Come to the Table

I want to encourage you to turn in the Gospel of Luke to chapter 22.

I will be reading verses 14 through 23.

Luke chapter 22, 14 through 23.

Luke 22 · chapter mention

And if you don't have a Bible with you, there should be one located there in the pew right in front of you.

You can find the scripture on page 882.

That's 882, and encourage you to turn there.

And if you don't own a Bible, please take that one home as our gift to you.

We give away Bibles every week, and it's our joy to do that.

We would love for you to have that Bible as your own.

Luke chapter 22, beginning in verse 14.

Luke 22 · chapter mention

And when the hour came, he reclined at table and the apostles with him.

And he said to them, I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer.

For I tell you I will not eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God.

And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he said, Take this and divide it among you.

For I tell you that from now on I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes.

And he took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, This is my body which is for you.

Do this in remembrance of me.

And likewise the cup after they had eaten, saying, This cup is poured out for you, is the new covenant in my blood.

But behold, the hand of him who betrays me is with me on this table.

For the Son of Man goes as it has been determined, but woe to the man by whom he is betrayed.

And they began to question one another which of them it would be who was going to do this.

This is God's word.

Mark Rutland whimsically recalls a survey which Americans were asked what words they would most like to hear.

What words would they most like to hear?

And the first one he had guessed.

He said the words that people said that they would most like to hear is I love you.

Number two was I forgive you.

The third choice took him by surprise.

Supper's ready.

But it dawned on Rutland that these three statements provide a neat summary of the gospel story.

We are loved by God, forgiven by God, and invited to the banquet table.

Here we are in Luke chapter 22.

Luke 22 · chapter mention

There's cosmic drama going on that's building to a crescendo.

The religious leaders are looking for a way to put Jesus to death, but they fear the crowds.

But Judas, one of the twelve apostles, gives the answer an offering to betray Jesus.

Behind this drama, there is a greater spiritual drama.

Satan is trying to orchestrate things to sabotage Jesus' rescue mission.

Judas becomes the unwitting pawn of Satan to destroy Jesus.

But in this one point, both Jesus and Satan agree.

Jesus must die.

While Satan sees this as his crowning victory, in fact, it will be his ultimate defeat.

For God's plans cannot be thwarted.

The preparation seems kind of like a spy novel, and I never really picked this up until this week as I was studying it.

Judas has said he's going to betray Jesus.

If he knew where the Last Supper was going to be, he would have given them directions there.

It almost reads like a spy novel.

Jesus tells his disciples to go and they're going to find somebody who, a man who is carrying a jar of water, which is unusual.

Men wouldn't be the ones to do that.

They might carry a small amount of water, but this was a role that women would carry in that culture.

And so they, even the disciples didn't know where the Last Supper was going to be.

And so God's plans would not be thwarted.

Jesus was going to die, but it was going to be at his time in his way as he yielded his life.

John describes this time in the upper room.

All four Gospels talk about it.

Matthew, Mark, and Luke talk about the Last Supper.

John talks about the washing of Jesus washing the disciples' feet.

And in the beginning of that section in the Gospel of John, he writes this.

And that we're invited to his banquet table.

At the time Jesus was celebrating the Passover, it was a time of looking back to the remembering of God's deliverance of his people from slavery by the very power of God.

And in the midst of that remembrance meal, he transforms that meal into something totally new, into celebrating the new covenant in his blood.

This morning I want for us to prepare our hearts for the table.

How should we come to this table?

I think we find four lessons here in this passage of how we come to this table.

How do we prepare our hearts to fellowship with the risen Savior?

First of all, we come to this table as sinners.

The church is the only place that in order to qualify for membership, you have to recognize that you don't qualify.

The church says, only sinners welcome.

If you remember the religious leaders in Jesus' day, the scribes and the Pharisees, they would grumble and complain because of who Jesus associated with.

And at one point we saw earlier in Luke, they said, Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?

Jesus answered, Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick, I've not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.

And once again in this upper room, Jesus looked around at a room filled with sinners.

And this morning, as we gather here around this table, we too look around and recognize we are surrounded and are a part of a room filled with sinners.

Jesus came for those who knew they were sick, those who were desperate, those who recognized that they had no hope and no power in themselves.

The self-righteous were actually sick, but they were blind to their sickness, and so they could not come because they didn't see their need.

Acknowledging your sin is a prerequisite to membership in God's family.

In many clubs, there's exclusivity.

In some clubs, you have to have a certain amount of money or a certain background, a certain pedigree.

When I was in the South, there were clubs that were that were men-only clubs, and there were clubs that didn't allow people of different races.

But in God's family, he says, all who recognize your need come.

What does it take to be a part of God's family?

First, in order to be a Christian, you must admit that you don't qualify.

Now we look at this passage and we know that Judas was a sinner.

We know that what he had planned to do, what he is about to do in betraying Jesus.

The Bible tells us that Judas had no saving relationship with Jesus.

In fact, in John chapter 6, verse 70, of Judas, Jesus said, Did I not choose you the twelve?

John 6:70

And yet one of you is a devil.

And then John adds, he spoke of Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot, for he, one of the twelve, was going to betray him.

But Jesus showed grace and mercy to Judas.

He speaks words of grace to Judas.

Judas was there as Jesus was talking about his death.

He was there to hear the call to repentance, the offer of forgiveness.

Judas' heart was resolutely set against Jesus, and he could not repent because he would not repent.

But here's something that we don't often think about.

All of the other apostles were just as much sinners as Judas.

All of the apostles in that room were just as much sinners as Judas.

And you may be thinking, what do you mean?

How is that?

They are all fallen.

We are all fallen and sinful by nature and by practice.

They were self-willed and rebellious.

They were hostile and opposed to God.

Like Paul would say later that they were all by nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind.

There was nothing inherently virtuous or extra special about the other apostles.

They were people just like Judas.

They were people just like us.

What made the difference?

The only thing that made the difference between Judas and the rest of the apostles was that the rest of the apostles bowed their knee to King Jesus.

In their own faltering way, they had come to know Jesus, the Messiah, the one who was to be the Savior.

And that made all the difference in the world.

This is a meal for those who come with nothing in their hands, nothing to bring, but only to receive.

And friends, that's the gospel.

That is the good news of Jesus Christ.

This meal reminds us of what Jesus did for us and what we could never do for ourselves.

We come here time and time again because we're apt to forget.

We are prone to forget so many realities about who Jesus is and what he's done.

We're apt to think that there's something that we need to do in order to be accepted by God or to earn his favor.

But we are like beggars reaching up for the gift of a king.

We have nothing we can offer the king, and yet he gives and we receive.

And at the end of Revelation, John writes these things.

He says, The Spirit and the bride say, Come, and let the one who hears say, Come, and let the one who is thirsty come.

Let the one who desires take the water of life without price.

We come to this table as sinners, with nothing to offer God, nothing to give, and yet he gives his all, he gives himself to us.

So how do we prepare our hearts for this table?

First of all, we prepare our hearts for this table by recognizing that we are sinners.

But secondly, we come to this table knowing that we are desired.

Notice what Jesus says here in verse 15.

He says, I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer.

And this is the heart of Jesus towards his people, towards us, towards his disciples.

This reflects the reality of Jesus towards us.

He desires you.

He desires to have an intimate relationship with you.

He desires to have an intimate fellowship with those who reject him.

If you remember earlier in Luke's gospel, when Jesus was talking about Jerusalem, he says this, O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city who killed the prophets and stoned those who are sent to it.

How often I would have gathered your children together as hens gather her brood under her wings, and you were not willing.

That is the heart of Jesus.

The heart of Jesus, God is long-suffering and patient, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

God has a longing heart for those who don't know him to come into relationship with him so he can fellowship with you.

God longs for sinners to turn to Jesus in repentance and faith.

Jesus longed to share the Passover with his disciples because he loved them and wanted an intimate fellowship with them.

And that same desire that Jesus had for his disciples, he has for you.

He longs to have deep, intimate fellowship with you.

He loves you like he loves the apostle John, like he loves the apostle Peter.

He loves you like he loves Paul.

And maybe you're thinking, Jesus isn't interested in me.

I'm a mess.

If you knew what was going on in my life, I can't get my act together.

I've come to faith in Christ.

I'm trying to follow him, but but how can he love me like he loves those men?

But God has no stepchildren.

And God does not play favorites.

When you come to Christ, he places his love upon you, and he loves you in Christ just as much as he loves Billy Graham and John Piper.

The Father loves you because you are in Christ, he loves you like he loves his son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

He has placed you in Christ so that you could be the object of his affection and the recipient of his grace.

But the problem is that often we don't desire him.

Honestly, sometimes we're oblivious to the reality of how much God desires us.

Forgive this illustration, but I saw it this week.

Some of you may have seen it too.

Um this viral video that is is going on uh this this week, and it was with uh uh Nicole Kidman and Jimmy Fallon.

Did anyone see this video?

Maybe I'm the only one.

Okay.

We know those who are on Facebook.

Um but but here's the story Jimmy Fallon's uh the host of the Tonight Show, and he has on Nicole Kidman, and they're talking to one another, they're beginning the interview, and uh Jimmy Fallon says, You you remember we met once before?

I don't know if you remember it or not, and she goes, Oh, I remember.

And and and he says, Well, let's compare stories.

Let me tell you my story.

And and and he begins to tell his this story of him uh getting a phone call and saying Nicole Kiban wants to meet you and he thinks it's for a part for a movie.

And while he's in the middle of telling this story, she says, I remember because I liked you.

And you can see on his face, he's like, What?

What?

And and so that he's going on, and and she's like, What do you mean you liked me?

And and and then she interrupts and begins to tell him the story that she was she was single and she was with a mutual friend that knew him, and she said, Oh, I'd really like to meet him.

And she goes over there, and Jimmy Fallon's wearing sweatpants and a baseball cap.

He he barely talks to her, and right in the middle of while she's there, he begins to play video games.

And so after about an hour and a half, she says, Well, obviously he's not interested at all, and she leaves.

And I think the reason why this video went viral is because both men and women can relate to it.

Guys are clueless, we're oblivious to the reality so often.

But I think that's how all of us are towards God.

God loves us and desires to have an intimate, ongoing, daily walk with Him.

And we're oblivious to that reality.

Like the apostles, we come to this table knowing we're sinners.

We come to this table knowing that we are desired by God.

Thirdly, we come to this table knowing we are forgiven.

There's a transition here from the old covenant to the new covenant.

The old covenant was mediated through priests who had to go and make intercession for the people.

They would go to the priests, and the priests would go and make sacrifice, and then uh the people would come and hear what uh what God was saying through the priests, they would have bloody sacrifices.

There was a sacrificial system of bulls and goats uh that they would sacrifice for the atonement of sin, but the blood of bulls and goats could never take away sin.

And so there's perpetual sacrifice going on year after year, and God and his forbearance uh covered over their sins, but it was never removed because that wasn't within the power of these sacrifices.

But then Jesus came as the Lamb of God, the true, spotless Lamb of God who was to give his life as a sacrifice to take our place, to pay the penalty for our sins so that we could have a relationship with him.

And there's no sin that cannot be forgiven if you turn to Jesus.

This is an infinite sacrifice that Jesus made on our behalf.

No one is outside of God's grace.

We think maybe I could never come to Christ, you don't know what I've done, or it's so hard to believe that I'm forgiven.

You don't know my background, you don't know my sin.

But I think sometimes we see our sins large and our saviors small.

Paul writes this in 1 Corinthians.

He says, Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?

Do not be deceived.

Neither the sexually immoral, nor the idolaters, nor the adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

And then he says this, and such were some of you.

But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

Paul lists all of these sins, and we could add to it, we could add to it a whole host of sins, but we need to add our sin to that list.

The problem is, is we see our sin big and the sacrifice of Jesus is small.

And maybe you're here and you know Christ, you've you've genuinely bowed your head and your heart to the Savior, but in your heart of hearts you wonder if you've really been forgiven and accepted.

Maybe you've had an abortion.

Or you paid for someone to have an abortion.

And now you realize what you've done and the implications of it, and it haunts you.

And nobody else knows, but you wonder can I ever truly be forgiven and accepted?

Can I ever truly be loved by God?

This is what I did.

Maybe you're divorced and you feel like a second class Christian.

Maybe you're divorced and you were the one that was at fault.

You were the one that left your spouse.

Can I ever be accepted?

Again by Christ, the way I was.

Maybe you have secret sin in your past that no one else knows about.

Maybe you're struggling with something right now.

You're struggling with things on your computer.

You may think you have great sin, but you have a greater savior.

No matter what you've done, you have a greater savior.

You see, Jesus is fully God and fully man.

The Bible tells us that Jesus Christ, being the second person of the Godhead, the second person of the Trinity, came to earth, never setting aside his deity.

He was fully God while he was on earth.

He continues to be today.

And when he came and was born, he took upon himself a human nature so that he's fully God and fully man.

And as a man, he can take our place because he fully identifies with us in our humanity.

That's why the bulls and goats could never take away sin.

But Jesus Christ was a man like us, and so that he could take our place and die for our sins.

But Jesus Christ is fully God.

And so that means when he died on the cross, it was an infinite sacrifice in its depth that all those who come to him will be saved to the uttermost.

His sacrifice was infinite.

It doesn't matter what sin you're thinking about, it doesn't matter.

All of the sins that you have ever committed in your life, they are finite.

And the sacrifice of Jesus Christ for you was an infinite sacrifice.

You cannot sin in a way that cannot be forgiven.

This table is for everyone who has asked Jesus for forgiveness, having accepted his death and resurrection on your behalf.

If you know Jesus Christ, if you have asked Christ to come into your life, this table is for you.

We come to this table as sinners.

We come to this table as desired.

We come to this table forgive.

And lastly, we come to this table to remember we have fellowship with Jesus.

We come to this table to remember and fellowship.

Luke records something that the other gospels don't record.

They were in the middle of the Passover.

There were multiple cups that were passed out four in total.

They represented different things, and there was a whole set service that they had, a meal that they had.

And so Luke adds, he he recognizes Jesus' words, and he has this cup before the bread, probably the first cup of the four that was in the Passover meal.

And he talks about this, and then he says, This is my body which is given for you.

Do this in remembrance of me.

When he holds that bread and he says, This is my body, he wants us to hold this piece of bread, recognizing it as an emblem, it is an illustration of what Jesus gave when he gave his body to be bruised and battered and hung on a cross for us.

And when we hold that bread, we're reminded of the body of Christ.

And the disciples understood the figure of speech, that it was a metaphor.

He says, Do this in remembrance of me.

I have to be honest, I never caught this until this week when I was reading the commentaries on this passage.

I've always taken it, and I don't think this is mistaken, it's just partial.

I've always taken it when he says, do this in remembrance of me, he was saying, do this in remembrance of my death on the cross and the resurrection.

And that's true, but I think it's more than that.

He says, do this in remembrance of me, the person of Jesus Christ.

Do this in remembrance of all that I am and all that I've done.

Remember Jesus as the sinless one.

Remember Jesus who is filled with compassion.

Remember Jesus who was the one that forgave sinners.

Remember Jesus, the one who cleansed the lepers and touched them before he cleansed them.

Remember Jesus, the one who loved those that the world despised.

Remember Jesus, full of grace and truth.

Remember his perfect life.

Remember his sacrificial death.

Remember his resurrection.

Remember that Jesus Christ is alive right now, today, reigning in heaven, and he is looking down in love at you.

We serve a risen Savior.

And we remember Jesus that he lives to ever intercede for us and that he looks at us with love and understanding and compassion and acceptance today.

We fellowship with the Savior who's alive.

We remember Jesus and all that he is and all that he's done.

It's not merely a concept of salvation or a theological reality.

It is a relationship with the God of heaven and earth.

Day by day, we remember Jesus.

And when we celebrate this table, we come to remember and we come to fellowship as the apostles did that day.

When we celebrate this table in faith, our hearts are lifted up and we have true and real fellowship with the risen Savior.

In faith, we are nourished and we taste and see that the Lord is good.

This is a very special time of worship that God gives to us as we come together as His family.

This is a special time of remembering, but also a special time of fellowshipping with one another, yes, but fellowshipping with Jesus Christ.

In faith, we're nourished as we taste and see that the Lord is good.

And so, how do we come to this table?

How do we prepare ourselves for this table?

We we come as sinners.

We come knowing that we are desired by God.

We come forgiven, knowing that the blood of Jesus Christ has paid the penalty for all of our sins.

The guilt has been removed, the shame has been lifted, we stand before God with heads held high.

And we come to remember and fellowship with the risen Savior.

You are loved.

You are forgiven.

You are invited to this banquet table.

As the musicians come, we prepare our hearts.

Let me close in prayer, and then we will continue to have this opportunity to celebrate the Lord's table together.

Father, we do thank you for sending your son out of your great love for us, messed up sinful, rebellious people that shake our fists at you and run in the other direction.

You pursued us and you caught us by your grace, and you made us your own through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, of his sacrifice on the cross.

And you delight right now to have fellowship with us that we can worship our God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, remembering what Jesus has done for us.

Help us to remember Jesus and a fellowship now.

We pray in Christ's name.

Amen.