Seven Days That Changes The World | The Table Is Set For You | Senior Pastor Keith Stewart

SEVEN DAYS THAT CHANGED THE WORLD
THE TABLE IS SET FOR YOU | PART 5
Senior Pastor Keith Stewart
March 22, 2026
 
On the night He was betrayed, Jesus took an ordinary Passover meal and transformed it into a sacred invitation to remember Him, receive His grace, and be renewed by His presence. In this message, we will explore the meaning of the Lord’s Supper, how it fulfills the deeper purpose of Passover, and why communion is not reserved for the perfect but offered to the broken, needy, and undeserving. Together, we’ll see that this table is where Christ meets His people with mercy, restores their identity, and calls them into a life that is taken, blessed, broken, and given for others.

1. What part of this message most changed or deepened your understanding of the Lord’s Supper?
 
2. The sermon says communion is “not a magical rite” and “not merely a nostalgic ceremony.” What do you think those two errors look like in real life, and how should we think about communion instead?
 
3. In what sense did Passover form Israel’s identity as a delivered people? How does communion form the church’s identity as a redeemed people?
 
4. The message emphasizes that remembering in Scripture is more than mental recollection. How should communion actively shape the way we live, think, and respond to life?

5. Why is it significant that the first Lord’s Supper was surrounded by betrayal? What does that teach us about who this meal is for?
 
6. Have you ever felt unworthy to come to the table? How does the statement, “Communion is for the undeserving,” challenge or comfort you?
 
7. Which part of the pattern taken, blessed, broken, given most describes your present season of life? Why?
 
8. What would it look like this week for your life to become “bread for the world” — something God uses to nourish, strengthen, or bless others?

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

What a perfect song for today's message as we talk about uh communion. Before we get into the message today, there's a couple announcements I want to make. One is uh I want to encourage you to invite people, especially to join us for Easter. Uh, there are some cards that are in the seatback pockets uh in front of you or right behind you, and if you can't find them there, they're available in the uh Welcome Center. Basically, it's a card with the church address, a little map how to get here, our service times, as well as the YouTube link. You know, I don't know if you're aware of this or not, but most people who come to a new church do so because of the invitation of a friend versus getting something in the mail versus having a big event. Friendship connection is everything when it comes to bringing people to church. And the best thing about it is when people come through a relationship, they don't come into a church disconnected, not knowing anybody. They they know you. Now, without making this seem weird or anything, really, a friend, a neighbor, a coworker, somebody you suspect maybe doesn't go to church, we're not trying to steal sheep. We're not trying to get people to leave a good church and come here. What you want to do is you just offer them a card like that and say, hey, listen, I don't know if you have a church home or not. I'd like to invite you to come to our church on Easter. That's all you have to do. Don't you're not selling anything, you're not trying to pressure, you know, it's really just creating an opportunity. So I'd like to encourage you sometime over the next couple of weeks to be sure to get one of those cards, pass it to somebody you know. And if you enjoy doing that kind of thing on the radio, take a stack of them, have them available so that you can invite friends. Another thing I want to do is somewhat sad. I want to tell you today is Gary Owens' last Sunday with us as executive pastor. Uh it marks 20 years of service to Spring Creek Church. He's retiring. Uh, many of you don't know Gary personally because Gary's a real behind-the-scenes kind of uh pastor, but his contribution to Spring Creek has been invaluable. Gary possesses a set of skills that I don't have. He is bent toward administration, and he's helped to give structure and uh support to the vision and direction I've set for the church. As you can imagine, after 20 years of working together, we've gotten to know each other fairly well. So I have a ton of memories I'm gonna cherish about Gary and serving alongside him. I think of back in the early days of the church when we served over in Glenhill Estates, that's over off of Derry Road. It's the lowest income, highest crime area of our city. We went into that neighborhood to fix up homes of the elderly and people on assistance and single moms to help create a better environment there. Because you know the one thing about it, disorderly behavior does not like an ordered environment. So we went in there to help really create some order. And I can remember a lot of sweat and achy muscles and even some blood both of us spilt on those days cleaning up all those houses and yards. But whether we were there or in one of Garland's many parks, helping to bring them up so that the community could really enjoy them or mobilizing the church in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina or the three-year building project where we worked alongside the good people at Kaiser Street Missionary Baptist Church, one of the oldest African-American congregations in our city. They had an old building they wanted to turn into community center. For three years, we worked alongside them. Gary was an integral part of that. Building floats for MLK Day, all kinds of world vision events, outside concerts, picnics, you name it. The thing is, none of those events happen without somebody coming alongside and saying, hey, how do we make sure that we got everything we need for an event like that? And Gary has been that kind of person. I think about all the conferences over the years we've attended, the laughs and the learnings that we've had together. I learned something about Gary. Gary likes to try new things. He's always into new things. And sometimes even booking us into hotels that were downright frightening. But it was new. He'd never been there. He wanted to check it out. I would sit in the corner of my room, huddled all night long, just hoping that nobody was going to break in on me. But he likes the new stuff. He's always ready for an adventure. I can remember hard times in the history of the church when things weren't going well financially for us, and both Gary and I took a cut in our salary so that we wouldn't have to cut any of the staff or have them have to reduce their pay. I can remember when Gary said to me that his ambition in life was to give as much money as he possibly could to the kingdom of God. I can remember countless times when he wasn't quite sure of the direction or position I was holding, but he stood by me anyway. And I remember this very vividly. We had a woman who was attending our church who fell, actually fell over on this side of our property and decided to sue us. That case ended up going to arbitration. And as the verdict was finally, you know, agreed to, um, and every every all the parties were satisfied, Gary said, I'd like to have a private conversation with this woman. Now all the lawyers said, No way, you're not having a conversation without us. And so Gary had to proceed in the presence of all these lawyers, and he simply said to them, Even with everything that's happened between us, I want you to know you're always welcome at Spring Creek. And I thought, that's good. That's the heart of this church. That lets you know we we got no axe to grind against anybody. If you want to be a part of this fellowship, we want you to be a part of this fellowship. And in all those things and many more, I'm gonna miss Gary. And I hope that everybody here will join with me in praying for God's best to be showered upon him and his next chapter and season of his life. I pray that he and Melissa and the life they've carved out for one another in their retirement years will be even more fulfilling than anything they imagine. And I pray that as he leaves on this new adventure, that he knows I'll always be praying for him. I'll always have gratitude for the contribution he's made and I'll always love him. And so I hope that you'll join with me in first expressing our gratitude for the work he's done over the last 20 years, but also in praying that this next chapter of his life will be truly blessed. Would you pray for me as I pray this blessing on Gary's life as well as praying for God to meet us in today's message? Father, I thank you so much for Gary Owen and for how you brought him into my life and for the differences that he's made in this church. We will always be grateful for his many years of service and the difference that he's made. I pray, God, that in this new chapter, this new horizon, this new adventure that he has, that there'll be less scary things and much more exciting things ahead. And God, that he would just feel and know your blessing in every turn. That he would know what a faithful God you are, to love us where we are, giving us exactly what we need when we need it. I pray that he and Melissa will just grow stronger in their marriage and their love for one another, and that they'll find that the coming days are full of things they never anticipated. So I pray, God, that in the interim that you will be with Spring Creek as we navigate the future and decide what's best uh for our church and for this position that's now vacant. I pray that you would also uh help us as we gather around your word right now, that you would just have complete freedom in this congregation to speak into our lives, to encourage us, to challenge us, to direct us according to your will. In Jesus' name, amen. So Apollo 11 was the spacecraft that first landed two people on the moon. When the lunar module landed on the surface of the moon on July 20th, 1969, the first thing the astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin did was wait. NASA was real concerned that they'd had a very arduous journey to get to the moon. They wanted them to be fully rested before they made the first ever moon walk, before Michael Jackson even did his, right? He would make the first moon walk and also other activities that entailed for their moon adventure. So as the men rested and mentally prepared for the next phase of their mission, Aldrin got on the calm system and spoke to the people on the ground, the ground crew back on Earth. And to the public, this is what he said. I'd like to take this opportunity to ask every person listening in, whoever and wherever they may be, to pause for a moment and contemplate the events of the past few hours and to give thanks in his or her own way. But when the communication was over, Aldrin read a verse from the Gospel of John and he took communion. What you see on the screen right now are the actual notes that he took with him into space to guide him in his own private communion service. I want you to hear him describe what that experience was like. In the radio blackout, I opened the little plastic packages which contained the bread and the wine. I poured the wine into the chalice our church had given me. In the one-sixth gravity of the moon, the wine slowly curled and gracefully came up the other side, the side of the cup. Then I read the scripture. I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever abides in me will bring forth much fruit. Apart from me, you can do nothing. Now I want you to think about how significant this actually is. That the very first food and the very first drink ever consumed on the surface of the moon were the elements of communion. Now that's quite a statement in and of itself, right? And so he you have here this picture right now the screen is the communion chalice. This is the photo of the actual bag and the chalice that Neil Armstrong used in that first communion, historic communion in space. Now, originally, I'll tell you, Aldrin wanted to broadcast this service to the world. But what had happened, the atheist activist Madeline Murray O'Hara, who was considered the most hated woman in America, uh had actually a few months earlier in the previous year had sued NASA. You might remember this, Apollo 8, when they rounded the moon, so they don't land, but they go around the moon. And when they did that, they read from the book of Genesis, chapter one. And when that happened, she decided to sue NASA for using a religious book in space. Well, eventually that lawsuit was dismissed. But NASA was worried that an overtly religious display might trigger another lawsuit. So when Aldrin told the flight crew what he wanted to do, the operations manager, that he planned to broadcast his little service to the world, the manager told him to go ahead but have communion, but keep your comments much more general. So Aldrin kept the service low-key on purpose. And that's why, for some of you in this room, this is the first you've ever heard that the very first food and drink consumed on the surface of the moon were the elements of communion. Today, what I want to do is talk to you about the fifth day of the seven days that changed the world by talking to you about the institution of the Lord's Supper. So let's begin with the simplicity of a meal. Here's how Paul wrote it in 1 Corinthians 11. 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. And when he given thanks, he broke it and said, This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat this drink and uh eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. Now at the close of today's service, we are going to participate in a meal that's been celebrated by all Christ's followers for the last 2,000 years. For those of you who are at home right now and you're watching this, please know you can participate too. Just go to your cupboard real quickly, grab crackers, tortillas, any kind of bread, get some type of juice from your refrigerator. If you don't have juice, go with water, because Jesus can change water into wine, in case you didn't know. And you can, at the close of today's service, you can participate in this service as well. But here's the thing: if you were to attend this service, a communion service, at all the churches in our community, what you would discover is a wide variety of beliefs and practices around this particular meal. At some of the services, they would have a single loaf and a single cup. At others, like ours, you'd be given a little cup with a small piece of bread on top. And still others, you might go forward to an altar where a minister would serve you the bread in the cup. In others, you might be served in your seats. At some services, the priest alone would drink from the cup, and you'd be given a wave wafer that was only dipped in the cup. Now you should also know this service has been called by a lot of different names throughout church history. Some call it the Lord's Supper, some call it the Lord's Table, some call it the Eucharist, which means thanksgiving, others call it communion. There are certain church traditions that attach an almost magical significance to the Lord's table. These churches believe that when you partake of the bread in the cup, you are literally receiving the actual blood and the actual body of Jesus Christ. So in those traditions, the Lord's table is seen as an essential to the faith. At the opposite end of the spectrum, there's others that ascribe almost no significance whatsoever to communion. And to those believers, communion is not nearly as important as it should be. Now, from the Bible, what we understand is this the Lord's Supper is not a magical rite, and neither is it merely just a nostalgic kind of ceremony. Instead, it's a meal, if properly understood, can bring us into the presence of Jesus Christ, help us deal with our own brokenness, restore fellowship with God and with one another, and bring honor to Jesus Christ. John Calvin wrote about communion when he said, his life, that is Jesus' life, passes over into ours. That's what actually happens in communion. When we partake of communion, we have this one-on-one personal experience with Jesus Christ. So it's more than just a nostalgic rehearsal, it's a meeting place with Christ. In the Gospel of John, Jesus said something similar. He said, Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him. So once again, we see this promise of the abiding presence of Jesus Christ when we partake of the elements of communion. Now, many of you will recognize the name Dietrich Bonhoeffer. He was a famous pastor during World War II, uh, brilliant, actually, seminary teacher, and he opposed Adolf Hitler's policies in the 1930s. As a result of that, on April 5th, 1943, the Germans arrested Bonhoeffer and put him in prison. Two years later, the Nazis executed Bonhoeffer, hanging him on the gallow, literally right before the Allies swept into Germany to liberate all the camps. But about 10 weeks, about 10 weeks after his arrest, Bonhoeffer ended up writing a letter to his parents, and this is what he said. It is Monday, and I was sitting down to a dinner of turnips and potatoes when a parcel you sent arrived. Such things give me greater joy than I can say. Although I'm utterly convinced that nothing can break the bonds between us, I seem to need some outward token or sign to reassure me. I suppose it is rather like the felt need in our religion for sacraments. Now, do you get what he's saying? He's saying, Mom, dad, I know that you love me. I really don't doubt that, but it's there there's a part of me that kind of needs that special touch, that reminder. And when I get a care package from home, I'm reminded that I'm not forgotten, that I'm loved. And he's saying that's that's that's the way that feels. When that comes, it's a special connection, and I'm assured of that love. And then he compared that experience to communion itself. The communion is this care package from God. It's a reminder that we're not forgotten, that we are really deeply loved. And all of this ends up being communicated in communion. What's amazing to me is when it comes down to communion, it incorporates and compresses so much of our faith into a single ceremony. So the crucifixion of Christ for our sins, our dependence on Him for salvation. That's all in this meal. Our anticipation that he's coming again, our fellowship with one another in the church, and something that we're inclined to forget, in communion, we're given an assurance that in the afterlife it is still a very human life, because we'll continue to eat and drink like we do in our human bodies. So all of that is really pictured within this special meal that we partake of. So what I want to do is I want to turn our attention now to Jesus taking a very well known, well-known Jewish feast called Passover and redefining it, looking deeper into those elements and letting a couple of elements within that feast come to represent him. So let's talk about the purpose of Passover. So at the heart of the Exodus, when you look at the Old Testament, the heart of the Exodus is the story of the Passover. And the Passover marks the Jewish people in a very unique way. That is, until more recent history. If you ask Jewish people today, what is the historic event that most defines who you are? More Jewish people today will say the Holocaust than they will Passover. In fact, there's not a few rabbis who are very concerned about this. Because uh Rabbi Sharon Browse, she's written extensively about Jewish identity, and in her work, what she argues is that Jewish identity has moved from being uh rooted in this narrative of liberation, which is what the Exodus is all about, to this trauma-based identity, which is the Holocaust. So Rabbi Browse has argued that Exodus, if you take Exodus as kind of the defining act of your faith, then that helps you to respond to injustice with hope and determination. The Holocaust teaches people to be defined by victimization and trauma. Now, maybe you've never thought about it before, but I but I trust these rabbis and what they're seeing among their own people. Passover formed Israel's identity as a delivered people, like communion forms the church's identity as a redeemed people. So what I want to do is I want to go back in time and I want us to rediscover why God left the Passover meal for the Jewish people. And I'll tell you, it's a threefold purpose. And I'll give them to you right up front, and we'll look at them one at a time. The threefold purpose is this God is reliving, helping them to relive the event, to reunite as a community, and to redirect their lives. So let's look at them one at a time. Number one, it's to relive the event. So this is Exodus chapter 12, and Moses is explaining the significance of Passover. He said, You shall observe this rite as a statute for you and for your sons forever. And when your children say to you, What do you mean by this service? You shall say, It is a sacrifice of the Lord's Passover, for he passed over the houses of the people of Israel in Egypt when he struck the Egyptians, but he spared our houses. So think about it. Passover is a kind of ritual reenactment. Everything about this meal is kind of to recreate the event they went through. Everything from you had to wear with your sandals on your feet, like you're ready to go. You had to have your staff in hand, like you're ready to walk. You had to eat this meal in haste because you didn't have a lot of time to eat it. It was all this journey of we're getting ready to leave, we're getting ready to be delivered. And in particular, God is going to pass over us. So their identity is rooted in being the passed over once. Well, some years later, this is Deuteronomy 16, he says this you shall eat no leavened bread with it, seven days you shall eat it with unleavened bread, the bread of affliction, for you came out of the land of Egypt in haste, that all the days of your life you may remember the day when you came out out of the land of Egypt. So this is written about 40 years later. This is written to the children of the parents who went through the original Passover. And what God is saying through Moses is listen, I want you to continue to reenact this. Even though you didn't personally experience it, even though you didn't go through this trauma, I want you to reenact it just like our people did that first Passover. I want you to remember this feast. I want you to remember what I did, because what this does is you're reliving the event in this moment and you're reminding yourself that you too are among the Passover ones. Then there's second, reuniting community. God's people were to be drawn together in community to celebrate the Passover meal. This is not a solo act. This is not you going to your house, me by myself, I'm having this meal, I would gather with my family and with my extended family. We'd all be under the same roof, reminding ourselves that we belong to each other as we partake of Passover. Well, in Deuteronomy 16, which like I say is about 40 years later, Israel's given a slightly new direction. Now they're instructed to eat the Passover in Jerusalem. So now they're not even in their separate towns or their separate homes or just with their individual families. They go together to the city, to Jerusalem, and everybody at the same time is partaking of Passover together. So there's no more segregation, no more clans. It unites them as a people. One people, one identity, we're the Passover ones. That identity ties them together. So we, in one sense, we go through and we remember because it is going to relive the event. Second, because it's going to reunite the community. The third is it's going to redirect our lives. So Moses gives instructions to Israel about the feast of Passover, and he tells the Israelites what the feast will be like. He says, like a sign on your hand and a reminder on your forehead. Now, does that sound familiar to anybody? Our minds immediately go to Revelation. We think about the mark of the beast that we're gonna be marked on our hands, and we're gonna be marked on our foreheads. So is God gonna microchip all these people? No, because that's not what that means in the first place. To be marked on your forehead is about what goes on behind your forehead, your thinking. To be marked in your hand is about your actions. So in your thoughts and your actions, God He wants his people to be reminded of who he is and what he's done. Does that make sense? That's the same thing is true of the mark of the beast, too. It's not about you resisting some person going to put a microchip under your skin. People who are marked by the beast are people who already think and act like the value system of the beast. And you see, there's a lot of people already marked by the beast. Because the beast is Babylon, the beast is the systems of this world. And if our thinking and our actions look like the systems of this world, we're marked by the beast. Well, the Bible's telling us to be marked by the things of God. And all of this happens through a specific act called remembering. Now, to us, when we think about remembering, all we think about is mental recall. That I can remember this fact, I can rehearse it in my mind, I remember when that happened. But the thing is, remembering in the Bible was never like that. Remembering in the Bible is about that I'm so attentive to the promises of God that they guide how I live today. So they inform, they propel me forward. This is what remembering is supposed to do for me. When I remember what God has done, I recall what God can do. And what I remember is there's no problem that's too big for God. Because I see that. I see that in the Passover meal. Look at what God did. He took on our great enemy and he defeated our enemy that we were powerless to do anything. We were slaves to that enemy. He set us free to be the people of God. There's no problem too big for God. Passover is intended to show them that. So on the fifth day of the seven days that changed the world, Jesus takes this Passover celebration that's all about reliving the event, reuniting the community, and redirecting our lives, and now institutes a celebratory meal for us, for the church, for his people to do exactly the same things. So when we take of communion, we relive the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ. Just like the Jewish people at Passover, they dramatize that escape. They let it play out in how they dress and what they do and how they partake in the meal. In the same way, when we come together, we are reenacting the crucifixion of Christ. When we come together and we take the bread and we take the cup, we're reminded that Jesus Christ broke, his body was broken and his blood was spilled on our behalf. I'm reminded that my sin was laid on Jesus, that he's taken the penalty for my sin. And because of that, I live a condemnation-free lifestyle. Jesus was condemned in my place. So I won't be condemned anymore. And I'm reliving that moment. I'm at the foot of Christ. I'm worshiping Christ. I'm reminding of what his great love has already done for me. So it's about reliving the event, but it's also about reuniting the community. For far too much of church history, communion is treated like an individual act among a lot of people. In other words, we come together and we receive communion, but it's like me and Jesus, we got our own thing going right here. And I'm going to have my own experience with Jesus. Let me tell you something that completely defies what Jesus says in his word about what this meal is supposed to be. I'll give you this example. This is from 1 Corinthians chapter 10, verse 17. But there is one loaf. Our manyness becomes oneness. Christ does not become fragmented in us. And that's what happens when we see this as just an individual act. Christ is fragmented all throughout this room. Rather, we become unified in him. We don't reduce Christ to what we are, he raises us to what he is. So communion is about us, it's about all of us. In fact, in this passage in 1 Corinthians 10, when Paul says you, he doesn't say you singular. He uses Texan. He says y'all. Okay, he's saying everybody that I'm talking to right now, we all together participate in this meal because it unites us. It reminds us that we belong to one another. Friends, you're not going to get very far into spiritual life on your own. You're not. You know, there's this old African proverb that says, if you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together. We need each other. Now, I don't know about you, but for me, I wouldn't have made it as far as I have if it wasn't for my good friends in Christ. Because they encourage me, they correct me, they instruct me, they're there for me. I'm never alone. And that's probably one of the worst feelings you have is when you feel like you're up against a problem and you're all by yourself. I'm never alone. My family's with me. I'm not standing as an isolated individual. I stand with others. We together are the new passed over ones. We're the ones that the judgment of Christ fell on, the judgment of God fell on Christ, and now his judgment doesn't fall on us because we've been passed over. So communion's about all of us. It's about reliving the event, it's about reuniting the community, but it's about redirecting our life. Communion restores perspective. Because you see, communion reminds us that God has already dealt with our biggest problem sin, hell, death, and the grave. He already dealt with your biggest problem. So what you've got in your life that's too big for a crucified, resurrected Savior. What problem is that big? What problem is bigger than death? What problem is bigger than hell? What problem is bigger than the condemnation we were under? No problem you have. So it restores perspective because I'm reminded that my God, even though it looks like he's defeated on Friday, he's a third-day God. And on Easter Sunday morning, he's going to get up out of the grave and show us who has the power over death, hell, sin in the grave, and that's Christ. So you need communion, rain or shine. You need communion whether you feel like it or don't. You need communion if you're busy or you're bored, whether you're weak or you're strong. You can't afford not to come. Passover and the Lord's Supper picture the same spiritual reality because Christ is our Passover. This is what Paul wrote: Christ, our Passover, who is sacrificed for us. But there's one more thing that I really want to address that seldom, if ever, gets treated or talked about in a communion service, and it's this: the betrayal that bookends the Lord's Supper. Now, this takes kind of the 35,000-foot view of Scripture to understand this. But as you look through Scripture, you realize at every juncture in redemptive history, when God made a covenant with his people, almost immediately after the covenant was ratified, there was betrayal of that covenant on our part. In other words, before the ink is even dry on the promises of God, we prove ourselves unfaithful. For example, God makes a covenant with Noah to never again destroy the entire earth with a flood. How does Noah repay him? By getting blind, stinking, drunk. That's what he does. How about when God made a covenant with Abraham to bless him, make of him a great people, gave him a land all to themselves? At the first sign of difficulty, Abraham deserts the land he's promised and lies about Sarah being his wife. When God renewed his covenant with Israel on Mount Sinai, remember the story? Moses goes up on the mountainside, he receives the Ten Commandments, he's delivered them already from slavery in Egypt. And when he comes down, what does he find? The people of God, like pagans, are caborting around a golden idol. When David was promised that one of his descendants on the throne would sit on the throne in God's kingdom forever, he repaid God by committing adultery and murdering the woman's husband. So it shouldn't surprise any of us that even here in the upper room, the Gospel of Mark calls a special attention to this dismal reality. Now I've mentioned to you this before. It's true throughout Scripture, it's especially true in the Gospel of Mark. Jewish people like to write with what's called chiastic structure or sandwich technique. Unlike us as Americans, we like to write and build a story to a climactic end. Jewish people often put their main point in the middle of a story and not the end. So they would sandwich a truth around that central point. Well, it happens in communion, too, because what you when you begin to read the story, the account of the Lord's Supper, the very first one, it's sandwiched between two accounts of betrayal. So before the supper, Jesus predicts Judas' betrayal. Immediately after the supper, he addressed Peter's betrayal. So when you read it, the flow of the story goes like this: betrayal, Lord's Supper, betrayal. That's the sandwich technique. That's chiastic structure. So what Mark is trying to call our attention to is that in this most intimate of moments, the very symbol of the new covenant that God is making with his people, it's marked by infidelity on our part. Every time in the Bible that God does something special and unique for his people, we answer it with infidelity. The question is why? Why does Mark emphasize that in the very first communion, it's marked by betrayal on both ends? I think it's to remind us that communion is not for perfect people. God is reminding us we're not in a relationship with him because we deserve it. We're in a relationship with him because we need it. God gives us the undeserving ones, the liars, the cheats, the broken, what we don't deserve. The qualified, the perfect, the competent, the people who have it all together need not apply. So in the very first communion, the one that's our pattern, the one that we're to look to as an example for all time, on that night that Jesus has that meal with his 12 disciples, it's attended by a traitor and a bunch of cowards. Men who will either turn Jesus in for the money or will run away from him to save their own skin. The first communion, the one that most people consider the holiest and purest moment in the life of the church, began and ended with betrayal. Mark makes this perfectly clear. Friends, hear me saying this communion is for the undeserving. I'll tell you why this is important. There's a verse in the King James Bible that's used by a lot of pastors and spiritual leaders to keep people away from the Lord's Supper. And I'm going to read it to you and I'm going to explain to you what Paul's saying. This is the verse. Wherefore, whoever, whosoever shall eat this bread and drink this cup of the Lord unworthily shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord. Now, like I say, this is a verse often misapplied by preachers saying that if you come to the communion table and you're not worthy, that you should not come. That if there's any sin, there's any indication whatsoever that you're less than perfect with God, that you should not partake of this meal. I'm sorry, friends, that's not what this verse means. When he talks about unworthily, he's talking about the manner in which they partake of this communion supper. And in particular, especially if you've read my book, I have an entire chapter talking about this. He's talking about how the rich in Corinth were exploiting the poor and making them very conscious of their poverty and what's happened around the Lord's table. He's saying if you come around to this place of equality, this place where we're reminded we all belong to each other, and you make some people feel like they're second class, that's partaking unworthily. It's treating people like they don't deserve a place there. He's not talking about people who are less than perfect like you and me. So hear me saying this. No one gets into Jesus' feet because their hearts are pure. When Jesus ate with people, if there's any example we see in the Bible, he ate with the socially unacceptable, the outcast, the self-righteous. They were all invited to Jesus' table on equal terms because none of us can brag, and no one has a right to turn other people away from Christ's meal, because he's the host and he's the one who sets the rules. And Jesus made very clear in the very first one the undeserving ones are the ones it's intended for, because they are the ones who would betray him, and they're the ones he took supper with. It's because of that, it's understanding this that the first Lord's Supper was marked by betrayal, by infidelity. This is why this invitation to communion has always been my favorite one. Come to this service, not because you must, but because you may. Come to testify, not that you're righteous, but that you sincerely love our Lord Jesus Christ and desire to be his true disciples. Come not because you're strong, but because you're weak. Not because you have any claim on heaven's reward, but because in your frailty and sin, you stand in constant need of heaven's mercy. So you're invited to communion. Not because you're worthy, not because you have your life altogether, not because you're sinless and spotless in heart, but because you need what Jesus offers. You need his grace, you need his presence, you need his covering for sins, you need his acceptance. The one who knows you and loves you like no other. God has invited us, the unfaithful of heart, to enjoy this meal with him. So God's answer to the human family is a meal where he says, Come as you are, gather around my table and be reconciled to me, because Christ has already dealt with our sin problem. It's all pictured in communion. His body was broken, his blood was spilled, so that you would never have to endure anything like that. There's this wonderful little book. It's called The Tale of the Tardy Oxcart. I don't know if you've ever read it or not, written by a local pastor named Chuck Swindahl. He was president of Dallas Seminary for a while. But in that book, he tells a story of a little eight-year-old Kenyan girl named Monica. She fell into a pit, she broke her leg. Mama Nijiri, an older woman, saw what happened, immediately jumped into the pit to help lift Monica out. But also in that pit was a black mamba, the deadliest snake in all of Africa and maybe in the world. And what ended up happening was it bit both Monica and Mama Nijiri. Both of them were rushed to the nearest medical center they could find. Monica improved, but tragically, Mama Najiri, she died. A missionary nurse was there taking care of Monica, and what she explained to Monica was this: because the Mamba had bitten Mama Negiri first, it had emptied all of its poison into Mama Negiri. And so when it bit Monica, it had no poison left. And the nurse went on to explain that's exactly what Jesus did for us. He took all the poison of sin so that we could live. And Monica finally understood why Jesus came. That he took our penalty. That he took the poison. He took it so that I could live, I could be healed. And she trusted Christ as her Lord and Savior. What I'm saying is, is Jesus already took this thing from the serpent on the cross. He absorbed it all so that that snake now has no power over you. Aren't you glad? Aren't you glad that Jesus has taken the worst that life can offer? He's absorbed it all so that you don't have to. And that snake, he may bite at you, but he just has thangs. He's got no poison left for you. Jesus took it all. So there's one final thing I want to sell share, but I want us to prepare for communion. Some of you may not have noticed on the way in there were baskets that had the communion elements. If you got to your seat and you want to participate but didn't get it, just raise your hand. We've got some ushers in the back, and they'll make sure to come by and give this to you. I will tell our friends of Bill W who are in the room that this is non-alcoholic wine. This is great juice, okay? So you don't have to worry about breaking your sobriety. It is an important thing. I understand that, and I would never want that to get in the way of you partaking in communion. So be sure to keep your hand up till somebody gets to you, somebody will get to you. Uh, I'd also say that uh we're going to partake of this together, so I'm gonna do a little explaining first, and then all at the same time we'll receive those elements. If you're at home, this would be a good time for you to go to the kitchen and get the elements so that you can join us at the close, too. So I want to wrap up with this final point by call a holy pattern: taken, blessed, broken, given. These are the words of Jesus. While they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks, and broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying, Take it, this is my body. So notice this is the pattern for the first communion. Jesus takes bread, he blesses bread, he breaks that bread, and then he gives it to his disciples. It's taken, blessed, broken, given. That's the pattern. Now there's a wonderful devotional writer, his name is Henry Nowen. Henry Nowen wrote a great book called Life of the Beloved. And in that book, he talks about this pattern of being taken, blessed, broken, given. Listen to what he said. To identify the movements of the Spirit in our lives, I have found it helpful to use four words: taken, blessed, broken, given. These words summarize my life as a Christian because I'm called to become bread for the world. Bread that is taken, blessed, broken, and given. Now, we live in a world that doesn't have much use for broken things. We really do. I mean, whether that's a broken relationship or broken hearts, or we even have a term for technology that we don't want to repair, we call it throwaway technology. And sometimes we take that same attitude toward people. I don't want to spend the time making it right with you, working through the messiness, forgiving you, whatever it might be. I'm just going to throw this relationship away and move on. But here's what I want you to know God has use only for broken things. All his tools, his best ones, are broken tools. The things we esteem least, God esteems most. What we call trash, God calls treasure. Because you see, you and I are broken. We're broken people living in a broken world among the breakage, right? And we're always going to intersect with other people who are broken like us. Take, taken, blessed, broken, and given. That's the pattern for my life. It's a pattern for your life. To be taken means to be chosen by God, to be blessed and affirmed in our identity. To be blessed is to be affirmed in our identity. To be broken is to be refined through our suffering. To be given is to have offer our lives in service to other people. So let's walk through them. First, we're taken. You realize you're chosen by God from the world. That's the language the New Testament uses. You have been chosen by God. I say often, you know, God, my Father, is very fond of me. And I know He's fond of you too. I just hope that you live in that reality. That you've been chosen by God, that God has taken care of the sin problem. There is nothing that flows out of my heart or from his heart that is interrupted by this thing called sin anymore. Because God has forgiven me completely. So I have been taken. I've been chosen, but I've been blessed. I'm blessed by God's great love. He affirms my identity and my purpose. He allows me to see life as a gift and grace as the means of making it through this life. But you know, none of that exempts us from being broken, does it? All of us are going to go through broken experiences. Some of us are going to have broken hearts and relationships. Others of us are going to find brokenness in our self-will, maybe around a particular consumption, something we consume, an item, an addiction, whatever it might be. We have all kinds of brokenness in our life, but you see, we're also given. And given means God takes that brokenness in your life, and as He redeems it, as He heals it, you become a conduit of that love and that mercy to other people's lives. You see, here's the thing I know. You know who the broken are because they own it and they're not ashamed of it. And you know when people are faking it, don't you? Because the truly broken, they got no uneasy ego to defend. They're playing no games. What you see is what you get. They know who they are, but they also know who they are by God's grace. They know what God does with that. And when we are honest with each other, your brokenness may look nothing like mine. But we share in that brokenness, don't we? We share, we understand, we make the connection around brokenness. So our lives, like broken bread, are given to the world, and God says, let me take your brokenness and make it your ministry, this conduit of healing to the world. So what I'm saying is that Jesus is showing us the pattern of our discipleship through the elements of communion, selected by God, blessed by God, broken through this world and given away to others. So as we partake of communion today, would you first make it your prayer? Take my life, Lord. Take it. Choose me. Bless me. Break me. Use me. So we're gonna prepare to take communion. I want to tell you a little thing about these little cups, okay? There's two different tabs. The top tab will remove the bread only. If you pull the larger tab, you're gonna have an open cup and have to try to finagle this piece of bread out of there. So lift just the top cup to remove the bread. I want you to do something for me. It's really small, but take a moment and just break it. Break it. Hold it together and let me talk to you about this bread. Jesus said this in Matthew 26, 26. While they were eating, he took bread. Jesus gave thanks and broke it, gave his disciples and said, Take and eat, this is my body. So as you receive this bread today, I want you to imagine yourself at the foot of the cross. Because that's where we all are, right? I mean, we're at the foot of the cross, and we see Jesus' broken body and his blood oozing from his life. But what I want you to see, even more than that, I want you to see his eyes. I want you to see him looking at you. I want you to hear him say, You know I'm doing this for you. I knew you would exist. I know who you are. I'm willingly carrying this because I love you that much. So I want you to relive the moment, but I also want you to take a minute and just look around this room. You're not alone in this. You got brothers and sisters all around you. We're a family. We have a shared identity, but it goes beyond a shared identity. It's a shared experience of a God who loves us like no other. And he shows up in one another, right? He's always showing up in your brothers and sisters and reminding you that you're not forgotten, that you're loved. But not just that. As you look at this bread and you think about what Jesus did, I want you to be reminded in this moment that there is no problem in your life that's bigger than what this solved, than what Christ did for you. That literally, when he gave his life, his body was broken, his blood was spilt. He dealt with our biggest problem. So whatever isolation, whatever shame, whatever fear, whatever judgment, whatever it is that's in your heart and looming in your mind, it seems to be so big, there is no problem bigger than a resurrected Savior. He's able to take that on, he's able to defeat it. So if you will, the bread of life, the body of Jesus Christ. Thank you, Lord. Here's the second half of Jesus' instruction. Then he took the cup, gave thanks, offered it to them, saying, Drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. Now listen to this last line. I tell you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now until the day when I drink it anew with your father with you in my Father's kingdom. Now Jesus makes a promise before we receive this cup. He says, There's coming a time in eternity when the body of Christ is going to be reconstituted on the other side of eternity. He said, I'm taking it with you, my disciples, now. So in that first communion ever. But he said, There's coming a time when the whole family is going to all be together in God's presence. And Jesus says, I'm going to sit down at that meal with you. I'm going to sit down with you and we're going to enjoy this together. And we're going to think about how God passed over us all and made a place in eternity for us. So as you take this cup today, be reminded that we've got a future together and with Christ that you can't even imagine today. The cup of salvation, the blood of Jesus Christ. Let's pray. Father, thank you so much. Thank you for who you are. Thank you, God, that you joined us today. You invited us to your table. That you're present here, giving us what we need in this moment. Not just merely a reflection on who you are, but showing up as you are to us where we are, to be what we need in this moment. God, I thank you for this invitation that you would inhabit every cell of our body like this nourishment that goes in and gives nourishment to every cell. It's our invitation to you, Lord, to be in us in every way. In all of our thinking, in all of our behavior, may you saturate us with who you are. And God, may we go in this strength to face whatever this new week holds, knowing, God, that you're bigger than our biggest problems. In Jesus' name. Amen. God bless y'all.