What’s New?
By Jerry Batson, Th.D.
Special to The Alabama Baptist
We have begun in the New Year to think about truths that the Bible labels as new. Thus, Theology 101 began last week with the New Covenant as contrasted with the Old Covenant. The Old Covenant had a memorial meal, which we commonly refer to as the Passover.
The Passover Meal was historically related to the deaths of the firstborn in Egypt that led to Israel’s deliverance from bondage. Jewish households took a lamb for sacrifice and sprinkled its blood on the lintel and doorposts of their homes (Ex. 12:7).
The presence of the blood secured the safety of the Jewish slaves when an angel visited the Egyptian homes securing the death of the firstborn of their families and flocks. The meal that centered on the lamb became known as the Passover Meal, the annual observance of which was a perpetual reminder of divine deliverance and a repeated occasion for instructing future generations.
The two elements
As one aspect of Jesus fulfilling the Law of the Old Covenant, He shared a final Passover with His disciples. In the setting of that Passover Meal, Jesus instituted a new meal when He took bread, broke it and, having given thanks, gave it to the disciples and commanded them to eat it. He did similarly with the wine.
In doing so Jesus referred these two elements to His own body given and blood shed. In that context He said concerning the cup, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood” (1 Cor. 11:25). Thus, just as the Old Covenant had a meal of remembrance, so Jesus established a new meal as part of the New Covenant. We today commonly refer to this new meal as The Lord’s Supper.
In establishing the new meal, Jesus explicitly invested it with the need for remembrance on the part of His followers. His familiar instructions included the words, “Do this in remembrance of Me” (Luke 22:19).
Not only is the Lord’s Supper a meal of remembrance, it is one of anticipation. Jesus explained it this way: “For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death till He comes” (1 Cor. 11:26). Not only a means of remembrance and anticipation, the Lord’s Supper also is a time for self-examination: “Let a man examine himself and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup” (1 Cor. 11:28).
Family dimension
Furthermore the Passover Meal had a family dimension to it inasmuch as it was explicitly observed in Jewish family gatherings.
In the case of the new meal its observance is fraught with a family significance in a spiritual sense: “The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? For we, though many, are one bread and one body; for we all partake of that one bread” (1 Cor. 10:16–17). The community of believers constitutes the spiritual body of Christ, which we also commonly refer to as the Church.
Baptists have traditionally understood the Last Supper of Jesus with the disciples to be the inauguration of this memorial meal of the
New Covenant. We commonly view this meal as “a symbolic act of obedience whereby members of the church, through partaking of the bread and the fruit of the vine, memorialize the death of the Redeemer and anticipate His Second Coming” (Baptist Faith and Message, Article VII).
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