Communion Message
(The supremacy of Jesus)
October 21-22, 2000
Pastor Donald Sheley

For I have received from the Lord that which I also delivered unto you: that the Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, "Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me. In the same manner He also took the cup after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in My blood. This do, as often as ye drink it, in remembrance of Me." For as often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death till He comes. Therefore whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord. But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup.

The communion time is a time that reminds us of the great sacrifice of our wonderful Christ, and we come today to proclaim the glories and the benefits of that salvation as we identify with the Christ of the cross. When we think of the cross we think of the sacrifice, we think of the Old Testament kind of worship with the priesthood and the various altars. And the book of Hebrews so beautifully talks about the sacrifice of Christ, in fact, its entire theme is the supremacy of Jesus. In the very first chapter it talks about Christ being supreme over the angels, it talks about Christ being supreme over the priesthood, and of the ancient Levitical system. I'd like to read a portion concerning that matter. It says, by so much more Jesus has become a surety of a better covenant. Also there were many priests, for they were prevented by death from continuing. But He, because He continues forever, has an unchangeable priesthood. Therefore He is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them. For such a High Priest was fitting for us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and has become higher than the heavens; who does not need daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifices, first for His own sins and then for the people’s, for this He did once for all when He offered up Himself. For the law appoints as high priests men who have weakness, but the word of the oath, which came after the law, appoints the Son who has been perfected forever.

In this particular passage the writer of the Hebrews is accumulating his proofs to prove that the priesthood of Christ was far superior than the priesthood of the ancient past, and he stresses the fact that the institution of the priesthood after the order of Melchizedek was confirmed by an oath of God while the ordinary priesthood was not. And he takes this particular thought from the passage out of Psalm 104:4 (110:4); The Lord hath sworn and will not repent, thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. Now in our text it says that He did this by an oath. And the very idea of God taking an oath is absolutely startling. Long ago Philo said, he pointed out that the only reason for taking an oath is because a man's bare word may be disbelieved, and he takes an oath in order to guarantee that his word is true. But God needs never to do that because it's impossible that God's word should ever be disbelieved. If therefore God never confirms a statement by an oath come, that statement must be unique and extraordinary in importance. For a thing which God confirms by an oath must be something so utterly unchangeable that it’s woven into the very fiber and texture of the universe and must remain forever. So then, it is possible that the ordinary priesthood could pass away, but the priesthood after the order of Melchizedek, which is Christ, can never pass away because God did not only Institute it, He followed the amazing and unique course of confirming it with an oath.

You say, what's your point Pastor? What the writer is saying is that God wrote in the very fiber, the very texture, of the laws of this universe a divine truth; and that divine truth is that Jesus Christ is our High Priest. He will never change. Nothing will ever change that, it's written into the very nature, the very fiber, of the universe. And of this High Priest, it says that He ever lives to make intercession for us. The writer also says, Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. And so the writer's point is this, you and I have in heaven a great High Priest who ever lives to intercede on our behalf, and that great High Priest has walked earth’s pathway because He was none other than Jesus Christ. And thus, because He understands life and He understands in all of its tensions and its turmoils and its pains and its hurt, the writer says when we come to Him in prayer we can be assured that He thoroughly understands the problems we're dealing with in life.

Rejection; He understands that. He came to His own and His own received Him not, and they participated in hanging Him to a cross. Rejection; He understands rejection. The pain of loss; He could stand at Lazarus’ tomb and weep with those who weep. He felt the pain of loss because His great friend that introduced Him, and His relative, John, was beheaded on behalf of the message that Christ preached. Jesus understood pain. He understood misunderstanding. So what I have found that in the communion service not only do we deal with us whole issue of sin, because all of us have sinned this week and we're going to seek God's forgiveness and His cleansing. And the promise is this, that if we confess our sins He is faithful and just and He'll forgive us our sins, and He'll cleanse us. We have that assurance when we come to Him today. But I'm aware that a lot of people deal with a lot of other spiritual issues during the communion time. It's a wonderful time to do it. Some of us have been hurt this week too; deeply.

I had a lady come to me last night in our service and she said, Pastor, I'm not taking communion today. I said, I don't understand. She said, I'm so filled with anger, I haven't dealt with it. I had a man's sitting in one of the services this morning. I saw that his facial expressions were torn with tension, and Friday he got fired. And a man who provides for his family knows what it means to lose your source of income. So while he knelt today he asked God to give him wisdom in his interview with his job opportunity tomorrow. We deal with so many things on our knees before God. But as we do today, I want you to remember our great High Priest understands. And written into the very fiber of the universe and the way God governs this universe is the interceder, our wonderful Christ is our great High Priest. He’s there. He's there. He's ready to listen if you'll just pour out your heart to Him. This could be the morning for a wonderful miracle way down inside of you. Let's kneel together, shall we?

Lord Jesus as we kneel here today as a family, and friends, and guests, but we're all one because we're at the table. Our journeys have been different this week. For some it's been a journey of joy. For others it's been splattered with tears. Some upsets, some heartbreaks, some disappointments, and then there were times, Lord Jesus, when we chose to be disobedient to the ways of righteousness and in rebellion we did our own thing. We sinned and we're ashamed of it. Here we are on our knees today and we ask You, dear Jesus, please forgive us. And we recognize that these simple but yet profound elements that we hold in our hands tell us, they almost shout at us, that's the reason why You died so that You could forgive us.

But there are other people who kneel here this morning whose pain from life's problems is almost too much to bear. Jesus, would You meet us wherever we are. For some of us You seem so far away. For some of us we've prayed about things for so long and it seems like heaven is brass. Would You, Lord Jesus, in this precious moment when Your presence is so real, would you minister to every person here. For those who are discouraged, would You give them courage and hope. For those that are in pain today, would You be their balm of Gilead. For those who are searching for truth, Jesus, to them be the way, the truth, and life. Thank you. Let's take the bread together, shall we? And then the cup. And everybody said, amen. Let's stand and greet one another, shall we?