Last week, we listened in on some of the Lord’s upper room teaching. We witnessed His hands washing the disciples feet then dipping into the sop and offering Judas another chance to turn from what He planned. I want to look back into that same evening and see those hands breaking bread.
It was a regular Passover meal. The apostles have been with Him for three and a half years and at the beginning of this meal He shares the importance of tonight. The hour had finally arrived (Luke 22:14) and Jesus turned to His apostles and said ?I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer? (Luke 22:15). Let?s take in the full picture as He takes up a cup and gives thanks and having the disciples share it (Luke 22:17).
A warm upper room, candles burning, Jesus and the disciples are reclining and eating, partaking in conversation and learning from the mouth of their Lord and Teacher. The Passover meal is no mundane thing?nor do I wish to give that impression. Even so, the Lord changed the meter of the meal, by now taking some of the bread, offering a blessing and giving it to the disciples (Matt 26:26).
His words imbued the elements with meaning as He told them ?Take it (Mk 14:22); eat (1 Cor 11:26); This is My body, which is given for you; do this in remembrance of Me.? (Luke 22:19)
In the same way He took the cup after supper, gave thanks and passed it to them and said ?This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant in My blood (Luke 22:20) which is poured out for many (Mk 14:24) Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.? (1 Cor 11:25)
The very night that the Lord is betrayed, He provides his disciples with a way to look back at this day and remember He told them it would happen. The very night that the Lord would be left alone as He had His will swallowed up in the Father?s, is the very night that He prepares His people with something they would keep doing from then until His return. Paul would tell us that as often as we eat this bread and drink the cup, we proclaim in the present the Lord?s death in the past, until He comes in the future (1 Cor 11:26).
Don’t lose focus! There is much happening in the world and in our lives but we can look back, often, and see the Lord and His hands. Those hands which broke bread, would soon be pierced and bear those markings forever more. Those hands broke the bread and passed the cup and He asks us to remember Him, not in His earthly ministry as much but in His atoning work of His death.
- Jesus on The Cross
- The Lord Broke the Bread
- Jesus Cleared the Temple
- Jesus Wept on Palm Sunday
- Chronology of the Passion Week
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