Prelude To A Sacrament
Sermon
Sermons on the First Readings
Series III, Cycle C
We have a table before us. It is a familiar table; we have gathered around it together countless times before. It features the cherished elements of bread and wine; and taken together, those elements on this table form a sacrament.
Across the many traditions within the Christian church, we call this sacrament by different names. The Roman Catholics refer to the Mass, while the Eastern Orthodox church uses the Divine Liturgy. A number of Protestant denominations call it the Eucharist, others holy communion, and still others the Lord's Supper.
Whatever the terminology in the twenty-first century, however, we all trace the sacrament back to the same event in the first century. The table that is before us tonight recalls a different table from 2,000 years ago. Each time we partake of this sacrament, we recite, recall, and reenact that particular meal shared by Jesus and his disciples.
It was Thursday night -- the eve of Christ's atoning death. He clearly knew what was ahead, though the disciples seem to have been largely unaware. On three different occasions prior to this night, Jesus had plainly told them what would happen to him in Jerusalem. Again, on this occasion that we call his Last Supper, he was very straightforward about what was going to happen.
Interestingly, Jesus saw a connection between what was going to happen and the meal that they were sharing. The story is so familiar to us that we may miss the element of surprise. After all, what correlation can there possibly be between an evening meal, on the one hand, and an execution, on the other? Yet Jesus made a connection.
As they ate together, Jesus took two of the elements of their meal and associated them with what was to come. He took bread, broke it, and identified it with his body -- specifically, with his body being broken. Similarly, he took a cup of wine, shared it, and identified it with his blood -- specifically with his blood being poured out.
You and I come to this table from this side of the cross and the empty tomb, and so we have some understanding of Jesus' words. But those first disciples must have been entirely bewildered by what he said.
Furthermore, Jesus expressed an assumption on that occasion that his followers would continue to eat that bread and drink from that cup indefinitely into the future. He instructed them always to do that eating and drinking in remembrance of him. Again, a mystifying thing to say at that moment.
Ever since that Thursday night, however, Jesus' followers have done just what he said. We have shared the bread and cup of communion in remembrance of him. We have remembered his broken body and his shed blood. We have understood and received the connection between the meal on Thursday night and the atoning death on Friday afternoon.
The table that is before us this evening has an antecedent. Our table here is an extension of that table in Jerusalem, where Jesus and his first followers shared the bread and cup, 2,000 years ago.
Even that table was not the original. That famed table where the disciples gathered for Jesus' Last Supper had its own predecessor. When they sat down to eat, they had an eye on a still different table from long before. That Thursday night was no ordinary evening meal. It was the Passover meal.
Most holidays, you know, are celebrations of some past event. At a personal level, we celebrate the day when some family member was born or the day a couple was married. As a nation, we celebrate the day when certain battles were won, when significant historical figures were born, or when our founders declared their independence. In the church, we celebrate the day when Jesus was born and the day he rose, among others.
Passover, likewise, was a holy day set aside each year to celebrate a past event. Specifically, Passover was Israel's festive remembrance of the night that God had delivered them from their bondage in Egypt. That night is the setting for the Old Testament scripture reading that we shared this evening.
The children of Israel had been slaves in Egypt for 400 years. That is an almost unimaginably long time for us. After all, we have only been a nation for 230 plus years. Rewind our history 400 years, and we find ourselves back in days of the Jamestown settlement. William Shakespeare was still finishing up his career 400 years ago. Can we fathom, therefore, what it would be like for a people to go into slavery during the age of Shakespeare and finally meet their release today?
The family of Jacob -- who was renamed Israel -- had moved to Egypt during the ascendancy of Jacob's son, Joseph. They lived there for a generation as honored guests in the land. After that generation had died, the new Egyptian regime did not look so kindly upon the very large family of foreigners occupying some of their best land. The Pharaoh turned their status upside down, making them into Egypt's slaves.
For four centuries, the children of Israel labored in cruel bondage. For four centuries their children were born in chains and their old men and women died under the whip. For four centuries they cried out to their God for help, but no help seemed to come.
Then one day, quite out-of-range from the Israelites' view or earshot, God encountered a man at a burning bush. And though that man was the patron saint of reluctance, God urged and encouraged him to be God's agent of deliverance for the Israelite slaves. He was to return to Egypt -- from which he himself had fled some years before -- and appear before the Pharaoh as God's representative. With God's instruction and assistance, he was to navigate Israel from bondage to freedom.
The process did not begin well. In fact, almost as soon as Moses took his first obedient steps, things got worse for the Israelites he sought to deliver. It was a most discouraging beginning to what seemed already to be a hopeless endeavor. God needed to reassure Moses and the people of his ultimate victory.
That, incidentally, remains very much a part of the dynamic between God and his people in every generation. We are so inclined to assess the probability of success based upon circumstances. We instinctively extrapolate from how things are going so far, and we think that actually predicts the results. It does not, however, for victory is not an extrapolation of circumstances but an extension of God's promises.
So the process continued. The Nile turned to blood. Frogs and pests plagued the land, followed by diseases in both humans and animals. There was hail and darkness. Crops were destroyed and animals died. Yet, for all the devastation, Pharaoh's default setting was stubbornness and pride, and he continually refused the demands of Israel's God.
And then, finally, came that night: the night when God would deal the severest blow to Egypt, and the slaves would be set free. No, more than just set free -- they would be hurried out of the land, laden with gifts and treasures. And that pivotal night -- the pivotal event -- was the Passover.
The saving event was God's to do. Israel did not need to strategize or fight to win their freedom. They needed only to cooperate with what God was doing, and that cooperation took two forms. First, they had to prepare the outside of their homes. Second, they had to prepare and eat their evening meal.
Significantly, the central issue for the preparation of their homes was blood. Specifically, the blood of a lamb. That blood, brushed along the sides and tops of the doors of their homes, would signal the angel of death to pass over those homes. Of course, we do not presume that the angel could not have been otherwise invested with the knowledge of which homes were to be spared, but God has always invited his people to distinguish themselves by some act of faithful obedience: circumcision, looking up at the serpent on the pole, baptism, and such. This particular act was meant to be instructive to them -- and to us -- as their salvation was achieved by the blood of the lamb.
Then there was the meal. The passage we read earlier provided some of the instructions about the meal, and those instructions from God were remarkably detailed. After all, is there anything more routine, more ordinary, more daily than eating? Yet, on this most extraordinary of nights, God was concerned with their menu.
Through Moses, God gave Israel a very specific recipe for that night. The elements of the meal were symbolic -- calling to mind a memory of their bondage and a reminder of God's deliverance. Plus, God's recipe featured more than just the particulars of what they should eat; he also gave instructions about what they should wear and how they should eat. For everything about the meal -- from the unleavened bread to the walking sticks to the hasty consumption -- all spoke of hurrying. After 400 years of waiting for deliverance, now they were suddenly in a hurry, for now their deliverance was going to come quickly. Like firefighters who sleep dressed-to-go, the children of Israel were told to wolf down their food and be ready to leave, for that was going to be the night.
Finally, there was one more component to God's directions. In addition to the menu, the attire, and the speed of the meal, God also gave them instructions for the future; namely, that they were to eat that meal on that same night every year for the rest of their lives. And, beyond that, their children and their grandchildren were to eat that meal every year on that night. It was designed to be "a day of remembrance for you," God told them. "You shall celebrate it as a festival to the Lord; throughout your generations you shall observe it as a perpetual ordinance."
So it was that over 1,000 years later, Jesus and his disciples sat down at the table together to celebrate the Passover meal: A remembrance of how God had saved his people from their slavery in Egypt. On that night, Jesus reinterpreted two of the elements of the meal. They now symbolized his body and his blood, and they spoke of how God would deliver all humankind from its bondage to sin. God's people were to continue eating that bread and drinking that cup for all generations "in remembrance."
So it is that we have a table before us -- indeed, it is a table from more than 3,000 years before us! Moses and the soon-to-be-free children of Israel are gathered around it. They have on their coats and shoes, and they are eating in a hurry. Their meal both coincides with God saving them and represents God saving them. As such, we discover, their meal is a prelude to this sacrament. Amen.
Across the many traditions within the Christian church, we call this sacrament by different names. The Roman Catholics refer to the Mass, while the Eastern Orthodox church uses the Divine Liturgy. A number of Protestant denominations call it the Eucharist, others holy communion, and still others the Lord's Supper.
Whatever the terminology in the twenty-first century, however, we all trace the sacrament back to the same event in the first century. The table that is before us tonight recalls a different table from 2,000 years ago. Each time we partake of this sacrament, we recite, recall, and reenact that particular meal shared by Jesus and his disciples.
It was Thursday night -- the eve of Christ's atoning death. He clearly knew what was ahead, though the disciples seem to have been largely unaware. On three different occasions prior to this night, Jesus had plainly told them what would happen to him in Jerusalem. Again, on this occasion that we call his Last Supper, he was very straightforward about what was going to happen.
Interestingly, Jesus saw a connection between what was going to happen and the meal that they were sharing. The story is so familiar to us that we may miss the element of surprise. After all, what correlation can there possibly be between an evening meal, on the one hand, and an execution, on the other? Yet Jesus made a connection.
As they ate together, Jesus took two of the elements of their meal and associated them with what was to come. He took bread, broke it, and identified it with his body -- specifically, with his body being broken. Similarly, he took a cup of wine, shared it, and identified it with his blood -- specifically with his blood being poured out.
You and I come to this table from this side of the cross and the empty tomb, and so we have some understanding of Jesus' words. But those first disciples must have been entirely bewildered by what he said.
Furthermore, Jesus expressed an assumption on that occasion that his followers would continue to eat that bread and drink from that cup indefinitely into the future. He instructed them always to do that eating and drinking in remembrance of him. Again, a mystifying thing to say at that moment.
Ever since that Thursday night, however, Jesus' followers have done just what he said. We have shared the bread and cup of communion in remembrance of him. We have remembered his broken body and his shed blood. We have understood and received the connection between the meal on Thursday night and the atoning death on Friday afternoon.
The table that is before us this evening has an antecedent. Our table here is an extension of that table in Jerusalem, where Jesus and his first followers shared the bread and cup, 2,000 years ago.
Even that table was not the original. That famed table where the disciples gathered for Jesus' Last Supper had its own predecessor. When they sat down to eat, they had an eye on a still different table from long before. That Thursday night was no ordinary evening meal. It was the Passover meal.
Most holidays, you know, are celebrations of some past event. At a personal level, we celebrate the day when some family member was born or the day a couple was married. As a nation, we celebrate the day when certain battles were won, when significant historical figures were born, or when our founders declared their independence. In the church, we celebrate the day when Jesus was born and the day he rose, among others.
Passover, likewise, was a holy day set aside each year to celebrate a past event. Specifically, Passover was Israel's festive remembrance of the night that God had delivered them from their bondage in Egypt. That night is the setting for the Old Testament scripture reading that we shared this evening.
The children of Israel had been slaves in Egypt for 400 years. That is an almost unimaginably long time for us. After all, we have only been a nation for 230 plus years. Rewind our history 400 years, and we find ourselves back in days of the Jamestown settlement. William Shakespeare was still finishing up his career 400 years ago. Can we fathom, therefore, what it would be like for a people to go into slavery during the age of Shakespeare and finally meet their release today?
The family of Jacob -- who was renamed Israel -- had moved to Egypt during the ascendancy of Jacob's son, Joseph. They lived there for a generation as honored guests in the land. After that generation had died, the new Egyptian regime did not look so kindly upon the very large family of foreigners occupying some of their best land. The Pharaoh turned their status upside down, making them into Egypt's slaves.
For four centuries, the children of Israel labored in cruel bondage. For four centuries their children were born in chains and their old men and women died under the whip. For four centuries they cried out to their God for help, but no help seemed to come.
Then one day, quite out-of-range from the Israelites' view or earshot, God encountered a man at a burning bush. And though that man was the patron saint of reluctance, God urged and encouraged him to be God's agent of deliverance for the Israelite slaves. He was to return to Egypt -- from which he himself had fled some years before -- and appear before the Pharaoh as God's representative. With God's instruction and assistance, he was to navigate Israel from bondage to freedom.
The process did not begin well. In fact, almost as soon as Moses took his first obedient steps, things got worse for the Israelites he sought to deliver. It was a most discouraging beginning to what seemed already to be a hopeless endeavor. God needed to reassure Moses and the people of his ultimate victory.
That, incidentally, remains very much a part of the dynamic between God and his people in every generation. We are so inclined to assess the probability of success based upon circumstances. We instinctively extrapolate from how things are going so far, and we think that actually predicts the results. It does not, however, for victory is not an extrapolation of circumstances but an extension of God's promises.
So the process continued. The Nile turned to blood. Frogs and pests plagued the land, followed by diseases in both humans and animals. There was hail and darkness. Crops were destroyed and animals died. Yet, for all the devastation, Pharaoh's default setting was stubbornness and pride, and he continually refused the demands of Israel's God.
And then, finally, came that night: the night when God would deal the severest blow to Egypt, and the slaves would be set free. No, more than just set free -- they would be hurried out of the land, laden with gifts and treasures. And that pivotal night -- the pivotal event -- was the Passover.
The saving event was God's to do. Israel did not need to strategize or fight to win their freedom. They needed only to cooperate with what God was doing, and that cooperation took two forms. First, they had to prepare the outside of their homes. Second, they had to prepare and eat their evening meal.
Significantly, the central issue for the preparation of their homes was blood. Specifically, the blood of a lamb. That blood, brushed along the sides and tops of the doors of their homes, would signal the angel of death to pass over those homes. Of course, we do not presume that the angel could not have been otherwise invested with the knowledge of which homes were to be spared, but God has always invited his people to distinguish themselves by some act of faithful obedience: circumcision, looking up at the serpent on the pole, baptism, and such. This particular act was meant to be instructive to them -- and to us -- as their salvation was achieved by the blood of the lamb.
Then there was the meal. The passage we read earlier provided some of the instructions about the meal, and those instructions from God were remarkably detailed. After all, is there anything more routine, more ordinary, more daily than eating? Yet, on this most extraordinary of nights, God was concerned with their menu.
Through Moses, God gave Israel a very specific recipe for that night. The elements of the meal were symbolic -- calling to mind a memory of their bondage and a reminder of God's deliverance. Plus, God's recipe featured more than just the particulars of what they should eat; he also gave instructions about what they should wear and how they should eat. For everything about the meal -- from the unleavened bread to the walking sticks to the hasty consumption -- all spoke of hurrying. After 400 years of waiting for deliverance, now they were suddenly in a hurry, for now their deliverance was going to come quickly. Like firefighters who sleep dressed-to-go, the children of Israel were told to wolf down their food and be ready to leave, for that was going to be the night.
Finally, there was one more component to God's directions. In addition to the menu, the attire, and the speed of the meal, God also gave them instructions for the future; namely, that they were to eat that meal on that same night every year for the rest of their lives. And, beyond that, their children and their grandchildren were to eat that meal every year on that night. It was designed to be "a day of remembrance for you," God told them. "You shall celebrate it as a festival to the Lord; throughout your generations you shall observe it as a perpetual ordinance."
So it was that over 1,000 years later, Jesus and his disciples sat down at the table together to celebrate the Passover meal: A remembrance of how God had saved his people from their slavery in Egypt. On that night, Jesus reinterpreted two of the elements of the meal. They now symbolized his body and his blood, and they spoke of how God would deliver all humankind from its bondage to sin. God's people were to continue eating that bread and drinking that cup for all generations "in remembrance."
So it is that we have a table before us -- indeed, it is a table from more than 3,000 years before us! Moses and the soon-to-be-free children of Israel are gathered around it. They have on their coats and shoes, and they are eating in a hurry. Their meal both coincides with God saving them and represents God saving them. As such, we discover, their meal is a prelude to this sacrament. Amen.
