For our scripture reading this morning, turn with me to John 6. John chapter 6. This chapter, of course, includes that wonderful discourse regarding Jesus as being the bread of life. And you recall as well that the authorities and many of the Jews didn't like it, that he said that at all. We just want to read a portion of that discourse, verses 47 through 58. verses 47 through 58 of John chapter 6 as we give our attention to the Word of God. I tell you the truth, he who believes has everlasting life. I am the bread of life. Your forefathers ate the manna in the desert, yet they died. But here is the bread that comes down from heaven which a man may eat and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. This bread is My flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. Then the Jews began to argue sharply among themselves, How can this man give us his flesh to eat? Jesus said to them, I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For My flesh is real food, and My body is real drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him. Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven. Your forefathers ate manna and died. But he who feeds on this bread will live forever. And I would also ask this morning that you turn in the back of the Psalter hymnals to Lord's Day 28, page 36. Actually, pages 36, 37, and 38, where we have the first of three Lord's Days on the Lord's Supper, dealing with the Lord's Supper. These are fairly lengthy questions and answers, and I've decided that I'm not going to have the congregation say them together as we normally do. I will be covering them rather thoroughly throughout the body of the sermon. So at this time, I just want to read the three questions, and then we will consider this Lord's Day and its teaching. throughout the sermon. Question 75, Lord's Day 28. How does the Lord's Supper remind you and assure you that you share in Christ one sacrifice on the cross and in all His gifts? Question 76. What does it mean to eat the crucified body of Christ and to drink His poured out blood? And in question 77. Where does Christ promise to nourish and refresh believers with His body and blood as surely as they eat this broken bread and drink? This cup. Beloved congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ, from the beginning of time, mankind has made it a point to remember the past. And one of the ways that mankind has done this is through the building of memorials to call to mind, to bring back to the memory something from the past. And we know, of course, that this was true among God's Old Testament people, the Israelites. You recall that Jacob set up a memorial stone to remind him that God had appeared to him at Bethel and to remind him of God's wonderful promise to him there at Bethel. And you remember that Joshua, after Joshua led the children of Israel across the Jordan into the land of Canaan, he had a memorial of twelve stones set up, and as Scripture says, for a memorial to the children of Israel forever. To remind them of what? To remind them that God cut off the waters of the Jordan so that they could pass through on dry ground. Today we know that there are many war monuments, which are memorials to those who fought and even died in battle. In my hometown in Iowa, there's a memorial in the city park to remember those from the town who fought and lost their lives in battle. Memorials are to call our attention to past events. Events that have some sort of a significance on our lives today. But the simplest memorial of all that is as to outward appearance is the Lord's Supper. Jesus commanded His disciples as representatives of all of His people, of the entire church, to do this in remembrance of Me. Or as another Bible version says, this do in remembrance of Me. You see, of all of the memorials ever set up, none has a greater message than the sermon of the Lord's table. Because not only does it commemorate the Savior's death, but through the visible signs and seals, it interprets His death for us. Congregation, using that imagery that we considered a couple of weeks ago, the imagery of the sacraments as that finger. I preach to you this word of God. The finger of the Lord's Supper points to Christ's memorial. We want to notice its message of assurance, its message of fellowship, and its message of authority. As a congregation, we have been preparing throughout this past week through self-examination to feast at the Lord's table, the Lord willing, tonight. And where does the Lord's table direct our eyes? What is it that we see in the Lord's Supper? Does this sacrament truly point me to the cross of Jesus? Because only there at the cross will the message of the supper be a message of assurance. Again, question 75. How does the Lord's Supper remind you and assure you that you share in Christ one sacrifice on the cross and in all His gifts? How does it do that? Not does it do that. That's assumed. It does do that. And as this question points out, the Lord's Supper is to give assurance to the believer that the sacrifice of Christ and all of Christ's gifts or benefits are for Him. Now the answer to that question points out that this assurance comes from both the command and the promise of Christ. You see, Christians are called, they are commanded to perform a duty. And along with that, Christ promises the satisfaction of the soul. It begins with the command, the answer begins in this way, Christ has commanded me and all believers to eat this broken bread and to drink this cup. This command comes from Luke 22, verse 19, and again it is to do this, or this do, in remembrance of me. See, beloved, partaking of the Lord's Supper is not an option for God's people. It's not optional. So many have made it optional today. If I feel like it, I'll go. If I don't feel like it, I won't go. It's not an option for God's people. And we must consider why we do or why we do not partake. Do I partake out of custom? Because very simply, that's what we do as a church. Do I partake out of superstition? Because certainly it does me more good to partake than harm. Of course, these are wrong reasons for partaking. I must partake because my Lord commands it. But in the same way, if I would be tempted to skip the sacrament because of a conflict with another, or because my heart is not in order, the Lord comes to me and says, you settle that conflict, you get that heart in order, because this is where you belong. As well, sometimes some say, and I've known some like this, They're tempted to stay away from the Lord's table because they don't feel bold enough or good enough in themselves to come. I'm not good enough. Yet you see, that too is bold disobedience to Christ's command to do this. The Lord's Supper is that which Christ prepares for His people. And He makes us worthy partakers. It's not our work. And we must understand that just as Satan desires us, Satan wants us to come out of custom or superstition, he also likes nothing more than when a member of Christ disobediently leaves his or her place empty at the table. Satan knows that we can bring nothing but our sin to Christ. He knows that. He is also aware of our urgent need. Don't kid yourself. He knows. And therefore, Satan tries to command us to work for that bread that does not satisfy the riches of this world, the things that moth and rust destroy and thieves break in and steal. Because Satan also knows that those who feast in faith receive rich, bountiful treasures from the king's palace. He knows that Christ commands, come, buy without money and without price. Now why does our Lord command His people to come in order to remember Him and His death, which of course reminds us of our urgent need. And as 1 Corinthians 11 verse 26 says, to proclaim the Lord's death till He come. To proclaim the Lord's death. Boys and girls, by proclaiming Christ's death, we teach of the only way of salvation. You see, the Lord's Supper, like holy baptism, is to point the believer to the one sacrifice of Christ accomplished on the cross. Our attention must constantly be focused on the one and only way of salvation, on our only hope, especially in our day when Jesus Christ is being considered as only one of many ways of salvation and many false teachings continue to circulate. In the midst of that especially, His cross must always be before our eyes. And the Lord's table is a monument to His great faithfulness as our Lord, who for the joy that was set before Him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and had sat down at the right hand of the throne of God, as Hebrews 12 says. But Christ's command to partake then is not meaningless, but it's filled with significance for His people. Indeed, He bids His people to come for His glory, but also for our advantage and our assurance. His table with the sign and seal of His once-for-all sacrifice is to our comfort. Because the promise the catechism speaks of is intimately tied to the visual instruction that we see. Now, we're quite familiar with what visibly takes place as we celebrate Holy Communion. Boys and girls, I'm sure that you could describe for us what the minister does. Tonight, the Lord willing, as we come together, I will take the bread, hold it up for all to see, and break it. And then that bread is passed out and those who have made a public profession of their faith, of their true faith, eat that bread. And then the cup is taken again for all to see, and again after it is passed, we drink it. And even though the minister says appropriate words of explanation, yet all by itself, the quiet and the wordless breaking of the bread and the cup in our hand is a most beautiful sermon. The bread and the cup proclaim to us to listen to our Lord's silent witness of what He has done for us. The sermon of the Lord that must speak to our hearts as the bread is broken and the cup is taken is that whereas you should otherwise have suffered eternal death, I have given my body to the death of the cross and shed my blood for you. The bread and the cup are signs pointing to the body and blood of Jesus, to His flesh, apart from which there is no life, as John 6, verse 53 says. And the Catechism beautifully explains the believer's assurance as it tells of the promises of the Lord's Supper. Continuing on, with this command, He gave this promise. First, as surely as I see with my eyes the bread of the Lord broken for me and the cup given to me, so surely His body was offered and broken for me and His blood poured out for me on the cross. Second, as surely as I receive from the hand of Him who serves and taste with my mouth the bread and cup of the Lord, given me as sure signs of Christ's body and blood, so surely He nourishes and refreshes my soul for eternal life with His crucified body and poured out blood. Congregation, do you notice how personal this is again? Christ redeemed His body, the church of which He is the head, but the assurance is personal for each and every member of that body. And along with the visible instruction of forgiveness, and the fact that we believe Jesus Christ suffered and died, along with that is the blessed assurance that He did it for me as a believer. And again, just as with the realness of the water of baptism, the realness of the bread and the cup, And the realness of my taking and eating and drinking these, along with that is the realness that Christ did this for me. And I am therefore in communion with and am a member of Christ. You see, the beauty here is that God allows an unfaithful me to see and to touch and to taste His faithfulness and the signs He has instituted. Those who partake by grace through faith have the assurance that just as our bodies are nourished by the physical bread and wine or juice, our souls are nourished with the body and blood of Christ. Jesus says in verse 55 of John 6, For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. And only those who truly partake of Him in true faith will live forever, as He says in verse 51. Now boys and girls, you know that as we eat the bread and drink from the cup, it becomes a part of us. Just as with any physical food, it turns into our flesh and blood. It becomes one with our flesh and blood. Now the bread and the cup of the Lord's Supper are signs of Christ. They are not His body and blood, but they represent, they point to His body and blood. But the life principle is the same. just as our physical bodies need physical foods, our spiritual body, our spiritual life, needs spiritual food. And as our souls are spiritually nourished with Christ, His life enters us. And we become one with Him. He lives in me. And His life is eternal life, which means my life, then, is eternal life. Beloved, both holy baptism and the Lord's Supper point to the cross of Jesus and His saving sacrifice. And these two sacraments are intimately connected. Yet, they're so different. Baptism is the sacrament of incorporation, promise of incorporation into Christ. Even the promise given to little Lucas this morning. The promise of incorporation into Christ for those who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord's Supper, then, is the sacrament of continual nourishment For those who are indeed incorporated into Christ. And therefore, whereas baptism is administered to infants because the promise of this incorporation is to them also, the Lord's Supper is only for those who consciously believe, who have, by the grace of God, claimed His promises. Baptism signifies that one is grafted into Christ by true faith as the branch is grafted into the vine. And the Lord's Supper then points to that union and the nourishment of that union unto fruit. And therefore, as a believer by the grace of God, my celebration of the Lord's Supper is saying Amen to my baptism. And therefore, as we said a couple of weeks ago, baptism must ultimately drive us to the Lord's table. They cannot be separated. And therefore, boys and girls and young people, as your parents teach and train you in the way of the Lord, as they teach you what your baptism is all about, as God works in your life by His grace and brings you to faith in Him, to believe on Him, then that must drive you to the Lord's table to say, I belong. That's where God's people belong together. And I belong there. Baptism signifies and seals our adoption as His children. It points to the implanting of new life. And the Lord's Supper signifies and seals our provision as His children and the growth of that new life. And therefore, we must ask, is that new life truly mine? Am I an adopted child of God? And as well do I understand the grace of God in my life? And the beauty and the comfort here is that all of this is not because of what my hands have done. Just as God places His mark upon His children in baptism, our Lord gave the bread and wine. He didn't offer it. He gave it to His disciples. He didn't wait for them to take it, but with outstretched arm, He said, take, eat, and drink. It is for you. What love, huh? It's not because of our faithfulness that we partake, but because of His hearty love and faithfulness towards us. He is the One. who brings us into fellowship with Himself. And that's the second memorial message we want to consider. Notice question and answer 76. What does it mean to eat the crucified body of Christ and to drink His poured out blood? It means to accept with a believing heart the entire suffering and death of Christ and by believing to receive forgiveness of sins and eternal life. But it means more. Through the Holy Spirit, who lives both in Christ and in us, we are united more and more to Christ's blessed body. And so although He is in heaven and we are on earth, we are flesh of His flesh and bone of His bone. And we forever live on and are governed by one Spirit as members of our body are by one soul. Now there are two key ingredients to this fellowship. Notice that the answer begins, it means to accept with a believing heart, or as the older version of the catechism says, to embrace. As if to put your arms around and embrace with a believing heart. The first ingredient must necessarily be that there is fellowship with Christ by faith. Eating and drinking His flesh and blood is the spiritual exercise of faith. And then the second ingredient is that this fellowship never stays the same. It changes. It grows daily by faith. Christ's gifts or benefits, the forgiveness of sins, and life eternal are mine. And the promise of these gifts, the promise of these blessings is sealed in the Lord's Supper. And beloved, forgiveness of sins is mine through fellowship with the death of the crucified one. And life eternal is mine through fellowship with the living exalted one. Eating and drinking our Lord's flesh and blood as represented at His table is first of all a believing embracing of Christ's finished work. It's really an act of confession. By it I am confessing that the truth of myself is that I cannot be saved in any other way than by the blood of Jesus. Is that your confession this morning? You see, what is it that we proclaim at the Lord's table? Paul says we proclaim Christ's death. And therefore, we have nothing to bring to His table, but we come to receive the assurance of His forgiveness. At His table, Christ breaks and pours and gives, and the believer receives and eats and drinks. Christ suffered, but the believer enjoys. But then more must take place. Those who leave the table, the same as they came, are in bad shape. For the believer, eternal life begins in principle in this life. We know it's not perfect. We know it's not complete in this life. It will be in glory one day. But those whom Christ brings into fellowship and communion with Himself, grafting them into Himself, He blesses them with more and more unity with Himself. And one of the ways He does that is through the Lord's table. He draws us closer and closer to Himself through His Spirit who has taken up residency in believers. And that means, congregation, that believers are no longer governed by their own sin and lust, but believers are governed by the Holy Spirit. And as represented through the exercise of the supper, for the true believer, the exalted Christ, pours His Spirit, His power, and His life into us so that we have the mind of Christ, as Paul says in Philippians 2. His life-giving sap flows more and more into the branches so that His life flows more and more from the branches. And as you examine yourself, you must ask, am I a vessel through which Christ flows? Beloved, fellowship between Christ and those for whom He died is real. Very real. John 6 verse 56 says, Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him. That whole passage, especially the portion we read from John 6, speaks passionately about life and that this life is bound up only in him. And those who have that assurance and enjoy that fellowship with Christ can confess with Paul, I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. In the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. And that means then that it is impossible, it is impossible for the true believer to come away from the Lord's table the same as he came to the Lord's table. One cannot remain the same after truly remembering Christ's death. You see, with the life of Christ, there is no room for hatefulness or anger or quick tempers or anything hurtful. Those are to be replaced with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, and so on. And if those hateful, hurtful qualities continue, and now I'm not talking about the fact that they do pop up once in a while. We all admit that. We all have to confess that because of the sin that remains in us against our renewed will. But if they continue, if they are a habit, That's a bad sign, and it points to danger. The fruit of life with Christ through the Spirit is unmistakable. And that means that the believer's testimony of Christ and witness for Christ will be clearly evident at all times, whether in here, assembled with God's people, or outside. As you have examined yourself, is spiritual growth evident in your life? And that's what the elders are called to look for at family visitation. As God's people, when the elders call you to ask to come and visit you, we must be honored to have them come. We must be honored that they love the Lord Jesus Christ and His congregation and desire to do the work that they have to do and to oversee the flock. And we are to be excited to tell them what the Lord has done for us. Sometimes there are some who refuse to be visited, And that's sad, but it's also wrong. Because it means that either they don't understand what family visitation is all about, or they are ashamed of their spiritual life. But Christ through His Spirit also makes us more and more united to His sacred body. That we enjoy the communion of saints. And this table is a beautiful expression of the communion of saints. You see, at the Lord's table, rank and status and position and education or physical wealth or anything else, these things don't matter. They're left at the door. As brothers and sisters in the Lord Jesus Christ, we share spiritual unity. All are sinners that come penitently before a holy God. And then this fellowship must also necessarily grow in word and deed among God's people outside of these walls. Beloved, the celebration of the Lord's Supper is not just some vain exercise without any meaning. It pictures a reality for each and every one of us that is a matter of life or death. If you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, by grace through faith partaking is not an option. Because the message of the table also comes with the authority of Christ Himself. Question 77. Where does Christ promise to nourish and refresh believers with His body and blood as surely as they eat this broken bread and drink this cup? In the institution of the Lord's Supper, in the Word of God itself, the Lord Jesus on the night when He was betrayed took bread and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, Take, eat, this is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. In the same way also the cup after supper saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes. This promise is repeated by Paul in these words, the cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one bread. We who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread. We know, as we hope to consider tonight, that our Lord instituted the supper in the night in which He was betrayed. As the weight of our sin began its ultimate downward push on Him, in the depth of darkness, His love glowed the more brilliant, as He said, Take, eat. Believers are not to be mere spectators at the Lord's table, but are to participate in order that they remember and believe. Through the Lord's Supper, Jesus Christ continues to point to the past and hold before our eyes His cross of glory and shame, His cross of forgiveness. He also points to the present and says, this is for you. I give you my promise that my life is your life. And He also points to the future. Paul says, ye proclaim the Lord's death till He come. You see, His table is a promise. His promise that He's coming again. The Lord's Supper, we know, replaced the feast of Passover. And Jesus Christ Himself is the perfect Passover Lamb. His people are set apart by His blood. And He feeds and He nourishes them with Himself for the promised eternal land. Apart from the crucified body and shed blood of Jesus Christ, There is no salvation. There is no right of passage to heaven. Not for anyone apart from Jesus Christ. And therefore, there is no assurance of forgiveness. There is no fellowship with God. And beloved, if self-examination reveals that you are worthy to come to the Lord's table, then please stay away. Because you are deceived. Those who have the assurance of fellowship with Christ are only those who with a humble spirit come with this confession, nothing in my hands I bring. Simply to thy cross I cling. What do you see when you consider the Lord's table? Do you see the cross of Jesus? Do you see the joy of eternity? Do you have the assurance that it's for you? If you do, then God's blessed assurance to you is that you can confess Christ is mine because I am His. How do I know? The Word of His Supper tells me so. Amen. Shall we pray? Father, once again in Jesus' name, we bow before your throne of grace. We thank you, Lord, that when we were able to do absolutely nothing to remedy our sinful situation, that you have done it all for us. You've sent Jesus Christ, your only begotten Son, that he should pay the penalty for our sin, suffering the wrath and punishment of God in our place, but also that he lives again today and forevermore. And therefore, because he lives, we too have the assurance that we shall live forevermore. Strengthen us in this assurance. Strengthen us in such a way that we would walk with more humble confidence as more faithful servants of the Most High God. Lead us and guide us, O Lord. Prepare us as well for this evening hour as we, one and all, desire to come back to gather around Your table in this place. In the name of Jesus Christ, we pray these things. Amen.