The Beauty of Communion
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As they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take and eat it; this is my body.” Then he took a cup, and after giving thanks, he gave it to them and said, “Drink from it, all of you. For this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. But I tell you, I will not drink from this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.” After singing a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.
Such a beautiful picture.
What was this meal they were eating?
On the first day of Unleavened Bread the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Where do you want us to make preparations for you to eat the Passover?”
The First day of Unleavened Bread.
What is that?
If you go back to the Book of Exodus in Chapter 12 you read about the preparation for this meal that would later be called Passover.
Backstory -
Israel was in Egypt, Moses had been called by God to go to Pharaoh and request that God’s people be freed. Pharoah was not obliging. God sent plagues. 10 in total.
After the 9th Plague, God sent instructions to Moses for the Passover, and God commanded that an unblemished year old sheep or goat may be used. He also stated that NO LEAVEN may be used in the making of bread for 7 days. God told Moses that this month, the month it happened in, was to become the 1st month of Israel’s new year.
That on the 10th day of the month a year old unblemished male sheep or goat would be selected. It would be kept until the 14th day of the month, and then slaughtered at twilight.
Twilight in Hebrew means in the period between light. So, while the sky is dark.
After slaughtering the animal, the Israelites would then take the blood and put it on the 2 door posts and the lintel of the houses where the meal would be eaten.
This means they would take the blood, put it on the door jam, as well as across the TOP over the door.
The meal would be eaten THAT NIGHT, with unleavened bread.
There is so much symbolism in this meal, and we keep going back to this unleavened bread.
God says
“I will pass through the land of Egypt on that night and strike every firstborn male in the land of Egypt, both people and animals. I am the Lord; I will execute judgments against all the gods of Egypt. The blood on the houses where you are staying will be a distinguishing mark for you; when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No plague will be among you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.
I will PASS OVER YOU, When I see the blood! AMEN!
He continues:
“This day is to be a memorial for you, and you must celebrate it as a festival to the Lord. You are to celebrate it throughout your generations as a permanent statute. You must eat unleavened bread for seven days. On the first day you must remove yeast from your houses. Whoever eats what is leavened from the first day through the seventh day must be cut off from Israel.
This is a permanent statute, means it is annual! It never goes away!
YOU MSUT EAT unleavened bread for 7 days.
You are to eat unleavened bread in the first month, from the evening of the fourteenth day of the month until the evening of the twenty-first day. Yeast must not be found in your houses for seven days. If anyone eats something leavened, that person, whether a resident alien or native of the land, must be cut off from the community of Israel. Do not eat anything leavened; eat unleavened bread in all your homes.”
unleavened bread was called the bread of affliction
Do not eat leavened bread with it. For seven days you are to eat unleavened bread with it, the bread of hardship—because you left the land of Egypt in a hurry—so that you may remember for the rest of your life the day you left the land of Egypt.
Leaven is almost always symbolic of SIN!
Unleavened - without sin
Unleavened bread might be made hastily when serving a meal to an unexpected guest (Gen. 19:3; 1 Sam. 28:24).
Leavened bread was made by taking a bit of old fermented dough and working it into new dough. The old yeast would cause the new dough to ferment and rise.
The Bible tells us that the Israelites were to eat only unleavened bread every year during Passover as a commemoration of the Exodus from Egyptian bondage.Further commands regarding the eating of unleavened bread are found in Exodus 12:8; 29:2; and Numbers 9:11. To this day, in Jewish homes, the Passover celebration includes unleavened bread.
According to the Hebrew lexicon, the term unleavened bread is derived from the word matzoh, which means "bread or cake without leaven." The lexicon also states that matzoh is in turn derived from a word which means "to drain out or suck." In referring to this second Hebrew word, the lexicon states, "In the sense of greedily devouring for sweetness." So it is quite possible that unleavened bread, while it may have been heavy and flat, may also have been sweet to the taste.
Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus.
In the Bible, leaven is almost always symbolic of sin. Like leaven that permeates the whole lump of dough, sin will spread in a person, a church, or a nation, eventually overwhelming and bringing its participants into its bondage and eventually to death (Galatians 5:9).
A little leaven leavens the whole batch of dough.
Romans 6:23
For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Check this out:
When it was noon, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. And at three Jesus cried out with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lemá sabachtháni?” which is translated, “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”
When some of those standing there heard this, they said, “See, he’s calling for Elijah.”
Someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine, fixed it on a stick, offered him a drink, and said, “Let’s see if Elijah comes to take him down.”
Jesus let out a loud cry and breathed his last. Then the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. When the centurion, who was standing opposite him, saw the way he breathed his last, he said, “Truly this man was the Son of God!”
What did Jesus cry out? Psalm 22!
A psalm of VICTORY that perfectly describes everything he was going through in this horrible experience, as well as what would happen afterwards! And I can promise you this, Jesus was not saying that God had abandoned him or turned his face, because our Father says I WILL NEVER LEAVE YOU OR FORSAKE YOU!
You may feel like it! You may cry out!
Save me from the lion’s mouth,
from the horns of wild oxen.
You answered me!
I will proclaim your name to my brothers and sisters;
I will praise you in the assembly.
You who fear the Lord, praise him!
All you descendants of Jacob, honor him!
All you descendants of Israel, revere him!
For he has not despised or abhorred
the torment of the oppressed.
He did not hide his face from him
but listened when he cried to him for help.
Don’t miss this because it is beautiful! Jesus cries out, teaching with his last breath, the WORD OF GOD, a beautiful PSALM!
I will give praise in the great assembly
because of you;
I will fulfill my vows
before those who fear you.
The humble will eat and be satisfied;
those who seek the Lord will praise him.
May your hearts live forever!
All the ends of the earth will remember
and turn to the Lord.
All the families of the nations
will bow down before you,
for kingship belongs to the Lord;
he rules the nations.
All who prosper on earth will eat and bow down;
all those who go down to the dust
will kneel before him—
even the one who cannot preserve his life.
Their descendants will serve him;
the next generation will be told about the Lord.
They will come and declare his righteousness;
to a people yet to be born
they will declare what he has done.
AMEN!
When did Jesus die? It was noon and darkness came over the whole land!
In the TWILIGHT! The period between the lights!
When was the Passover lamb slaughtered? In the twilight!
Because Jesus is our perfect, unblemished, passover sacrifice!
tell us that “the wages of sin is death,” which is God’s judgment for sin, and this is the reason that Christ died—to provide a way out of this judgment for sin if man will repent of his sins, accept Christ as his Passover sacrifice.
As they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take and eat it; this is my body.” Then he took a cup, and after giving thanks, he gave it to them and said, “Drink from it, all of you. For this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. But I tell you, I will not drink from this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.” After singing a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.
At the passover meal, Jesus takes the items that the Israelites had been eating for years, and gives them NEW MEANING!
This cup - that’s my blood!
For this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.
This bread - that is MY BODY!
And he took bread, gave thanks, broke it, gave it to them, and said, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”
Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new unleavened batch, as indeed you are. For Christ our Passover lamb has been sacrificed. Therefore, let us observe the feast, not with old leaven or with the leaven of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
I can go on and on.
We take communion as a continuation of the celebration of the Lord’s Passover.
The Lord’s Passover is simple: when God saw the blood on the door posts and lintel, judgment passed over the people. Their life was spared.
Jesus is our passover lamb. When we ask Jesus to be our Lord and Savior, we are covered by the Blood. The Doorposts and lintel of our life has the blood of Jesus, and we are no longer under judgment.