Harbor Church - Mid City

Now for those of you who are not yet followers of Jesus, I will freely admit that our text about the Lord’s Supper can sound horribly strange.  See you just heard a text read that talks about Eating the body of Christ; drinking the blood of Christ.  You’re probably thinking, “I always thought that Christians were a bit regressive, but surely they must know that cannibalism had its day long ago.” 

But let me try to show you how something seemingly strange is actually profoundly beautiful.  If you are ever going to taste and see the beauty of this meal and the joy that Jesus offers you through it, then I think you need to look in 4 different directions before coming to the table:

(1)  Look backward

You won’t get the full experience of Jesus in this meal if you don’t look backward in history and reflect on what lies behind this meal.  Now I need to explain this a bit so that you will know what you’re supposed to look back to in history.  See if you look at v15 Jesus calls this meal a “Passover Meal.”  So when the disciples and every Jew up until the 1^st century sat down on Passover, they knew the exact moment in history that they were celebrating and looking back to:  the night the angel of death passed over their homes in Egypt and God liberated them from Pharaoh.

Now the way this event was celebrated was through a meal that always went exactly the same way. 

The head of the family pronounced a blessing over the first cup of wine, followed by herbs dipped in a sauce symbolizing the bitterness of their slavery.  The youngest son would then ask, “Why is tonight different from any other night?”  Normally from basis of Deut 26 the head of the family would explain the meaning of Passover.  Our forefathers were slaves but God looked upon their suffering. Then the head of the family would take unleavened bread and break it and talk about Deut. 16 and this being the bread of their affliction.  This was the way it always went.  Every year, for thousands of years, this was the most central event in the Jewish calendar and it went exactly the same way.

Until the head of this new family, Jesus, begins his Passover celebration in the upper room.  See Jesus says, “This is my body broken for you; do this in remembrance of me (not in remembrance of what happened in Egypt.”  All of a sudden, Jesus gives them a new historical reference point.  He is saying, “This meal will no longer be about what happened back then, but rather how what happened back then is being fulfilled tomorrow on the cross in my broken body.”  We’ll no longer look back to that event as the central point in history, but rather tomorrow—the cross—is the point to which all of human history has been moving.

See this isn’t just about a group of people being freed from pol and economic slavery, but tonight we eat a meal on the eve of being redeemed from sin and death itself.  This is the night from which all of history has been moving.  So as a follower of Jesus when you take this meal, you really can’t take it without looking back to what Jesus did for you on the cross.

(2)  Look forward to another table

But you don’t just look backward, you also must look forward.              Scotty Smith, who is a friend of mine, says this often, “We live between two tables.  One is a table of sorrow, the other a table of satisfaction.”  See the first table is the Lord’s Supper in the Upper Room, the second is the Lord’s Supper that we’ll celebrate in the new heavens and new earth.  You see this in v16 where Jesus says, “For I tell you, I will not drink again of the fruit of the vine until the Kingdom of God comes.”  Here, Jesus is saying there is another table, another feast, that this meal anticipates, and it is the wedding feast of the Lamb. 

See my friends every time you come to this table you’re getting an appetizer, a foretaste, of what is to come at the great wedding banquet of the lamb pictured in Revelations  I was talking to a friend of mine about this and he said, “Eating the Lord’s Supper is a lot like eating just a bite off the grill.”  And when he said this I thought, “You’re right.  That’s it.”  Think about it.  One of my favorite things to do is throw a steak or some ribs on the grill.  You’re standing beside the grill with some friends and family, smelling the smoke.  With each whiff, your anticipation of the meal increases.  And then, the very best part is when you cut just a little sliver off to taste it and, you know, make sure things are going according to plan.  That little bite is a foretaste and creates great excitement about what is to come.  That is what this meal is.  It is a foretaste of what is to come.  When you eat it you look forward into the new heavens and new earth and picture the joy that you will have one day at the Great Wedding Banquet and your heart sets sail.

And let me tell you who is going to be seated with you at this wedding banquet.  Rev. 5 says it will be people who have been ransomed by the blood of the lamb from every tongue, tribe, and nation.  So friends each time we eat of this meal together you should picture yourself in the midst of Ethiopians, Russians, Vietnamese, Congalese, Latin Americans, Mexicans, whites, blacks, Asians. That is one day.  But here in this bridge church, in this glorious part of the city where the nations have gathered, we say, “Give us a little foretaste right now.  Give us a morsel from the grill here on earth.”

See, my friends, the Lord’s Supper should be this foretaste that makes us hunger for the new humanity, where every race, class, and culture will be present. See part of our missions vision in the years to come is to plant churches all around the world with indigenous leaders that are raised up from this very community.  Won’t it be great when Scott Bennett and Kim and others of you who have a heart for ST missions are leading trips with indigenous leaders going to their country to plant churches.  The Lord’s Supper should be the ongoing sustenance we need, those bits off the grill, that keep us hungering and moving toward the wedding banquet of the nations being present here in our midst who will one day be sent out from us to plant churches.

TRANS:  So look backward in history to the cross, look forward in history to great table, and then

(3)  Look around you

Look around you and celebrate the new family you have been brought into.  Here I want to thank Tim Keller, for much of the analysis that follows for the next 2 areas that we need to look to have been shaped by his thinking on this text.  One thing he pointed out that I had missed in reading this text is this:  the Passover Meal was something that was eaten with your family.  Families wouldn’t even think of not being together for this yearly celebration. 

But yet Jesus has taken every single one of the disciples away from their family.  Why?  B/c he is saying, “In me, you have a new family. Not a new club, but a new family.  And this new family is going to be                     more foundational to you than even your biological family.  Despite differences in race, class, and culture, you will share a greater bond with people in this new spiritual family b/c of the bond you share through Christ than you will with even your own family members. 

If you have been following Jesus for any length of time, then you have experienced this.  When I am at Christmas Dinner, there are people that I am related to by blood that I am not nearly as close to as people in my spiritual family.  So, tasting and seeing the beauty of the Lord’s Supper means looking around and celebrating the new family that God has brought you into. 

You don’t get this in a TV church, or internet church, or church in nature.  It is incredibly popular now to say, “Oh, yeah, I am spiritual person.  I don’t go to church; my church is in nature.”  I am moved by the ocean as well, but Jesus is saying here, “I am calling you to relationship, to eat and break bread together, and build foundational family relationships together.” So look around you this morning when we celebrate our meal together and          taste and see the beauty of having a new family, of not having to go it alone.

(4)  Look inside you

Finally, this meal really won’t mean anything unless you look inside of your own self.  See, historically, both the Passover meal and the Lord’s Supper have always been preceded by a time of confession of sin.  Why is that?  Is it because Jews and Christians are into guilt?  No.  Here is why.  Go back to the Passover meal.  Remember, this meal was called Passover because the angel of death passed over anyone who put the blood of the lamb over their doorstep. 

Not religious performance, not biological bloodlines of being Jewish, but faith.  God’s salvation wasn’t a racial thing or a religious thing.  No.  Neither the Egyptians nor the Israelites had lived up to the full demands of the law.  See salvation was and still is a matter of faith.  And to smear blood over your home indicated, “I am trusting you God.”

See is easy for us to say, “Well, it was easy for those simple folks to have faith back then.”  But don’t do that.  Remember, the Israelites had been in captivity in Egypt for 430 years—that is a long stinking time. Many of them struggled with the same fears and doubts you have, “If God exists, then why wouldn’t he have busted us out of this place long ago.  And now He is asking us to do something foolish like painting the blood of the lamb over my home.  Great. I am sure that will really help the resale value of my home, even as meager as it is.  And they knew that if God didn’t come through then this would only fuel the Egyptians mockery of them. What was required of them was faith—do something that will make you look silly.  Such is the way of faith.  We’re often required to take steps that don’t make a great deal of sense to those around us.

But this obviously raises some questions, particularly for those of you who are here that are skeptical about Christianity.  Why would God do it this way?  Why would he choose a lamb that was to be slaughtered and smear his blood over the door? 

Well, we get the answer in our text.  If you notice, the most astonishing part of this meal for the disciples is something that most of us who haven’t ever observed a Passover meal in our lives even recognize in reading this text.  See what would have shocked the disciples out of their sandals was the fact that there was no lamb on the table to eat.  The centerpiece of any Passover meal was the sacrificial lamb.  Eating the lamb reminded them that the angel they took protection under the blood of the lamb. 

Did Luke just leave it out?  No, Matt and Mark say the same thing. Why?

B/c the sacrificial lamb of God was sitting at the table, so there was no need to put a lamb on the table.  See when he breaks the bread, he says, “This is my body,” the broken lamb of God; and when he drinks the cup, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood.”  The Blood of the Lamb of God.  This meal is no longer about Egypt, but Calvary.  It was no longer about a sacrificial lamb, but it was about THE sacrificial Lamb of God who would make atonement for the sins of all mankind. 

But for many San Diegans that I talk to, this is still not very satisfying.  In fact, we just talked about this last week at our Curious Discussion Forum.  Why all the blood and guts?  Why did Jesus, the Lamb of God, have to die?  Couldn’t God have just forgiven us without this whole sacrificial thing? 

But forgiveness doesn’t work that way, even in human relationships.  Think about the last time someone really hurt you.  I am talking about a deep, intentional wound.  Now you have 2 options.  The first option is for you to seek vengeance in some way.  You make their life miserable.  You slander them.  You talk about them behind their backs, to their face, whatever opportunity you get.  You make it very clear to them, “I am going to ruin you just like you ruined me.”  But there is a problem with this option.  You feel better, but you become hardened and bitter.  The old adage…2 wrongs don’t make a right.  What happens is that the evil they did against you, you’re now returning to them.  That means it has gotten inside you.

Interpreter:  There is a film that captures this dynamic of forgiveness vs. vengeance really well called the Interpreter.  Nicole Kidman plays the lead.  Her family was killed by an evil dictator in Africa.  As a result, she went through phases of being a militant radical, opposing the regime, and then, finally, she reverted to diplomacy through the U.N., largely as an interpreter.  Now this evil dictator gets scheduled to speak at the UN and there is a death threat on his life.  Kidman becomes a suspect. Sean Penn, as a detective, begins to ask her about her feelings towards this man and here is where we’ll pick up, “When I think about him, I feel disappointment.”  He responds, “that is a lover’s word.  How about rage.”  Kidman responds, “Everyone who loses someone wants revenge, on God if they can’t find someone else.  In Africa, “in Motobo, the Ku believe that the only way to end grief is to save a life.  If someone is murdred a year of mourning ends with a ritual that we call the drowning mantra.  As an all night party beside a river, at dawn, the killer is put in a bota ,and it bounds so that he can’t swim.  He is then pushed over, and then the family of the dead has to make a chance, they can let him drown or swim out to save him.  The ku believe that if the family lets th ekiller drown theyl’ fhave justice but spend the rest of htie lives in mourning.  But if they save him, and admit that life isn’t always just that very act can take away their sorrow.  Vengeance is a lazy form of grief.

See the family who has been wronged has a choice—they can seek vengeance and let this guy drown, and if you’re system of justice is balanced by an eye for an eye, or in this case, a death for a death, then justice is achieved.  But Kidman says, the Africans know that you may have “       justice but spend the rest of your lives in mourning.”  B/c you have just committed another wrong; the evil they perpetrated comes inside you.  But, she says, there is another option.  The family who has been wronged has the option of swimming out and saving the very person who murdered their family member.  This is forgiveness. 

See here is the point that the film makes so well:  forgiveness doesn’t just happen by saying, “I forgive you.  It takes suffering yourself.  In this case, the wronged party actually swimming out and saving the life of the one who took their family member’s life.  Through this sort of suffering on someone else’s behalf forgiveness is born.

Such is the way forgiveness happens.  Not simply by saying, “I forgive you, but by the party who is wronged suffering.  That is what forgiveness is.  And, in general, just so you know, the less the offense, the less the suffering required to yield forgiveness.  A little white lie that doesn’t do much damage won’t require you to suffer much to forgive someone.  But when you’re really wronged and deeply wounded, it will require much emotional suffering to forgive this person.

Now, remember, the same relational dynamics apply that apply in our human relationships apply in our relationship with God.  Here is the problem:  The Bible says we all have wounded God’s heart deeply by our sin.  And when you pool all of our sin together as mankind, is it any wonder that God’s suffering would be as great as it was when you consider all the wrongs that we collectively as mankind have committed against him.  Murder, treason, character defamation, fraud—you name it, we have done it to God.  And remember, the greater the offense, the greater the suffering required to forgive the offense. 

See this is why Jesus had to die.  B/c God made a willful choice to forgive us, knowing that his suffering would be far greater than any suffering imaginable.  See on the cross you have the ultimate suffering for the ultimate forgiveness.  As Tim Keller said well, “The currency of forgiveness is Blood, sweat, tears, and thorns.”  See God couldn’t just say I forgive you anymore than any of us can—he had to suffer too.

For some of you, you have never tasted this forgiveness that comes by trusting in the blood of the lamb.  Another way to say this is that you have never eaten the Lord’s Supper.  Oh, you may have gone through the ritual, but you have never eaten the meal by putting your faith in the one whose body was broken for you.  If you haven’t, then I want to give you an opportunity to do so now, by putting your trust in Him and receiving the forgiveness of God through the lamb of God that was slain on your behalf.

Recent Sermon