The Gospel of Bread and Wine - Part 1 - What is the Lord's Supper - Fletch Matlack
What is the Lord’s Supper?
Mark 14:22-25
Immanuel – 9/6/26
The passage we just heard read is from Jesus’ last supper, the last time he would eat with the disciples, and they with him. Many things happened during that supper – teaching, foot washing, betrayal. But among the most significant was the moment Jesus instituted the Lord’s Supper. He was giving his disciples – he was giving the church – grace and gospel in bread and wine. Its significance and power in the life of a believer must not be underestimated.
This is why, today, we begin a five-week sermon series on the Lord’s Supper, which I have titled, “The Gospel of Bread and Wine.” There is a twofold purpose to this sermon series.
1. To more fully understand the significance and power of Communion in the life of the believer.
2. To help you understand why we – the Elders of Immanuel – have become convinced Immanuel needs to participate in the Lord’s Supper every week.
In today’s sermon, I want to simply answer the question, what is the Lord’s Supper? As we do this, it is important you know we can use these terms interchangeably: the Lord’s Supper, Communion, some simply say “the Table.” The Roman Catholics call it the Eucharist.
Main Point
In the Lord’s Supper, Jesus gives his church a visible, tangible proclamation of the gospel. This is bread and wine that reminds us of his death, gives us communion with him in the present, and points us forward to the fullness of his kingdom.
If we are going to understand the Lord’s Supper, we need to look more closely at what was happening in that upper room. Jesus did not institute the Lord’s Supper at a random meal. This was the feast of Passover.
Egypt had subjected Israel to brutal slavery. The people cried out to God. God raised up Moses: the man to lead Israel out of slavery. God brought 9 plagues upon the people of Egypt, but one remained. During the night, the 10th plague would begin, and an angel of death would slay all the firstborn sons of Egypt. But God made a provision for Israel. They would take a lamb – without any defect – and kill it, spreading it’s blood on the door frames of their homes. Then they would eat a meal: meat (or flesh) from the lamb which was slain and some unleavened bread. During the night, if blood was found on the door frame, the angel of death would pass over the household. The firstborn would be spared.
For well over 1,000 years, God’s people have eaten the Passover meal and remember the great God who rescued them from bondage. But on this night, Jesus takes the bread and says something astonishing “This is my body.” Then, lifting the cup, he says, “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many.”
Jesus was declaring Passover is about him! He is the Passover Lamb.
All of us are slaves to sin. We are addicted to our lusts, the applause of others, to our comforts, to pride, to our selfish desires. The wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23). Slaves to sin, cursed to die.
But God has made a provision! Like a lamb without defect, Jesus is the only morally perfect man to have ever lived – sinless, blameless, righteous. Yet it is he whose body is torn for the sins of others. His blood is not spread on a doorframe, but spilled on a cross. And God says that if we trust in Jesus – that his blood was spilled instead of our own – then we are forgiven, freed from our slavery to sin, and will be granted everlasting life!
Passover was always about Jesus! He is the Lamb who was slain. By the tearing of his body and spilling of his blood we are free to live!
Brothers and sisters, you have just heard the gospel. The gospel has come to you in words. And like Paul says in Romans 10:17, Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ. But Jesus, in his great kindness, has given the church even more. He gives us the gospel in a form we can see, and touch, and smell, and taste. He gives us the gospel in bread and wine.
We hear the gospel proclaimed from the pulpit, then we hold that proclamation in our hands. “This is my body. This is my blood.” Jesus blessed it and gave it. “Take,” he says.
Jesus has given it to us. He loves us and is for us! The Supper he instituted is for the good of his beloved people! And he wants us to remember.
How forgetful we are, and plagued by doubts, prone to wander, easy to sin. Have we gone too far? Will God still receive us? Jesus says, “Take. Eat.” And we remember. We remember the tremendous price he has paid for us. And after paying so great a price, to make us his own, will Christ now abandon those he purchased with his own blood? Never! Nothing in all creation can separate us from his love (Romans 8:39)!
In bread and wine we receive this truth and we remember!
This is where our Baptist forefathers can help us. Hanserd Knollys was a seventeenth-century English Particular Baptist pastor and one of our theological forefathers. He suffered persecution and imprisonment for his ministry. Listen to the way he described what happens at the Lord’s Table:
“Christ and his Saints, do enjoy mutual communion and spiritual fellowship one with another, at the Lords Supper.”1
Communion means communion. In the breaking of bread and drinking of wine, we commune with Christ. Jesus is truly present with us when we participate in the Lord’s Supper. I’m not going to fully unpack this idea today, but will leave that more to next week’s sermon. But I want you to understand that when we call this meal Communion, we actually mean something by that.
Again, as Hanserd Knollys wrote, “Christ Sups with his Saints, and the Saints Sup with Christ.”1
The Lord’s Supper in not a funeral meal for a dead man from Nazareth. There is a host for this table, and he is alive! As we will see in the last sermon of this series, the unseen Christ makes himself known in the breaking of bread.
This is why, for centuries, Baptists have called the Lord’s Supper an ordinance. Because Christ ordained it. He commanded it. Along with baptism, it is one of the two ordinances Jesus has given to the church. Through the ordinances, in a special way, Jesus communes with us. Do we not long for more of Christ? At his Table, Christ has given us a means by which our faith is nourished and our communion with him enjoyed.
Read vs 25
At the Lord’s table we remember what he did in the past. We commune with him in the present. But Jesus also directs his disciples to the future.
For those 11 disciples remaining in the upper room, the cross was coming tomorrow. But three days after, the living Christ would burst from the tomb – the First Born of the new creation. That empty tomb was the seed of a new kingdom, one that will grow and fill the whole earth. At the fullness of the kingdom, in its consummate glory, another table is coming.
Jesus is going to drink with them again. Think about that promise. The disciples are about to watch him die. Their world is about to collapse. And Jesus is already talking about the next time they will sit together at a table. Death will not have the last word,another meal coming.
Two weeks from now we will trace something remarkable through the Bible. Again and again, when God communes with his people, there is a meal. The Bible ends with such a meal – the Marriage Supper of the Lamb – the very meal Jesus foreshadows in our passage today.
Every time we eat the bread and drink from the cup we remember what Jesus has done for us, know that he communes with us, and anticipate a magnificent meal that is coming.
And if all of this is true – if Christ has given his church a meal that proclaims his death, strengthens our communion with him, and fills us with kingdom hope – then perhaps you can understand why your elders began asking:
Why are we doing this only twelve times a year?
Then, add to this, the clear pattern we see in the New Testament. Listen to the passage immediately following 3,000 souls saved at Pentecost:
They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. -Acts 2:42
The very earliest church devoted itself to four things: apostolic teaching, fellowship, breaking bread (the Lord’s Supper), and prayer. There is no command to practice Communion every time the church gathers. But what we see in Acts, and throughout the New Testament, is that Communion was a central element of Christian worship – a regular rhythm in early church gatherings.
Paul writes, For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes. -1 Corinthians 11:26
With our mouths, how often should we proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ? Always! With every opportunity we have! How often should we want to proclaim the gospel in bread and wine? As elders, we have become convinced: every Sunday gathering, we want this proclamation among us – until he returns.
That said, I understand the concern: If we do Communion every week, it will not be as special. It will lose something. Let me be very clear: Frequency has nothing to do with making the Lord’s Supper special. Rarity does not create holiness.
The Word is not sacred because we only preach it occasionally. Prayer isn’t made godly by rarity. Infrequency doesn’t make singing special. No! It is quite the opposite! These things are great in their frequency, in regularity. The Table is sacred because Jesus gave it to his church for regular remembrance, communion with him, and kingdom anticipation. How we should love to come to the Lord’s Table as often as we are able!
The danger to us is not frequency. The danger is familiarity without faith. I’ll talk about this more in a future sermon: we must approach the table with a right heart, with reverence, prepared to fellowship with our King. Familiarity without faith is a danger we must fight against.
I know there is another concern out there: If we do Communion every week, isn’t that a little too Roman Catholic? Aren’t people going to associate us with the ritualism of Catholicism?
Here’s the important thing to understand: What makes the Roman Catholic understanding of Communion distinctively Roman Catholic is not how often they take it, but what they teach is happening when they take it.
Roman Catholic theology teaches that in the Eucharist the bread and wine are transformed into the actual body and blood of Jesus. This is called transubstantiation.
We reject that. The bread remains bread and the wine remains wine. They are signs of Christ’s body and blood. And yet, as we’ve already seen, that does not mean Communion is empty. The risen Christ truly communes with his people at his Table.
Also, the Roman Catholic church understands the Eucharist sacrificially. Now, I’m going to try to be as accurate as possible. Roman Catholics believe Jesus was sacrificed once – on Good Friday. But they teach that in the Mass, that one sacrifice of Christ is made present again, and the Church participates in Christ’s offering of himself to the Father.
As Protestants, we reject this. We believe Scripture leaves no room for an ongoing sacrificial offering of Christ in Christian worship. As Hebrews clearly teaches,
For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified. -Hebrews 10:14
A single offering, offered once. What has this one offering accomplished? Christ’s sacrifice has perfected his people for all time!
We have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. -Hebrews 10:10
Once for all!
At the Lord’s Table, we are not offering Christ to God. Christ has already offered himself to God for us! We are not making his sacrifice present again. We are proclaiming the sacrifice he already accomplished.
The bread says: His body was given.
The cup proclaims: His blood was shed.
The gospel declares: It is finished!
The Supper does nothing to add to Christ’s sacrifice or secure something his cross left unfinished. Jesus accomplished our redemption once for all—on a bloody cross and vindicated with an empty tomb!
It’s not the frequence of Communion, it’s the Roman Catholic teaching of the Eucharist we protest as heresy. The regular celebration of the Lord’s Supper goes all the way back to the earliest church. But more importantly, it was given to the church by Christ himself. It is ours. Weekly Communion isn’t Catholic, it’s Christian.
Brothers and sisters, in the Lord’s Supper, Jesus gives his church a visible, tangible proclamation of the gospel. This is bread and wine that reminds us of his death, gives us communion with him in the present, and points us forward to the fullness of his kingdom.
Again, from Hanserd Knollys: “Christ giveth his saints spiritual Bread, hidden Manna, New-wine and water of life at his Supper…and bids them, ‘Eat O friends, and drink, yea drink abundantly, O beloved.’” “The Saints when they sup with Christ, have meat and drink, which others know not of.”1
Church, Jesus himself has given us the bread and wine. It is not an empty ritual. It is not a mere Baptist tradition. This is not something we tack onto the end of a worship service 12 times a year. This is a gift, brimming with grace and significance. Bread and wine – body and blood. Remembrance, communion, anticipation. A proclamation of the cross and a foretaste of his consummate kingdom.
Jesus blessed it, gave it, and said, “Take.”
¹Knollys, H. (1656) An Exposition of the First Chapter of the Song of Solomon. p. 57. University of Michigan, Early English Books Online. https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo2/A87819.0001.001/1%3A3?rgn=div1%3Bview%3Dfulltext
