At the last Passover before Jesus Christ’s death, He and His disciples engaged in what Paul calls "the Lord’s supper." The idea was the established feast would be celebrated first before Christ instituted a new one.
Luke 22:19-20 reports on the occasion, “And he took bread, and gave thanks, and brake it, and gave unto them, saying, This is my body which is given for you: this do in remembrance of me. Likewise also the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the new testament in my blood, which is shed for you.”
Jordan explains, “What Christ was giving the men was not a religious system. And it’s not a religious ceremony Paul’s talking about, either, when he quotes this passage from Luke in I Corinthians 11.
“The breaking of bread was a fellowship meal that had to do with His suffering. It focused on that. He had a long conversation with these men that evening about what was going to happen in His absence and what their ministry was to be about.
“Read it in John 13, 14, 15 and 16 as He closes that fellowship time with them. It says it was His desire that He could have this time with them to talk about what was on His heart. He takes the bread and gives it to them and says, ‘Break it; here, eat this.’ Now, He tells them what the bread is: ‘This is my body which is given for you,’ meaning, ‘My body’s going to be broken and distributed for you.’
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“When He says, ‘This is my body,’ the Catholics take that and make it into what they call the doctrine of Transubstantiation. (Editor’s Note: Wikepedia defines Transubstantiation as “the change of the substance of bread and wine into that of the body and blood of Christ that, according to the belief of the Roman Catholic Church, occurs in the Eucharist.”)
“I remember in Grant Park in 1979, just after I moved to Chicago, the Pope held up a wafer and said, ‘This is your Saviour,’ and I thought, ‘He must have already gotten into the hooch! That piece of bread can’t be my Saviour,’ but they believe that it’s transubstantiated, and not just into the presence, but into the body of Jesus Christ.
“As you former Catholics know, when you take that wafer, you’re eating God like a cannibal.
“You’re not supposed to eat an hour before you go to Mass. I’ve read the regulations. The reason for that is so you don’t want to have conflicting stuff in your stomach. And your stomach cleans itself out about every 20 minutes.
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“Priests will argue, ‘You take the Bible literally don’t you?! Doesn’t He say, ‘This is my body?’ Well, why isn’t it His body?’
“When I hold up this piece of chalk and say, ‘This is my body,’ you know that chalk’s not my body because what’s holding the chalk? My body!
“Now, I know I might be nuts but I’m not stupid! If I say, ‘This is my body,’ and my body’s holding the chalk, then I don’t think the chalk is my body. I think the chalk represents my body; it stands for my body. The illustration’s going to represent my body, but I know my body is me.
“You see, when you take your Bible literally it doesn’t mean you park your brain at the door and you can’t read; you just take it in the natural way things are written.
“In John 6 Jesus said, ‘I am the bread of life.’ Now, do you think He’s a loaf of Sunbeam? Golden Sunshine? Ezekiel sprouted whole grain? What is He? In John 10 He says, ‘I am the door.’ How many hinges does He have? What kind of a handle?
“You know what that is! That’s a metaphor, a figure of speech. It’s obviously figurative language.
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“So, why was His body going to be broken for them? He says, ‘Do this in remembrance of me.’ He’s saying, ‘When you do this, by doing it it’s a symbol that’s reminding you of me. And that I’m given for you.’
“Now, what do you do with bread? You eat it and get nourishment. So the bread’s going to nourish them. And they’re going to get light and sustenance and nourishment from Him.
“The verse goes on, ‘Likewise the cup which is shed for you.’ Now, here’s how you know you’ve got a problem saying that His body is literally the bread. The verse says, ‘Likewise also the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the new testament in my blood, which is shed for you.’
“If you take that literally, what is the New Testament? It’s the cup. In Matt. 26:27, it says, ‘And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it.’ He took the cup and said drink the cup. He didn’t say drink what’s in the cup, He said drink the cup.
“Did He mean stick the cup down your mouth? Try to swallow it down? When He says, ‘Drink the cup,’ is He saying to literally drink the cup or is He saying drink what’s in the cup? Obviously, that’s a metaphorical way of saying, ‘Drink what’s in the cup,’ but that isn’t literally what He said. He said drink the cup. It’s obvious He’s speaking in a figurative way.
“Well, if He’s speaking in figurative way about the cup, obviously He’s speaking in a figurative way about His body too. So when you try to make this stuff be, not figures of speech, but all literal—literally His body, literally His blood. . .He never says drink the blood, He says drink the cup. He doesn’t say drink what’s in the cup.
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“When He says, ‘This cup is new testament in my blood,’ it’s important to see that what He’s doing here is setting up a memorial of the deliverance provided in the new testament that’s going to replace the deliverance that was provided for Israel under the old testament.
“He honors the old, He celebrates it, but then He replaces it with the new. And when He says, ‘Do this in remembrance of me; Remember what I’ve done; it’s finished,’ you now have a memorial of it. It’s not something that’s going to have to be repeated. It’s a finished work, accomplished.
“By the way, if what was in the cup was literally blood, and you’re supposed to eat His flesh—literal flesh and drink His literal blood—that would be a violation of Scripture.
“God told Noah, and He told Israel under Moses, and the Holy Ghost told the churches today in Acts 15, not to drink blood. Well, if before the Law, under the Law, and then under grace you’re told not to drink blood, it would be strange for Christ to set up a memorial where you drink blood, wouldn’t it?
“If He had to tell people back there—Noah, and then under the Law, and then for us today—not to drink blood, would you think maybe there might be somebody out there trying to get you to drink blood? Otherwise, God wouldn’t have told you not to!”
(new article tomorrow)
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