Lord's Supper-Bread

ss=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify'>Lord’s Supper – Bread 

Jesus and His disciples had come together to celebrate the Passover meal. Traditionally, this was a time to remember when God was leading His people out of Egypt under the rule of Pharaoh. We read of this time in Exodus when Moses and his brother, Aaron, were attempting to persuade Pharaoh to let God’s people go. After a series of plagues, God had gotten fed up with Pharaoh and decided to give him a final ultimatum.

God had told Moses to let his people know of this plan. They were told for each family to find an unblemished lamb and slay it. They were to then take some of the blood and paint the doorframe of their houses. The Lord said that He was going to go through the land and kill all the firstborn. While He passed through, He would see the blood on the doorframes and pass over those houses.

As always, He did exactly as He promised. There was a great cry among all the Egyptians. Because of this, they urged God’s people to leave quickly thinking that the death was going to spread to them.

They took little with them and, in fact, Exodus 12:39 tells us “They baked the dough which they had brought out of Egypt into cakes of unleavened bread . For it had not become leavened, since they were driven out of Egypt and could not delay.”

Because of this event, God gave His people the chance to enjoy the Passover Dinner. With this, they celebrate their deliverance out of Egypt and bondage. To this day, the Jewish people still celebrate this time.

Today, we have an opportunity to celebrate our deliverance out of sin with our sacrificed Lamb. Isaiah 53:7 speaks of the coming Savior as “like a lamb that is led to slaughter.” And in John 1:29, John the Baptist sees Jesus walking towards him and states, “Look, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”

Jesus, Himself, gave us this opportunity when He spoke with His disciples at the Last Supper. He did this while celebrating the Passover Meal. We read about this during readings of various passages in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. But we are going to concentrate on the passage in 1 Corinthians. Beginning in Chapter 12, verse 23, we read,

·       For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, “This is My body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of Me.”

“This is My body.”

When we read of the bread being broken as Christ’s body was broken, this is not in the physical sense but in the spiritual sense. Back in Isaiah 53, we read a prophetic writing about Christ that He would be crushed for our iniquities and pierced for our transgressions. When we hear the break of the wafer, think about Christ's broken body, and how He was crushed for our sins. When you look at the wafer and see the holes, think of how His body was pierced for our sins while hanging on the cross. We need to remember that Jesus willingly went to the Cross as a completely sinless man. But it was during this time that all of our sins were heaped upon His shoulders. Jesus prays in Luke 22, verse 42, “Father, if You are willing, remove this cup from Me.” He was referring to God’s plan to take all of mankind’s sins upon his shoulders.

“…which is for you…”

That word “YOU” did not stop with the disciples. The original language means the same thing as saying every believer. We can take comfort in knowing that we each get to enjoy this celebration. We also need to remember that this is a very personal time. Though we enjoy it as a group, each one of us should be thinking in a very private manner. We can enjoy the bread and juice as if we are the only person taking it with Christ sitting right next to us. It is during this time that we can experience a spiritual transformation.

“…do this in remembrance of Me.”

We are reminded that when we partake in the Lord’s Supper, we are to remember what Jesus did for each one of us. While we pass out the bread, and you take one for yourself, take some time to think about what Jesus did for you while He died on the Cross. While we take the piece of bread in our mouths, as a group, and you feel and hear the crunch of the wafer, think about Christ’s broken body.

(Pass out the Bread)

Let us pray.

 “This is My body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of Me.”