1 Corinthians 11:23–25 “The Lord
Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given
thanks, he broke it, and said, ‘This is my body, which is for you. Do this in
remembrance of me.’ In the same way also he took 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.’ ”
The next lesson on the Sacraments
stated that they sign and seal the covenant of grace, tangibly representing the
promises of God and confirming our faith. They make the spiritual truths of the
gospel alive to our senses, providing us as embodied creatures with helps for
knowing and continuing in the Lord’s grace. We are so connected to the
physical world that we often have trouble grasping unseen spiritual realities. True?
Baptism and the Lord’s Supper are God’s gifts to us to assist us in
understanding and believing spiritual truths.
As helpful as the sacraments
are for conveying truth about the world we cannot see with our physical senses,
we must be clear that the mere actions involved in administering water, bread,
and wine do not in themselves explain or depict anything. That is to say,
without the Word of God (the Holy Scriptures of the Bible), the sacraments are
empty signs. We need to hear words from our Creator—the words of institution
given for the sacraments and the preaching of His special revelation— so that
the sacraments have something to sign and seal. First and foremost, the
sacraments are about what God does, and God works salvation in His people
through the preaching and teaching of His Word. The Apostle Paul writes in Romans 10:17, “Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ”.
Along the same lines, the Apostle Peter asserts, “You have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable,
through the living and abiding word of God” (1 Peter 1:23). The Holy Spirit works faith in our hearts not
primarily through the sacraments but through the faithful preaching of His
Word. Without the Word, the sacraments do not have anything to sign and have no
promises to seal on our hearts.
This lesson asserts that God’s
promises always accompany His institution of sacraments. In Genesis 17, for
example, the Lord’s pledge to be God to Abraham and His descendants is given
alongside the command to circumcise. Paul in today’s passage gives us the words
of Christ in the institution of the Lord’s Supper. In telling us to eat of the
bread and drink of the cup, Jesus affirmed His giving of His life for our
salvation. Sacraments are important, even vital, for the spiritual health and
nurture of God’s people, but the preaching of God’s Word has a certain
priority. The Word of God gives us something for our faith to latch onto, and
the sacraments confirm tangibly that which is promised in the Word, encouraging
us to keep clinging to God’s promises.
In conclusion, many of us
come from a background in which the sacraments were mere afterthoughts, so we
are thankful when we find churches that take these ordinances of God seriously.
Yet we must never prioritize the sacraments over the preaching of God’s Word.
Instead, the preaching of God’s Word and the administration of the sacraments
must go together. Let us not let eagerness to meet Christ in His sacraments
cause us to neglect meeting Him in His Word.
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