Approaching the Lord’s Table: Forgiveness, Victory, Faith, God’s Word, God’s Love

As we approach the Lord’s Table, let’s think about two verses of Scripture.

“The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45).

“Surely He shall deliver you from the snare of the fowler” (Psalm 91:3).

The first of these verses speaks of the forgiveness of our sins.

The second speaks of victory over Satan.

Through the precious blood of Christ, we receive the forgiveness of our sins (1 Peter 1:18-19).

Through the precious blood of Christ, we are victorious over Satan (Revelation 12:11).

Let us rejoice in God’s gift of forgiveness. Let us also rejoice in His gift of victory.

We do not earn God’s forgiveness. It is God’s gift. Victory is not earned. Like forgiveness, victory is God’s gift.

How do we receive these great gifts of God?

We come to the Cross of Christ. At the Cross, we learn that Christ to bring us forgiveness – and He died to give us victory.

We receive these gifts by faith.

Forgiveness and victory do not come to us without faith. Faith is the response by which we receive God’s gifts.

What is faith? How does faith change us? What part do the reading and preaching of God’s Word have in the strengthening of our faith? How does the celebration of the Lord’s Supper help us to grow in faith?

* Faith is centred on Jesus Christ. It is putting our trust in Him.

* Faith is not only believing with our minds. It’s being changed in our hearts. Faith does not leave us where it finds it. Faith leads us on a journey of discovery. It’s a journey in which we learn more and more of our Saviour. We are learning to love Him, follow Him and serve Him.

* Faith does not take any glory for itself. Faith gives all the glory to God. Faith does not say, ‘Glory for me.’ Faith says, ‘Glory to God.’

In this journey of discovery, what part is played by our gathering together for worship?

* We gather to hear the Word of God. It is read to us. It is preached to us. Faith is part of a conversation between ourselves and our God. He speaks to us. we are learning to speak to Him. unless God speaks to us, we will be unable to speak to Him. God’s Word is spoken to us. God’s Word creates our response. God speaks, and it is done. He says, “Let there be light, and there is light.” God’s Word is our shining light in a dark world. When His light shines upon our life, we walk in His light. It is the light of His love. This is the light that inspires our faith.

* We gather to celebrate the Lord’s Supper. This is a special time of remembering Jesus. It’s a special time of being reminded that Christ loves us. His love is the greatest love of all. There is no love like the love of Jesus. we gather at the Lord’s Table. We learn that we are loved. we are loved with an everlasting love. It’s a love that will not let us go. God loves us long before we ever thought of loving Him. When our love is weak, His love is strong. this is the message that comes to us from the Lord’s Table. This is the love which gives strength to our faith.

The Lord's Supper: Remembering and Responding

In our celebration of the Lord's Supper, our primary focus is on what Jesus Christ, our Saviour,has done for us. This is the "there and then" part of the Lord's Supper. We remember His death for us. We think of Him. we give thanks to Him.

There is also a secondary focus of attention. It's the "here and now" part of the Lord's Supper: our response to Him. We are not only remembering the story of what happened a long time ago. As well as remembering Him - what He did for us there and then, we are responding to Him here and now.

May God bless each of us in both our remembering Him and our responding to Him.

The Rock and the River

The Rock and the River are still there – even when I can’t see them! We look out towards Dumbarton Rock and the River Clyde. There is, however, a problem! Straight ahead of us, there are some large trees. When the leaves are on the trees, we can’t see anything that’s behind the trees. We can’t see the Rock and the River – but they’re still there!

There is another Rock – Jesus Christ, the Rock of our salvation. There is another River – the Holy Spirit, the River of God’s blessing. When our faith is weak, we must remember this: Jesus is still the Rock of our salvation. When we don’t feel very blessed, we must remember this: the Holy Spirit is still the River of God’s blessing.

Jesus told a story about two builders. One was wise. He built his house on a rock. The other was foolish. He built his house on sand.  How are we to build our lives on Jesus Christ, the Rock of our salvation? We must hear His Word. We must obey His Word (Matthew 7:24). Hearing and obeying – this is the way of blessing. We read, in Ezekiel 47, about the River of God’s blessing: “The water came only to my ankles … the water came up to my knees … the water was up to my waist … the stream was so deep I could not wade through it. It was too deep to cross except by swimming” (verses 3-5). What an increase of blessing there is “when we walk with the Lord in the light of His Word” (Mission Praise, 760)!

 * There will be storms. There will be clouds. Beyond the storms and the clouds, there is the sunshine of God’s love. We must learn to lift up our eyes – and catch a glimpse of the glory of God. We walk about the streets of Bellsmyre. We hardly notice the beauty that’s all around us. Look to the north. Look to the south. Look to the west. Look to the east. What do you see? – “How clearly the sky reveals God’s glory! How plainly it shows what He has done!” (Psalm 19:1). When we see that our whole life is surrounded by the presence of God our Creator, we are encouraged. We look at our problems, and we say, “I look to the mountains; where will my help come from? My help will come from the Lord, who made heaven and earth” (Psalm 121:1-2). 

 * We come to the Lord’s House. We gather together to celebrate the Lord’s Supper. We are called to remember Jesus and His love for us. We find it difficult to focus our attention on Him. We feel that His love is not really getting through to us. At the Lord’s Table, is there a word of encouragement for us? Yes! There is! The Lord’s Supper is not so much about our remembering Jesus. It’s about Jesus remembering us. When we forget Him, He never forgets us. What a wonderful message this is! We are loved with the greatest love of all. It’s the love that will never let us go. Jesus loves us with “an everlasting love” (Jeremiah 31:3). When we are assured of Christ’s love for us, we begin to say, in our hearts, “To God be the glory! Great things He hath done” (Mission Praise, 708).

 * As we come to the House of the Lord, we hear the words, “Let us worship God.” Jesus reminds us that “God is Spirit, and only by the power of His Spirit can people worship Him as He really is” (John 4:24). We hear about being “in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day” (Revelation 1:10). All of this seems so far beyond us. We are “weak.” In our hearts, we say, “we do not know how we ought to pray.” Coming to the Lord in our weakness, we hear His Word of encouragement: “the Spirit comes to help us” (Romans 8:26). Jesus loves us. The Holy Spirit helps us. The Lord is with us. He wants to bless us: “He is here, He is here, He is moving among us; He is here, He is here, as we gather in His Name! He is here, He is here, and He wants to work a wonder; He is here as we gather in His Name” (Mission Praise, 218).

May the Lord bless each and every one of us as we gather together to worship Him. Let us look to Him in eager expectation of His abundant blessing.

Bread And Wine

Bread and wine - these were the elements chosen by Jesus to teach us about His dying love. The bread speaks to us of Jesus' body broken for us. The wine speaks to us of Jesus' blood shed for us.

Jesus used bread and wine to proclaim His salvation. He did this at the Last Supper, but that wasn't the first time that Jesus had used bread and wine as visual aids to help us to understand the meaning of His salvation. Before the Last Supper, there were the miracles of turning water into wine and the feeding of the five thousand.

(1) The miracle of turning water into wine, along with the cleansing of the Temple, proclaims the miracle of the new birth. It leads us into the words of Jesus - "You must be born again" (John 3;3).

• The contrast between the water and the wine speaks to us of the contrast between "that which is born of the flesh" and "that which is born of the Spirit."
• The transformation of the water into wine speaks of the new birth which Jesus came to bring us: "Mild He lays his glory by, Born that man no more may die, Born to raise the sons of earth, Born to give them second birth." This great miracle of turning water into wine prepares us to hear what Jesus says to us concerning being born again, born anew, born of God, born from above, born with a heavenly birth.

(2) The meaning of the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand is summed up in the words of Jesus - "I am the Bread of Llfe" (John 6:35).

Jesus did not perform this miracle to impress the crowd. This miracle created for Him another opportunity to teach the people the real significance of His miracles and the real meaning of faith.

The Lord speaks of Himself as the Bread of Life. He gives eternal life to all who put their faith in Him. By speaking of Himself in this way, He highlights the Gospel character of this miracle.

At the heart of the miracle story, there is, in John 6:4, a short sentence, which we could easily overlook: "Now, the Passover, the feast of the Jews was at hand." We must not overlook this fact. It points us forward to the Lord's Supper, which also took place at the time of the Passover.

"When I see the blood, I will pass over you" (Exodus 12:13) - Jesus fulfilled this!

Now, the Lord's Supper, the feast of the Christians, is at hand. May God grant that your understanding of and experience of Christ's love will be deepened and enriched through our looking together at these two great miracles.

Baptism and the Lord's Supper

The sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper - What place do they have within the total context of the Christian life? What part do they play within the total purpose of God for our lives?

The sacraments are signposts. They point us to the Lord Jesus Christ, our Saviour. When you see a signpost marked, "Edinburgh", you are pointed in the direction of Edinburgh. The sign says, "This is the way to Edinburgh." When you see a sign that says, "Come alive with Pepsi", your attention is directed to Pepsi-Cola. The sacraments point us to Jesus. The sacraments direct our attention to Jesus. The signpost says, "This is the way to Edinburgh." The sacraments point to Jesus. They say, "He is the Way to heaven." The Pepsi-Cola advert says, "Come alive with Pepsi." The sacraments invite us to "Come alive with Jesus." When you see the sign for Edinburgh, you are not already in Edinburgh. It is possible to see the sign and yet never arrive at the place. Similarly, it is possible to receive the sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper with really coming, in faith, to Christ and receiving the gift of eternal life. When you hear the words, "Come alive with Pepsi", you are not, in fact, drinking a glass of Pepsi-Cola. You can see the advert without ever tasting Pepsi-Cola. Similarly, you can partake of the sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper without receiving the new life which the Holy Spirit gives to all who put their trust in Jesus Christ.

The really important thing is not the outward sign. The most important thing is the inner reality. We come, in faith, to Jesus Christ. He comes to live in our hearts. It is so easy to miss the point of the sacraments. Instead of allowing them to point us to Jesus Christ and all that He has done for us, we get bogged down with self-centred thoughts: "I have been baptized", "I never miss a Communion." Whenever our thoughts focus on ourselves rather than Christ - "I have done this", "I have done that", we need to hear the warning of God's Word: "Let any one who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall" (1 Corinthians 10:12).

In a challenging passage at the start of 1 Corinthians 10, the Apostle Paul speaks in this way of the Old Testament people of Israel: "all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same supernatural food and all drank the same supernatural drink. For they drank from the supernatural Rock which followed them, and the Rock was Christ" (1 Corinthians 10:2-4). When we read these words about being "baptized into Moses" and eating the supernatural food and the supernatural drink, our minds move quite naturally to the sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper. If we are tempted to congratulate ourselves, we should look on to the next verse - "Nevertheless with most of them God was not pleased; for they were overthrown in the wilderness" (1 Corinthians 10:3).

We live in a spiritual wilderness, a moral wilderness. if we are looking for salvation from the things that we have done - "I have been baptized", "I never miss a Communion", we will be disappointed. We will be overthrown in the wilderness, swallowed up in the moral and spiritual wilderness which surrounds us. If we are to know the saving power of God in our lives, we must learn to look beyond the sacraments to the Saviour. "It is only by forgetting yourself that you draw near to God." This is how we must learn to think about the sacraments. The focus is not so much upon ourselves - "I have been baptized", "I never miss a Communion." The focus is upon Christ. Through Him, we draw near to God. This is how we must think of the whole Christian life. Christ is the centre.

In a life centred upon Christ, where do the sacraments fit in?
Baptism is a once-for-all event. The Lord's Supper is a repeated occurrence. More frequent than the Lord's Supper is our weekly public worship. Sunday by Sunday, we gather together to worship the Lord. Week by week, there are opportunities for praying together and studying God's Word together. Day by day, we can speak to the Lord and we can read His Word. In all of this, Christ is to be the centre. We do all these things, not to prove how religious we really are but to let Christ have His way in our lives. In all that we do, we confess our own unworthiness. Without Christ, we are nothing. We do not attempt to make ourselves worthy in God's sight. It cannot be done. Aware of our own unworthiness and our need of the Saviour, we come to Christ from whom we receive the forgiveness of all our sins, the new life of the Spirit and the gift of eternal life.

If, in your thinking about the sacraments, self has intruded where Christ should be, I appeal to you, on the basis of God's Word: "Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God" (Ephesians 4:30), "Do not quench the Spirit" (1 Thessalonians 5:19). Do not boast about the sacraments as things which you have done. Let the Holy Spirit lead you beyond the sacraments to the Saviour. Do not take it for granted that you belong to Christ because you have received the outward signs. Remember God's Word - "The Lord knows those who are His" and "Let every one who names the Name of the Lord depart from iniquity (or wrongdoing)" (2 Timothy 2:19).