Sermon Tone Analysis

Personal Introduction

Text- Prompt- “If you have your Bible or a Bible App, Please turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 10.

That’s 1 Corinthians Chapter 10.

As you open to that section would you please stand with me for the reading of Scripture.

“ No Slides- Read direct from the Bible

Sermon Introduction

It is fitting in a series on worship that we deal with the place and meaning of the Lord's Supper in worship.

Interestingly, the Lord's supper is never called "worship" in the New Testament, and the gathering of the church where it happens is never called "worship" in the New Testament.‌

The point of stressing this is to break us of the habit of equating worship mainly with what happens here on Sunday morning.

This is worship.

What we do here is, in fact, worship.

But maybe we should call it "congregational worship" or "corporate worship."

Because if we fall into the habit of equating this with the worship of the church, we will miss the new and radical point of the New Testament:

namely, that worship is driven into the heart as a matter of spirit and truth, and out from the heart, worship flows in all of life, not just in ‘worship services.’

“ [1]

So today, we’re going to cover 3 questions that I think we can inquire of Scripture as we look at Paul’s teaching about the Lord’s Supper.

After looking at those questions, we will discuss a theological application where we will take 3 looks at Jesus as we prepare to partake of the supper together this morning.

Transition:

As we examine the Apostle’s teaching on the Lord’s Supper, our first question to consider is:

Slide:

Question 1: What is the meaning of the Lord’s Supper?

1) The Apostle Defines the Lords Supper as Participation in Christ’s blood and body

Slide: vv.

10:16

If we look at verse 16 in chapter 10, we see that the Apostle defines the Lord’s Supper as a participation in the blood and the body of Jesus Christ.

The greek word used here is Koinonia - sometimes we translate this as fellowship, but I think that is a watered down word these days.

It is a word of intimacy and its a word that conveys giving… in fact, its the same word used by Paul when he commends the churches for their generous giving for the suffering church in Jerusalem.

So participation in this sense is the giving of one’s self to another.

What Paul is getting at here is a real spiritual participatory intimacy with Christ in his death and resurrection of Christ.

It is the same idea when Paul proclaims in Galatians 2:20 that “ I have been crucified with Christ.

It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.

And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

Theologians call this the Exchanged Life.

When Paul states that the Lord’s Supper is a koinonia in the blood and body of Christ, he is communicating a very important truth:

-We can not have life with Christ if we do not have an exchanged life with Christ.

We must give up who we are are for who he is.

This exchanged life is made possible because Jesus gave his body for our sins and he gave his blood as a seal of the New Covenant we have in him.

The New Covenant is the promise and seal of Christ’s work- a once and for all sacrifice for mankind’s sin and a seal that is made upon the heart of God’s elect children.

This New Covenant and Christ’s saving work makes us into something we were not before— we are a new creation ---- co-heirs with Christ, united with him and seated with him in the heavenly realms...

The elements we consume in the Lords Supper are meant to reminds us of this truth.

That’s why Jesus said do this to remember me.

The Christian Life is All About Jesus- It’s Not About Us - but about Christ in us.

When we remember Jesus we are reminded of this Exchanged Life which includes the promise of a relationship with our creator.

C.S. Lewis put it this way- “The Son of God became the Son of Man, so that the Sons of Man may becomes son’s of God.”

This union with Christ is striking.....

When you partake of the Lord’s Supper- It really should cause you to stop and ponder the audacity for what Christians claim..... God has turned an enemy (us) into a child.

Given all the vastness of God’s creation, the Psalmist declares what is man that you consider him?.... and the Apostle John reflecting on our adoption states:

“See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.”

I want to illustrate this with a Biblical Example-

If you recall, the Gospel of John gives us some different details about the Lord’s Supper that the other Gospel do not.

As he gathered with his disciples, Jesus began to teach that he would soon be leaving them and that they know the way to the place he is going...

and a very interesting exchange occurs between him and some of his disciples.

In John chapter 14, the disciple Thomas responded to Jesus and said,

5 ....“Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”

6 Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life.

No one comes to the Father except through me.

7 If you really know me, you will know my Father as well.

From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”

8 Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.”

9 Jesus answered: “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time?

Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.

How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?

10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me?

The words I say to you I do not speak on my own authority.

Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work.

Now it’s so important that you catch this.

If you know Jesus, that is, if you have koinonia with Jesus, then you know the Father… and Jesus gives you assurance in this… From now on, you do know him and have seen him.

This is the promise we celebrate when we take communion together.

We have seen the Father because we see Jesus for who he is.

Now here’s the most interesting part about our union with Christ and the exchanged life.....

When the Father looks at you, he sees Christ in you!

That is the most astounding part of our union with Christ!

So here’s the application for that and the question that we need to ask ourselves when we partake of the elements- when the worlds looks at me, does it see Christ to?

Are we so united with Christ that we can claim as Jesus did- not in any ultimate sense but in a finite and contingent way- can we claim in a limited way, that if you have seen me, you have seen the father?

2) The Lord’s Supper is the Fulfillment of the Passover Festival

The second thing we need to understand about the meaning of the Lord’s Supper is that when we observe the Lord’s Supper we are, in fact, participating in the Passover feast as Christians.

When Jesus instituted the Lord’s Supper he was celebrating the Jewish Passover feast with his disciples but he reframes it in light of his death & resurrection

What we’re seeing here is fulfillment theology at work- Jesus opens the eyes of the Apostles to see that the Passover feast is really about him.

What happened with Israel in the original passover is a pattern that Christ will recapitulate in himself though his death and resurrection, Jesus is the lamb of God.

So, if we’re going going to understand the Lord’s Supper correctly, we also need to understand the theology of the Passover.

According to the Book of Exodus, God heard the cry of the Israelites who were enslaved in Egypt and he sent Moses to demand to Pharoah that the Lord commands him to Let his people go.

And Stivey mentioned this last week- but it is a a very critical point- Why did God command this?

It was so that the Israelites could leave the land of pagan gods and worship the one true God according to his terms.

After Pharoah again refused, God judged Pharoah with the tenth and final plague- the death of all the first born in the land of Egypt.

God also commanded Moses to tell the Israelites to roast a a perfect lamb and mark some of its blood above and on the sides of their doors so that the Angel of Death would pass over them.

Then they were to consume this meal completely.

Then the Lord commanded that they repeat this feast every year as a lasting ordinance.

Slide Exodus 12:25-27

In the book of Exodus, we see Moses teach this; he says,

Notice here Moses said it is the Lord’s Passover.

Paul uses similar language when he calls the Christian passover the Lord’s Supper.

The point is both of these feasts belong to the Lord and are about the Lord.

Also, notice that it is the telling of this story that the people bowed their heads and worshipped the Lord.

When the Israelites repeated the Passover feast, they told the repeated the story about what God had done to save them from slavery and the judgment of God.

This was their spiritual worship expressed with the physical elements of the sacrificial meal.

Jesus identified himself as the Passover lamb at the supper he had with his disciples....and that he would be going through a new Exodus that would change everything.

In Christ, mankind can find freedom from bondage to sin and death- The Lord passes over judgement for those who are in Christ because of what Christ has done- Christ is the Lamb who’s blood is taken up by Christians and painted on the doors over their hearts

The exodus of Israel from Egypt was not only to deliver them from slavery but also to free them to worship the living God.

So also, in Jesus’ exodus, He delivered us from the chains of Satan and sin and enabled us to worship God in Spirit and truth.

The Passover exodus of Jesus has reversed the curse and opened the entrance to life everlasting forever.

We partake of the Lord’s Supper to commemorate this event, but also to receive it and embody it as the community that God has saved.

OT Israel looked back to the Exodus through the Passover meal.