in Remembrance

Men have made evil use of this most blessed ordinance.

Yet they have no excuse from any obscurity of Scripture.

Nothing is said of a sacrifice or an altar, but everything is plain.

The Supper, as we find it in Holy Scripture, is a service of remembrance, testimony, and communion, and nothing more.

No pompous ceremony is arranged for. Not even a posture is prescribed; but merely the providing of bread and the juice of the vine; taking, breaking, eating, drinking, and no more.

The spiritual action is specially prescribed; the remembrance of our Lord must be there, or we fail to keep the feast.

I. OTHER MEMORIES WILL COME, BUT MUST NOT CROWD OUT THE ONE MEMORY.

The following remembrances may be natural, allowable, and profitable, but they must be kept in a secondary place:—

1. Of ourselves when we were strangers and foreigners.

2. Of our former onlooking and wishing to be at the table.

3. Of our first time of coming, and the grace received since then.

4. Of the dear departed who once were with us at the table.

5. Of beloved ones who cannot be with us at this time because they are kept at home by sickness.

6. Of many present with us, and what grace has done in their cases We may think of their needs and of their holy lives, etc.

7. Of the apostates who have proved their falseness, like Judas.

   • However these memories may press upon us, we must mainly remember him for whose honor the feast is ordained.

II. THE ORDINANCE IS HELPFUL TO THAT ONE SACRED MEMORY.

1. Set forth, the signs display the person of our Lord as really man, substantial flesh and blood.

2. Placed on the table, their presence betokens our Lord’s dear familiarity with us, and our nearness to him.

3. Broken and poured forth, they show his sufferings.

4. Separated, bread apart from wine, the flesh divided from the blood, they declare his death for us.

5. Eating, we symbolize the life-sustaining power of Jesus and our reception of him into our innermost selves.

6. Remaining when the Supper is ended, the fragments suggest that there is yet more bread and wine for other feasts; and, even so, our Lord is all-sufficient for all time.

   • Every particle of the ordinance points at Jesus, and we must therein behold the Lamb of God.

III. THAT SACRED MEMORY IS IN ITSELF MOST NEEDFUL FOR US.

It is needful to remember our crucified Lord, for—

1. It is the continual sustenance of faith.

2. It is the stimulus of love.

3. It is the fountain of hope.

4. It is a recall, from the world, from self, from controversy, from labor, from our fellows—to our Lord.

5. It is the réveille, the up-and-away. It is the prelude of the marriage supper, and makes us long for “the bridal feast above.”

   • Above all things, it behooves us to keep the name of our Lord engraved on our hearts.

IV. THIS SYMBOLIC FESTIVAL IS HIGHLY BENEFICIAL IN REFRESHING OUR MEMORIES, AND IN OTHER WAYS.

1. We are yet in the body, and materialism is a most real and potent force; we need that there be a set sign and form to incarnate the spiritual and make it vivid to the mind.

   • Moreover, as the Lord actually took upon him our flesh and blood, and as he means to save even the material part of us, he gives us this link with materialism, lest we spirit things away as well as spiritualize them.

2. Jesus, who knew our forgetfulness, appointed this festival of love; and we may be sure he will bless it to the end designed.

3. Experience has often proved its eminent value.

4. While reviving the memories of the saints, it has also been sealed by the Holy Spirit; for he has very frequently used it to arouse and convince the spectators of our solemn feast.

   • To observe the Supper is binding on all believers.
   • It is binding to the extent of “oft.”
   • Only as it assists remembrance can it be useful. Seek grace lovingly to remember your Lord.

Memorials

It is common enough in human history to meet with periodical celebrations, anniversaries of the day of their birth, or of their death, held in honor of those who have greatly distinguished themselves by their virtues, their genius, or their high services to their country or to mankind. But where except here do we read of any one in his own lifetime originating and appointing the method by which he was to be remembered, himself presiding at the first celebration of the rite, and laying an injunction upon all his followers regularly to meet for its observance? Who among all those who have been the greatest ornaments of our race, the greatest benefactors of humanity, would ever have risked his reputation, his prospect of being remembered by the ages that were to come, by exhibiting such an eager and premature desire to preserve and perpetuate the remembrance of his name, his character, his deeds? They have left it to others after them to devise the means for doing so; neither vain enough, nor bold enough, nor foolish enough to be themselves the framers of those means. Who, then, is he who ventures to do what none else ever did? Who is this, who, before he dies, by his own act and deed sets up the memorial institution by which his death is to be shown forth? Surely he must be one who knows and feels that he has claims to be remembered such as none other ever had—claims of such a kind that, in pressing them in such a way upon the notice of his followers, he has no fear whatever of what he does being attributed to any other, any lesser motive than the purest, deepest, most unselfish love! Does not Jesus Christ in the very act of instituting in his own lifetime this memorial rite, step at once above the level of ordinary humanity, and assert for himself a position toward mankind utterly and absolutely unique?—Dr. Hanna.

Miss Edgeworth, in one of her tales, relates an anecdote of a Spanish artist, who was employed to depict the “Last Supper.” It was his object to throw all the sublimity of his are into the figure and countenance of the Master; but he put on the table in the foreground some chased cups, the workmanship of which was exceedingly beautiful, and when his friends came to see the picture on the easel, every one said, “What beautiful cups they are!” “Ah!” said he, “I have made a mistake, these cups divert the eyes of the spectator from the Master, to whom I wished to direct the attention of the observer”; and he took his brush and rubbed them from the canvas, that the strength and vigor of the chief object might be seen as it should.—G. S. Bowes.

He who remembers not Christ’s death, so as to endeavor to be like him, forgets the end of his redemption, and dishonors the cross, on which his satisfaction was wrought.—Anthony Horneck.