Communion Message
Don't ever forget My cross
April 18, 2004
Pastor Donald Sheley

The passage that's familiar to all of us for our communion service is a passage taken out of the book of 1 Corinthians where Paul seeks to give directions to a congregation who have so misused the sacred expression of communion. He writes: For I have received from the Lord that which I also delivered to 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 oft as you drink it, in remembrance of Me." For as often as you 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.

Some days ago I was observing a Christian film and it was dealing with the text of the gospel of John in relationship to Christ, and when it came to the story of the crucifixion I listened to the text of the Scriptures and I had not realized that I had missed this, or at least I'd gone over it a number of times and had not realized there is a difference, but in John's gospel it says: After this, Jesus, knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the Scripture might be fulfilled, said, "I thirst!" Now a vessel full of sour wine was sitting there; and they filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on hyssop, and put it to His mouth. So when Jesus had received the sour wine, He said, "It is finished!" And bowing His head, He gave up His spirit.

The word that fascinated me was 'received', because it seems that in Matthew's account there is a difference. Matthew writes: And when they had come to a place called Golgotha, that is to say, Place of a Skull, they gave Him sour wine mingled with gall to drink. But when He had tasted it, He would not drink. Then they crucified Him, and divided His garments, casting lots, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet.

In researching those two passages I found this very wonderful explanation written by a Pastor over 100 years ago, and this is how he explained these passages. He said, this draught of vinegar mingled with gall or as Mark more accurately expresses it, wine mingled with myrrh, must be distinguished from the sponge filled with vinegar and put upon a reed in the last hour in which Jesus hung upon the cross.

The draught was offered to Him as He stood by the cross before He was nailed to it. The sponge full of vinegar was given in response to His cry, "I thirst". The draught was a cup of spiced wine. It contained a drug intended to stupefy. It was the rude chloroform of the day; the other, was only a sop to cool the burning fever of His tongue.

There was in Jerusalem a society of benevolent women whom gentle pity moved to a gracious ministry to the outcast, to the fallen, and to the criminal. It was their custom to provide this draught of wine mingled with myrrh that the felon on his cross might have the agony and the horror of his crucifixion dulled and his senses deadened while death was making its slow conquest of his life.

The cup filled with this spiced and stupefying wine was set down at the foot of the cross. It was placed in the hands of Jesus. He knew its purpose. He recognized the office its kindly donors intended to fulfill, and surely a thrill of gratitude passed through His heart. With His perfect courtesy, with a deep regard for so beautiful a deed, He takes the cup in His hands, lifts it to His lips, and tastes it. But when He had merely tasted it He set it down again; He would not drink.

Why would not Jesus drink of this cup? He did not usually disregard any gracious service done to Him. He never disdained any ministry of kindness. He did not despise the alleviations of His sorrow which were offered to Him, and how quick He was to response to kindness, how open to sympathy; but now, He's facing the cross with all of its agony and He refuses the cup offered to Him by kindly hands. Why? Because He will not have His senses drugged. He will not have His mind clouded. He will not suffer any unspiritual aid to be given to His resolve. He will be fully master of Himself. He will go through the valley of the shadow of death with every sensibility and keen tension, with every faculty in unclouded clearness, with body and soul and spirit poured out in the act of dying before God.

The death of Christ was His supreme work. The work He desired with anguish to accomplish, the work for which He took our flesh and veiled His Godhead. In that dying act He assumed our sins, He bore our guilt, He suffered our penalty, He offered Himself as our sacrifice, and as He stands beside the cross He is laying Himself down on the altar of God and He will do His great deed in the full might of a willing conscious unclouded sacrifice. He will not lay down His life with a torpid body, half dead sensibilities, a dulled mind, and a clouded spirit. He will do this great deed as it required to be done in full self-consciousness and thereby make a perfect sacrifice.

He did not come to slip into death numb, dormant, and dulled in every faculty. He said, I lay down My life of Myself, no man taketh it from Me. He would not die with any darkness on His memory or His imagination or His will. He might have saved Himself the long hours of horror and chill; He might have saved Himself the broken heart; He might have saved Himself the derision and the scorn or He might have saved Himself the sense of being forsaken of God, but these, these were part of the perfect sacrifice by which He redeemed His people and set them free. When He tasted thereof He would not drink.

You know, we sit here 2000 years removed from the sacred scene that took place on a harsh, angry hillside with the mobs and hate. It's hard for us to grasp the depth of the suffering, but it's always been amazing to me that the text of the Scripture does not emphasize the physical suffering, it speaks so much of the spiritual benefits that flow from Calvary. He was our sacrifice. He was the lamb slain before the foundation of the world. He took your sins and He took mine, and when He died, He died in our stead because the ultimate penalty for sin is death.

And our wonderful Christ took that death due us because of our sin, He became our substitute, and He died there for us, and that's why we call Him our Savior. 2000 years later we come here to service to worship and we're going to have the joy of remembering once again His cross.

I've made the observation in the past that Jesus never asked us to celebrate His birth, and He never asked us to celebrate His resurrection, and yet those are the two high holy days of the Christian Church. He did ask us don't ever forget My cross. And that's why we come to this moment now as a service of memorial to our wonderful Christ. Let's kneel together shall we.

Lord Jesus, we kneel here in Your presence. We've expressed our love and our faith in the singing of the hymns and the choruses. And now we come in our hearts to a moment where we must come face to face with the very heart, the very core, the very soul, the very center of our Christian faith, and that is Your cross. For if the cross had not happened there would be no salvation and there would be no provision for forgiveness for us. We would be all men most miserable to live a life of pain and to die without a hope.

But because You came, Lord Jesus, and You took the penalty of sin for all mankind, and in Your body on that cross the penalty was paid in full for all of us. You who knew no sin became sin for us so that we might be made the righteousness of God. And Lord Jesus, we come to this moment to express our gratitude and our thanks for such a glorious salvation that You have provided for us.

These elements that we hold in our hands Sunday after Sunday are a constant reminder of how much You really did love us. You said the bread was as Your broken body, and the cup was Your precious blood that would be spilt for the covering of our sins and the forgiveness of our sins. So today in adoration, in praise and acknowledgment that we are Your disciples dear Jesus and You're our Savior, and our Master, and our Lord we partake of these elements now. Let's take the bread together...and then the cup. Thank you dear Jesus. Thank you very much. Thank you. And everybody said amen