Up to this point, Luke has measured his account by weeks, even months.  Now, it’s by hours: time is short.  The vast majority of people in those times didn’t eat big meals; they couldn’t afford to; food wasn’t so abundant as we take for granted.  Ancient meals were simple fare.  The Passover meal reflected that: roasted meat, unleavened bread, bitter herbs, wine.  But that meal was also different: sacred, blessed, solemn and joyful all at once.  There’s really no similar meal in our experience, not even Christmas or even Easter dinner.  Some of you, I know, have participated in a Passover seder, maybe even here at Bethel.  But it’s not the same.  The Passover was an identity-affirming event, a time for remembering, hoping, celebrating, and grieving—high and deep emotions.

“And he said to them, ‘I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer’” (22:15).  Well, that sets a tone.  Jesus had been telling them all along that this suffering would come: rejection, trial, condemnation, death.  I suppose most of them thought Jesus was just being unusually morbid: Come on Jesus!  Cheer up.  A few may have thought all the troubles were making him sad and depressed, and they were sad for him, and with him.  The disciples had seen a lot of good—wonders, power, and love—in company with Jesus.  They had also seen, more than they had wanted or imagined, much of the bad that fills hearts, even their own.

“For I tell you, I will not eat it again until it finds fulfillment in the kingdom of God” (22:16).  The last time, until the next time.  To eat the Passover, to participate in the meal, was not only to affirm identity as the people of God; eating, participation, was also to remember all the story—not just the deliverance from bondage in Egypt.  That was the immediate occasion, but beloved, remember: the people of God had been through a lot of history since that night of the display of the terrible, wonderful, liberating power of God.  The disciples were well aware of their long history of faith contending with disobedience.  It was a very mixed record and, on the whole, not so encouraging, from the human side of the relationship.

That long history might be summed up this way: by and large, in practice if not in principle, the people of God lived by the motto Whoever gives me what I want—that’s the one I’ll worship.  Now, God will always give us what we need.  As for what we want, what we think we want, as for what we have convinced ourselves will make us so happy and fulfilled . . . many gods are on offer, here.  William Barclay wisely reminds us that “The essence of idolatry is the desire to get.  A man sets up an idol and worships it because he desires to get something from it.”[1]  Give me what I want, and I will worship you: even young Jacob bargains like that (Gen 28:20-21).

The Passover, the meaning of the Passover, must be fulfilled.  What is the meaning of the Passover?  Freedom, certainly, but there’s more.  The Passover was God claiming His people, demonstrating His sovereign power, His mighty will, His eternal plan.  Safety, preservation—all who were under the blood were spared, safe.  The Passover was also about the blood of our safety.  From what Jesus says, it sounds as if the full meaning, the full significance of the Passover has not yet been entirely fulfilled but awaits its final fulfillment in the kingdom of God.

We live in the peculiar situation of already and not yet.  We are already saved in Christ; we have not yet experienced or realized the full meaning of salvation.  We are claimed to make the kingdom visible—life lived God’s way, according to God’s principles, doing God’s will.  We know we aren’t there yet!  Faith tells us fulfillment will come.  The day will come when we feast together at the table of the fulfilled, perfected, finished Passover: perfectly free and perfectly God’s.  Glorious day.  Joyful day.

We can have a taste of that day, now, here: simple fare, hardly abundant, by any worldly measure.  “And he took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, ‘This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me’” (22:19).  The Passover was about remembering, many things: the blood, the power, salvation, freedom, obedience.  The bread for the Passover was to be unleavened—no yeast.  In Exodus, we read that the bread was unleavened because, that night of their departure, the bread did not have time to rise.  It was time, that night, for the people of God to rise, and go.  Now or never.  Decision time.  We don’t like to be rushed, hurried.  There are times and situations in which we must hurry.  Each Passover was a reminder for the Jew that it is time to rise and go.  Decision time.  Choose life.  As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.

Jesus gives thanks for the bread.  It’s easy to pass right by that.  He says grace.  We say grace, most of the time, anyway.  God provides.  Amen.  God does not have to provide.  God is under no compulsion to provide.  God provides.  Amen.  The bread of the Passover is the bread of decision, the bread of commitment.  Jesus gives thanks for the bread, the bread of salvation.  He is telling us that to eat this bread is to accept what is being offered; to eat is to participate in what is being offered, and is to have in us, now part of us, now being incorporated into us, what is being offered.

Luke is careful to tell us Jesus broke the bread.  We use this term sometimes, to break bread, but it seems a little odd, definitely old-fashioned.  We might tear bread, even slice it, but bread isn’t like a cup or a bone, that it would be broken.  Oh, I broke the bread!  Maybe it’s like some of those fancy birthday cakes, a little lamb, for example.  They look so pretty, so neat; it’d be a shame to ruin it by cutting into it.  Still, let’s cut into it.  It can’t be shared, can’t be enjoyed, otherwise.  It can’t become part of us, otherwise.  Breaking is for sharing.  Breaking is for taking.

It isn’t the case that Jesus breaks off the first piece, then hands the loaf to the next man, who breaks off a piece for himself and then gives the bread to the next man, who does the same, and so on.  For each one, Jesus breaks off bread, and gives it, from his own hand.  Jesus gives.  Jesus has the bread, holds the bread, gives the bread.  He gives to each of us; he will feed each of us.  You know, God faithfully and sufficiently fed His people for forty years in the wilderness—the wilderness, by definition, is the place of scarcity, not material scarcity only.  Time and again, rather than gratitude and love, what God received in return for all His giving was disdain, complaint, strife, rejection, and insult.  The people preferred other food.  God knows.

“This is my body given for you.”  The eleven—it’s John who tells us Judas had already left—they knew Jesus could say weird things, hard to understand, hard to take.  The eleven, being Jewish, also understood about offering and sacrifice; they understood about participating in these.  They understood Jesus was in some way speaking of himself as an offering, a sacrifice.  That doesn’t mean they yet understood when, where, how, or why.

To receive the benefit and the blessing, worshipers must participate in the sacrifice, receive the sacrifice.  To refuse the sacrifice is to reject what is being offered.  I returned to church nearly twenty-five years ago.  At that time, though through the Spirit I believed, because I had not yet been baptized, I decided, until I received baptism, not to receive Communion.  The people in church didn’t know that; why would they?  Oh, the look on the guy’s face next to me, as I passed the plate along without taking the bread or the cup!  Accept what God offers you, what God is making available to you, through this sacrifice.  That’s what Jesus is saying.

“[D]o this in remembrance of me” (22:19).  Lest we forget.  We remember many things about Jesus: the stories we love, the words we cherish.  Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ was so hard for so many to watch, in part, because Protestants especially don’t cause themselves to remember the cross with Christ upon it.  We are an Easter people.  The work is done; nothing to see here.  That is true and lovely, and leaving matters there leaves out important details and probably cuts us off from something we need, deep inside.  To forget the suffering, the blood, the death on the cross is to forget the cost, the costliness of our sin, and the only way of our salvation.  Recalling all that just one evening, or two, isn’t quite sufficient.  We didn’t force God to send Jesus to the cross.  The Son voluntarily went for us.  This has always been God’s plan.  Oh, it causes me to tremble, tremble.

“In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you’” (22:20).  The eleven probably understood Jesus was referring to the blood of the sacrifice.  They understood about the blood of the covenant—God’s sacred pact with those He has selected for salvation.  Every covenant was ratified, as it were, by blood; a covenant could be sealed only by blood.  It is a compact for life, and life requires life.  Here is what I will give You, God says.  What will you give Me?  He wants us to know.  The offerings on the altar at the Temple were of different sorts: sin offerings, burnt offerings, thank offerings, fellowship offerings, peace offerings.  Several required pouring out a liquid offering, a libation of wine, upon the sacrifice on the altar.  The mandatory offerings, the vital sacrifices, required dashing or splashing, splattering or sprinkling the victim’s blood upon the altar.  Jesus reminds his followers of the sacrifice that is being made, the covenant that is being sealed, the cleansing being purchased, through the blood, poured out.  Oh, it may seem brutal, barbaric, primitive, revolting.  Humanity has come so far, you know.  The sacrifice, the blood, is radical, visceral, vital, essential.  It breaks me.  I just want to fall down and weep for sorrow, weep for love.  Would you also, with me?

[1] William Barclay.  Letters to the Philippians, Colossians, and Thessalonians.  1957.  Daily Study Bible.  Philadelphia: Westminster P, 1975.  152.