Sainte Cène

The Lord’s Supper is:

A look back:

Lord’s supper

People often look back over their week, and if they’ve struggled with sin, or failed God this week, they’ll stay in their seats.

Here’s why that’s a mistake.

Jesus instituted the Lord’s Supper with his disciples at the Feast of the Passover just before his death. The Passover was the Jewish feast in which the people was called to remember God’s faithfulness in Egypt (Exodus 12).

A look back: a call back to the Passover, in which the people was called to remember God’s faithfulness in Egypt. Jésus is reappropriating the feast to call us to remember God’s faithfulness in him. When he calls us to ‘do this in remembrance of me,’ it is not a remembering of loss we are called to, but of faithfulness. It is a song of celebration, not a funeral dirge.

So what Jesus does here is show that God’s faithfulness to the people in Egypt was actually a precursor, a foreshadowing, of the ultimate faithfulness he would show them in the person and work of Christ. In the same way that through the Passover, God’s people was called to remember his faithfulness to them in Egypt, through the Lord’s Supper, Jesus is calling us to remember God’s faithfulness to us in him.

is reappropriating the feast, to call us to remember God’s faithfulness to us in him.

So for that reason (and for others which we’ll see over the next couple weeks) this is not meant to be a solemn, sad, somber event. When Jesus says, “Do this in remembrance of me,” we are to remember his death; but not just his death. We are also called to remember everything his death obtained for his people, in fulfillment of God’s promises to them. The “remembering” he is speaking of is not the remembering of loss, but of God’s faithfulness. It is a song of celebration, not a funeral dirge.

wa call back to the Passover, in which the people was called to remember God’s faithfulness in Egypt. Jesus is reappropriating the feast to call us to remember God’s faithfulness in him. When he calls us to ‘do this in remembrance of me,’ it is not a remembering of loss we are called to, but of faithfulness. It is a song of celebration, not a funeral dirge.

When he calls us to ‘do this in remembrance of me,’ it is not a remembering of loss we are called to, but of faithfulness. It is a song of celebration, not a funeral dirge.

And that’s why staying in your seat if you don’t feel worthy is such a mistake. Standing up and participating in the Lord’s Supper is not something you should do only if you ‘feel good’ about your week. You are COMMANDED to feel good about Christ’s faithfulness to you, regardless of how you feel about your week.

So if you have faith in Christ, if you have received his grace by faith in his finished work, stand up, come forward, and celebrate God’s faithfulness together with us.

A look forward: to the wedding feast of the Lamb, when the Bridegroom will set a feast before his bride and celebrate their union.

A look around: a reminder of the union with Christ which ALL of us share in. We ‘discern the body’ when we remember that we are co-equal sharers in the benefits of Christ’s work. It is not a mournful look inward to think about our sins (we have the time of confession for that); it is a CELEBRATION of the grace that not only I, but that ALL of my brothers and sisters have received.