Today we will observe the Lord's Table or Eucharist where we remember our Lord Jesus Christ in the only remaining ritual for the Church.
Jesus Christ entered the human race so that He could fulfill the Father's plan as savior of the world through His substitutionary spiritual death and spiritual victory on the cross through the baptism of the cup that occurred on the cross.
Our celebration of the Lord's Table recalls our Lord's spiritual victory that was God's strategic victory over satan that was accomplished while He was on the earth in unglorified humanity.
Jesus Christ is the pattern for humility and obedience He became the channel for the fulfillment of God the Father's plan by complying with the grace principle of pivot power where the power of God's word is deployed through positive volition. Luke 22:42;
In sending Jesus Christ to die as our substitute, God initiated and demonstrated His love for us Rom 5:8; 1John 4:19; we reciprocate love by complying with His mandates. 1John 5:2-3;
Our celebration of the Lord's Table is therefore an expression of our reciprocal love for our Lord who is the strategic victor of time and eternity. We concentrate on him through the elements of the only ritual for the post-canon period of the Church Age Luke 22:19-20;
Jesus Christ was obedient to the Father's unique plan for His life by enduring the suffering and death on the cross Phil 2:8; that resulted in his humanity being exalted above every created being, such that, every created being will ultimately bow down to him. Phil 2:9-10;
He completely and perfectly fulfilled the directive will of the Father by unilaterally providing a way of salvation for everyone. Rom 5:8; as the "lamb slain from the foundation of the world" Rev 13:8; KJV John 1:29;
While we were enemies of God, God demonstrated his love for us by giving his uniquely born Son "monogenes" who entered the world through the virgin birth. John 3:16
As a result of Jesus' substitutionary spiritual death on the cross God is propitiated so He is free to reconcile mankind from their fallen state of depravity without compromising his perfect righteousness and justice because TLJC willingly laid down his life for us as our substitute. John 15:13 ; 1John 3:16
This is why believing in TLJC is the only way to a relationship with God John 14:6 , salvation Acts 4:12 and eternal life John 3:16;
Anyone can appropriate this Grace gift of salvation which is secured by the Power of God John 10:26-29; simply by believing in TLJC 1Cor 15:3-4 in the same way that Paul and Silas instructed the Philippian Jailer who asked "what Must I do to be saved?"
Their response recorded In Acts 16:31
Anyone, any time, anywhere can become saved in a moment in time simply by believing in TLJC privately in their thoughts only.
TLJC left his friends, the members of The Royal Family of God, this one and only ritual in the church age The Lord's table which we are mandated to observe in remembrance of Him.
The mandate is found in 1Cor 11:24; in the second person plural present active imperative of the Greek word " poieo" that where Paul references TLJC's own instruction found in Luke 22:19-20;
An expanded translation of 1Cor 11:24 taking into consideration the tense mood and voice of "poieo" would be " Keep on doing this in remembrance of me"
Because these verbs are only imperatives regarding ritual in the New Testament the Lord's Table is one and only ritual of the Church Age and it is a test of our capacity to concentrate on our Lord Jesus Christ through the Bible Doctrine that is resident in our soul as we partake of the elements that represent his work on our behalf.
We have these instructions for partaking of the Lord's table from the Apostle Paul starting in verse 26 of 1Cor 11.
1Cor 11:26 For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes.
27 Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner, shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord.
28 But a man must examine himself, and in so doing he is to eat of the bread and drink of the cup.
29 For he who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgment to himself if he does not judge the body rightly.
30 For this reason many among you are weak and sick, and a number sleep.
31 But if we judged ourselves rightly, we would not be judged.
We understand from this that we are to examine ourselves (imperative mood is a mandate to start doing something and stop doing another privately in our thinking.
In the privacy of our priesthood, and when we find we are outside of the word, we apply the first problem solving device, and simply acknowledge the sin as described in 1 John 1:9;
If/when (third class condition) we acknowledge any known sin he is faithful and righteous to forgive our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. This is the believer's experiential forgiveness during their post salvation life in time.
Having examined ourselves, and acknowledging any known sin we may have discovered, we are then instructed to partake of the elements, the bread and the cup.
The bread which represents his body in which he bore the sins and the judgment for our sins and the sins of the whole world, past present and future.
1Cor 11:23 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;
1Cor 11:24 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.
eat the bread
The cup which represents his substitutionary spiritual death on the cross which purchased the freedom from spiritual death and eternal condemnation of everyone who believes in him.
1Cor 11:25 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.
drink cup
In our study of Mark we have concluded our study of Jesus' Olivet comments that are recorded in Mark with the mandate to "keep on being alert".
We saw that this mandate was given because there is no prophesy that must occur before Jesus sudden return for the Church so Church Age believers must be constantly prepared for it to happen.
This brings us to chapter 14 where a timestamp is established in the narrative so that the reader is informed about the chronology of the events that are about to occur.
Mark 14:1; The Feasts of Passover and Unleavened bread were two days away. This places this statement on Monday because that year the Jews would observe the Passover on Wednesday at sundown that for the Jews was the beginning or "evening" of Thursday under the principle of "evening and morning"
The words translated two days away are literally, "after two days." To the Jews, with their inclusive way of counting, "after two days" would mean "on the day after tomorrow." On Monday the "day after tomorrow" which is Tuesday is Wednesday.
We have studied this in previous Resurrection Sunday classes as part of our study of the chronology of Jesus crucifixion and resurrection.
Remember determining the days that the events occurred on that week is complicated not only because there were two systems of determining time in use but also because there were two Sabbath days before Jesus' resurrection.
In the Roman system of determining time a new day starts at midnight and in the Jewish system a new day begins at sunset and there was the Sabbath of the Feast of Unleavened bread in addition to the weekly or 7th day Sabbath.
Remember the Passover is observed the evening of Nissan 14 followed immediately by the Feast of Unleavened Bread on Nissan 15 with its two Sabbath days. Lev 23:5-8;
So the week of Unleavened Bread can have three Sabbath days depending on which day that the Feast starts on. The year our Lord was crucified there were three Sabbath days during the Feast.
They were on Thursday that began on Wednesday evening according to Jewish time with the Passover observance, Saturday the seventh day Sabbath that began on Friday evening the day before resurrection Sunday (Lev 23:8) and the last day was Wednesday starting on a Tuesday evening.
So this verse begins the discussion of the week of Jesus' capture, beating, crucifixion and resurrection by establishing a day that is two days before the Passover and Unleavened Bread.
Mark 14:1; The Jewish political-religious party bosses kept on seeking how to capture Him by stealth so they could kill Him. The Greek word translated "seeking" is the plural imperfect active indicative of "zeteo." that means to "seize."
The imperfect tense refers to an action that is being pursued actively but is incomplete and they weren't sure they could get it done. In fact without God's permissive will there was no way that they could capture Him because even though they had tried they had never been able to do it.
The Greek word translated "stealth" is "dolos" that means deceit or guile or craft. They were trying to catch Him by surprise but of course that was impossible because of His doctrinal awareness but He would allow them to take him captive because it was God's will.
Mark 14:2; Their reasoning was that this could not occur during the Feast of Unleavened Bread because the people might riot.
Religious leaders are always afraid because they have no true authority from God they must borrow their power from the mob. At the moment the mob was supporting Jesus but that would change in a day or so once they became disillusioned.
The Jewish leaders also knew that if their capture of Jesus caused a riot the Romans would stop it with excessive force and brutality and their positions would be threatened.
We see from this that they were looking for a way to arrest him secretly when very few people who would try to protect Him were around to see it happen.
God expedited His capture when Judas' unexpectedly offered to betray Him putting events on God's timetable rather than theirs under the principle that Jesus Christ controls history.
We have previously seen that Jesus' capture and subsequent crucifixion was part of God's directive will. Mark 8:31; but the Jews' choice to participate was God's permissive will.
In the next verse we see that at the same time that the political party bosses were trying to capture Him those who loved Him were honoring Him.
In nearby Bethany Jesus is spending the Monday night and they are having a party. Jesus knew He was going to die in a couple of days because He had already prophesied about His impending death and He knew it would occur on Passover.
He isn't sitting around moping about it He carries on as usual because He has God's Word in His thinking and He is there for the specific purpose of fulfilling God's Word.
We can do this and so can anyone else who has God's Word in their thinking and understands that their whole purpose in life is to glorify God through His Word.
God's Word provides the potential capacity for every believer to do this no matter what is going on in their life.