THE LORD’S SUPPER

THE LORD’S SUPPER

Excerpts taken from ‘The Lord’s Supper’ by Thomas Watson 1665

“A sacrament is a visible sermon.  And herein the sacrament excels the Word preached.  The Word is a trumpet to proclaim Christ, the sacrament is a glass to represent him… The Lord condescends to our weakness…God, to help our faith, does not only give us an audible Word, but a visible sign.”

The Mystery of the Lord’s Supper

The Greeks call the sacrament musterion: a mystery.

The Word is for engrafting, the sacrament for the confirming of faith.  The Word brings us to Christ, the sacrament builds us up in him. 

‘Et sensus fovetur, et fides firmatur’ [Sense is fed, and faith is strengthened].

1. The Author of the Sacrament Is Jesus Christ.

“Jesus took the bread.”  To institute sacraments belongs of right to Christ, and is a flower of his crown.

2. It was when he had supped (Luke 22:20; ‘after supper’): which had this mystery in it, to show that the Sacrament is chiefly intended as a spiritual banquet; it is not to indulge the senses but to feed the graces.  It was ‘after supper’.
3. Christ took bread also because of the analogy; bread did nearly resemble him: ‘I am that bread of life’ (John 6:48).

 Jesus took bread, and blessed it …and he took the cup, and gave thanks (Matt. 26:26-27).

1. Christ’s blessing the elements was his giving thanks.  So it is in the Greek: Eucharistia; ‘He gave thanks.’
2. Christ gave thanks that God had given these elements of bread and wine, not only to be signs but seals of our redemption.
3. The third thing in the institution is the breaking of bread.  “He broke it.’  This did foreshadow Christ’s death and passion, with all the torments of his body and soul:  ‘It pleased the Lord to bruise him’ (Isa. 53:10).  When spices are bruised, then they send forth a sweet savour.  So when Christ was bruised on the cross, he did send out a most fragrant smell.  Christ body being crucified was the breaking open of a box of precious ointment, which did fill heaven and earth with its perfume.
4. But how could Christ suffer, being God?  The Godhead is impassible.  Christ suffered only in his human nature, not the divine.  By simile: if one pours out water on red hot iron, the fire suffers from the water, and is extinguished, but the iron does not suffer.  So the human nature of Christ might suffer death, but the divine nature is not capable of any passion.  When Christ was, in the human nature, suffering, he was, in the divine nature, triumphing.

 The Benefits of the Lord’s Supper

My blood…is poured out……for the forgiveness of sins (Matt. 26:28).

This is a mercy of the first magnitude, the crowning blessing: ‘Who forgiveth all thine iniquities … who crowneth thee with lovingkindness’ (Psa. 103:3-4).  Whosoever has this charter granted is enrolled in the Book of Life: ‘Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven’ (Psa 32:1). 

Christ’s Love Displayed in the Sacrament

This is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many (Matt. 26:28).

1. Behold the amazing love of Christ.  The cross, says St. Augustine, was a pulpit in which Christ preached his love to the world.
2. It was wonderful love that Christ should suffer death.  ‘Lord,’ says Bernard, ‘thou hast loved me more than myself, for thou didst lay down thy life for me.’  That Christ should die as the ‘greatest sinner’ (Luther), having the weight of all men’s sins laid upon him, here was love usque ad stuporem dulcis (sweet to the point of astonishment).
3. It was wonderful love that Christ should die for such as we are.  What are we?  Not only vanity, but enmity.  When we were fighting, he was dying; when we had the weapons in our hands, then he had the spear in his side (Rom. 5:8).
4. It was wonderful love that Christ should rather die for us than for the angels that fell.  They were creatures of a more noble extract, and in all probability might have brought greater revenues of glory to God; yet that Christ should pass by those golden vessels, and make us clods of earth into stars of glory – Oh, the hyperbole of Christ’s love!

 The Broken Body of Christ

This is my body (Matt. 26:26).

1. Was Christ’s body broken?  Then we may behold sin odious in the red glass of Christ’s sufferings.  It is true, sin is to be abominated because it turned Adam out of Paradise, and threw the angels down to hell.  Sin is the peace-breaker, it is like an incendiary in the family, that sets husband and wife at variance; it makes God fall out with us.  Sin is the womb of our sorrows, and the grave of our comforts.  But that which may most of all disfigure the face of sin, and make it appear ghastly, is this, it crucified our Lord: it made Christ veil his glory and lose his blood.

The Blood of Christ

This is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins (Matt. 26:28).

Let us prize Christ’s blood in the sacrament.  It is ‘drink indeed’ (John 6:55).  ‘The grape cluster of my body was taken to the winepress of the cross for thy salvation, and from it was pressed the new wine of thy redemption’ (Bernard).

Christ’s blood is a reconciling blood.  Christ’s blood is ‘the blood of atonement’.  Nay, it is not only a sacrifice, but a ‘propitiation’ (1 John 2:2).  Which denotes bringing us into favour with God.  It is one thing for a traitor to be pardoned, and another thing to be brought into favour.  Sin cut us off from God, Christ’s blood cements us to God.   Only the blood of Christ can ingratiate us into God’s favour, and make him look upon us with a smiling aspect.

1. Christ’s blood is a quickening blood.  ‘Whoso…drinketh my blood, hath eternal life’ (John 6:54); it both begets life, and prevents death.  Sure enough, the life of our soul is in the blood of Christ.
2. Christ’s blood is a cleansing blood.  ‘How much more shall the blood of Christ…purge your conscience?’ (Heb. 9:14).  As the merit of the blood of Christ pacifies God, so the virtue of it purifies us.  It is the King of Heaven’s bath.  ‘The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin’ (1 John 1:7).  The Word of God is a looking glass, to show us our spots; and the blood of Christ is a fountain to wash them away (Zech. 13:1).
3. Christ’s blood is a softening blood.  There is nothing so hard but it may be softened if it lie steeping in his blood; it will soften a stone.  The heart which before was like a piece hewn out of a rock, being steeped in Christ’s blood becomes soft, and the waters of repentance flow from it.
4. Christ’s blood is a cooling blood. 
1. It cools the heat of sin.  The heart naturally is full of distempered heat.  It burns in lust and passion; the blood of Christ allays this heat, it quenches the inflammation of sin.
2. It cools the heat of conscience.  In time of desertion, conscience burns with the heat of God’s displeasure.  When the heart burns, and is in an agony, Christ’s blood is like water to the fire: it has a cooling and quenching virtue in it.
5. Christ’s blood is a comforting blood.  It is best in affliction.  It cures the trembling of the heart.  The blood of Christ can make a prison become a palace.  It turned the martyrs’ flames into beds of roses:  ‘The martyrs are beaten, they rejoice; they die and behold they triumph.  Why?  Because, steeped in the blood of the cross, they do not fear death but hope for it.’  Christ’s blood gives comfort at the hour of death.
6. Christ’s blood is a heaven-procuring blood.  ‘Through the side of Christ, he threw open to us the gateway to heaven’ (Bernard).  Our sins did shut heaven.  Christ’s blood is the key which opens the gate of paradise for us.  ‘We die through the tree of knowledge; we rise through the tree of the cross.’

 Self-Examination

But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread, and drink of that cup

(1 Cor. 11:28).

It is not enough to do what God has appointed, but as he appointed.  ‘Prepare your hearts unto the Lord’ (1 Sam. 7:3).  The musician first puts his instrument in tune before he plays.  The heart must first be prepared, and put in tune, before it goes to meet with God in this solemn ordinance of the sacrament.  Take heed of rashness and irreverence.  If we come not preparedly, we do not drink, but spill Christ’s blood, ‘Whosoever shall eat this bread, and drink this cup of the Lord, unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord’ (1 Cor. 11:27).  He that comes unpreparedly to the Lord’s Supper turns the cup in the sacrament into ‘a cup of fury’; ‘He changes the cup of blood into the cup of wrath.’

It is not enough that others think we are fit to come, but we must examine ourselves.  It is hard for a man to look inward, and see the face of his own soul.  But this probatory work is necessary:

v  If we do not examine ourselves, we are at a loss about our spiritual estate.

v  God will examine us.  It was a sad question the master of the feast asked, ‘Friend, how camest thou in hither, not having a wedding garment?’ (Matt. 22:12).  So it will be terrible, when God shall say to a man, ‘How camest thou in hither to my table with a proud, vain, unbelieving heart?  What has thou to do here in thy sins?  Thou pollutest my holy things.’ 

We would examine our sins, that they may be mortified; our wants, that they may be supplied; our graces, that they may be strengthened.

1. We must come with serious hearts.  God knows every communicant, and if he sees any levity and indecency of spirit in us unworthy of his presence, he will be highly incensed, and send us away with the guilt of Christ’s blood, instead of the comfort of it.
2. We must come with intelligent hearts.  There ought to be a competent measure of the knowledge, that we may ‘discern the Lord’s body’.  They that know not the mystery, feel not the comfort.  Some say they have good hearts, yet lack knowledge; we may as well call that a good eye which lacks sight.
3. We must come to the sacrament with longing hearts.  We should say, as Christ, ‘With desire I have desired to eat this Passover’ (Luke 22:15).  Desires are the sails of the soul, which are spread to receive the gale of a heavenly blessing.
4. If we would come prepared to this ordinance, we must come with penitent hearts, ‘whose souls have been pierced, though not with a sword’ (Augustine).  A broken Christ is to be received into a broken heart.  The more bitterness we taste in sin, the more sweetness we shall taste in Christ.
5. We must come with sincere hearts.  Bad aims will spoil good actions.  What is our design in coming to the sacraments?  Is it that we may have more victory over our corruptions, and be more confirmed in holiness?  Then God will be good to us and heal us.
6. If we would come rightly prepared to the sacrament we must come with humble hearts.  We see Christ humbling himself to the death; and will a humble Christ ever be received into a proud heart?  How humble should he be who is to receive an alms of free grace!  Humility was never a loser.  The emptier the vessel is, and the lower it is let down into the well, the more water it draws up; so the more the soul is emptied of itself, and the lower it is let down by humility, the more it fetches out of the well of salvation.  God will come into a humble heart to revive it (Isa. 57:15).  That is no part of Christ’s temple which is not built with a low roof.
7. We must come with heavenly hearts.  The mystery of the sacrament is heavenly, what should an earthworm do here?  The sacrament is called koinonia, a ‘communion’ (1 Cor. 10:16).  What communion can an earthly man have with Christ?  An earthly man makes the world his god.  Then let him not think to receive another God in the sacrament.  Oh, let us be in the heavenly altitudes, and by the wings of grace ascend.
8. We must come with believing hearts.  Christ gave the sacrament to the Apostles principally as they were believers.  Such as come faithless, go away fruitless.  So that, because faith is humble, and gives all the glory to Christ, and free grace, hence it is God that has put so much honor upon it.  This is the golden bucket that draws water out of the well of life.
9. We must come to the Lord’s table with charitable hearts.  Christ’s blood was shed to reconcile us, not only to God, but one to another.  Christ’s body was broken to make up the breaches among Christians.  He that does not come in charity to the sacrament has nothing of God in him, for ‘God is love’ (1 John 4:8).
10. We must come hither with praying hearts.  Every ordinance, as well as every creature, is ‘sanctified by…prayer’ (1 Tim. 4:5).  When we send the dove of prayer to heaven, it brings an olive leaf in its mouth.  Many seem so distracted with worldly cares that they can scarce spare any time for prayer before they come to the sacrament.  Do they think the tree of blessing will drop its fruit into their mouth when they never shook it by prayer?  God does not set his mysteries as so low a rate as to cast them away upon those that do not seek them (Ezek. 36:37).

 We see how we are to be qualified in our approaches to the Lord’s table.  Thus coming, we shall meet with embraces of mercy.  We shall have not only a representation, but a participation, of Christ in the sacrament; we shall carry away not only panis [bread] but salutaris [healing]; we shall be ‘filled with all the fullness of God’ (Eph. 3:19).

OUR PRAYER

Lord, all I have is thine.  My head shall be thine to study for thee; my hands shall be thine to work for thee; my heart shall be thine to adore thee; my tongue shall be thine to praise thee!