The Lord's Supper
Text: Matthew 26:20-30; Mark 14:17-26; Luke 22:14-23; I Corinthians 11:23-29
Series: Restoration Sermons
Date:
Speaker: Ed Rangel
Location: Waupaca Church of Christ
Bible Version: NASB 1995
Sermon Type: Expository
Learning Objectives
By the close of this lesson the hearer should be able to:
- State the correct names for the Lord's Supper (I Cor. 11:20; I Cor. 10:21) and explain why "Eucharist," "sacrament," and "emblems" are all incorrect.
- Identify the three set feasts of Jewish law, explain why Jesus observed them, and explain how the Lord's Supper relates to but does not replace the Passover.
- State the argument for weekly observance on the first day of the week using the chain of reasoning from resurrection appearances through Acts 20:7 and I Cor. 16:1-2.
- Explain the two distinct purposes of the Lord's Supper from I Cor. 11:24-26: remembrance of his death, and proclamation until he comes.
- Identify the three specific abuses condemned in I Cor. 11:27-29 and explain what "discerning the body" means.
Thesis
The Lord's Supper is not a sacrament, not a Eucharist, not a half-remembered tradition to be observed at the church's convenience. It is the Lord's own table (I Cor. 10:21), to be kept on the Lord's own day (the first day of every week), for the Lord's own purpose (the memorial of his death until he comes), in the manner the Lord himself requires (with discernment of the body). The church that treats it otherwise has misunderstood what it is and dishonored the one whose supper it is.
Burden
The burden is two-sided. First: a significant portion of the confusion about the Lord's Supper comes from names that are not biblical — Eucharist, sacrament, emblems — names that carry theological freight the New Testament does not authorize. The names must be corrected before the practice can be understood. Second: the specific abuses Paul addresses in I Corinthians 11 are alive in every era — people who participate without discernment, who treat the table as a social occasion, who are present in body but absent in attention. The burden is to restore both the right understanding and the right practice.
Introduction
"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.' In the same way He took the cup also after supper, saying, 'This cup is the new covenant in My blood; do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me'" (I Cor. 11:23-25). Paul received this from the Lord and delivered it to the Corinthians. The chain of transmission is direct: from Christ to Paul to the congregation. What the congregation does at the table is not their invention; it is what they received.
The table has a long history: it was instituted at the Passover, it continues on the first day of every week, and it will continue until Christ comes again. Between its institution and his return, every faithful assembly of Christians keeps it.
I. Its History
The Lord's Supper was not invented by the early church. It was instituted by Christ himself at a specific meal on a specific night, in the context of a specific history.
Three set feasts in Jewish law. The law of Moses required that all Jewish males appear before God three times each year: the feast of Passover (Unleavened Bread), the feast of Pentecost (Weeks), and the feast of Tabernacles (Booths). These were not optional gatherings — they were law.
Jesus kept the feasts. As a man born under the law (Gal. 4:4), Jesus was obligated to keep the law's requirements. He appeared at Jerusalem for the feasts. His final week in Jerusalem was structured around the Passover. The meal at which he instituted the Lord's Supper was a Passover meal.
Instituted at the Passover. "And He said to them, 'I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer'" (Luke 22:15). The Lord's Supper was instituted within, and grows out of, the Passover meal. The Passover commemorated Israel's deliverance from Egypt through the blood of the lamb; the Lord's Supper commemorates the new Israel's deliverance from sin through the blood of the Lamb of God. The connection is organic and intentional.
Does not replace the Passover; the Passover laws do not apply. The Lord's Supper is not the Passover continued. The Passover was given to Israel under the law; the Lord's Supper was given to the church under the new covenant. The laws governing the Passover — its participants, its elements, its procedures — do not govern the Lord's Supper. The two are related historically but are distinct covenantally. Christ did not replace the old feast with a new feast on its schedule; he instituted a new memorial that belongs to the new covenant and its assembly.
II. Its Names
What something is called reflects what it is understood to be. The names used for the Lord's Supper reveal the theology held about it.
Not Eucharist. The word eucharistia is a Greek word meaning "thanksgiving." The Lord gave thanks at the table, and the act of giving thanks has always been a feature of the observance. But "Eucharist" as a name for the supper carries sacramental theology — the idea that the bread and cup are transformed into the literal body and blood of Christ. That is not what the New Testament teaches. Using the term uncritically imports a theology the New Testament does not authorize.
Not Sacrament. "Sacrament" is a Latin term (sacramentum) with no direct New Testament equivalent. In Roman Catholic theology, a sacrament is a means of grace that confers what it signifies — the Lord's Supper as a sacrament confers grace through the act of partaking. The New Testament does not teach this. The Lord's Supper is a memorial, not a mechanism of grace that operates through physical ingestion.
Not "the emblems." The word "emblems" is a pious tradition of the Restoration Movement but it is not a New Testament term. Christ said "this is My body" and "this is My blood of the covenant" — he did not say "these are emblems of My body and blood." The memorial nature of the supper is established by "do this in remembrance of Me," not by a terminological distancing of the bread and cup from what Christ called them. Calling them "emblems" adds a word Christ did not use; calling them "the Lord's Supper" uses the word Paul used.
The Lord's Supper — I Corinthians 11:20 (kyriakon deipnon). This is Paul's name, and it is the correct one: the supper belonging to the Lord. Not the church's supper, not the congregation's tradition, not the believers' fellowship meal — but the Lord's. His name on it establishes both its dignity and the standard by which it is kept.
The Lord's Table — I Corinthians 10:21 (trapeza kyriou). "You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons; you cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons." The table belongs to the Lord. Sitting at it is an act of communion with the one whose table it is.
III. The Time
When the Lord's Supper is to be observed is not left to congregational preference.
The first day of the week is the resurrection day. The resurrection occurred on the first day (Matt. 28:1; Mark 16:1; Luke 24:1; John 20:1). The appearances of the risen Christ occurred on the first day (John 20:19 — "the same day, the first day of the week"). The ascension appears to have occurred on the first day. The Spirit came at Pentecost on the first day (the feast of Pentecost follows Passover by fifty days, falling on the first day of the week). The day is not arbitrary; it is the day defined by the event the Lord's Supper proclaims — the death and resurrection of Christ.
Early Christians broke bread on the first day. "On the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread..." (Acts 20:7). The gathering was on the first day; its purpose was to break bread. The connection between the first day and the breaking of bread is not incidental — it is the pattern of the early church.
What belongs exclusively to the first day belongs to every first day. The logic is drawn from I Cor. 16:1-2: "On the first day of every week each one of you is to put aside and save, as he may prosper." The instruction is weekly, on the first day of every week. The principle: a practice assigned to the first day is assigned to every first day, not to the first day of the preacher's choice or the congregation's convenience. If the Lord's Supper belongs to the first day, it belongs to every first day.
Those who do not keep the Lord's Supper do not keep the Lord's Day. The two are not separable: the day was defined by the death and resurrection that the supper proclaims; the supper belongs to the day that commemorates the event it proclaims. The congregation that meets on the first day and does not observe the Lord's Supper has missed the central act of first-day worship.
IV. Its Purpose
The Lord's Supper has a specific purpose, stated explicitly in the institution narrative.
Remembrance — do this in remembrance of Me (I Cor. 11:24-25). The supper is a memorial. Christ is not physically present in the elements; he is remembered through them. The act of taking the bread and cup is the act of calling to mind — deliberately, actively, attentively — what Christ did in his body and with his blood. A memorial that is observed without the mind's engagement has failed to be a memorial; it has become a ritual.
Remember his death — I Cor. 11:26: "For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes." The specific content of the remembrance is the death — not his birth, not his teaching, not his example, but the death. The broken bread is the body broken; the cup is the blood shed. The supper is a weekly proclamation that Jesus Christ died for sins, and that his death was the event that defines the new covenant.
Monumental. Every monument exists for the purpose of the supper: to keep memory alive in the presence of the thing remembered. The Lord's Supper is a monument to the cross. As monuments in cities keep the significance of historical events before the eyes of passing generations, the Lord's Supper keeps the significance of Calvary before the eyes of every generation of the church.
Till Christ comes again. "Until He comes" — the memorial is not perpetual in an absolute sense. It belongs to the period between the ascension and the return. When Christ comes again, the supper that proclaimed his death will be superseded by the direct presence of the one it proclaimed. The supper is the church's practice in the meantime — the memorial of the absent Lord who is present in a different sense than his physical presence would require.
V. Abuses
Paul's instruction in I Corinthians 11 was prompted by abuses — specific failures in the Corinthian congregation's observance that he condemns by name.
Commune with the Lord, not with each other. The Corinthians had turned the Lord's Supper into a social occasion — "each one takes his own supper first; and one is hungry and another is drunk" (I Cor. 11:21). The purpose of the table is communion with the Lord, not the fellowship of the congregation with each other. Fellowship is good; the table is not its occasion. The congregation that observes the Lord's Supper as a social event has missed whom the supper is with.
Not past life but present purpose. The memory the supper evokes is not the memory of one's personal spiritual history — it is the memory of Christ's death. The person who uses the time at the table to reflect on their own religious journey has turned a memorial to Christ into a meditation on themselves.
Neglect of the supper is disrespect toward Christ. The person who skips the Lord's Supper when they are present at the assembly has not exercised a preference; they have declined to remember the death of the one who died for them. The supper is not optional for the person who is present; it is the act of the assembly on its day.
Unworthy manner — the specific abuses named. Whispering to a neighbor during the observance; writing in notebooks or studying outlines; looking around at the congregation; treating the table as a pause in the service rather than its center. The Greek is anaxiōs — "in an unworthy way," which Paul defines by contrast: not discerning the body. The conduct that fails to attend to what the bread and cup signify is unworthy conduct at the table.
Condemned if discern not the body. "For he who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgment to himself if he does not judge the body rightly" (I Cor. 11:29). The condition for condemnation is not sinfulness in general but the failure to discern the body — to recognize, in the breaking of the bread, the body of Christ that was broken. The person who eats without this recognition eats judgment. The warning is severe precisely because the table is significant: it is the Lord's, it proclaims his death, and it requires the attention its significance demands.
Application
Three direct applications:
First: weekly observance. The congregation that observes the Lord's Supper less than weekly has adopted a schedule that the New Testament does not authorize and that the early church did not practice. The argument for weekly observance on the first day is not a tradition — it is the logic of Acts 20:7 and I Cor. 16:1-2 applied to the day that the resurrection defined.
Second: attentive observance. The specific abuses in I Corinthians 11 — distracted partaking, social conversation, mental absence — are present in every era. The corrective is not a longer observance but an intentional one: the mind deliberately directed to the death of Christ, the bread taken in recognition of the body broken, the cup taken in recognition of the blood shed.
Third: correct naming. What it is called matters. Calling it the Lord's Supper — his supper — preserves its dignity and its ownership. The congregation that adopts the Lord's name for the Lord's table has begun to understand what they are doing.
Conclusion
"For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you." The chain of transmission from Christ to the congregation passes through every faithful preacher and teacher who has delivered what they received. The Lord's Supper was not invented by the church; it was instituted by Christ, received by the apostles, delivered to the congregations, and kept every first day until this day. What is kept must be kept rightly — on the right day, with the right attention, for the right purpose, and under the right name.
Invitation
The table belongs to the Lord. To sit at it, a person must first belong to the Lord. The new covenant that the cup represents was sealed by the blood that the cup proclaims. Entry into the new covenant is through the new birth — believing in Jesus Christ as the Son of God, repenting of sin, confessing his name, and being baptized for the remission of sins (Acts 2:38). The person who has obeyed the gospel has been brought into the covenant whose memorial is set before them every first day of the week.
Word Study
| English Term | Greek Term | Basic Meaning | Usage in This Sermon | Sermon Significance | Key Texts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lord's Supper | kyriakon deipnon | The supper belonging to the Lord — kyriakos (the adjective form of kyrios, Lord) + deipnon (the main evening meal). | Used in I Cor. 11:20 as Paul's name for what the Corinthians were perverting. | The genitive relationship (of the Lord) establishes ownership and therefore standard. It is not the congregation's supper to observe as they choose; it is the Lord's, to be observed as he requires. The same adjective appears in Rev. 1:10 — "the Lord's Day" (kyriakē hēmera): both the day and the supper carry the same possessive. | I Cor. 11:20 |
| Table of the Lord | trapeza kyriou | The table belonging to the Lord — the surface at which a meal is shared, here belonging to kyrios. | Used in I Cor. 10:21 in contrast to "the table of demons." | Sitting at a table is an act of communion — sharing not just food but relationship with the one whose table it is. The exclusivity is the point: one cannot commune with the Lord and with what opposes the Lord simultaneously. The table is not neutral furniture; it is the Lord's. | I Cor. 10:21 |
| In remembrance | eis tēn emēn anamnēsin | Into the memorial of me — anamnēsis is active remembrance, the deliberate bringing of a past event into present consciousness. | Used in I Cor. 11:24-25 twice: once for the bread and once for the cup. | Anamnēsis is not passive nostalgia but active memorial — the same word used in the Greek Old Testament (LXX) for the memorial offerings that brought Israel's need before God. The Lord's Supper is not a passive tradition; it is an active, intentional proclamation of the death of Christ. | I Cor. 11:24-25; Luke 22:19 |
| In an unworthy manner | anaxiōs | In a way not worthy of the object — without the recognition and reverence appropriate to what is being done. | Used in I Cor. 11:27 for the manner of eating and drinking that makes one "guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord." | Paul does not say "unworthy people" eat unworthily — he says people eat in an unworthy manner. The issue is conduct, not status. The specific conduct is defined in v. 29: not discerning the body. Any manner of partaking that fails to recognize what the body and blood represent is unworthy conduct at the Lord's table. | I Cor. 11:27, 29 |
Scripture Interlock Table
| Theme | Boles' Outline | Supporting Scripture |
|---|---|---|
| "I received from the Lord what I delivered to you" — chain of transmission | Intro. | I Cor. 11:23 |
| Three set feasts; Jesus observed the law | I | Gal. 4:4; Luke 22:15 |
| Christ nailed the law to the cross — Passover laws don't govern the Supper | I | Col. 2:14 |
| "Lord's Supper" — the correct name | II | I Cor. 11:20 |
| "Lord's Table" — the correct name | II | I Cor. 10:21 |
| Resurrection on first day — appearances on first day | III | Matt. 28:1; John 20:1, 19 |
| Spirit came on first day (Pentecost) | III | Acts 2:1 |
| "On the first day... to break bread" — early church practice | III | Acts 20:7 |
| "First day of every week" — weekly principle | III | I Cor. 16:1-2 |
| "Do this in remembrance" — memorial purpose | IV | I Cor. 11:24-25 |
| "Proclaim the Lord's death until He comes" — proclamation | IV | I Cor. 11:26 |
| "Eats and drinks judgment... not discerning the body" | V | I Cor. 11:27-29 |
| Baptism for remission — entry into the new covenant | Invit. | Acts 2:38 |
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Converted from H. Leo Boles, Outline 174. Primary texts: Matt. 26:20-30; Mark 14:17-26; Luke 22:14-23; I Cor. 11:23-29 (stated by Boles). OCR corrections: "I Cor. I l:20" → "I Cor. 11:20"; "lll." → "III."; "lV." → "IV." Doctrinal audit: weekly observance argued from the logic of Acts 20:7 and I Cor. 16:1-2 rather than stated as a bare tradition; the memorial nature (against Catholic transubstantiation) affirmed through the explicit "in remembrance" language without importing alien philosophical arguments; the incorrect names (Eucharist/sacrament) rejected on biblical grounds without caricature; abuses (I Cor. 11) developed from the text rather than from contemporary observation; invitation retains full obedient response (Acts 2:38) as entry into the new covenant the cup proclaims.
