh goodness no and nobody who had any idea of the Levitical priesthood and the high priests and it's not offerings would have ever thought of it that way the only way you can think of it that way is if you're a good Western individualist which many people are these days but that's another sermon for another time this is the blood of the Covenant poured out for the remission of sins so the person who comes to these elements is saying there is own one way there is only one means of forgiveness of sins I cannot accomplish this there is nothing I can do in and of myself I am clinging completely and totally to the finished work of Christ and if his sacrifice is insufficient I will not be saved because I'm not trying to back this up by going to another church tomorrow another church the next day and try another religion on Thursday if I'm going to have forgiveness of sin is to be found in and only in Jesus Christ and his shed blood for me that's the Christian message that's why this is an absolutely uniquely Christian experience but I hope that when you partake you see the deep theology that underlies it that what you're saying and what you're doing is in perfect harmony with what the Scriptures teach concerning the atoning sacrifice of Christ we could very valuable move from here directly into the book of Hebrews to establish all sorts of incredible stuff about Christ as the as the mediator and the the nature of his sacrifice there's there's so much the beauty should never ever become commonplace for us that's the one dangerous but you know one of the arguments against doing the Lord's Supper every Lord's Day well it'll just become commonplace it's just it's just what you do don't let that happen as long as when you are coming down this aisle you are focused upon what Christ did why do we have two elements our Catechism question I must have left it down there know what here it is well there's what I'm here our catechism question did you catch this so was and continues to be God and man in two distinct natures and one person forever that's called the hypostatic Union folks fancy term very important vitally important that's a nice way of putting it but the point is he was a true man and he had a physical body and blood to give but he was the god man and it's only by the giving of the god man that we can have peace was gone peace with the father only he can bear in his body our sins and that's why there's two elements and that's why we for take of both and we don't just have you come up and get a piece of bread well the elders up here drink a cup drink of it all of you my hope is that as we briefly look at this subject together you will see the many beautiful connections between the supper and the whole realm of Christian theology as to who Jesus is and what he accomplished so that every time we partake of the supper every time your focus will be upon the truth that it'll ground you more in the truth over and over again we need to repeatedly be reminded of what defines us as a people and if you fully understand who Christ was and what he did the fact that he gave himself you are going to be a person who's going to be much less in danger of being cut off of the flock out into some strange teaching people who are always coming along trying to get disciples themselves this is a vitally important part of your grounding in your faith is to understand these things and so it's my honor to open these words with you and to consider these words and now my honor to give instruction as if we're going to have to do too much of it concerning partaking of the Lord's Supper I've already said everything but I'm gonna say it again especially since we always have visitors if you are a follower of Jesus Christ what do I mean by that you believe that Jesus Christ was truly the Son of God the Eternal Word made flesh not just a prophet not one God amongst many gods not Michael the Archangel a mere creation even if a powerful one but if you believe in Jesus Christ and you have committed yourself to him in repentance and faith yes repentance we dare use that word because you can't define the gospel without it in repentance and faith then you are welcome to come to the table you are welcome to remember him jesus said do this in remembrance of me as often as eating this bread and drink this cup you do this in remembrance of me and so we are going to remember our sin bearer and if he is your sin bearer then you are welcome to come forward but we also ask if you have not made that commitment don't just follow the crowd do not do that which would have no meaning and in fact we warned you against it and as mentioned earlier if you are a part of a church of like faith and order and are under discipline from that church do not come to take the supper here just because you can't take it someplace else you must deal with the relationship with that church first you must deal with whatever that issue is first but if you're a follower of Christ then we have the opportunity in just a moment to come and to partake of the elements in obedience to Jesus just think another day another place where Jesus's command the night of his betrayal will be fulfilled in that amazing never thought of it that way you get to be part of that it is indeed a tremendous privilege so before we do so let us pray together our gracious Heavenly Father we have opened your word we have considered what your Word teaches and what you've done amongst your people for literally thousands of years and father there is a tremendous blessing to be had in our hearts as we consider that we are obeying our master and Lord that he desired this for his people help us to understand to rejoice in the great price that has been paid for our Redemption helped us to recognize that there have been many errors that have been promulgated many false teachings and you have protected us from them may you continue to protect us from them may we remain focused upon what your Word teaches and may we see the gospel the gospel in this celebration may we think of the broken body the shed blood the voluntary nature by which our Lord and Savior gave himself for us and because he was the god man it wasn't just an impersonal thing he truly gave himself for a specific people Lord our minds cannot begin to truly contemplate the depth of your riches and your mercy in your grace but Lord during this time assure us once again of your grace your acceptance help us to rejoice in the great salvation that has been provided for us we pray these things in Christ's name

Channel: Apologia Studios

Views: 30,047

Rating: 4.7837839 out of 5

Keywords: jeff durbin, apologia studios, james white debate, dr. james white, dividing line, alpha and omega ministries, james white sermon, paul washer sermon, shocking youth sermon, shocking sermon, the lord's supper, communion sermon, the eucharist, sermon jam, best sermons, t.d. jakes sermons, joel osteen sermons, joel osteen best sermon, john piper sermon, john macarthur sermon, jeff durbin sermon, best sermon ever, andy stanley sermon

Id: 3PlnXl6Cqsc

Length: 69min 25sec (4165 seconds)

Published: Wed May 22 2019