Lent Devotions
Lent Week Two for catch up.
Lent Week Three – this week.

We have created a facebook group to follow and discuss, please join! – 40 days of Lent!
Lent Day Thirteen
The Bread and the Cup

Music

I am the Bread of Life – John Michael Talbot
I am the Bread of Life – The Jesus Peace

Scripture

Mark 14:22-26 Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB)
The First Lord’s Supper
22 As they were eating, He took bread, blessed and broke it, gave it to them, and said, “Take it;[a] this is My body.”

23 Then He took a cup, and after giving thanks, He gave it to them, and so they all drank from it. 24 He said to them, “This is My blood that establishes the covenant;[b] it is shed for many. 25 I assure you: I will no longer drink of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it in a new way[c] in the kingdom of God.” 26 After singing psalms,[d] they went out to the Mount of Olives.

Matthew 26:26-30
Luke 22:14-20

Devotion

On Lent Day Eleven, I talked about Communion. We are commanded to do it IN REMEMBRANCE of Jesus Christ. If you missed my opinion on the importance, you might want to review!

What are we remembering? His death, burial and resurrection – but the parts of the communion remind us of HIS death on our behalf.

There are TWO elements, emblems, or symbols – whichever way you want to call them. Those that believe in transubstantiation call them “The Host”. That may be what ALL liturgical denominations call them, I don’t know. I’m only familiar with Catholic and Episcopalian terminology, and even that, my catholic is not always accurate!

Bread
What is he telling them to remember with the bread?
The bread is his flesh. Now, at this point nothing has happened to his flesh because He is the perfect lamb without blemish and without spot. He is sitting at the Passover Table with His friends…not broken yet. This is taking the Old Testament Passover, where the matzo bread is broken and telling them that that is a foreshadowing of His body that is going to be broken.

The next day he gets whipped and ridiculed and beaten and those who have studied the effects of crucifixion and the beatings that Christ endured say that his body was completely broken. Wikipedia has a full explanation of all things Crucifixion. There is only one reason for the body of Jesus Christ to be broken, that is because by his stripes we are healed.

Isaiah 53:5 King James Version (KJV)
5 But he was wounded for our transgressions,
he was bruised for our iniquities:
the chastisement of our peace was upon him;
and with his stripes we are healed.

That passage also says that he was bruised for our iniquities and the chastisement of our peace was upon Him.
Romans 4:25

1 Peter 2:21-24 Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB)
21 For you were called to this,
because Christ also suffered for you,
leaving you an example,
so that you should follow in His steps.
22 He did not commit sin,
and no deceit was found in His mouth;[a]
23 when He was reviled,
He did not revile in return;
when He was suffering,
He did not threaten
but entrusted Himself to the One who judges justly.
24 He Himself bore our sins
in His body on the tree,
so that, having died to sins,
we might live for righteousness;
you have been healed by His wounds.

God the Creator did not have to come to Earth in the form of a man for any other reason than He knew He was the only solution to our problem which is being separated from God. We may not have known that it was a problem. The problem started by the very ones who had experience Perfection of walking in the perfect garden with God. Even before that, by Lucifer that had experience walking in the presence of God before creation! Our spirits know there is an emptiness, desiring the supernatural in our lives.

Our bodies are broken because sin is in the world and the world has fallen.
Our bodies hurt and degenerate and get disease because of death entered the world hand in hand with sin.
The only way to pay the price for mankind’s sin was for the perfect man to lay down his life and allow his body to be broken for us.

In Passover in old time, they would take a lamb and it would have to be a perfect lamb so it was probably the best lamb of the whole herd. They had to care for this Lambs that it would not get a scratch that would not get a blemish it had to be perfect. Then for four days before Passover they had to bring the lamb into their home and make it part of their family. So think of this as a very special pet that the whole family knows and loves and cares for. Everyone knows that at the end of the week this lamb is going to be killed. Everyone in the family is going to go up to this beloved animal, who has lived with them in close proximity, who has been cared for and protected and provided for, and they will lay their hands upon this lamb and speak their sins from the past year over this lamb. Then they would kill it. Then they would roast the lamb and the lamb would be there Passover dinner. They would eat the lamb who had died for their sin. Exodus 12

When this foreshadowing was explained by Christ at the Lord’s supper there were those that did not take it well.

John 6:47-58 Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB)
47 “I assure you: Anyone who believes[a] has eternal life. 48 I am the bread of life. 49 Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. 50 This is the bread that comes down from heaven so that anyone may eat of it and not die. 51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread he will live forever. The bread that I will give for the life of the world is My flesh.”

52 At that, the Jews argued among themselves, “How can this man give us His flesh to eat?”

53 So Jesus said to them, “I assure you: Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you do not have life in yourselves. 54 Anyone who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day, 55 because My flesh is real food and My blood is real drink. 56 The one who eats My flesh and drinks My blood lives in Me, and I in him. 57 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. 58 This is the bread that came down from heaven; it is not like the manna[b] your fathers ate—and they died. The one who eats this bread will live forever.”

In some faith communities, even today, it is considered cannibalism! “what do you mean you’re eating the Flesh of Christ and drinking his blood? That’s cannibalism!”

For your own future research you can Google transubstantiation and determine whatever you want to believe along those lines. Here are a few starter links, and for the record, they do not agree.

Wikipedea – transubstantiation
Got Questions – Transubstantiation
Catholic.com – Transubstantian for Beginners

• I believe, the blood in the cup is not blood but a symbol of the blood of Christ.
• I believe, the bread is not the Flesh of Christ but a symbol to help us remember what happened 2018 years ago.
• I believe, that I have a good biblical basis for this because the lamb that was slain for Adam and Eve and every animal that was slain there after for a sin offering was a foreshadowing of the perfect lamb that was going to come and give us life. This was no longer a foreshadowing, but a remembrance of what HAS happened.
• I believe that this is the remembrance of drinking the wine and eating the Passover lamb.

I lean on 1 Corinthians 11:16 But if anyone wants to argue about this, we have no other custom, nor do the churches of God.
Not in regards to the Lord’s Supper, but in regards to the position on communion.

Foreshadows
I was looking up the traditions of matzo bread for Passover and matzo bread is cut in stripes and pierced so that it will not bubble in any way shape or form, so that it does not show any evidence of yeast in it even if it is just flour and water. Think of using a fork to pierce the pie crust so that it will not bubble while being baked.

First, no yeast = no sin. Yeast stands for sin in the Bible.
Jesus had no sin.
Stripes?
Jesus was whipped and had stripes across his body.
Pierced?
Jesus’s hands and feet were pierced with the nails and his side was pierced with a sword.

My thoughts on the bread:
As we think about Jesus giving up his life on our behalf, we can do like the non denominational churches do and have regular bread that we all tear off a piece. Because of my faith background, though, that, well, it seems all cool and great and everything but in my faith history it does not seem like the communion bread. You can chalk that up to my preference or gospel, but, it is what it is! The Wafers that I was given as an Episcopalian, the wafers that I have participated in in Catholic mass are flat, just plain flat. They taste like I imagine homemade paste would taste, which would be flour and water. That is kind of what I expect, so maybe this is just my opinion because this is my history.

Matzo?
I really like that it’s pierced and it has lines like stripes. So that when I would look at the bread given, an even more complete reminder is presented of what Jesus’s body went through on my behalf.

CUP or specifically, the wine in the cup.

The cup which represents the blood.
Again, I speak to the laws, the Jews were not allowed to drink blood. Therefore, I believe that the cup of wine that Jesus called his blood was symbolic, just like the Jews knew that the blood shed for them was symbolic of a messiah that was to come.

There are those that are adamant it must be wine, there are those that are adamant that it can’t be wine, there are those that will argue whether or not Jesus had wine and they’ll even argue that he did not make wine at the wedding.

• • I don’t know. As I’ve said before, I’m not a seminary theologian with degrees behind my name.
  • I do know, from gardening, that grape juice, without being fermented, turns to vinegar just like any juice. It rots, it doesn’t ferment into a a delicious drink that people would enjoy drinking.
  • I do know that it could not be kept in the refrigerator in Jesus’ day.
  • I do know that it couldn’t be kept Frozen in the little cardboard containers that you add water to for reconstitution.
  • I really don’t have any specific designation one way or the other.
  • In my opinion, it makes sense that it was some sort of wine, because of storage issues.

Again, I lean on 1 Corinthians 11:16 But if anyone wants to argue about this, we have no other[e] custom, nor do the churches of God.
Again, not in regards to the Lord’s Supper, but in regards to the position on communion.

Back to my faith history. When I took a sip of wine from The Chalice at the Eucharist, the bitterness of the wine and the burning as it went down my throat made me feel like there was some cleansing power. It was a more tangible reminder! Grape juice, for me, is sweet, and washes down the dry bread.

Cleansing – that’s what the blood does for us. “The blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from sin”  1John 1:7.
The blood of Jesus Christ pays the price for sin, “for the wages of sin is death but the gift of Christ is eternal life through Christ Jesus” Romans 6:23.

Since it is illegal in the Old Testament, and unclean or ungodly to drink blood, this does not mean that the wine or the grape juice turns to blood, it’s a remembrance. Just like I said above on the aspect of the bread being a remembrance of what Christ has done for us, the cup for Passover and there are four which I’m going to go deeper in when I’m discussing the whole aspect of Passover that cup that was the Passover cup of wine was what Christ lifted up and said “this is my blood which is shed for you drink this in remembrance of me.”

Could this be Him warning them all that they’re going to have to take up their crosses that their bodies would be broken and their blood would be shed on his behalf? We know it’s true.

Mark 10:37-40 Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB)
37 They answered Him, “Allow us to sit at Your right and at Your left in Your glory.”

38 But Jesus said to them, “You don’t know what you’re asking. Are you able to drink the cup I drink or to be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with?”

39 “We are able,” they told Him.

Jesus said to them, “You will drink the cup I drink, and you will be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with. 40 But to sit at My right or left is not Mine to give; instead, it is for those it has been prepared for.”

Does that ring true here in the United States of America? No, because for the most part we have freedom of religion here and freedom to practice our religion as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else. Therefore, I choose wine, to help me to remember the bitterness of bleeding for me – to remember the need for cleansing – to remember the price that was paid for me.

A Teaching on the Living Blood
One year, in a church we attended, a pastor named Bill preached a teaching called The Living blood of Christ. It was very interesting. Bill was a farmer and Bill drove country roads and Bill saw roadkill all the time. He looked at the roadkill and the blood that would be on the ground would rot and die and just become rancid or wash off or disappear or whatever. He pointed out that life is in the blood.

Leviticus 17:11 King James Version (KJV)
11 For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul.

He pointed out that Jesus’s blood is still living and still efficacious to cover our sins. His blood was perfect, because His blood was part of the Divine God man. His blood does not rot, nor disappear. He did have to bleed out, He had to give every drop of His blood to pay for every sin ever committed and that ever would be committed until the day that we have the new heavens and the new Earth and He Reigns and rules in our world. HIS BLOOD IS ALIVE AND POWERFUL TO THIS DAY!

You see, every one of those animals, all the way back to Adam and Eve, that were slain to pay for the price of sin, their blood stopped being a payment at the point that that animal died. The blood was bled out and that was it. You sinned again and you had to kill another animal! Their blood died once it was given out. The blood of Jesus Christ continues to pay the price for us when we come to Him and ask Him for forgiveness. The blood of Jesus Christ continues to be efficacious for The Sinner who turns their life to him and says I believe that Jesus is Christ even though that blood was shed somewhere between 0 and 33AD.

Every year, I keep hearing that we should have Christmas everyday! “People should celebrate Christmas all year long!” Here’s my concern. While he had to be born fulfilling all of the prophecies, if he had not gone to the cross, none of the other would have mattered.

THEREFORE – Let’s celebrate Resurrection Day every day! Give thanks every day for what Christ did for us on Calvary!

Prayer and Worship
Communion Song – Barry McQuire
Communion Song – Third Day
Hallelujah for the Cross – Newsboys

Lent Day eight explains the need to make a response.

Got Questions provides a detailed explanation of The Roman’s Road.
Billy Graham’s version of the Plan of salvation is classic.
 

Thanks for joining me in this journey,
In His hands and under His wings,
~Christi
Ps 63:7 Because you are my help, I sing in the shadow of your wings.

“The Lord does not give me rules, but He makes His standard very clear.
If my relationship to Him is that of love, I will do what He says without hesitation.
If I hesitate, it is because I love someone I have placed in competition with Him, namely, myself.” – from My Utmost for His highest

Copyrights and Legal-eze
There are many organizations that support children and families. Here are ones that we are blessed to be a part of. Please consider sponsoring a child – the life you change could be your own.

• Naomi’s Heart Ministries
• Obed’s House Ministries
• Project Based Missions, Global
• The son of a friend will be interning with CRU – previously known as Campus Crusades for Christ. If you’d like to support someone I can vouch for in this area, please consider going to Matthew Plant’s donation page.
• Compassion