The Lord’s Supper
1 Corinthians 11:23–28
Good morning. Good morning. It’s a joy and a blessing to be with y’all today. What a joy to be with y’all. Today on the fifth Sunday, we keep the kids in here with us. The fifth Sunday is a little different in the sense that normally on the fifth Sunday, we’ll take a moment and part of what we do for this service is we observe the Lord’s Supper. Sometimes I’ll preach a message and then we’ll have Lord’s Supper towards the end. Other times I’ll preach a passage on the Lord’s Supper. And that’s what we’re going to be doing today. We’re going to 1 Corinthians 11. 1 Corinthians 11 is probably the most complete text on the Lord’s Supper. And we’re going to be going there today.
Before we go there, is the mic okay, guys? It’s good. Okay, good. We’re going to be going to 1 Corinthians 11. I invite you to open up there.
Not for the Better, but for the Worse
You know, in verse 17, we’re going to begin reading in verse 23. But before we read from there, in verse 17, Paul says this. He says, “Now in giving these instructions, I do not praise you, since you come together not for the better but for the worse.” Paul is writing to the church in Corinth. And in verse 17, he begins—that’s where he’s beginning to transition to speak about the Lord’s Supper. And he starts off in verse 17 giving them critique. He’s saying in this I do not praise you. In other words, when they were gathering to worship and gathering to partake of the Lord’s Supper, there were some things that were not good, were not pleasing to Paul, but more importantly, were not pleasing to God.
Have you ever experienced that in church where you come together to worship and it does more harm than it does good? It shouldn’t be that way. When we gather to worship, we’re getting to worship Jesus. But in this church in Corinth where we get this text about the Lord’s Supper—the Lord’s Supper is also shared in the Gospels, but again, 1 Corinthians is one that is the most complete I would say on the Lord’s Supper—what we see is the way the church in Corinth was observing the Lord’s Supper, it was not pleasing to God.
You know what? A lot of times when what we do is not pleasing to God and when the way we worship is not pleasing to God, a lot of times the reason for that is because we take our eyes off Christ. Sometimes in church, we can start to get our eyes on things that we want and on preferences instead of keeping our eyes on Jesus. And the way Paul starts this passage in 1 Corinthians 11, what we see is the church in Corinth. They had taken their eyes off Christ and the way they were gathering to worship was disgusting. We’ll talk more about it as we get into this text.
And I think one thing we can take away from that is when we’re here to worship, whether it be to observe the Lord’s Supper, anytime we’re worshiping, that we keep our eyes on Jesus. Amen. Amen. Sometimes we have flesh and sometimes we can be self-centered. Sometimes we can think about what we want and we can get to thinking about what we want and before you know it it can consume us and our mind and our heart is more on what we desire than on just worshiping Jesus. Have you ever had that happen or seen that happen? That seems to be what’s happening with this church from Corinth. So it’s so important we guard against selfishness and keep our eyes on Jesus.
You know, we’re here today to worship Jesus. We’re here today to get to worship Jesus and as we’re doing it, we’re partaking in the Lord’s Supper. But I think when this text, these verses begin, that’s one thing I think we should be reminded of is the importance as we’re here to worship, keeping our eyes on Jesus, focusing on Jesus, worshiping Jesus.
The Word of God
But after Paul rebukes them, when we go on to verse 23, that’s where we’re going to begin reading is 1 Corinthians 11. We’re going to begin there in verse 23. And when we start reading there in verse 23, we go ahead and start to get to see a detailed account of the way Paul says, instead of what you’re doing, here’s what the Lord’s Supper should look like.
I do invite anybody that would like to and is able to stand with me in honor of the reading of the word of God. 1 Corinthians 11, beginning in verse 23. There the word of God says,
“For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you: that the Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, ‘Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.’ In the same manner He also took the cup after supper, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in My blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.’ For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death till He comes. Therefore whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup.”
Thank you. You may be seated.
Opening Prayer
God, we just thank you. We praise you for this time that we’re able to worship you. And God, right now, as we continue to worship through the preaching of the word, Lord, help me. And Lord, let the Holy Spirit move in this place. God, I know anywhere I fall short, you can still use it. God, I just pray you use your word, the holy word of God to work inside of us. And God, I do pray if there’s somebody here today in need of salvation that they give their life to you, Lord, this very day. And if there’s somebody that needs to return to you and get sin out of life, today would be the day they rededicate to you. God, we love you. We just ask you to be with us and bless this time as we worship you and as we break open the word. It’s in Jesus’ name we pray. All God’s people said, “Amen.” Amen. Thanks for that amen from the back. Hey, I like that. I think that was some of the young ones. We might need them in here more often.
Stepping Out to Serve
I want to get into beginning in verse 23. Before I do, I’m just going to take a moment. There’s been a lot of changing at our church. For instance, as most of y’all know, Scott felt the call to full-time homeless ministry, so he’s no longer leading music. But I just had a person or two come to me and they said, “Well, what about Crystal?” And I just praise God that, you know, I love God’s timing. Crystal had stepped out in faith and for the first time in many years, she actually had the ability to help with something like this. Then not long after Scott, there was no one leading music. So y’all pray for Crystal as she’s stepping out in faith to help lead the music. I thank God for all the choir, all the praise team. I thank God for those guys upstairs, too. Jackson and Hinton’s up there, I see. And of course Wayne been doing a lot with sound, too. But pray for everybody serving.
And think about this. God’s going to keep going on no matter whether we step up or not. But just think about those guys up there, the way they’re stepping up. Some of them haven’t been doing sound every week. Think about Crystal, the way she’s stepping up to lead. Think about the other choir. They’re continuing to lead. There’s other needs in the church. And just one vision God’s put on my heart is to see for this church to see the Spirit of God work through the people of God in such mighty ways that multitudes would be saved, multitudes would be baptized and multitudes of believers would keep growing in their walk with Jesus and living more and more for Jesus.
So just like some of them are kind of stepping out in faith. Hey, stepping out in faith to serve God in a new way is scary, but there might be ways you can serve. Hey, you might be an instrumentalist. We could use some instrumentalists. You might know how to play keyboard or you might know how to play drums or you might know how to play piano or you might know how to play guitar. You know what Psalm 150 says? It talks about all kinds of instruments praising God. Did you know that? That’s biblical that many instruments come together. Or you might have a gift with singing and you might want to sing. If you do, they practice on Wednesdays. Let Crystal know. But there might be other ways you can serve. So I would just encourage you if God’s leading you in some area of serving the Lord, let us know. It takes God’s people. And it’s exciting what God does when God’s people are on fire and God’s people serve.
Why Observe the Lord’s Supper?
Verse 23, it opens up in 1 Corinthians 11 with verse 23 saying, “For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you.” Paul is saying what he’s about to say. He received this from the Lord. Now, I don’t know if that means he received it from other early followers of Christ and in part it ultimately came from the Lord or if the Lord himself revealed it to him. I do know this, Paul was caught up to the third heaven. 2 Corinthians tells us that he was caught up to the third heaven. He was taken to paradise. He didn’t know if it was in body or in spirit. That’s what 2 Corinthians says. But he was caught up to the third heaven while still living on this earth and he heard many things. It tells us in 2 Corinthians. So the Lord could have revealed it to him then or could have revealed it to him some other time. We also know he went to Arabia after he got saved and it wasn’t for 3 years before he went to Jerusalem. But Galatians tells us once he went to Jerusalem, he spent 15 days with Peter. Maybe Peter gave him some. I don’t know. But the way it starts off there, it sounds like it’s directly from the Lord. It says, “For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you.” And then he starts to share about the night Jesus instituted the Lord’s Supper.
And I guess I’ll start by saying this. Why observe the Lord’s Supper? Maybe you’re here today and maybe you’ve never been a part of the Lord’s Supper service or maybe you have been a part of many, but maybe you don’t even understand why. Why observe the Lord’s Supper? Well, in this text, we get the reason. It says there in verse 24, “And when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, ‘Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.’” And the same for the cup. He says, “Do this in remembrance of Me.” So we observe the Lord’s Supper. It’s really simple because the Lord says to. The Lord says, “I want you to do this in remembrance of Me.”
Now, the Bible does not say how often to receive the Lord’s Supper. There’s churches that have communion weekly. There’s churches that have communion monthly. There’s churches that have communion quarterly, annually, different ways. The way we currently do it is on the fifth Sunday, so it turns out to be about four Sundays a year.
Something else about the Lord’s Supper is when we partake in the Lord’s Supper, it’s meant to be a meal that we partake together. It’s a symbolic meal. You know, as Paul’s writing to Corinth, most scholars believe that when they partook in the Lord’s Supper, they were having what they call a love feast. So they’re having a big meal, too. But the Lord’s Supper that we partake in today, it’s symbolic. The bread is a symbol of the body of Christ and how he suffered for us and he gave up his body for us and he died for us. And the juice that we partake in, it’s a symbol that he shed his blood for us. Some as they partake say they believe Jesus is actually in it. The way we believe is this is a symbol. This bread symbolizes the body of Jesus. The juice symbolizes the blood of Jesus and what he did for us.
But when we partake, we’re to gather together. You know, there’s something special about a church family. Amen. And there’s something really special about a church family in unity. The Lord’s Supper is to me one thing it can do for a church family is bring you together in unity because it’s meant to be a meal that we partake in together and even though we have differences we agree on Jesus Christ because those that partake in the Lord’s Supper are supposed to be those that are believers in Christ. So this is something that we can have unity in as believers in Christ as we partake. We’re to gather together.
Now, I’ll tell you, there are times when somebody is homebound or somebody’s in the hospital or somebody’s sick and they can’t be here. So today there might be somebody that comes to your mind that can’t be here. I’ll tell you, there’s something really special. It is meant for the church to gather together, but there is something really special about bringing communion to somebody. I’ve had the blessing of doing that several times over the years with homebound people. Some people that have gone on to the Lord now. And there’s something so special about bringing communion to people that can’t physically get here and just reading the text that we read today and bringing it to them.
A little bit about this time that we’re partaking in. We’ll preach this message. We’ll have invitation and at the end we’ll partake in the Lord’s Supper.
A Time of Remembrance
One thing about the Lord’s Supper we see in this text is this is a time of remembrance, a time of commemoration, a time of remembrance. Watch again what it says in verses 24 and 25. It says there in verse 24, “And when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, ‘Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.’” That’s what the Lord told the disciples.
See, the Lord’s Supper first happened. We read about it in the Gospels. When Jesus took the disciples and he said, “Let’s gather together for the Passover feast.” And he took the Passover feast the Jews had always celebrated and he gave it a brand new meaning. That he is the true Passover Lamb. Watch what it says in verse 25. “In the same manner He also took the cup after supper, saying”—watch what he says—“This cup is the new covenant.” In other words, the Jews were under the old covenant, under the law, under the Mosaic covenant, but you had to keep asking forgiveness. You had to keep making offerings. You had to sacrifice animals. And Jesus says, “This is the cup of the new covenant.” When he instituted this, he said, “This is the new covenant in My blood.” See the blood of Jesus. Jesus gave up his blood and he gave up his body for a once and for all complete atoning sacrifice for our sins. So we don’t have to keep sacrificing animals. Aren’t you glad for that? We don’t have to follow the law to be saved. We should be living for Jesus. If we’re saved, we should be living for the Lord. But none of that saves us. It’s the blood of Jesus that saves. “This cup is the new covenant in My blood.” And again, he says, “This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.”
So today, we’re here to observe the Lord’s Supper. And one of the biggest things I think about with the Lord’s Supper is that we remember what Jesus has done for us. Do you ever have times you feel like you don’t take time to remember what he’s done for you?
I met a guy in the coffee shop. I’d never met him, but I saw a shirt. He had a shirt on for a company where I’m a chaplain, a big landscaping company. So I introduced myself to him and as I started talking to this guy and we got to know each other, I found out he was a Christian pretty quick. And man, when he started to tell me his story about a time when he was in darkness 10 or 15 years back, a believer but in darkness, he said he was really struggling in his faith, he just cried out to God. He said, “God, show me a sign that you’re real.” And an hour or two later, he’s in downtown Wilmington, and a guy was walking by on the sidewalk. And the guy said, “Hey, how are you?” And he said, “I’m fine.” They kept walking and the guy turned around. He must have sensed something from the Spirit. And he caught the guy and he grabbed him and he said, “Jesus loves you.” I want to tell you, Jesus loves you. And this guy at Port City Java the other day, maybe 15 years since that happened, just started bawling as he’s telling this story. And what he was bawling about is he remembered what Jesus had done for him. He remembered that Jesus forgave him. He remembered that Jesus loves him even though he has messed up and he’s a sinner, but he knows he loves him and he forgives him because he gave his life to him. And when I thought about this guy, I thought about, you know, we need to remember what the Lord has done for us.
You know, we can sometimes just go through the motions, but this is a great time to remember how God saved you. Are you saved? Are you going to heaven because you’ve given your life to Jesus? If you haven’t, I’m not judging, but I want to tell you, it’ll be the best decision you will ever make in your life. If you have not made that decision, I pray you won’t wait any longer. I pray you’ll make it today and you’ll make it public today. If you are born again, when we partake of the Lord’s Supper, we want to remember.
So we can have all kinds of things going in life. We can have struggles. We can have problems. We can have financial issues. We can have health issues. We lose people. People we love pass away. You might be going through some really hard things right now, this very day. I’ll tell you, if you are remembering what he’s done for you, it’s not to minimize how hard it is what you’re going through, but when we remember and when we have a heart of thankfulness for what he’s done for us, it can help us in those hard times. When we concentrate on what’s going on in the hard things and that’s what we dwell on and not on Jesus, it makes it even harder. But so this is a time that we try to slow down, worship Jesus, and remember what he’s done for us and remember that Jesus died for you. Isn’t that amazing?
Jesus came down from heaven. He was born of a virgin. He grew up in a human body as God in the flesh on this earth. And he literally walked amongst us. And he came here for a purpose. He came to die for us, to die for you so that you could be forgiven, to die for me. Remember that.
A Time of Appreciation
And when we remember that, this is also a time of appreciation. When we remember how the Lord has saved us, I’ve heard some testimonies from some of y’all about the way you used to be and how God changed you. When you remember the way you used to be and you think of—and I see some people looking at people—when you remember the way you used to be and the way God saved you and changed you, if that’s you, that’s all the more reason we should have a heart of appreciation. So it’s a time of remembrance or a time of commemoration. It’s also a time of appreciation. How can we not come to this table thankful if we’re saved? Amen. Amen. How can we not?
So when we’re getting ready to partake, we’re preparing our hearts to say, “God, I thank you.” We’re having a good crying with God. We’re saying, “God, thank you for sending your Son. Jesus, thank you for dying for me. Jesus, thank you for forgiving me. Even though I’m a sinner, you still forgave me.” So it’s a time of commemoration, a time of appreciation.
A Time of Proclamation
It’s also a time of proclamation. Verse 26 of this passage says, “For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death till He comes.” In other words, when we partake of this supper, the gospel is being visually seen in a sense.
When we partake of the bread, that bread symbolizes Jesus’s body and how he suffered for us. How he allowed them to beat him. He allowed them to flog him. The Roman way was 39 stripes. Forty stripes minus one. And most scholars believe when they were scourging Jesus, that whip would have had pieces of metal and bone interwoven in it. So that each time the whip those 39 times is being whipped on Jesus, flesh is coming out of the skin. It’s penetrating and then being pulled out. You know, when we partake, it’s proclaiming the gospel because that bread reminds us Jesus gave up his body for us. That bread reminds us Jesus suffered for us.
And also the juice, it proclaims the gospel because that’s a symbol of the blood of Jesus. Without Jesus shedding his blood for us, we would not be saved. Amen. Without—there’s only one way, no other way to be forgiven of sins and go to heaven, only through faith in Jesus Christ. So when we partake in this meal as it symbolizes the body and the blood of Jesus it also proclaims the gospel.
So it’s a time of commemoration, a time of appreciation, a time of proclamation where it proclaims the gospel. And again, I would tell you this supper is meant to be for believers in Christ because it’s called the Lord’s Supper. If you’ve never trusted in Jesus, my encouragement to you, my hope for you today would be that you’d make that decision. So this meal was meant to be for believers in Christ. And if you haven’t yet trusted in Jesus, maybe today could be the day. What a great way to come to Christ.
A Time of Examination
It’s a time of commemoration, a time of appreciation, a time of proclamation. It’s also a time of examination. Verses 27 and 28 talk about not partaking of this in an unworthy manner. So there’s a little bit of a warning here in the passage. If you go to verses 27–28, it says, don’t partake in an unworthy manner. It also says, examine yourself. In other words, before we partake, we should examine our own lives to make sure we qualify. More than anything, most of all, are we a believer in Christ? You know, to be a part of the Lord’s Supper, we would have made that decision to give our life to Jesus. But secondly, I think we should examine ourselves if we are a believer. Am I walking with God or do I have some habitual sin in my life that I need to turn over to God and repent from?
See, the church in Corinth had a lot of sin. We talked about verse 17 that Paul rebuked them. Well, we’re about to read a little bit about why Paul was not happy with the way they were observing the Lord’s Supper. Verse 18 of 1 Corinthians 11 says, “For first of all, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you.” Have you ever seen that in church where there’s divisions? Have you ever seen people in church warring against each other? Man, the enemy, the enemy will use that to divide a church. Have y’all ever experienced that? Yes. Where church has been divided.
Gossip will lead to division. Hey, sometimes somebody will be talking, we’ll be talking about somebody else and we might think it’s no big deal. It’s a sin. We got to help each other to stay away from gossip. If I start to gossip, put me in my place. If you start to gossip, I pray God gives me the strength to kind of lovingly say that’s not how—we’re not to gossip. Gossip will divide a church. The devil will use gossip to divide a church. This church had divisions. I bet you they had some gossip. That’s just me saying that. The Bible doesn’t say they did, but I bet you they did. Because normally division will come about when people start talking about them. Y’all ever experienced that? Yeah. Gossip and causing strife, talking bad about people. By the way, anytime you have gossip, we’ve all done it. Has everybody done it? Do you ever, if you’re a believer, you feel kind of bad inside about it, don’t you? So you know it’s wrong. You’ve already got the Holy Spirit convicting you.
But it says in 1 Corinthians first, so one of their sins was division. Whatever they were doing to being divided, 1 Corinthians 1:10 says, “I appeal to you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree.” We’re meant as a church family to be in unity. And that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind. So one way we could examine ourselves is maybe there’s somebody in your church here that you got a problem with. Maybe today you can go up even during invitation and pray with them or say, “Forgive me.” Sometimes the division never stops because nobody admits they’re wrong. Somebody probably did something wrong. Amen.
It also says in verse 19, “For there must also be factions among you, that those who are approved may be recognized among you.” What does Paul mean by that? Those who are approved may be recognized. In other words, sometimes when there is division, sometimes when there is factions, sometimes it might be showing the true colors of people. It could be that a person’s not really a believer. You know, there’s people in church that have gone to church all their life and they might not be saved. I just heard of a guy that I know. He shared with me his wife’s grandmother, I think, had been in church all her life, but had never given her life to Jesus. And at 91, she gave her life to Jesus and got baptized. So I don’t know where you’re at, and I’m not trying to say who’s saved and not, but going to church isn’t what saves you. We should be in church, but it’s by giving your life to Jesus, trusting fully in Jesus. But Paul is saying if there’s these divisions, it could be that that person that’s arguing and gossiping is not even saved. So that’s why they’re not acting like a child of God. Or it could be that someone’s a believer living in sin. Either way, there’s a problem.
But we see other sin in the Corinthian church. Verse 20, it says, “Therefore when you come together in one place, it is not to eat the Lord’s Supper. For in eating, each one takes his own supper ahead of others; and one is hungry and another is drunk.” I read that and it’s hard to wrap my mind around it, but everything I’ve read on this is that in the early church, they would often have big meals. They called them love feasts. So as they partook in the Lord’s Supper, they would also eat a lot of food. Perhaps they ate a lot of food and then ended with the Lord’s Supper. I don’t know. But they had a lot of food they ate along with the Lord’s Supper. Well, what it’s saying here is you get this picture of the church in Corinth that some people—the rich, the wealthy, the influential—they were getting the food and the poor, maybe the homeless, the ones that were more poverty-stricken, maybe the ones that were kind of considered outcasts, they were getting left out and they weren’t eating at all. And then it goes on to say, and some of you are getting drunk. So you understand why Paul’s mad, why Paul’s disgusted. The church in Corinth about the only thing it seems they were doing right with the Lord’s Supper was gathering together. But they had division. They had strife. They weren’t in unity. They were thinking about being self-centered, wanting all the food and not letting others in the church get food. Some of them were even getting drunk.
So the point here is that there was a lot of sin and Paul’s saying you got to examine yourself. And Paul goes on in verse 22 he says, “What! Do you not have houses to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the church of God?” When Paul says, “Do you despise the church of God?” he’s referring to how some people were being left out of eating and some people were getting drunk. And he’s saying the church of God, the gospel is for everybody. The gospel, it doesn’t matter what race you are. It doesn’t matter if you’re male or female. It doesn’t matter if you’re rich or if you’re poor. The gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ is for everybody. It’s for all people. And if the church in Corinth was observing in a way that they were leaving out certain people, they were despising God’s church because the church, the gospel is for everybody.
I’ll tell you, speaking of there, there is definitely a focus in the church of Corinth on the rich. The rich were looking down on the poor. And I’ll tell you, you know what the Lord said in Luke 6? He said, “Blessed are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who hunger now, for you shall be filled. Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh.” And in Mark 10, it says, “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” I only share that to say, well, first, the gospel is for everybody. But we need to be on guard. You know, there’s a lot of people in the world way poorer than any of us here. There’s a lot—I’ve been to Nicaragua on missions—it’s like mile after mile of people living in a concrete hut the size of a room with no running water, no electricity. They were happy. And I’ve gone out to do ministry a lot of times. I’ve gone one time in a kind of a richer place. And let me just say four out of the five people said, “Get away from me” the moment I walked up. “I don’t want to hear about the Lord.” I don’t know what that means, but when I go and do ministry where there’s a lot of poverty, it is amazing. Almost everybody is crying for prayer. They’re desperate for prayer. Sometimes I think when we’ve got our needs met and we got a lot of when God’s blessed us in a lot of ways, we better be on guard because we need to remember we need the Lord. No matter if we’re rich, no matter if we’re poor, we desperately need the Lord.
But in this church in Corinth, people were getting left out. And Paul is saying, you got to examine yourself. I think a takeaway for us, a takeaway for us today is, is there some sin in my life? And if so, not to say, I’m not going to partake. I’m just going to keep on sinning. No, I think what would be better is if it says, you know what? Yeah, I’ve got something in my life that does not need to be there as a child of God, and I’m going to identify it. I’m going to admit it today. I’m going to cry out at this altar. I’m going to confess it to God today and I want to repent and I want to live for God. See, when I think of examining yourself before you partake, I think about being a believer. But I also think about examining your heart if you are a believer and are you living right? Are you living for the Lord? So I think this is an opportunity for each of us to examine our own hearts and our walk with God and to get right with God if there’s some area that needs to be—we need to fix, we need to turn back to the Lord on.
A Time of Consideration
So it’s a time of commemoration, a time of appreciation, a time of proclamation, a time of examination. It’s also a time of consideration. It says there, “Therefore, my brethren, when you come together to eat, wait for one another.” We’ll partake in a moment, and everybody will come forward to get their bread and the juice, and you’ll go back and sit down, but we’ll wait and we’ll partake together as a way of being considerate of one another. They were leaving people out from eating. Some of them were getting drunk. So what Paul is reminding us in this text is that this meal is meant to be a meal of unity. And I think something that reminds us of as we partake is we should be loving. When I think of being considerate, a time of consideration, I think of the great commandment where the Lord talks about love God and love others. That it’s that reminder to us to love one another. And how will they know you’re my disciples? If you what? Have love for one another.
A Time of Anticipation
And then finally, you know this meal it is a time of remembrance. We remember what the Lord has done. It’s good to remember what the Lord’s done. Amen. And in a hard time to remember what the Lord has done. But it’s also a time of remembrance, a time of appreciation, thankfulness to God, a time of proclamation, a time of consideration, examination, and a time of anticipation.
Verse 26 says, “For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death till He comes.” We sang a song today. “Come Jesus Come.” Y’all know Jesus is coming back, right? Amen. Amen. It’s not just some make-believe thing. Jesus is really going to come back. The Bible says he’s going to come back on clouds. He’s going to come back in glory. The Bible says he goes to prepare a place for you. And he says, “If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also.” Jesus is coming back. Ain’t that exciting?
So something’s exciting to me as we partake and as we partake of the bread and the juice and we remember what he’s done for us, we also get to look forward to the fact that he’s coming back. So it’s a time of anticipation. We don’t know the hour, but we know he’s coming. And I know today it’s a little closer than yesterday. I do know that he is coming back. So when we partake today, remember that Jesus is coming back.
Closing Prayer
Hey, let’s pray.
Lord, we love you. We just thank you for your word. We thank you for the fact that you left us the word of God. And I thank you for the fact that we know you told us you want us to do this in remembrance of you. You want us to take time to partake in the Lord’s Supper as a church family. I thank you that you gave us instruction. And God, I just thank you for this time that we’re able to worship you and have this symbolic meal together. And God, I just pray you continue to be with us as we do that.
But also right now, Lord Jesus, I just want to take a moment and have us do business with you. I don’t know how you’re working in hearts, but I do know you work in hearts through the preaching of the word, through worship, through the word of God. And I know this much. The Bible says faith comes through hearing and hearing through the word of God. Maybe today there’s someone here that’s in need of salvation. I pray you’d draw them in and I pray they’d make a decision to give their life to you. And I pray they’d make it public today. Maybe today there’s someone that’s been straying and that they’re examining their heart and they need to get rid of sin. Maybe today they would just confess to you and want to lay at this altar and return to you.
God, I don’t know the ways you’re working, but I just pray right now before we get to partake in the Lord’s Supper, I just want to take a moment for us to sit with you, for us to do business with you in whatever ways you’re working in hearts. I pray your people would respond. And I pray it all in Jesus’ name.
