Page 1 Luke 22:1-23 The Last Supper It is the night of Jesus betrayal and the night before his death. In this passage we see Jesus instigation of the Lord s Supper of what we refer to as the Lord s Table, Communion, the Eucharist. This ancient practice that has been repeated in the church down the ages over the past 2000 years is birthed here, on the eve of Jesus death. This is where it all started. We will be taking communion after this message. And in this message, we will be looking at how it all started, what it all means, why we take this bread and wine, what this sacrament is all about. Before we get to the actual supper, let s consider the role of Judas and his betrayal of Jesus. 1-6: The name Judas has become synonymous in the English language with betrayal. In fact, the dictionary defines the word Judas as: One who betrays another under the guise of friendship. And this, of course, is what Judas does. The chief priests and teachers of the law are looking for a way to get rid of Jesus. They want to do it before the massive crowds arrived for the Passover celebrations in Jerusalem. Judas is their way in their point of access their man on the inside. None of this is a surprise to Jesus. He has repeatedly predicted his death and resurrection. And he is fully aware of Judas role. 21-22: But God has a plan.
Page 2 How many of you know that it is not always easy to see what God is doing, to discern his plans, his ways to see the big picture? We are aware of our little thread in the tapestry of life, but we struggle to see the wider picture, the greater plans and purposes of God. Take Peter for example: Jesus outlined his plan of salvation to his followers way ahead of it happening: From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life. Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. Never, Lord! he said. This shall never happen to you! Jesus turned and said to Peter, Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns. (Matthew 16:21-23) That s the before. That s Peter s view of the plan of God. He has in mind human concerns, but not the concerns of God. Now look at the after as Peter preaches in Jerusalem after the event: Fellow Israelites, listen to this: Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know. This man was handed over to you by God s deliberate plan and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross. But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him. (Acts 2:22-24)
Page 3 Jesus knows all about his impending death. Jesus knows all about Judas and his plans to betray him. And that s why, say many commentators, he sends Peter and John on this clandestine, counter-intelligence, cloak-and-dagger mission to prepare the Passover meal. 7-13: Jesus wants to eat this last supper with his disciples. He wants to instigate the Lord s Supper, communion, before he is crucified, and he does not want Judas spoiling the party. So he sends Peter and John to make the preparations. Instigation of the Lord s Supper: 14-20: What is Jesus doing? What is the significance of this supper? Jesus instigates: A new custom A new community A new covenant 1) A new custom It is the feast of Passover in Jerusalem and Jesus and his disciples are celebrating the Passover meal together. This is a custom that goes back over 1500 years and finds its origin in the deliverance of the people of Israel from Egypt under the leadership of Moses. The people of Israel were slaves in Egypt and God sent Moses to Pharaoh with the command: Let my people go. Pharaoh
Page 4 refused and there followed a series of plagues on Egypt culminating in the plague on the firstborn son in every household. The Israelites are instructed to slaughter a lamb and to daub the doorposts of their houses with its blood to protect them from this plague. On that same night I will pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn of both people and animals, and I will bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt. I am the Lord. The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are, and when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you when I strike Egypt. This is a day you are to commemorate; for the generations to come you shall celebrate it as a festival to the Lord a lasting ordinance. (Exodus 12:12-14) Obey these instructions as a lasting ordinance for you and your descendants. When you enter the land that the Lord will give you as he promised, observe this ceremony. And when your children ask you, What does this ceremony mean to you? then tell them, It is the Passover sacrifice to the Lord, who passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt and spared our homes when he struck down the Egyptians. (Exodus 12:24-27) And this is what they did. For 1500 years they celebrated the Passover meal and the deliverance of Israel from Egypt by God s supernatural intervention. This was their custom. The head of the household would lead them through the meal, with four stages. They would eat lamb with bitter herbs and unleavened bread, and they would share wine, with four different cups.
Page 5 The Passover meal was rich in symbolism and was an ancient custom to retell the story of the Passover to each new generation. The unleavened bread was equated in the meal with bread of affliction because it reminded them of their persecution in Egypt as mentioned in Deuteronomy 16:3 Do not eat it with bread made with yeast, but for seven days eat unleavened bread, the bread of affliction, because you left Egypt in haste so that all the days of your life you may remember the time of your departure from Egypt. Now Jesus took this ancient custom, and he instigated a new custom, a new ritual, a new commemoration, taking the bread of the meal and the wine to symbolise a new deliverance the deliverance of people from their slavery to sin by his sacrifice on the cross. As John the Baptist proclaimed when he saw Jesus: Look the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. So in this meal, on this evening, reclining at the table with his disciples, Jesus takes the bread, and instead of saying this is the bread of affliction, he says: 19: This is my body given for you, do this in remembrance of me. And he takes one of the cups of wine and he says: 20: This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you. Jesus is instigating a new custom. A new commemoration. Instead of looking back to the Exodus and the blood of a lamb daubed on a doorpost, we look back on the death and sacrifice of the Lamb of God who has taken away our sin once and for all on the cross.
Page 6 The bread that we eat symbolically represents Jesus body broken for us, and the wine that we drink represents his blood poured out for us. This is a new custom by which we are to remember the Lord s death until he comes again. Jesus told his disciples: 15: I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. This was a deeply significant and defining moment, and as Jesus shared the meal with them, he said: 16: I will not eat it again until it finds its fulfilment in the kingdom of God. That is his second coming and the full consummation of his kingdom and what the Book of Revelation refers to as the wedding supper of the Lamb. So when we take communion together, we are following a 2000- year old custom, which builds on a preceding 1500-year old custom that s 3500 years of custom and tradition remembering the deliverance of God and the covering of the blood of the Lamb for our sins. And this will continue until he comes again. But Jesus is not just instigating a new custom on the eve of his death, he is also initiating a new community. 2) A new community Jesus death on the cross would usher in a new community. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:28)
Page 7 Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for we all share the one loaf. (1 Corinthians 10:16-17) We who are many are one body. We are companions people that share bread. Communion draws us together as one body. We are to examine ourselves and we are to forgive others as we are forgiven. As Darrell Bock states, when we take communion, we proclaim both the Lord s death and our community oneness with fellow celebrants at the table. Our relationship to one another is not an accident, but a product of great design and cost. That theological reality should cause us to relate to one another with great sensitivity. Paul severely rebuked the Corinthian church because they were taking communion in a way that was not communal, that did not honour the body of Christ, that was selfish and self-centred. Let s be honest community is hard. I look around our church and I see the reality of that everywhere. There are people that don t get on, there are people that don t like each other, people that fight and argue. There are people that feel disconnected, people that feel lonely, there are people that feel like giving up on church, and on community, because they don t want to try any more. There are people that don t try very hard at all and don t commit to community and to friendship. There are people hiding in the shadows. People that come late and leave early. People in their middle years slowly drifting into isolation.
Page 8 This is. the mess of congregation. This is also the shekinah the glory of congregation. Both at the same time. I ask you in light of this meal in light of this new community that Jesus instigated to commit yourself afresh to loving the body of Christ, to loving his church, to loving his people even your spiritual siblings that rub you up the wrong way. Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for we all share the one loaf. (1 Corinthians 10:16-17) Reconciling over communion the story of Pauline and Mandy. This meal marks a new community. We are companions. We break bread together. We are one body. 3) A new covenant So the instigation of this supper, of communion, marks a new custom, building on the custom of the Passover, it represents a new community, and it also represents a new covenant. The Old Covenant was a binding agreement and promise between God and the people of Israel. We read about this in Exodus 24. The people have been given the Ten Commandments. The Book of the Covenant is read out, to which the people respond: Everything the Lord has said we will do. Read Exodus 24:5-8
Page 9 There is blood everywhere. The blood symbolised two things: 1) The seriousness of sin 2) The payment for sin is death And Moses says: This is the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you Now, as Jesus takes the cup of wine at the Last Supper, he says: 20: This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you. This is a new day! Jesus says. A new agreement. The old one is superseded. The old agreement has to do with externals. The blood of bulls and goats. Sacrifices. Priests. Altars. External rituals that never really got to the heart of the problem the problem of the human heart. This new agreement is going to be internal it will be written on your hearts not on stone tablets. It will be fulfilled by the power of the Holy Spirit. It will be accomplished by Jesus. Jesus can and will give you a new heart of faith rather than an old heart of unbelief. Dr Christian Barnard, the first surgeon ever to do a heart transplant, asked his patient, Dr Philip Blaiberg, Would you like to see your old heart? It was in Johannesburg in South Africa, and Dr Barnard reached up to a cupboard, took down a glass container, and handed Philip Blaiberg his old heart. Philip Blaiberg said: So this is my old heart that caused me so much trouble. He handed it back, turned away and left it forever.
Page 10 This, in essence, is what Christ does for us. He gives us a new heart. God has written his laws in us. This, says Jesus, this is the blood of the new covenant. The new agreement. We remember this and take hold of this when we take communion together. Our response: What is our response to Jesus and his new custom, his new community, his new covenant? Have you forgotten what Jesus has done for you? Truly achieved for you? Remember afresh as you take the bread and drink the cup. This is not our bread of affliction, this is the body of Jesus broken for your sin. This is not the blood of a lamb daubed on a doorpost in Egypt, this is the blood of the Lamb of God, who died to take away your shame and guilt and wrongdoing. Have you forgotten or despised the body of Christ which is his church? Do you feel like giving up on community? When you take this bread and drink this cup, you are remembering that we who are many are one body. Jesus loved the church so much that he gave his life for it. Why would you despise his body, his people, your brothers and sisters? Is there someone with whom you need to reconcile? Is there forgiveness for which you need to ask? Commit yourself afresh to this community of saints, this mess and this glory of congregation.
Page 11 Do you need a new heart? Do you need your sins to be forgiven? Do you need to be changed from the inside out? Everything that you need has been achieved by Jesus death on the cross and his resurrection. He has made a way for you to be made right with God. You can ask him for a new heart this morning and for the first time, perhaps, you can take this bread and cup, knowing that this marks a new covenant, a new relationship with God. Give your old diseased heart to God and let him give you a new heart of faith and purity.