Maundy Thursday
Today we begin entering the deepest and most intense part of our Lord Jesus’ passion, His suffering for us and our salvation. We remember that on this night Jesus was betrayed. And this set off the whole chain of events that led to His agony, His trials, His sufferings and finally His crucifixion and death—but also His resurrection from the dead. Tonight we see both that true humanity of Jesus—for as St. John records of that first Maundy Thursday evening [13.21]: When Jesus had said these things, He was troubled in spirit; St. Luke records of our Lord’s agony a while later in Gethsemane as Jesus was praying [22.44]: And being in agony, He prayed more earnestly. And His sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground. As true God, Jesus knew exactly what was happening and what was going to happen. He knew that He would be loaded down with the sins of the world; He knew that He would be made sin; He knew that He would endure the Father’s wrath for the sins of the world, that He would endure the very pangs of hell being forsaken by God. He knew all that because that’s why He came—it was all part of the divine plan; Jesus knew in advance all what was going to happen because He is the true God. But because He is also true man, every part of Him recoiled at the prospect of what was in store. That’s why He was so troubled and in agony: as true God He knew exactly what was ahead; as true man He was in agony over it.
But what does Jesus do? Does He turn in on Himself and focus on Himself? No! He turns His focus to His disciples and to all His disciples down through the centuries –His Church. His care and concern is for them. So what does He do? He gives the Church the holy Sacrament of His body and blood. That’s what we remember and focus our attention on Maundy Thursday—Jesus instituting/ giving His Church the Blessed Sacrament of His Body and Blood. Here is Jesus’ care for His Church down through the ages—His care for the 11 disciples and His care for us today as He gave them that first Maundy Thursday just as He gives us today: His body and blood for the forgiveness of sin and strengthening of faith; His coming to us and uniting with us so that we are in Him and He is in us.
What does Jesus say? –Take, eat; this is My body which is for you; do this in remembrance of Me. And then: This cup is the new covenant in My blood. This do…in remembrance of Me. What do we see here in Jesus’ words to us/ His Church? Do this! Let us spend a few moments this evening pondering the question “how do we ‘do this’?” And as we examine our text, we will see that when it comes to this Blessed Sacrament, we are to do it frequently, thoughtfully and gratefully.
For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death till He comes. The simple thing to remember is that Holy Communion is a good thing; it’s a gift of Jesus to His Church. So, of course, we’d want to “do this often”—frequently. It was the custom in the Early Church that whenever the Christians met for worship, it was around the word and Sacrament. The celebration of Holy Communion was central. It certainly was not by accident that after His resurrection, Jesus revealed Himself to the Emmaus disciples by becoming the host and took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them [Lk 24.30].
What are we doing when we celebrate the holy Sacrament? St. Paul tells us in our text: you proclaim the Lord’s death. What do we have in the Sacrament but Jesus body and blood? —Separated. And what does it mean when body and blood are separated? It means death has taken place. And here, very specifically, when body and blood are separated, it means that a sacrifice has taken place. Think back to some of the OT sacrifices where the body was burned on the altar and the blood was sprinkled. The separation of blood from the body like that shows sacrifice. So each time we partake of the Lord’s Supper, we are preaching; we proclaiming a sacrifice has taken place—a sacrifice of the very God Himself, a sacrifice in which He laid down His life for us sinners; a sacrifice by which sinful humanity has been reconciled to the holy God; a sacrifice that shows both the humanity and the divinity of the One sacrificed, Jesus Christ—His humanity as He died and had blood to shed; and His divinity in that His was the perfect once for all sacrifice for sin. By proclaiming Jesus’ death we are proclaiming the forgiveness of sin. We are proclaiming that Jesus, by giving His body and pouring out His blood, He brought about our salvation; He redeemed us from sin, death and hell. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death. Let us do this frequently and so proclaim that Jesus is our salvation.
And then St. Paul adds that wonderful line: till He comes –For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death till He comes. Until Jesus comes again, returning in glory on the Last Day the Blessed Sacrament is the means of communication from Him to us. Remember, Jesus comes to us in the Sacrament giving us His very body and blood; in the Sacrament He comes and unites with us—we receive Him in our very mouths. That’s how real and physical His coming and union is with us. Now as we gather around the altar to receive Jesus’ actual body and blood, we are celebrating it in His invisible presence but we proclaim we look forward to being with Him and feasting with Him face to face in heaven.
As we celebrate the Holy Sacrament we proclaim Jesus’ death. This glories Jesus; it points to Him that our salvation is from Him and this stirs up faith to thank Him all the more fervently. And this is not only for ourselves but also for others to awaken also in them the knowledge of and thankfulness for this salvation in Jesus. And so afflicted and anxious consciences are comforted, the weak are strengthened and believers are made more sure against false teaching. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death till He comes. Let us “do this” frequently.
And let us do this thoughtfully. St. Paul writes in our text: Therefore whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup. What a great and holy mystery we get to ponder in this sacrament: Jesus is physically/ bodily present. The bread and wine do not just “represent” Jesus’ body and blood. Jesus is not just “spiritually” present in the sacrament. No He’s physically there—His real body and actual blood is what we receive. Notice what St. Paul writes here: those who partake of the Sacrament in an unworthy manner are not guilty of sinning against bread and wine, signs, symbols, emblems but against the body and blood of the Lord. Jesus’ body and blood are there in the Sacrament and they can be received in an unworthy way. For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body. A person’s faith does not make Jesus present in the sacrament [—that’s why an unbeliever can receive this sacrament to their spiritual detriment. This is one reason why the Church has practiced closed communion from her very beginning.] What “makes” Jesus present in the sacrament is His words: This is My body…This is My blood.
Just think of the great mystery before us in the sacrament. St Paul put it this way earlier [10.16]: The cup of blessing which we bless, it is the communion of the blood of Christ, is it not? The bread which we break, it is the communion of the body of Christ, is it not? Somehow/ someway Jesus joins His body to the bread and His blood to the wine so that we receive them. It was as much a miracle/ mystery for the disciples that first Maundy Thursday as it is for us today. But believing Jesus’ word This is My body…This is My blood given and poured out for you for the forgiveness of sin is part of what the “worthiness” to receiving the holy sacrament entails. We are worthy when we believe Jesus’ words that it is His actual body and blood and in it we receive the forgiveness of sin. Faith in the real presence is an indispensable pre-requisite for salutary use of the Lord’s Supper. That’s the great mystery that we ponder as we “do this'' thoughtfully.
As we “do this” thoughtfully, part of the “thoughtfully” is also examining ourselves as the apostle writes: But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup. This does not mean that we are to be sinless before we partake of the sacrament, because in that case who could? But before receiving the sacrament we will want to examine our life, heart, conscience in the mirror of God’s holy word according to the Ten Commandments. We examine ourselves to see if we are truly sorry for our sins and are truly repentant. This examination of conscience is in no way meant to keep Christians away from the Sacrament as they find their many sins in themselves. Instead, it is meant to stimulate the right desire for the grace of God that He shows and gives us in the Sacrament. The more that we heartily recognize our sin, the more we will want the forgiveness and grace the Lord gives us in this Sacrament. In reality, the only ones who are unworthy are those who don’t feel their weakness nor wish to be considered sinners. We will want to thoughtfully examine conscience lest we be drawn away from the sacrament. Luther comments [Con. 465]: “What, then, shall I do if I cannot feel such distress or experience hunger and thirst for the Sacrament?” Answer, “For those who are of such a mind that they do not realize their condition I know no better counsel than that they put their hand into their shirt to check whether they have flesh and blood. And if you find that you do, then go, for your good….” Luther’s advice also is good for those who object to the sacrament being offered more frequently lest it lose its “specialness”. A good and thorough examination of conscience makes one hunger and thirst for the sacrament; it makes it always “special”.
Not only do we “do this” frequently and thoughtfully, but also gratefully. This, too, flows from the examined heart and the forgiveness received from Jesus’ body and blood in the Sacrament. We had examined our conscience, saw our sin, and were full of sorrow over it; we recognized that our sin cut us off from God and was an affront to Him and that our sin condemns us to hell. In that sorrow we cry out to the Lord for His mercy. And what does He do? He comes to us in the holy Sacrament, gives us His body and blood—and by that gives us the assurance that our sin is forgiven as we receive in our mouths that very Body that bore our sin and was cursed for it; as that very blood that was poured out for our forgiveness goes in our mouth and down our throat. How can we doubt our forgiveness? Faith sees here and receives and holds on to Jesus’ body and blood—here is God’s mercy; here is the forgiveness of sin and eternal life. How can we not be grateful?
Jesus doesn’t just come, forgive us our sin, and send us on our way. Instead, He unites with us. We are in Him and He is in us. Now having recognized our sin, having confessed that sin, having received God’s mercy and forgiveness, full of joy and thankfulness we want to do the Lord’s will, we want to fight against sin. Our lives of love and gratefulness to the Lord are shown by our desire to live a holy life. Because we received Jesus in the sacrament, He is in us giving us the desire and strengthening us by His Holy Spirit to live out that grateful life of holiness.
Let us this Maundy Thursday, again hear Jesus’ word about the Blessed Sacrament and “do this” frequently, thoughtfully and gratefully. INJ Amen