Knowing the nature of man, Jesus designed a memorial for us to observe on a regular basis.It reminds us of the covenant that we have with God through Jesus Christ, that our sins are forgiven, that we have the Holy Spirit in us, and that we are prepared for the second coming of Jesus. Let’s take a look at Paul’s description of the Lord’s Supper in 1 Corinthians 11…
THE POWER OF THE LORD’S SUPPER – 11:23a:
There are traditions that are good as well as traditions that are bad, as Jesus criticized in Matthew 15. The good traditions are those that have the authority of Jesus Christ, traditions that have been passed down to His apostles through the Holy Spirit. Then there are bad traditions with no higher authority than man. Man’s traditions are not bad unless man wants to elevate them to the level of Christ’s traditions.
The power of the Lord’s Supper is that it has the authority of Jesus Christ behind it. Paul passed this tradition on to the church in Corinth, that which he had received from Jesus. That shows that this act of worship has the authority of Jesus behind it.
THE PATTERN FOR THE LORD’S SUPPER – 11:23b-25:
In this short paragraph, as we all know, Paul rehearses what happened in the upper room when Jesus took the Passover feast and turned it into the “Lord’s Supper.” As a Jew, observing the Passover meal, Jesus would have had a whole roasted lamb in front of Him, along with bitter herbs that made up the vegetable portion of the meal and unleavened bread.
I have found no reference to drinking fruit from the grape as a part of the Passover meal in the Old Testament. It may have grown out of offering a drink offering in addition to the Passover offering; certainly there was sprinkling of blood on the altar that accompanied the sacrifice of the Passover lamb. Either way, it would be easy to see how a drink would eventually become associated with the Passover meal. The earliest reference I could find in Jewish literature to drinking the juice of the grape as a part of the Passover meal is in a Jewish book called Jubilees, written somewhere around 150-140 B. C.
With this whole meal in front of Him, Jesus opted to simply use the unleavened bread and the juice from the grape as He began a new memorial feast, this time in commemoration of Himself as the spiritual Passover Lamb, who would “take away the sin of the world” (John 1:29).
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Stating that the bread “is” His body, Jesus is clearly using a metaphor. There is no scientific evidence nor biblical reason to believe that the bread was or is actually the body of Jesus Christ as some are taught to believe. It simply represents the body of Christ but Jesus uses the metaphor to portray in a very vivid way that we, as Christians, are united together with the body of Christ and taking the bread reminds us of that fact.
Then, Jesus took the cup with juice from the grape. This cup is the “cup of blessing” referred to in 10:16 and it was the final cup that the Jews drank as part of the Jewish Passover meal. For Jesus, the cup symbolized (again we have a metaphor) His new covenant. This “new covenant” is in contrast, of course, with the “old” covenant, the agreement God made with the nation of Israel. “New Covenant” is mentioned only once in the Old Testament, in Jeremiah 31:31. This cup symbolizes that new relationship between mankind and God, made available through Jesus Christ.
THE PERPETUITY OF THE LORD’S SUPPER – 11:26:
Did Jesus intend His followers to observe the Lord’s Supper for all time, everywhere? Clearly here in verse 26, Paul tells Christians to do it until Jesus comes again.
The first day of every week (16:2), Christians observe the Lord’s Supper and in doing so, we remind each other and we “proclaim” to the world, that we believe Jesus is coming again. Thus, the Lord’s Supper is an event in which we look up, to the grace of God; we look back to the sacrifice of Christ, and we look forward to the final coming of Christ. But, the Lord’s Supper is also a moment to look inward (11:27ff).
In respecting the “cup of the covenant,” let us always observe the Lord’s Supper in a worthy manner.
–Paul HOlland
