The Ordinances: The Lord’s Supper

This sermon is from Grace Fellowship Church in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. To access other sermons or to learn more about us, please visit our website at graceedmonton .ca.

The Ordinances as Blessings Given by Christ

So like I said, this week we're going to study the Lord's Supper. So this is the ordinances part two. And while some might be disappointed that we're not doing the last things yet, it is a good and it's a worthwhile topic.

And so I want us to approach it with that frame of mind. If you remember from last week, Amy, I'm not sure if you heard what we were talking about last week, but we shared a story about a man named Felix Mons, who was a Swiss Anabaptist believer.

And he was executed by, at that point, it was the Reformed Church, the Protestant Reformed Church in Switzerland. And he wasn't arrested and executed for murder or for adultery or for treason, but he was executed by drowning because of his view on baptism.

So he was drowned by the Protestant Church in that city because he believed in credo baptism, that only people who believe on Christ, only true believers, verifiable believers, should be baptized. And if you were baptized as a child, that meant you should be baptized again.

And so he went to death, to execution for that. And you'll remember too that I shared a story how in the second century, Christians were reviled, they were insulted, they were persecuted for their commitment to the Lord's table.

So for their commitment to the Lord's Supper, what we're talking about tonight. And they were even charged with cannibalism and because that was last week, I'll just remind us. So Cecilius the pagan, you'll remember there was a debate between the Christians and Cecilius the pagan, and he said something that is still ringing in our ears today in many ways.

He said, you Christians are the worst breed ever to affect the world. You deserve every punishment you can get. Nobody likes you. It would be better if you and your Jesus had never been born. And then the kicker, he says, we hear that you are cannibals.

You eat the flesh of your children in your sacred meetings. And that was often said of Christians is that they were cannibals, that they, because of this ritual, this ordinance that they participated in, they were likened to murderers and those that even ate their own children.

And like I said, it's something that rings in our ears still. I shared something with Steve this week. Just this week, unsolicited, we had someone randomly message us and call us all kinds of names and all kinds of bad things for no other reason than that we're Christians.

And so in any case, why did I tell these stories at the beginning of last week and why do I recount them now? The case that I was making and the case that I want to make today as we begin our study is this, that we see that in the Bible, for one, but also in the witness of Christians throughout the ages, the ordinances of the church have always mattered or should have always mattered.

They did really matter. And they're more than matters of convenience, but they are, in fact, blessings given by Christ. The ordinances are blessings given by Christ. They're to be received with thanksgiving.

Their meaning is to be understood and to be embraced by believers. And they're to be practiced with diligence in the church. So the ordinances are not these throw-away things that we find in the Bible.

They're something that matters, something that we should hold to. As I was preparing this week, I thought about a young adult service that Nicole and I used to go to when we were in our early 20s, and I started to think in all the time that we went, it wasn't that long, but in about a year, there never was the celebration of the Lord's Supper.

There simply wasn't something that was valuable enough in that context to celebrate. And yet that's not the case that we see in the Bible. That's not the case that we see in church history. The Lord's Supper is something that is of tremendous value, inestimable value, is how I put it last week.

So tonight, we're going to focus on understanding the Lord's Supper better, understanding the meaning of it. Who can participate in it? How do we participate in it? What does this look like? And so we'll start with review.

And kids, no one, at least, I want to ask you specifically. And maybe the adults can help if you get stumped. But what is an ordinance? Do you remember? You know? No? Does anyone else remember? What is an ordinance?

Baptism and the Lord's Supper are the two ordinances of the church. And that word ordinance, nice try, the word ordinance really is that which Christ has ordained. So when we think, what is an ordinance?

It's something that Christ has ordained. Because ordained is perhaps maybe a word that isn't used as often today as in times past. It's something that Christ has instituted. So when Christ instituted the Lord's Supper, that was something that he ordained.

And I was going to ask, what are the two ordinances? You answered too soon, but the two ordinances are the Lord's Supper and baptism. We talked about it last week that in the Catholic Church, for instance, they have seven ordinances.

And the problem, the exception that we take with that is not with Catholics, but simply with the idea that Christ did not ordain seven things as part of the worship of the church. But he ordained two things.

He ordained baptism, something he participated in, something that he taught in, something that in the Great Commission he ordained, and the Lord's Supper. Now, where do we see the Lord's Supper ordained in the Bible?

Does anyone remember where we've seen that? It happened in a building. You had to go up the stairs to get there. In the upper room. Yeah, well, no, that's fine too. So the first place that we see it fully laid out is in Matthew 26.

And so let's go in our Bibles to Matthew chapter 26. What I want us to do, we're going to review two of the main texts on the Lord's Supper, and then we will pretty much park ourselves in those two passages as we unpack the meaning of the Lord's Supper.

So in Matthew 26, verse 26, just for context, if you look at the beginning of verse 17, if you have a heading in your Bible, in the ESV it says, the Passover with the disciples. It was the celebration of the Passover, so the disciples were celebrating the Passover meal with Christ in the upper room.

And during this celebrating of the Passover meal, in verse 26, it says this, Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after blessing it, broke it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat, this is my body.

And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, Drink of it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. I tell you, I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until the day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom.

So as they're celebrating the Passover feast, and that's an important detail, I want you to remember that Christ breaks bread, he serves the wine, and as part of the instituting, the commemorating of, the inaugurating of the new covenant, he institutes the Lord's Supper.

And we won't go there, but we see parallels, if you're writing notes, in Mark 14 and Luke 22 of this particular passage. So we see the Lord's Supper in three out of the four Gospels. The next big passage that deals with the Lord's Supper is in 1 Corinthians 11.

So these are the two big texts that pertain to the Lord's Supper. So we'll probably have our finger in one of these passages for the remainder of the evening. But in chapter 11 and verse 23, I'll start there.

Paul quotes Christ, he says, For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus, on the night when 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. In the same way, also, he took the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.

So we see that the Lord's Supper is settled as an ordinance. It is both commanded, it's instituted, it's ordained by Christ in the Gospels, and it's practiced by the Church, as is reflected by Paul's words.

And it's an ordinance that's to be repeated. So we see that in verse 26. If you look, Paul says, he quotes Christ, something that we don't actually see in the Gospel accounts, but is no doubt accurate and inspired.

He says, For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, so as often as you do it, so it's something that's to be done with some regularity, as often as you do it, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.

It's something that is to be done until the Lord's parousia. So now we're getting into the last things, until the Lord comes. That's the word parousia means, the second coming of Christ. So I'm going to follow a little bit of the same pattern that we did last week, in terms of just keeping things simple.

So you'll remember last week I said, who are the subjects of baptism? Who gets to participate in baptism? Well, I'm going to ask the same question. Who are the subjects of the Lord's Supper? So who gets to participate when the Lord's Supper is served?

Who gets to go to the front, or receive it in their seats, and participate? I'll put that question to you guys. Who gets to participate in the Lord's Supper? Not everyone? Okay. Amy, you're always quiet.

Can I pick on you? That's right. Yeah, absolutely. That's right. In 1 Corinthians 11, verse 27, we'll start there. It says, Whoever therefore eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and the blood of the Lord.

Let a person examine himself. Then so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body, so without really understanding, without really holding to the sacrifice behind the Lord's Supper, eats and drinks judgment on himself.

That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. And so the Lord's Supper, there's unanimous... Oh, yeah, go ahead, Steve. Okay, I was going to say the Lord's Supper, there's unanimous agreement.

We've heard about differing perspectives. We'll hear about more differing perspectives, about the Lord's Supper, but there's unanimous agreement that the subjects, the participants of the Lord's Supper, are to be believers.

They're to be believers who are walking with the Lord.

Go ahead.

I don't know if you're... What do you say to someone who abstains from the Lord?

Absolutely.

We're going to get there. So can I answer that?

Yeah, sure.

We'll answer that in the course of the next minute or two, maybe the next five minutes. But no, it's absolutely important that we say that when we serve the Lord's Supper, those who we serve the Lord's Supper to, those who should participate, are those who are believers.

Now, some might say that they need to be baptized believers. Others say baptism doesn't matter. In my mind, I can't be too picky because Scripture is silent on the issue. I think that it's a good practice for those believers to be baptized.

So they're baptized as believers. That signifies their entry into both the Christian life, the covenant community, and then they continue that affirmation in the Lord's Supper. But if there's someone in the baptism classes next week and we're serving the Lord's Supper, I'm not going to fence the table from them.

I'll leave that between them and the Lord in terms of their own conscience. Does that make sense? Yeah. I have to at various times.

And again, that's not a different issue.

Yes.

That would be illegal.

You know what? Probably up until this study, I held to the fact that you just need to be baptized. I've told that to the kids. Why aren't we participating in the Lord's Supper? Well, you need to believe, you need to be baptized, and then you can participate in the Lord's Supper.

And that would probably be my own conviction, but because the Bible doesn't say that specifically, I can't hold other people, I can't bind their conscience with my preference. So that's why I leave that there.

But first of all, we see in the Bible, so if we look again in that 1 Corinthians 11, 27 -30 passage, everyone that takes the bread and the cup must first examine their own hearts before the Lord, it says.

Right?

So they should be asking diagnostic questions as they approach the table. And so a couple of the questions that you might ask, whether you're a believer or whether you don't know if you're a believer or an unbeliever, whatever the case might be, is this.

Have I rightly discerned the body? So we see that in the text, right? Have I rightly discerned the body? And what this means is, do I understand what this bread and this wine represent? The body of Christ that was broken and His blood that was shed on the cross.

For me, do I believe that? Have I discerned that? Do I understand the significance of this? Another question we should ask is, am I right with God through Jesus Christ? So if you answer no to that, then I would say no, you should not participate in the Lord's Supper.

Or maybe even better, repent and believe on Christ. But we should be asking, am I right? Is there repentance? Is there faith? Is there fruit that is consistent with that profession? Another diagnostic question as we examine ourselves before the table, is there the presence of any sin in my life that I am actively engaged in, that I am not repenting of?

Now this doesn't mean that I can't quite recall every possible sin and therefore I can't be certain that I've repented of every possible sin, but rather, am I nurturing some type of sin in my life? Am I nursing some type of favorite secret sin?

Am I giving into and entertaining this sin? And is there no repentance? Another question is, am I in right relationship with Christ's body, the church? Some believe that that idea of discerning the body in the context of a united church meeting together, taking the Lord's Supper, is am I bearing a grudge, any unforgiveness?

Is there bitterness in my heart against another member of Christ's covenant community? As far as it concerns me, am I at peace with all men in the assembly, all men and women in the assembly? And so we want to discern our fellowship and our communion with the people of God as we approach the table of God.

These are all questions, and there are more certainly, but just a few that came to mind as I was preparing. And then every time we partake in the Lord's Supper, it should be an opportunity for renewed repentance and a furtherance of our faith.

And so we'll get into the meaning of the Lord's Supper, but I can think of very few times where I've come to the Lord's Supper and there should be an opportunity as we serve the Lord's Supper for people to consider, to examine themselves, to repent, to remember why we are here, what this represents, to discern the body, and to look to Christ by faith.

And so I'm tempted to get into meaning, but I'm going to hold my horses there. When it comes to participating in the Lord's Supper, the subjects of the Lord's Supper, is there a role for anyone else in that?

So there are the believers certainly that are examining themselves, they're discerning the body. Do you think that there's a role for anyone else in that equation? Yeah, sorry, it's a bit of a fuzzy question.

Is there a role for anyone else in determining the subjects of baptism? Sorry, the Lord's Supper.

Outside of believers?

Outside of each individual believer sitting in their seat. Christ, absolutely. And what I would say too is the under-shepherds. I heard you say it this week, fencing the table, right? We believe biblically that the under-shepherds of the church have a responsibility to what theologians through church history have called fencing the table.

And so what that really is, if you're wondering, is that a biblical idea? When Paul writes this exhortation to the Corinthian church in 1 Corinthians 11, he is in essence fencing the table. And the way that we fence the table, we put up caution signs almost of warning and of discipline for the good of the flock.

And we do this so that no one would be deceived by false assurances, right? That's why if you look at what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 11 and verse 19, he said, for there must be factions among you in order that those who are genuine among you may be recognized.

He wanted people to know, he wanted there to be a clear delineation between who are believers and who are unbelievers. And this is in the context of the Lord's Supper. So he's saying there needs to be that delineation.

So he doesn't want anyone, and every under-shepherd, every under-shepherd who has a shepherd's heart does not want anyone to be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. They don't want anyone going to hell with the false assurance that they're a believer.

And then, also, they don't want anyone to be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin in the sense that people are walking openly in sin, practicing sin publicly, grossly. It's clear to the community, and yet we allow them to participate as if they're acting like Christians.

Does that make sense? And so the Lord's Supper, when an under-shepherd fences the table, when they're helping to determine what this looks like, it's not like, I think, of a bouncer outside a club or something, right?

Like a thug that determines whether you get in or whether you stay out. But rather, it's the leaders of the church having an eye for the good of the flock, the good of the people, gently, lovingly, graciously, guiding the people to ensure that they're not participating in an unworthy manner.

I'll have more to say, but go ahead, Steve.

Church Discipline and Fencing the Table

So, I guess, an application, does this, would that constitute as...

Absolutely, yeah. So, good example, Matthew chapter 18. If we go there quickly, we would teach and practice within the context of Grace Fellowship Church that if there is someone who is currently under church discipline, and that's a whole topic in and of itself, but if there's someone who's under church discipline, that we, as the leaders, would not allow them.

There would be that expectation amongst both the leaders and that individual that they are not to participate in the Lord's Supper. This is why. So, if we look at Matthew 18. So, in the beginning of verse 15, if a brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, right?

And so, I'm not going to read all of this, but there's essentially three stages to church discipline. If Steve sees me in some type of clear public sin, or if I sin against Steve in some way, or just sin against the Lord in a public way, Steve can come to me and say, Shane, I've observed this in your life.

I believe this to be sin, and I would just like to see you restored, brother. I don't want you to be hardened by this sin. If I say to him, Steve, this is none of your business. You know, carry on. I'm going to do what I do.

You do what you do. Then, what would Steve do in that context? Steve would take another brother or sister, or another one or two brothers and sisters. He would come back to me. They, together, would say, Shane, we're seeing this in your lives.

We love you. We want to see you restored. We don't want you to be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin, and we just want to exhort you to repent of your sin, and be reconciled to God in this particular way.

If I say, I want to do this. I'm going in this direction. Leave me alone. Then, Christ says in Matthew 18, He says, if he refuses to listen to them, verse 17, tell it to the church, and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.

So we would not serve the Lord's Supper knowingly to an unbeliever. If someone came into our fellowship, and they did not profess Christ, and they did not live with any fruit in keeping with a profession, and I saw them getting up to partake in the Lord's Supper, I mean, sometimes people will beat us to the table, right?

But that's a good opportunity. The Lord's Supper is a good opportunity to have a conversation with that person and say, this is what the Lord's Supper is. This is who participates in it. Where do you think you stand right now?

If you don't think that you believe in Christ, if you don't profess to believe in Him, or if it's clear from your behavior, from the fruit of your life, that you don't believe in Him, then I don't think that you should participate in the Lord's Supper yet.

Just like we would stop someone from being baptized who had no profession of faith in Christ, right? So it's not splitting hairs. The ordinances are meant for believers. Well, in the same way, if someone is in church discipline, and we are treating them, as Matthew 18 says, as a Gentile and a tax collector, so essentially, as an evil unbeliever, as a traitorous unbeliever, treasonous unbeliever, then we're going to say, you cannot participate in the Lord's Supper.

So that's one of the ways that we fence the table. We say, if you're practicing this sin, you're refusing to repent, you're welcome to come. Brother, sister, we love you. We want you to be restored. We want you to take the Lord's Supper.

We're praying for you every day. But as long as you're going to act like an unbeliever, we have to treat you like an unbeliever. So that's one way that we fence the table, is as an act of church discipline.

The other, as I've already mentioned, is simply someone that is an unbeliever by profession, or someone that's acting like an unbeliever. So they're maybe not a member of our church. If someone comes and visits, and they profess faith in Christ, we're not like a closed assembly, where we are going to refuse them.

Again, we simply just have to trust that their profession of faith in Christ is genuine. Does that make sense? And so, subjects of baptism, the first line is the believer. They must examine themselves.

They must rightly discern the body. The second line of defense, you could say, is the under-shepherds of the church. And at the same time, we recognize openly, the Bible recognizes it, I believe, that we don't require perfection at the Lord's table.

So there are many times I can think, as a brand new believer, where the Lord's Supper was being served, and where I left the room, or sat outside the room. I can think of one particular instance, when I, I don't know, I was a grump that morning, or whatever the case was, and I sat outside the room while the Lord's Supper was being served.

And I think that what would have been more mature for me, as a believer in that moment, is to consider this an opportunity to repent, to confess my sin to the Lord, to lay hold of Christ again, as we do every day, and to partake in the Lord's Supper.

So, John Calvin, he writes this, he says, who is worthy of participating? He says, this is the worthiness, the best and only kind we can bring to God, to offer our vileness and our unworthiness to Him, so that in His mercy we may be taken as worthy, to despair in ourselves, so that we may be lifted up by Him, to accuse ourselves that we may be justified in Him.

And so, who is worthy to participate in the Lord's Supper? All of those people whose merit is found outside of themselves and in Christ. That's how you know that you're eligible to participate in the Lord's Supper, is when your worthiness is not within you, but is outside of you, it's in Christ.

Steve and I have a friend who married, at one time she was married to a Jehovah's Witness, and she told me an interesting story about the Lord's Supper for Jehovah's Witnesses. And Jehovah's Witnesses have the Lord's Supper one day a year, and that one day a year they prepare the elements, so they have the bread and the cup, and everyone gets ready to serve it, and then when it comes time to serve the Lord's Supper, I think they bring the tray around, I don't know exactly how it works, but they bring the trays around with the elements, everyone looks at the elements, but no one touches it, no one takes the elements.

And the reason why is because within the Jehovah's Witnesses beliefs, only the elite can take the Lord's Supper, and the elite are the 144 ,000 of Revelation. And so the Jehovah's Witnesses celebrate some form of the Lord's Supper, but practically no one participates, yes.

I think that for them, it's who discerns within themselves that they are one of the 144 ,000. Yes, and so by and large, and I think the way that I understood it from how it was told to me, is that when someone does participate in it, they would write down that person's name, and that goes back to the Watchtower Society, because they're waiting, I think they're waiting for the full 144 ,000 to come to be in terms of their records.

So I don't know it all, I don't claim to know it all, but that certainly is not biblical, that's not what the Lord had in mind when he exhorted to us to rightly discern, to examine themselves. Rather, it is simply this, that the Lord's Supper, and we'll get to it in a little bit, is an opportunity for us to examine ourselves, and to remember that the only way that we are worthy of participating is when our merit is in Jesus Christ alone, by his grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.

So, who gets to participate? Anyone and everyone who believes on Christ. Even those who haven't been baptized, perhaps, as much as it might irk us, but I think that if, that's a good opportunity for the church to practice baptism regularly, to teach on these things, so that we can avoid putting the cart before the horse.

I don't know if that satisfies you, Steve, but okay, I'll ask this next. What is the meaning of the Lord's Supper? So, we know who participates, but why do we participate in the first place? That's a question.

Yeah, absolutely, for sure. Any other thoughts, answers? Okay, well, you took the first one, for sure. So, the first purpose, biblically, is to commemorate, so it's to remember and to proclaim Christ's death until he comes.

So, in that 1 Corinthians 11 passage, verse 25 and 26, so Paul quotes Christ. He says, This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink in remembrance of me. So, the Lord's table is a remembrance service, for as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.

If you don't know it already, we are forgetful creatures. We are very, very forgetful creatures. My wife knows that very well about me, that if my head wasn't attached, I would lose it. And not only do we forget our car keys or our login passwords, but we forget the very means by which we are reconciled to God.

We forget the gospel. As crazy as that is, humans forget the gospel. Like we were saying on Sunday, we drift towards, we default towards a performance-based salvation, a gospel of human achievement, rather than a gospel of divine accomplishment.

We're always drifting in that direction. And so the Lord's Supper is like that opportunity, it's that remembrance, that reminder that snaps us back to remember the object of our hope, that it is Christ crucified.

It is, as Paul says, the Lord's death that is proclaimed in this meal. It is the Lord's death that is our hope. And so throughout all of church history, and then for all of church future, the Lord's Supper is to stand as an opportunity to remember and to reflect upon and to proclaim Christ's sacrificial, atoning, all-sufficient death once for all time.

And God has given us this meal to do often, it says, that we would remember Him. Now there's a great debate about how often we do this. I'm not going to ask today because it simply is a debate because the scriptures don't say how often we should do it.

But we believe that to do it more often is more beneficial because we need the gospel not once in a lifetime, not once in a year, not once in a week, but every single day. And so we believe that we should participate in the Lord's Supper every Lord's Day, every Sunday, to participate that we would remember what Christ has done, where the source of our salvation is.

And because God never changes, and because human nature has not changed since the fall, we see this same type of practice in the Old Covenant. So if you guys think back to the Old Covenant, I was just reading in Joshua here this week, that when the Israelites passed through the Jordan River, does anyone remember what they did when the Jordan River was dry?

They grabbed something from the river. They grabbed big stones from the river, took them up onto the bank of the river, and they piled them up. They made a monument next to the Jordan River so that when people would go by that monument and remember the time that the Lord caused the Jordan to stand still, to open up so that they could cross the river.

Well, in the same way, does anyone remember the night that Christ instituted the Lord's Supper? What were they doing? What meal were they celebrating? The Passover meal. So that has significance. So if you remember, do you guys remember the Passover meal?

What happens there? What happened during the Passover meal, Noah? Okay, that's the Passover meal in the Upper Room, but what happened at the Passover with Moses? Do you remember the Passover? That's right, absolutely.

Exactly. So the very last plague as part of God's deliverance of the people. Oh, you've got to give a high five. As part of God's deliverance of the people out of Egypt. Very enthusiastic, by the way.

God's deliverance of the people of Israel out of Egypt is that God was going to strike down the firstborn of every Egyptian household and what God instructed the Israelites to do is to have a Passover meal, to sacrifice a Passover lamb, to smear the blood on the doorposts and the lintel of their house, and the angel of the Lord would pass over their house and would not touch anyone in their home.

And then this Passover meal was to be performed perpetually. So it was given to be performed in perpetuity every year. And so we're going to look, if we turn to Exodus 12, a little bit more about this Passover meal.

And what the Passover meal was, it was a teaching tool. It was a teaching tool that was to remind and to teach God's covenant people about the deliverance that God had performed for them. So chapter 12, verse 25, we're just going to focus on this piece.

In verse 25, God tells Moses and the Israelites, he says, And when you come to the land that the Lord will give you, as he has promised, you shall keep this service. So the Passover meal. And when your children say to you, what do you mean by this service?

You shall say, it is the sacrifice of the Lord's Passover. For he passed over the houses of the people of Israel and Egypt when he struck the Egyptians, but spared our houses. And the people bowed their heads and worshiped.

So God gave the Passover meal to be performed year by year, decade by decade, century by century, to remind and to teach the people of Israel about his deliverance. And so if we fast forward now, 3 ,600 years, sorry, 1 ,600 years, 3 ,600 years would be the day, 1 ,600 years to Christ during the Passover meal.

What the Lord Jesus is doing is he is instituting an ordinance, in essence, that will replace the Passover meal and will be one of the two ordinances in the life of the church. So I remember a few years ago, has anyone ever heard of the World Mission Society, Church of God?

A few raised hands. The World Mission Society, Church of God has, they are a Korean group, or I should say, they aren't a Korean group. It originated in Korea, but a group that believes that Christ has already come and that Christ married a woman, that she is actually still alive.

And so you'll hear them talk a lot about God the mother. Well, one day we were at the McEwen campus and the Lord so had it that we were right next door to the World Mission Society. And so we got talking and if you've ever had an interaction with them, they are quite aggressive, very forward in terms of putting forward what they believe, contrary to maybe what we believe.

And I was being more or less examined by this one man at the next booth, giving me a list of do's and don'ts. Have you done this? Do you do this? Asking me about having a Christmas tree or have you ever done this or do you not do that?

And then one of the questions that he asked to determine if I was in fact a true believer in Christ, was he said, do you celebrate the Passover? Because they would teach that you must celebrate the Passover to be saved.

And if I'm honest, my response to that was not wrong, but it was weak. I talked about how Christ had fulfilled the old covenant, that the old covenant was obsolete and so I didn't need to participate in the Passover, but I really missed a golden opportunity to talk about how the Passover, not only has that been done away with as part of the old covenant, but actually the Passover pointed to Christ, the Passover lamb, and the Passover pointed to a greater feast, to a better supper, to a better meal, and that is the Lord's Supper, that is the Lord's table.

It was on the Passover that Christ instituted the Lord's Supper. So it wasn't wrong, but it was a weak response. R .C. Sproul, this is a quote, he speaks of this reality, he says, the Lord's Supper is a drama that has its roots not only in the upper room experience, but roots that reach back into the Old Testament celebration of Passover.