1. Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Heavenly Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The message from God’s Word on this Maundy Thursday is taken from Mark 14:12-26 and 1 Cor. 10:16-17 and it focuses on the 3rd commandment. Dear brothers and sisters in Christ.
2. A wise man commented as the cars sped by, “This is typical of our age, tearing like mad to get nowhere.” Everyone seems to be in a hurry, complaining they don’t have time for things they should be doing. Most folks don’t even get enough rest at night, let alone make time to spend with their families, or time to spend with God. We’re a restless generation. Our lifestyle seems to be cheating us out of rest.
3. For 1,500 years, from Egypt to Christ’s coming, Israel was searching for rest. But it passed them by because of a lack of faith. The children of Israel wandering in the wilderness paint a picture of humanity chasing after rest. They failed to enter the Promised Land with its rest from their weary wanderings. This rest is the great Sabbath that God created on the seventh day of creation. It’s Christ’s work of redemption. It’s the rest that’s given to us by promise. We enter this heavenly rest by faith. The Israelites didn’t enter this rest because of the hardness of their hearts. Unbelief was their downfall.
4. Unbelief is also at the root of today’s troubles. Some influential theologians claim the Bible isn’t infallible, historical, reliable, or authoritative. This leads to false teachings and human suppositions, such as the belief that the creation and the fall into sin is just a story Moses made up. Postmodernists deny the virgin birth of Christ, the sinful nature of man, and Christ’s resurrection, among others. With these denials Christ and His work of salvation is lost. There’s no longer a need for a Savior from sin.
5. No wonder then within the 3rd Commandment is this command to remember, remember and don’t forget, don’t change the teachings, and promises of God found in His Word. It’s a lie from the devil himself when people say there’s no longer a need for an eternal rest because it can be found in the comforts of this life. But, we have a better promise given us to enter a rest from our weary pilgrimage. We have the good news of the rest in our Lord Jesus. He replaced the ancient Sabbath that we might know rest can only be found in Him—He is our Rest! By Jesus’ death, to cancel our sins, and His resurrection to guarantee the resurrection of our bodies, He gives us evidence of what real rest in God is. Not repeating the foolishness of the Israelites who died in the wilderness without entering their rest, may we hold to our faith and the promise to enter our rest in the mansions prepared for us. “So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God” (Hebrews 4: 9).
6. Remembering the Sabbath Day by keeping it holy is all about God being God for you, his sinners, through his Word. God is a talker. A speaker. Doing and giving what he says with his words. Catch that? I’d better say it again: God gives gifts, serves His sinners, through His words!
7. So, you’re given by God to take a little time out of your busy schedules (yes, that even includes sporting activities; yes, that even includes work schedules) in order to let God speak to you through his Word, to be receivers of his speaking to you through his Word. Through his Word, God actually holies you. He sanctifies you. He purifies you from all your sin through his divine Word preached and proclaimed by the preacher; namely, “I forgive you.” When you’re hearing those words or any of Christ’s words, you’re hearing Christ himself. The living voice of Christ is heard in the divine word of forgiveness. You are to make use of God’s Word and exercise yourself in it. Or, as the Small Catechism teaches: you should fear and love God so that you do not despise preaching and his Word but hold it sacred and gladly hear and learn it.
8. Magnificent preaching about the Sabbath Day in the way of the Third Commandment by the Lord Jesus on the night in which he was betrayed. They are his divine words of promise attached to and filling the Passover meal’s bread and wine. “Take,” Jesus says of the bread, “this is my body.” With regard to the cup of wine, Jesus flat out guarantees: “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many” (Mk 14:22, 24).
9. These are the words of the divine, eternal majesty himself. From his own divine mouth. From his own divine lips. Who spoke all creation into existence by speaking. “Let there be light,” and it was! The words of the Lord’s Supper are God’s sacred Word. They are his most holy Word. Gladly you are to hear them. Happily you are to learn them, make use of them. After all, they are for you. For your benefit—giving you the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation.
10. But will you? Or are you bored with his words? Do you routinely blow off his words, ignore them, disregard them, snub your nose at them? Or would you change the Lord’s words to what you believe are better words? Such as, “This symbolizes my body,” or “This is only a symbol of my blood,” which translates into . . . just bread and wine on the altar . . . only bread and wine in the pastor’s hands . . . merely bread and wine in my mouth. No body. No blood.
11. But that’s not what Jesus says or promises. “Take; this bread is my body.” “This cup of wine is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many.” There’s no spinning it. No massaging it. Is means is. The bread in the Lord’s Supper is his body. The wine in the Lord’s Supper is his blood. St. Paul makes this very clear when he asks you rhetorical questions. “The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation [or communion] in the blood of Christ?” Well, is it? Of course it is! “The bread that we break, is it not a participation [or communion] in the body of Christ?” (1 Cor 10:16). Well, is it? Of course it is!
12. So tonight, you hear the Lord’s words from the Lord himself. It’s his sermon, his preaching to you and for you: “Take; this is my body.” “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many.” Again, these are the words of the crucified and risen Jesus, who won and achieved the treasure of salvation for you in his Good Friday death. That which was once acquired under Pontius Pilate at the cross on Golgatha is ever again distributed: the body of Jesus given for you, the blood of Jesus shed for you for the forgiveness of sins. Through these specific words of proclamation (“Take; this is my body,” etc.), Jesus speaks to you. He gives you exactly what he says through his words—namely, his body and his blood for you for the forgiveness of your sins. That’s why the Words of Institution are to be spoken facing the congregation. Again, his words are preaching words. He’s talking to you in and through his words, so you know and believe exactly what he’s giving.
13. The whole point of the Sacrament is this. It’s the Lord’s service to you and for you. He came not to be served but to serve. Jesus is among you as one who serves. He bestows his body and blood with the bread and the wine by virtue of his Word. You are to receive or commune passively, to be given to by the Lord from his Word of promise. That’s in keeping with the Third Commandment’s point of making sure you hold his Word sacred and gladly hear and learn it—making use of it, exercising yourself in it. That means you go to the Lord’s Supper when it’s offered and that you believe what Jesus gives according to his Word. As you believe his Word, you have precisely what he promises. In the name of Jesus. Amen. Now the peace of God that passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, until life everlasting. Amen.
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