1 Corinthians 11:24 Commentary and Bible Study

The disciples did not yet understand about Calvary. It had not happened at the time the Supper was instituted. When Christ suffered and died, they would be broken and shattered. It would only be afterwards that it would dawn on them – this is what he had come to do – and he is explaining it to them, even at that 11th hour. ‘This is my body’, he said to them as he stood before them; this bread represents my body broken for you. We understand it. The bread represents, symbolises the body of Christ, broken for us. Luther insisted that the words ‘This is my body’ must be taken literally, and this has resulted in contortions of interpretation to somehow explain how Christ’s human body could be in many places at the same time, and still appear as a real piece of bread. But this is no different to the symbolic language of the Book of Revelation: ‘The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches: and the seven candlesticks which thou sawest are the seven churches’ (Revelation 1:20).The first thing about the Lord’s Supper is that it is a time for giving thanks. What did the Lord give thanks for? Undoubtedly, for the mercy of God. He must have thanked God for his wonderful mercy in sending the second person of the Trinity to suffer and die for sinners. I would think he must have thanked God for the fulfilment of the plan formulated before the foundation of the world, prophesied down through the centuries, spoken of sometimes in great detail as by Isaiah. That 53rd chapter of Isaiah, the atoning death of Christ, was now to take place. The implementation of the promises of God: he must have been thanking God for all these very things, and that is what we do. As I take the bread as a believer in Christ, it signifies my participation in Christ's body. This piece of ordinary bread, I eat it and I think, ‘I am a participant in the work of Christ, in the body of Christ. I was not there, but my sin was there, my guilt was there, in a sense my soul was represented there. I have an interest in his body. What he did, he did for me, for all of us if we are truly saved.’ As you eat that piece of bread which comes from the one loaf, it is your interest in the body of Christ. He broke the bread in order to distribute it, but it also pictures his broken body. Now we know that, strictly speaking, the body of Christ was not broken. He was already dead when the soldiers came to break the legs of those hanging on the crosses and so they did not break his legs – not a bone of him was broken (John 19:31-36). But his body was certainly broken in the figurative sense, since he was so hurt and harmed, having been scourged, having been nailed to that cross. His body was broken and torn with the agonies of his death on Calvary. The greatest pain was the pain within him, the spiritual agony, the agony of soul, the separation from God; the invisible, unfathomable pain and agony of the eternal weight of all our sin. So we picture his body as being so bruised, as it were, that it was broken. ‘Take, eat.’ Do we understand the Lord’s Supper? It is a thanking ordinance, first of all, and secondly it is taking ordinance. What do I do at Lord’s Supper? I take. ‘Take’, he says, ‘this is my body.’ Take the benefits of Calvary. Take the benefits of my suffering and death.’ I take the benefits of Calvary afresh. This is why it is a blessing to me. We took of the water of life freely, when by grace we first came to Christ, and we take of him afresh every time we bow our heads and pray at the Lord’s Table. ‘O Lord,’ I say, ‘I take afresh thy free grace, salvation freely given, poured out for me. I take afresh forgiveness for all my sin. I take afresh strength and blessing for the week, for the fortnight ahead. With Calvary in view, I know I can take strength and blessing. I take eternal glory afresh. I have received it definitively and certainly at salvation; but I take it afresh. And I will think of it this week, and praise God for it, and remember that this is the glorious future that God has appointed for me.’‘This do in remembrance of me.’ It is not a mystical blessing, the Lord’s Supper. There is nothing in the bread; there is not suddenly poured out from heaven and infused into us a special blessing, simply because we are at the Lord’s Supper. Some people think there is, even some Protestant teachers think there is a direct mystical blessing. ‘This do in remembrance of me.’ The blessing comes because we are thankful, because we reflect on this picture Christ has given us. The benefit comes to us spiritually as we exercise faith, not physically.