On the first day of unleavened bread, when they sacrificed the Passover, his disciples asked him, “Where do you want us to go and prepare that you may eat the Passover?”
Parallel Translations
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On the first day of unleavened bread, when they sacrificed the Passover, his disciples asked him, “Where do you want us to go and prepare that you may eat the Passover?”
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And the fyrste daye of swete breed when men offer the pascall lambe his disciples sayd vnto him: where wilt thou that we goo and prepare that thou mayst eate the ester lambe?
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Nowe the first day of vnleauened bread, when they sacrificed the Passeouer, his disciples sayde vnto him, Where wilt thou that we goe and prepare, that thou mayest eate the Passeouer?
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Cross-references (12)
Passages linked to Mark 14:12 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Exodus 12:6 You shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same month; and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it at evening.
- Exodus 12:8 They shall eat the meat in that night, roasted with fire, and unleavened bread. They shall eat it with bitter herbs.
- Exodus 12:18 In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at evening, you shall eat unleavened bread, until the twenty first day of the month at evening.
- Leviticus 23:5-6 In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month in the evening, is Yahweh’s Passover. On the fifteenth day of the same month is the feast of unleavened bread to Yahweh. Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread.
- Numbers 28:16-18 “ ‘In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month, is Yahweh’s Passover. On the fifteenth day of this month shall be a feast. Unleavened bread shall be eaten for seven days. In the first day shall be a holy convocation. You shall do no regular work,
- Matthew 26:17-19 Now on the first day of unleavened bread, the disciples came to Jesus, saying to him, “Where do you want us to prepare for you to eat the Passover?” He said, “Go into the city to a certain person, and tell him, ‘The Teacher says, “My time is at hand. I will keep the Passover at your house with my disciples.” ’ ” The disciples did as Jesus commanded them, and they prepared the Passover.
- 1 Corinthians 5:7-8 Purge out the old yeast, that you may be a new lump, even as you are unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover, has been sacrificed in our place. Therefore let’s keep the feast, not with old yeast, neither with the yeast of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
- Exodus 13:3 Moses said to the people, “Remember this day, in which you came out of Egypt, out of the house of bondage; for by strength of hand Yahweh brought you out from this place. No leavened bread shall be eaten.
- Deuteronomy 16:1-4 Observe the month of Abib, and keep the Passover to Yahweh your God; for in the month of Abib Yahweh your God brought you out of Egypt by night. You shall sacrifice the Passover to Yahweh your God, of the flock and the herd, in the place which Yahweh shall choose to cause his name to dwell there. You shall eat no leavened bread with it. You shall eat unleavened bread with it seven days, even the bread of affliction (for you came out of the land of Egypt in haste) that you may remember the day when you came out of the land of Egypt all the days of your life. No yeast shall be seen with you in all your borders seven days; neither shall any of the meat, which you sacrifice the first day at evening, remain all night until the morning.
- Luke 22:7-13 The day of unleavened bread came, on which the Passover must be sacrificed. Jesus sent Peter and John, saying, “Go and prepare the Passover for us, that we may eat.” They said to him, “Where do you want us to prepare?” He said to them, “Behold, when you have entered into the city, a man carrying a pitcher of water will meet you. Follow him into the house which he enters. Tell the master of the house, ‘The Teacher says to you, “Where is the guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?” ’ He will show you a large, furnished upper room. Make preparations there.” They went, found things as Jesus had told them, and they prepared the Passover.
- Galatians 4:4 But when the fullness of the time came, God sent out his Son, born to a woman, born under the law,
- Matthew 3:15 But Jesus, answering, said to him, “Allow it now, for this is the fitting way for us to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he allowed him.
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Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain They used to sacrifice.
They used to sacrifice.
This is spoken thus, by the figure Metonymy, which is usual in sacraments, and by the Passover is meant the Paschal lamb.
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Christ being made subject to the Law for us, doth celebrate the Passover according to the Law: and therewithall by a miracle showeth that notwithstanding he in the flesh shall straightway suffer, yet that he is God.
That is, upon which day, and at the evening of the same day, which was the beginning of the fifteenth, see also Matt. 26:17.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain 12 And the first day of unleavened bread, when…
12 And the first day of unleavened bread, when they killed the passover, his disciples said unto him, Where wilt thou that we go and prepare that thou mayest eat the passover?
Ver. 12. {See Trapp on "Mat 26:17"}
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain The time for the celebration of the passover being…
The time for the celebration of the passover being now at hand, Christ sends two of his disciples to Jerusalem to prepare things necessary in order thereunto.
And here we have observable, 1. An eminent proof of Christ’s divine nature, in telling them all the particulars which they should meet with in the city, as A man bearing a pitcher of water, &c.
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2. How readily the heart of this householder was disposed to receive our Saviour and his disciples, and to accommodate them with all things needful upon this occasion. Our blessed Saviour had not a lamb of his own, and peradventure no money wherewith to buy one, yet he finds as excellent accommodations in this poor man’s house, as if he had dwelt in Ahad’s ivory palace, and had the provision of Solomon’s table.
When Christ has a passover to celebrate, he will dispose the heart to a free reception of himself. The room which Christ will enter into, must be a large room, an upper room, furnished and prepared; a large room, is an enlarged heart, enlarged with love and thankfulness; an upper room, is an heart exalted, not puffed up with pride, but lifted up by heavenly-mindedness; a room furnished, is a soul adorned with the graces of the Holy Spirit; into such an heart, and only such, will Christ enter.
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain In these verses we have,
In these verses we have,
I. Christ's eating the passover with his disciples, the night before he died, with the joys and comforts of which ordinance he prepared himself for his approaching sorrows, the full prospect of which did not indispose him for that solemnity. Note, No apprehension of trouble, come or coming, should put us by, or put us out of frame for, our attendance on holy ordinances, as we have opportunity for it.
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1. Christ ate the passover at the usual time when the other Jews did, as Dr. Whitby had fully made out, and not, as Dr. Hammond would have it, the night before. It was on the first day of that feast, which (taking in all the eight days of the feast) was called, The feast of unleavened bread, even that day when they killed the passover, Mar 14:12.
2. He directed his disciples how to find the place where he intended to eat the passover; and hereby gave such another proof of his infallible knowledge of things distant and future (which to us seem altogether contingent), as he had given when he sent them for the ass on which he rode in triumph (Mar 11:6); "Go into the city (for the passover must be eaten in Jerusalem), and there shall meet you a man bearing a pitcher of water (a servant sent for water to clean the rooms in his master's house); follow him, go in where he goes, enquire for his master, the good man of the house (Mar 14:14), and desire him to show you a room." No doubt, the inhabitants of Jerusalem had rooms fitted up to be let out, for this occasion, to those that came out of the country to keep the passover, and one of those Christ made use of; not any friend's house, nor any house he had formerly frequented, for then he would have said, "Go to such a friend," or, "You know where we used to be, go thither and prepare." Probably he went where he was not known, that he might be undisturbed with his disciples. Perhaps he notified it by a sign, to conceal it from Judas, that he might not know till he came to the place; and by such a sign to intimate that he will dwell in the clean heart, that is, washed as with pure water. Where he designs to come, a pitcher of water must go before him; see Isa 1:16-18.
3. He ate the passover in an upper room furnished, estrōmenon - laid with carpets (so Dr. Hammond); it would seem to have been a very handsome dining-room. Christ was far from affecting any thing that looked stately in eating his common meals; on the contrary, he chose that which was homely, sat down on the grass: but, when he was to keep a sacred feast, in honour of that he would be at the expense of as good a room as he could get. God looks not at outward pomp, but he looks at the tokens and expressions of inward reverence for a divine institution, which, it is to be feared, those want, who, to save charges, deny themselves decencies in the worship of God.
4. He ate it with the twelve, who were his family, to teach those who have the charge of families, not only families of children, but families of servants, or families of scholars, or pupils, to keep up religion among them, and worship God with them. If Christ came with the twelve, then Judas was with them, though he was at this time contriving to betray his Master; and it is plain by what follows (Mar 14:20), that he was there: he did not absent himself, lest he could have been suspected; had his seat been empty at this feast, they would have said, as Saul of David, He is not clean, surely he is not clean, Sa1 20:26. Hypocrites, though they know it is at their peril, yet crowd into special ordinances, to keep up their repute, and palliate their secret wickedness. Christ did not exclude him from the feast, though he knew his wickedness, for it was not as yet become public and scandalous. Christ, designing to put the keys of the kingdom of heaven into the hands of men, who can judge only according to outward appearance, would hereby both direct and encourage them in their admissions to his table, to be satisfied with a justifiable profession, because they cannot discern the root of bitterness till it springs up.
II. Christ's discourse with his disciples, as they were eating the passover. It is probable that they had discourse, according to the custom of the feast, of the deliverance of Israel out of Egypt, and the preservation of the first-born, and were as pleasant as they used to be together on this occasion, till Christ told them that which would mix trembling with their joys.
1. They were pleasing themselves with the society of their Master; but he tells them that they must now presently lose him; The Son of man is betrayed; and they knew, for he had often told them, what followed - If he be betrayed, the next news you will hear of him, is, that he is crucified and slain; God hath determined it concerning him, and he agrees to it; The Son of man goes, as it is written of him, Mar 14:21. It was written in the counsels of God, and written in the prophecies of the Old Testament, not one jot or tittle of either of which can fall to the ground.
2. They were pleasing themselves with the society one of another, but Christ casts a damp upon the joy of that, by telling them, One of you that eateth with me shall betray me, Mar 14:18. Christ said this, if it might be, to startle the conscience of Judas, and to awaken him to repent of his wickedness, and to draw back (for it was not too late) from the brink of the pit. But for aught that appears, he who was most concerned in the warning, was least concerned at it. All the rest were affected with it. (1.) They began to be sorrowful. As the remembrance of our former falls into sin, so the fear of the like again, doth often much embitter the comfort of our spiritual feasts, and damp our joy. Here were the bitter herbs, with which this passover-feast was taken. (2.) They began to be suspicious of themselves; they said one by one, Is it I? And another said, Is it I? They are to be commended for their charity, that they were more jealous of themselves than of one another. It is the law of charity, to hope the best (Co1 13:5-7), because we assuredly know, therefore we may justly suspect, more evil by ourselves than by our brethren. They are also to be commended for their acquiescence in what Christ said; they trusted more to his words than to their own hearts; and therefore do not say, "I am sure it is not I," but, "Lord, is it I? see if there be such a way of wickedness in us, such a root of bitterness, and discover it to us, that we may pluck up that root, and stop up that way."
Now, in answer to their enquiry, Christ saith that, [1.] Which would make them easy; "It is not you, or you; it is this that now dips with me in the dish; the adversary and enemy is this wicked Judas." [2.] Which, one would think, should make Judas very uneasy. If he go on in his undertaking, it is upon the sword's point, for woe to that many by whom the Son of man is betrayed; he is undone, for every undone; his sin will soon find him out; and it were better for him that he had never been born, and had never had a being than such a miserable one as he must have. It is very probable that Judas encouraged himself in it with this thought, that his Master had often said he must be betrayed; "And if it must be done, surely God will not find fault with him that doth it, for who hath resisted his will?" As that objector argues, Rom 9:19. But Christ tells him that this will be no shelter or excuse to him; The Son of man indeed goes; as it is written of him, as a lamb to the slaughter; but woe to that man by whom he is betrayed. God's decree to permit the sins of men, and bring glory to himself out of them, do neither necessitate their sins, nor determine to them, nor will they be any excuse of the sin, or mitigation of the punishment. Christ was delivered indeed by the determinate counsel and fore-knowledge of God; but, notwithstanding that, it is with wicked hands that he is crucified and slain, Act 2:23.
III. The institution of the Lord's supper.
1. It was instituted in the close of a supper, when they were sufficiently fed with the paschal lamb, to show that in the Lord's supper there is no bodily repast intended; to preface it with such a thing, is to revive Moses again. But it is food for the soul only, and therefore a very little of that which is for the body, as much as will serve for a sign, is enough. It was at the close of the passover-supper, which by this was evangelized, and then superseded and set aside. Much of the doctrine and duty of the eucharist is illustrated to us by the law of the passover (Ex. 12); for the Old Testament institutions, though they do not bind us, yet instruct us, by the help of a gospel-key to them. And these two ordinances lying here so near together, it may be good to compare them, and observe how much shorter and plainer the institution of the Lord's supper is, than that of the passover was. Christ's yoke is easy in comparison with that of the ceremonial law, and his ordinances are more spiritual.
2. It was instituted by the example of Christ himself; not with the ceremony and solemnity of a law, as the ordinance of baptism was, after Christ's resurrection (Mat 28:19), with, Be it enacted by the authority aforesaid, by a power given to Christ in heaven and on earth (Mat 28:18); but by the practice of our Master himself, because intended for those who are already his disciples, and taken into covenant with him: but it has the obligation of the law, and was intended to remain in full force, power, and virtue, till his second coming.
3. It was instituted with blessing and giving of thanks; the gifts of common providence are to be so received (Ti1 4:4, Ti1 4:5), much more than the gifts of special grace. He blessed (Mar 14:22), and gave thanks, Mar 14:23. At his other meals, he was wont to bless, and give thanks (Mar 6:41; Mar 8:7) so remarkably, that he was known by it, Luk 24:30, Luk 24:31. And he did the same at this meal.
4. It was instituted to be a memorial of his death; and therefore he broke the bread, to show how it pleased the Lord to bruise him; and he called the wine, which is the blood of the grape, the blood of the New Testament. The death Christ died was a bloody death, and frequent mention is made of the blood, the precious blood, as the pride of our redemption; for the blood is the life, and made atonement for the soul, Lev 17:11-14. The pouring out of the blood was the most sensible indication of the pouring out of his soul, Isa 53:12. Blood has a voice (Gen 4:10); and therefore blood is so often mentioned, because it was to speak, Heb 12:24. It is called the blood of the New Testament; for the covenant of grace became a testament, and of force by the death of Christ, the testator, Heb 9:16. It is said to be shed for many, to justify many (Isa 53:11), to bring many sons to glory, Heb 2:10. It was sufficient for many, being of infinite value; it has been of use to many; we read of a great multitude which no man could number, that had all washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb (Rev 7:9-14); and still it is a fountain opened. How comfortable is this to poor repenting sinners, that the blood of Christ is shed for many! And if for many, why not for me? If for sinners, sinners of the Gentiles, the chief of sinners, then why not for me?
5. It was instituted to be a ratification of the covenant made with us in him, and a sign of the conveyance of those benefits to us, which were purchased for us by his death; and therefore he broke the bread to them (Mar 14:22), and said, Take, eat of it: he gave the cup to them, and ordered them to drink of it, Mar 14:23. Apply the doctrine of Christ crucified to yourselves, and let it be meat and drink to your souls, strengthening, nourishing, and refreshing, to you, and the support and comfort of your spiritual life.
6. It was instituted with an eye to the happiness of heaven, and to be an earnest and fore-taste of that, and thereby to put our mouths out of taste for all the pleasures and delights of sense (Mar 14:25); I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine, as it is a bodily refreshment. I have done with it. No one, having tasted spiritual delights, straightway desires sensitive ones, for he saith, The spiritual is better (Luk 5:39); but every one that hath tasted spiritual delights, straightway desires eternal ones, for he saith, Those are better still; and therefore let me drink no more of the fruit of the vine, it is dead and flat to those that have been made to drink of the river of God's pleasures; but, Lord, hasten the day, when I shall drink it new and fresh in the kingdom of God, where it shall be for ever new, and in perfection.
7. It was closed with a hymn, Mar 14:26. Though Christ was in the midst of his enemies, yet he did not, for fear of them, omit this sweet duty of singing psalms. Paul and Silas sang, when the prisoners heard them. This was an evangelical song, and gospel times are often spoken of in the Old Testament, as times of rejoicing, and praise is expressed by singing. This was Christ's swan-like song, which he sung just before he entered upon his agony; probably, that which is usually sung, Psa 113:1-9 to 118.
IV. Christ's discourse with his disciples, as they were returning to Bethany by moonlight. When the had sung the hymn, presently they went out. It was now near bedtime, but our Lord Jesus had his heart so much upon his suffering, that he would not come into the tabernacle of his house, norgo up into his bed, nor give sleep to his eyes, when that work was to be done, Psa 132:3, Psa 132:4. The Israelites were forbidden to go out of their houses the night that they ate the passover, for fear of the sword of the destroying angel, Exo 12:22, Exo 12:23. But because Christ, the great shepherd, was to be smitten, he went out purposely to expose himself to the sword, as a champion; they evaded the destroyer, but Christ conquered him, and brought destructions to a perpetual end.
1. Christ here foretels that in his sufferings he should be deserted by all his disciples; "You will all be offended because of me, this night. I know you will (Mar 14:27), and what I tell you now, is no other than what the scripture has told you before; I will smite the shepherd, and then the sheep will be scattered." Christ knew this before, and yet welcomed them at his table; he sees the falls and miscarriages of his disciples, and yet doth not refuse them. Nor should we be discouraged from coming to the Lord's supper, by the fear of relapsing into sin afterward; but, the greater of our danger is, the more need we have to fortify ourselves by the diligent conscientious use of holy ordinances. Christ tells them that they would be offended in him, would begin to question whether he were the Messiah or no, when they saw him overpowered by his enemies. Hitherto, they had continued with him in his temptations; though they had sometimes offended him, yet they had not been offended in him, nor turned the back upon him; but now the storm would be so great, that they would all slip their anchors, and be in danger of shipwreck. Some trials are more particular (as Rev 2:10, The devil shall cast some of you into prison); but others are more general, an hour of temptation, which shall come upon all the world, Rev 3:10. The smiting of the shepherd is often the scattering of the sheep: magistrates, ministers, masters of families, if these are, as they should be, shepherds to those under their charge, when any thing comes amiss to them, the whole flock suffers for it, and is endangered by it.
But Christ encourages them with a promise that they shall rally again, shall return both to their duty and to their comfort (Mar 14:28); "After I am risen, I will gather you in from all the places wither you are scattered, Eze 34:12. I will go before you into Galilee, will see our friends, and enjoy one another there."
2. He foretels that he should be denied particularly by Peter. When they went out to go to the mount of Olives, we may suppose that they dropped Judas (he stole away from them), whereupon the rest began to think highly of themselves, that they stuck to their Master, when Judas quitted him. But Christ tells them, that though they should be kept by his grace from Judas's apostasy, yet they would have no reason to boast of their constancy. Note, Though God keeps us from being as bad as the worst, yet we may well be ashamed to think that we are not better than we are.
(1.) Peter is confident that he should not do so ill as the rest of his disciples (Mar 14:29); Though all should be offended, all his brethren here present, yet will not I. He supposes himself not only stronger than others, but so much stronger, as to be able to receive the shock of a temptation, and bear up against it, all alone; to stand, though nobody stood by him. It is bred in the bone with us, to think well of ourselves, and trust to our own hearts.
(2.) Christ tells him that he will do worse than any of them. They will all desert him, but he will deny him; not once, but thrice; and that presently; "This day, even this night before the cock crow twice, thou wilt deny that ever thou hadst any knowledge of me, or acquaintance with me, as one ashamed and afraid to own me."
(3.) He stands to his promise; "If I should die with thee, I will not deny thee; I will adhere to thee, though it cost me my life:" and, no doubt, he thought as he said. Judas said nothing like this, when Christ told him he would betray him. He sinned by contrivance, Peter by surprise; he devised the wickedness (Mic 2:1), Peter was overtaken in this fault, Gal 6:1. It was ill done of Peter, to contradict his Master. If he had said, with fear and trembling, "Lord, give me grace to keep me from denying thee, lead me not into this temptation, deliver me from this evil," it might have been prevented: but they were all thus confident; they who said, Lord, is it I? now said, It shall never be me. Being acquitted from their fear of betraying Christ, they were now secure. But he that thinks he stands, must learn to take heed lest he fall; and he that girdeth on the harness, not boast as though he had put it off.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain And the first day of unleavened bread,.... Being come,…
And the first day of unleavened bread,.... Being come, which was the fourteenth of Nisan:
when they killed the passover; that is, "the Jews", as the Syriac and Persic versions supply; for any Israelite, that not a priest, might slay it: their canon runs thus (x),
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"an Israelite kills (the passover), and a priest receives (the blood), and gives it to his neighbour, and his neighbour to his neighbour, and he receives (the basin) full, and returns it empty; the priest that is near to the altar sprinkles it, at one sprinkling, over against the bottom of it.''
Upon which the commentators (y) observe, that the slaying of the passover by strangers; that is, such as are not priests, lawful. And so Philo the Jew, speaking of the passover, says (z);
"at which time the common people do not bring their sacrifices to the altar, and the priests slay; but by the command of the law, , "the whole nation", does the work of a priest; every one particularly bringing the sacrifices for himself, and then slaying them with his own hands.''
But then it was always killed in the court of the temple, and after the middle of the day; See Gill on Mat 26:17;
his disciples said unto him, where wilt thou that we go and prepare, that thou mayst eat the passover: for it was now Thursday morning, and the passover was to be slain after the middle of the day, between the two evenings, and eaten in Jerusalem at night; and they were now at Bethany, near two miles from the city; and it was usual for servants to get ready the passover for their masters; See Gill on Mat 26:17.
(x) Misn. Pesachim, c. 5. sect. 6. (y) Jarchi, Maimon. & Bartenora in ib. (z) De Vita Mosis, l. 3. p. 686.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain Matt. xxvi, 17; Luke xxii, 7.
Matt. xxvi, 17; Luke xxii, 7.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain See the notes at Mat 26:17-19.
See the notes at Mat 26:17-19.
Mar 14:12
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They killed the passover - The “paschal lamb,” which was slain in keeping the Passover.
Go and prepare - Go and provide a lamb, have it roasted, and properly prepared with the usual things to eat with it.
Mar 14:13
The city - The city of Jerusalem. They were now in Bethany, about 2 miles from the city.
A man bearing a pitcher of water - This could have been known only by the infinite knowledge of Christ. Such a thing could not have been conjectured, nor was there any concert between him and the man that “at that time” he should be in a particular place to meet them, for the disciples themselves proposed the inquiry. If Jesus knew a circumstance like that, then he in the same way must have known all things; then he sees “all” the actions of men - hears every word, and marks every thought; then the righteous are under his care, and the wicked, much as they may wish to be unseen, cannot escape the notice of his eye.
Mar 14:14
The goodman of the house - This signifies simply the “master” of the house. The original word expresses nothing respecting his character, whether it was good or bad.
The guest-chamber - A chamber for guests or friends - an unoccupied room.
Mar 14:15
A large upper room - The word used here denotes the upper room devoted to purposes of prayer, repose, and often of eating. See the notes at Mat 9:1-8.
Furnished and prepared - Literally, “spread” and “ready.” Spread with a carpet, or with “couches” such as were used in eating. See the notes at Mat 23:6.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain Whither wilt thou, &c. By these words the disciples…
Whither wilt thou, &c. By these words the disciples teach us to direct our every step according to the will of God; therefore does their Lord tell them, with whom he would eat the pasch, to go two of them into the city. (St. Jerome)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain 2. The Feast of the Passion, and of Victory.—The…
2. The Feast of the Passion, and of Victory.—The Paschal Lamb and the discovered Traitor. The Last Supper and the Lord’s Triumph over the Traitor. The Prediction of the Disciples being offended, and of their denying Him. Mar_14:12-31
(Parallels: Mat_26:17-35; Luk_22:7-38; John 13-17)
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A. The Disciples’ Passover-thought.—Unguardedness and Foresight; or, the Jewish Custom and Christ’s Spirit. Mar_14:12-16
12 And the first day of unleavened bread, when they killed the passover, his disciples said unto him, Where wilt thou that we go and prepare, that thou mayest eat the pass over? 13And he sendeth forth two of his disciples, and saith unto them, Go ye into the city, and there shall meet you a man bearing a pitcher of water: follow him. 14And wheresoever he shall go in, say ye to the goodman of the house, The Master saith, Where is the guest-chamber, where I shall eat the passover with my disciples? 15And he will show you a large upper room furnished and prepared: there make ready for us. 16And his disciples went forth, and came into the city, and found as he had said unto them: and they made ready the passover.
B. The Lord’s Passover-thought.—The Passover, and the hardened and discovered Traitor in the circle of Disciples. The Lord’s clear perception of the secret designs of the Traitor. Mar_14:17-21
17And in the evening he cometh with the twelve. 18And as they sat and did eat, Jesus said, Verily I say unto you, One of you which eateth with me shall betray me. 19And they began to be sorrowful, and to say unto him one by one, is it I? and another said, Is it I? 7 20And he answered 8 and said unto them, It is one of the twelve, that dip peth with me 9 in the dish. 21The Son of man indeed goeth, as it is written of him: but woe to that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! good were it for that man if he had never been born.
C. The new Passover.—The Lord’s fulness of Love on the night of the Betrayal. Mar_14:22-25
22 And as they did eat, Jesus 10 took bread, and blessed, and brake it, and gave to them, and said, Take, eat: 11 this is my body. 23And he took the cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them: and they all drank of it. 24And he said unto them, This is my blood of the new 12 testament [covenant], which is shed for many. 25Verily I say unto you, I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine, until that day that I drink it new in the kingdom of God.
D. A new Passover upon a new Night of Terror, and upon the Death of the First-born. Mar_14:26-31
26 And when they had sung an hymn, they went out into the Mount of Olives. 27And Jesus saith unto them. All ye shall be offended because of me this night: 13 for it is written, I will smite the Shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered. 28But after that I am risen, I will go before you into Galilee. 29But Peter said unto him, Although all shall be offended, yet will not I. 30And Jesus saith unto him, Verily I say unto thee, That this day, even in this night, before the cock crow twice, thou shalt deny me thrice. 31But he spake 14 the more vehemently, 15 If I should die with thee, I will not deny thee in any wise. Likewise also said they all.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Comp. Matthew and Luke.—The unity of these sections is to be found in the contrast between the disciples’ unprepared state of mind, and the ever clear perception which the Lord had of what lay before Him. Next, we have the opposition between the Passover and the Supper, the great institution of love, and of treachery; finally, the contrast between the faithful care with which the Lord warned the disciples, and their presumptuous self-deception respecting the fact of their own weakness. Peculiarities of Mark:—Exact statement of the day, Mar_14:12, with Luke. He brings forward (what is passed over by Matthew) the sending of the two disciples, but does not name them, as Luke does; and this again is to be traced back to Peter’s modesty, for Peter was one of those sent. The direction of Jesus also,—in Matthew, Go ye πρὸς τὸν δεῖνα,—is given here in a more expanded form, as also in Luke: the description of the man with the water-pitcher, who should meet them at the gate of the city, and the directions which they were to follow. He passes over, in his description of the Passover, the special narrations of Luke and John, and hastens forward with Matthew to the detection of the traitor. The indication of the betrayer has been already given: He who eateth with Me, Mar_14:18. The peculiar ἤρξαντο again, Mar_14:19. The audacious question of Judas, Is it I? which Matthew introduces, Mark omits, as he has previously omitted his words to the chief priests. In the celebration of the Supper, he agrees, excepting in a few trifling deviations, with Matthew. Peter has, through Mark, directed attention to the fact concerning the cup, “And they all drank of it.” In recording, “Shed for many,” Mark allows, “For the remission of sins,” to fall out. The words concerning the new cup in the kingdom of God he causes to follow the words of the institution of the Supper, as is the case in Matthew, but more briefly expressed. The remark (recorded by John) to the disciples, “Ye cannot follow Me now,” in Mark (and Matthew), runs, “All ye shall be offended because of Me.” Peter’s vow, “I will follow Thee,” as given by John, is extended in Mark, “Although all shall be offended, yet will not I;” shorter than in Matthew. The statement in John, “I will lay down my life for Thy sake,” stands in Mark, “If I should die with Thee,” etc., as in Matthew. The prediction that they would deny Him follows this asseveration in John, but precedes it in Mark and Matthew; in this latter case, the asseveration was, of course, more presumptuous. Mark alone has the more definite signal, “Before the cock crow twice.” The particular features which are introduced by Luke before this transaction, and which bring Peter still more prominently into view, are not related by Mark. He and Matthew present the strongest statement of the occurrence (an affirmation of faithfulness after the declaration of the denial).
Mar_14:13. Two of His disciples.—Peter and John. Comp. Luke.—And there shall meet you.—The description is as mysterious as in the despatching of the disciples to bring the colt. So, again, is the prominence given to the talismanic word εἰπεῖν, to be noticed. Quite groundless is the view of Meyer (rationalizing), that we find in the wonderful manner in which the supper is ordered, as recorded by Mark and Luke, an evidence of the later origin of this account. In this passage Matthew has only hinted at what the other two have explicitly stated. See Matthew.—A man.—It is a very mistaken conclusion, if, from the fact that it was a slave’s employment to carry water (Deu_29:11; Jos_9:21), we conclude this man was a slave.
Mar_14:14. Guest-chamber, τὸ κατάλυμά μου.—The reception-room, which is appointed for Me. With the word lodgings, the conception of a separate house is united. Much nearer the idea is, “My quarters.”
Mar_14:15. A large upper room.—The form ἀνάγαιον is best supported. Meyer: “In meaning, it is equivalent to ὑπερῷον, עִַלִיָה, upper room, place for prayer, and assembling together.” But, we must undoubtedly conceive of the “upper room” as being on the second floor: the Alijah, on the contrary, is a tower-like erection upon the flat house-roof (see 2Ki_4:10; comp. Act_10:9). The learned Winer, too, has no clear idea of the Alijah. Comp. articles, “Houses, Roof.” On the contrary, Gesenius: “עֲלִיָּה, cubiculum superius, conclave, super tectum domus eminens; ὑπερῷον;” and De Wette, Archäol. p. 146.—Furnished (provided with pillows).—That is, with pillow-beds laid around the table, as the custom of reclining at meals required.
Mar_14:17. With the Twelve.—The two messengers have returned and announced that all is ready.
Mar_14:18. One of you which eateth with Me.—The expression of grief. See Joh_13:18. Reference to Psa_41:10.
Mar_14:20. That dippeth with Me in the dish.—Meyer: “He was one of those lying closest to Jesus, eating, namely, out of the same dish.” Therefore, no very definite description. Yet the Passion meal was not the ordinary eating from a dish. The nead of the family distributed the portions. The case is thus to be conceived: Jesus was about to hand Judas his portion. Now it is a psychological fact, that an evil conscience causes the hand to move with an uneasy motion, even at the moment when one succeeds in showing a hypocritical face full of innocence and calmness. The hand, in opposition to the steady countenance, makes a hypocritically tremulous motion. So, accordingly, does the traitorous hand of Judas, betraying him, hastily extend itself, it would appear, to meet the Lord’s hand, as it is still in the dish, in order with feigned ease to receive the sop. The three statements—He who dippeth with Me in the dish (Matthew, and almost identically Mark); To whom I shall give the sop (John); and, The hand of My betrayer is with Me on the table (Luke),—agree, therefore, as regards the actual state of the case.
Mar_14:24. And He said unto them, This is My blood.—That our Evangelist makes this expression follow the drinking creates no difference between Matthew, and Luke, and Mark. Because Mark, namely, wished to make this the prominent fact, that all the company in rotation drank of the cup, he represents the Lord as speaking these important words while the act of drinking was being performed; from which it is self-evident, that He speaks them while the cup was passing round.
Mar_14:31. Spake the more vehemently.—We understand this not quantitatively,—he made regarding this many additional statements,—but qualitatively, of the increasing force in expressing himself, as the following sentence shows.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. See Matthew.
2. As the first Old Testament Passover was celebrated before the actual exemption and deliverance of the Israelites in the Egyptian night of terror, in the believing certainty of their salvation, so was also the New Testament Passover, the Supper, celebrated in the certainty of actual preservation and deliverance, before the outward fact, the death and resurrection of Christ. Exactly thus, in the justification of the individual sinner, does the celebration of his salvation from condemnation precede the completion of his salvation in sanctification.
3. The way and manner in which Jesus unites with the celebration of the Supper the announcement that His disciples should be offended because of Him, and His solicitude for their preservation and restoration, brings before us the relation subsisting between this preservation and that of the first-born in Egypt, for whom atonement had been made. The disciples, too, must the destroying angel pass by. No doubt, because Christ, who is the First-born in an especial sense, presents Himself a sacrifice for them. But this First-born, too, wins back His life from death.
4. Three Passovers: The typical Passover of the typified deliverance; the actual Passover of the real deliverance, finished in principle, pointing to the completion in life; the coming Passover in the kingdom of God, the celebration of the perfected salvation.
5. The detection of Judas, and the announcement of the stumbling of the disciples after the Supper, is a sign that the Supper is appointed to exclude the apostate and the hypocritical, to strengthen, establish, and restore the weak.
6. The celebration of the Supper: 1. The external preparation, and the internal (“One of you”); 2. the celebration itself; 3. the practical improvement (“In this night”).
7. The Lord changes the Passover into the Supper: Christ’s disciples now make with great willingness a Passover out of the Supper, in various ways. A simply ecclesiastical meal of custom; a simply memorial meal; a dogma-teaching meal; a meal falsely alleged to be capable of removing guilt.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
See Matthew.—The pious recollection of the disciples, and the holy thought of the Lord (paschal lamb, the Last Supper).—The quiet, hidden friend of Christ in the city of His foes, and the concealed enemy of Christ in the disciple-band.—Both brought to view by Christ.—The Lord’s Supper a celebration of salvation in the confidence of faith: 1. Outwardly, a pre-celebration; 2. inwardly, an after-celebration.—The holy appointment and efficacy of the Supper: 1. Revelation of hearts (acknowledgment of sins, and confession of faith); 2. the affrighting of sinful consciences; 3. the exclusion of the wicked; 4. the celebration of the pardon and the establishment of believers; 5. the determining of the future path; 6. the restoration of the erring.—The self-exaltation with which Peter goes forth after the Supper, is a sign that he had not yet properly understood it.—Peter, before and after the Supper, and during its progress; pointing to a mistaking of the Supper in its symbolic import.—The disciples forget too soon after Judas’ departure how much they have in common with him.—The consciousness of success, with which the Lord looks to the coming season of the perfect reunion of His disciples and Himself, being fully assured that all their temptations and conflicts could not prevent this result.
Hedinger:—At the approach of death, life-endangering perils, and other misfortunes, God’s word and sacrament are the best anointing and refreshment. Happy is he who consecrates his room to Jesus as a household church, or entertains Him oft in His poor members.—If we hazard all to obey God, we shall find it as the Lord hath promised before.—Osiander:—Who serves, believes, and obeys Christ, shall be deceived in nothing.—Canstein:—Whosoever receives the holy Supper aright, receives in it an assurance of the coming eternal glory.—Osiander:—In suffering and trouble look at redemption.—He will not break the bruised reed. So gracious is Jesus, that he promises consolation to, and addresses in the language of promise, even the stumbling disciples.—Hedinger:—He who relies too much on self, is building on sand.—Whosoever in a deliberative assembly introduces anything evil, may easily (in a greater or less degree) bring all the others over to his own side, so that they all express the same views.
Braune:—If amongst His friends there was a secret foe, there were many secret friends amongst His foes.—The traitor proceeds to complete his transgression, and Jesus proceeds to the institution of the sacrament of the Atonement.—Ignatius:—The Supper is a remedy bringing immortal life, an antidote to death.—Mark, who was most intimate with Peter, gives Jesus’ words thus: Before the cock crow twice, thou wilt thrice deny Me. The third part of the night, from twelve to three, was called the cock-crowing: before this should end, Peter would have thrice denied the Lord.
Brieger:—In the Passover, Christ is shadowed forth from every side. According to the law, the paschal lamb must be set apart on the tenth day of the month Nisan. And upon the tenth of this month, upon the so-called Palm Sunday, Christ made His triumphal entry, etc. (Add to this, that Jesus died about the ninth hour, almost the time when the paschal lamb was usually slain; that all the people put Him to death, as every head of a family slew a lamb; that the roasting-spit for the lamb had the form of a cross; that no bone of the lamb should be broken.)—How precious the promise, that He, as the Risen One, should go before them into Galilee! But they have ears for nothing. They regard only that word which charges them so hardly, and so deeply wounds. The Apostles were now occupied so entirely with themselves, that they were unmoved by what was immediately to befall their Lord.—However, if they had not observed the statement that the sword should fall on Him, they could not have had regard to the promise of His resurrection.—Gossner:—Christ can raise the hymn of praise, although He knows His disciples are about to betray Him, etc. We must not be restrained from praising God because of anything.—Bauer:—His body, His blood; that is, receive His life.
Footnotes:
[7]Mar_14:19.—Καὶ ἄλλος, μήτι ἐγώ; omitted by B., C., L., Versions, Vulgate, &c.; probably because the words were deemed superfluous, and that the construction was inadmissible. (We suppose εἶς to be supplied with the first μήτι ἐγώ.)
[8]Mar_14:20.—The evidence against ἀποκριθείς is quite conclusive; [rejected by Lachmann, Tischendorf.]
[9][Mar_14:20.—Lachmann, after A. and Versions, reads τὴν χεῖρα after εμοῦ.]
[10][Mar_14:22.—‘O Ἰησοῦς is wanting in B., D., Versions; bracketed by Lachmann; rejected by Tischendorf.]
[11]Mar_14:22.—Φάγετε must be struck out, on the authority of A., B., C., &c.
[12]Mar_14:24.—Καινῆς is wanting in B., C., D., L., &c. Tischendorf rejects it, but it is retained by Lachmann. The uncertainty of the reading even in Matthew excites suspicion, that the Pauline tradition gave rise to it; for “the blood of the testament [covenant]” can mean nothing else than “of the new testament.”
[13][Mar_14:27.—’Εν ἐμοὶ ἐν τῇ νυκτὶ ταύτῃ. B., C.*, D. want these words. A. has them. Lachmann retains ἐν ἐμοὶ, and brackets ἐν τῇ νυκτὶ ταύτῃ.]
[14][Mar_14:31.—B., D., L., Lachmann, Tischendorf read ἐλάλει for ἔλεγε.]
[15][Mar_14:31.—B., C., D., L. want μᾶλλον; Lachmann, Tischendorf omit it.]
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain § 121. — PREPARATION FOR THE PASSOVER, Mar_14:12-16.
§ 121. — PREPARATION FOR THE PASSOVER, Mar_14:12-16.
(See notes on Mat_26:17-19.)
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 12–16. Preparations for the Last Supper
12–16. Preparations for the Last Supper
12. the first day of unleavened bread] Wednesday in Passion week would seem to have been spent by our Lord in deep seclusion at Bethany preparing Himself for the awfulness of the coming struggle, and is hidden by a veil of holy silence. That night He slept at Bethany for the last time on earth. “On the Thursday morning He awoke never to sleep again.” Farrar, Life, ii. p. 275.
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when they killed the passover] i. e. the Paschal victim. Comp. Luk_22:7, “when the Passover must be killed;” 1Co_5:7, “Christ our Passover (= Paschal Lamb) is sacrificed for us.” The name of the Passover, in Hebrew Pesach, and in Aramæan and Greek Pascha, is derived from a root which means to “step over,” or to “overleap,” and thus points back to the historical origin of the Festival. “And when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I smite the land of Egypt” (Exo_12:13).
Where wilt thou] On this Thursday morning the disciples came to our Lord for instructions as to the Passover. They may have expected, considering the complete seclusion of Wednesday, that He would eat it at Bethany, for “the village was reckoned as regards religious purposes part of Jerusalem by the Rabbis, and the Lamb might be eaten there, though it must be killed at the Temple.” Lightfoot, Hor. Heb.
that we go and prepare] The lamb had, we may believe, already been bought on the tenth of Nisan, according to the rule of the Law (Exo_12:3), the very day on which He, the true Paschal Lamb, entered Jerusalem in meek triumph.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (12-21) And the first day of unleavened bread.—See Notes…
(12-21) And the first day of unleavened bread.—See Notes on Mat_26:20-25.
When they killed the passover.—Better, when they used to sacrifice; the Greek tense implying a custom. Here, again, both St. Mark and St. Luke write as explaining the custom for their Gentile readers.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain And on the first day of unleavened bread, when…
And on the first day of unleavened bread, when they sacrificed the passover, his disciples said unto him, Where wilt thou that we go and make ready that thou mayest eat the passover? The first day of unleavened bread would begin on the evening of the Thursday (the 14th day of the month Nisan). Where wilt thou that we prepare? They do not inquire in what city or town. The Passover could not be sacrificed anywhere but in Jerusalem. The question was in what house it was to be prepared.
Vers. 12-26. The Paschal supper.
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The Lord"s Supper is a distinctively Christian ordinance. Yet this record shows us that it was our Lord"s design that it should be linked on to an observance with which his disciples were already familiar. He thus took advantage of a principle in human nature, and connected the associations and recollections which to the Hebrew mind were most sacred, with what was to be one of the holiest and most pathetic engagements of his people throughout all time.
I THE OCCASION AND CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE INSTITUTION OF THE LORD"S SUPPER,
1. The place in which this festival was first celebrated was provided by willing friendship. The circumstantial narrative points to the high probability that some wealthy friend of the Lord Jesus placed the guest-chamber of his house at Jerusalem at the disposal of the Master whom he honored. There was something very appropriate in the consecration in this manner of the offices of human love.
2. The time is very instructive and pathetic. It was evening; it was the last evening of rest and peace our Lord should enjoy; it was the evening which preceded the day of his sacrifice.
3. The company consisted of the twelve favored companions of Jesus. Judas was at the meal, but retired before the institution of the Eucharist. How sacred and congenial a gathering! How sweet and touching this calm which came before the bursting of the storm!
4. The occasion was the observance of the Paschal meal. Thus the light of the Hebrew Passover was shed upon the Christian sacrament and Eucharist. Thus it was suggested to the apostle that "Christ our Passover was slain for us.
II THE TROUBLE WHICH SADDENED THE SUPPER. Evidently this made a deep impression upon all who took part in the meal. They saw that their Master was distressed, and they felt with him the touching sorrow. The treachery of Judas was known to him who needed not to be told what was in man. The grief which weighed down the heart of the Lord was communicated by him to all the sympathizing members of the group. The sin which was bringing Jesus to the cross was gathered up and made visible and palpable in the conduct of the traitor. And the sensitive nature of our High Priest was affected and oppressed by it.
III THE SPIRITUAL IMPORT OF THE SUPPER.
1. It was a commemoration of the Lord"s sufferings and death. The broken bread was intended to keep in perpetual memory the body which was broken; the wine poured out to recall to Christian hearts throughout all time the blood which was shed.
2. It was a symbol. Here is the explanation of the Lord"s own words concerning eating the flesh and drinking the blood of the Son of man. Thus are we taught and helped to feed on him by faith who is the Bread of life.
3. THE PROPHECY AND PROMISE OF THE SUPPER. It had a first chief bearing upon the past, yet it pointed on to the future; it prefigured the marriage supper of the Lamb. In the kingdom of God the heavenly wine should be quaffed; in the upper temple the plaintive hymn of the sacrament should be exchanged for the triumphal anthem of the glorified, immortal host and choir.
APPLICATION.
1. The blood was shed for many; have we shown our consciousness that it was shed for us?
2. Let every communicant tremble lest he betray the Lord, and ask with concern and contrition, "Lord, is it I?
Vers. 12-16. Preparing for the Passover.
The festival of "unleavened cakes," or "unleavened bread," commenced on the night of the 14th of Abib or Nisan (Exo_12:16) after sunset; that day, corresponding to our 16th of March, was therefore popularly called the first of the festival, because it was the preparation day for it. This preparation of the Passover, i.e. the killing of the lamb, etc., had to take place between three and six o"clock, the ninth and twelfth hours of the solar day. "Sacrificed," or "killed," has the force of "accustomed to sacrifice or kill." The room was to be "furnished," literally "strewn," i.e. the tables and couches were to be laid; and it was to be ready, i.e. cleansed, etc., in conformity with ceremonial purifications. A considerable amount of work had to be carefully gone through ere all things would be ready. The lamb, unleavened bread, bitter herbs, wine, and "conserve of sweet fruits," had to be purchased; the lamb had to be slain by the officiating priest in the temple; and then it had to be roasted with the herbs. From the circumstances connected with this preparation in the case of Christ and his disciples we see
I THE REPRESENTATIVE HEADSHIP OF CHRIST. The disciples looked to him for direction. They spoke of him, and not themselves severally, as being about to observe the Passover, which indicated, not that they themselves were not going to observe it, but that they ranged themselves under him as constituting, so to speak, his household That they should have to seek his direction at the last was no proof of carelessness, but only of habitual dependence upon him; and it pathetically suggested how closely their circumstances corresponded with the typical character of the first celebrants, who as strangers and sojourners partook of the hasty feast. Fittingly enough, he who sought at birth the shelter of an inn, goes to such a place to observe the Passover with his disciples, in a separate and distinct capacity from that of any other household in Israel. They were to ask, "Where is my guest-chamber?" it was he who was to entertain.
II His REGARD FOR THE OBSERVANCES AND INSTITUTIONS OF THE LAW. This is shown in the careful attention he gave to the details of the feast. Whether the arrangements made were due to the exercise of supernatural foresight, or merely to the natural forethought and human care of Christ, it is impossible to determine. In the former case, the "man bearing a pitcher of water," who was to meet them, would be indicated as a Divine token; in the latter, the man would be simply arranged for with the master or "goodman" of the hostelry. Either way, the feast was really prepared for by Christ, and no regulation was neglected. When the poverty, homelessness, and personal danger of the Savior are remembered, his observance of the Passover will be seen to possess an emphasis and intention quite special.
III THE CONTINUITY IN WHICH THE "LORD"S SUPPER" STANDS. It was a "moment" or stage of the Paschal feast, and therefore a portion of the same celebration. Doubtless the feast would be protracted, or at any rate the actual eating of the lamb would be distinguished in time from the partaking of the bread and wine, which came a little later, as a new commencement after Judas had withdrawn at the bidding of the Master. In this way the retrospective character of the eating and drinking is quite natural. The two great feasts of Judaism and Christianity are thus vitally connected, the new celebration being a survival of the old one, and a perpetuation of its spiritual meaning. In such instances do we see the continuity of essential ideas, observances, and institutions throughout the varying phases and progressive stages of religious development.
IV THE SPIRITUAL PREPARATION OF CHRIST FOR THAT WHICH THE PASSOVER SYMBOLIZED. It is just in the attention to these minute details, paid by One to whom in general the "spirit" was ever of so much more consequence than the "letter," that the inward preparedness of the Savior is suggested for his great sacrifice. The whole typology of the sacred festival had been spiritually realized by him, and its connection with his own death. In Matthew"s Gospel this foreboding consciousness of doom, elevated into a higher mood by spiritual willinghood, is expressed: "The Master saith, My time is at hand," etc. M.
The Passover.
The Passover was by far the most important of the Jewish feasts. The disciples of our Lord were sure that he, who ever fulfilled the righteousness of the Law, would not fail to observe it. Their reminder of what they supposed he had forgotten, but which really was the subject of far profounder thought with him than they could fathom, immediately led to the remarkable incidents which are here recorded the strange provision of the feast by a secret disciple, and the spiritual institution which Christ founded on the ancient rite. There were truths set forth by the Mosaic festival of which the Jews were never to lose sight, and which are full of significance to us. A few of these we will recall.
I THE PASSOVER REQUIRED A SPOTLESS VICTIM. In this, as in many other Jewish ordinances, the spiritual was represented by the visible. The victim might be chosen from the goats or from the sheep. (Kids were offered as late as Josiah"s reign, (2Ch_35:7) although in our Lord"s time only lambs were sacrificed.) This was of less consequence than the rule that the victim chosen should be "without blemish." Not deformed, sickly, or injured.
1. Doubtless this taught the worshippers to offer their best, and do so cheerfully, with humble acknowledgment of the Divine right. The Jews learnt the lesson. Their religion cost them something, and they nobly responded to its claims, as we see when the tabernacle was erected and when the temple was built. Christians, in their gifts and in services, too often act as the Israelites would have done had they chosen their blemished and sickly lambs for sacrifice.
2. Besides, this provision was significant of the sacred purpose to which the victim was devoted, and symbolical of the moral integrity of the person it represented. The male of the first year, in the fullness of its life, stood for the firstborn sons of Israel, who were spared, while it died.
3. Nor does this exhaust the meaning. The spotless lamb points to him of whom John Baptist said, "Behold the Lamb of God! to him who "offered up himself;" to him of whom we read, "Ye are not redeemed with corruptible things... but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish, and without spot.
II THE PASSOVER REQUIRED PERSONAL PARTICIPATION. It might have seemed to human wisdom hardly reasonable that deliverance from a pestilence should be the result of sprinkling the blood of a slaughtered lamb on the two side posts and lintel of the door; but he would have suffered the penalty of his rashness who had run the risk of his incredulity. Every saved household had its own lamb, and every saved one in that household was compelled to remain, for his safety, in the blood-sprinkled house. This arrangement, on the basis of family relationship, was not made so much for convenience as it was to sanction and sanctify home life, and to teach all who were united by earthly love to find their center in the Paschal lamb. The Israelites were not saved because they were descended from Abraham, but because of the blood sprinkled in faith and obedience.
III THE PASSOVER WAS TO BE ACCOMPANIED BY PENITENCE AND SINCERITY.
1. The use of unleavened bread was ordained. Leaven, the presence of which was strictly forbidden, was a symbol of moral corruption, which the people were to put away from their hearts. Christ Jesus warned his disciples against "the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy." St. Paul, (1Co_5:7, 1Co_5:8) referring to evil in the Church, said, "Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us: therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth." More than anything else our Lord rebuked insincerity. As the King of truth he still says, "He that is of the truth heareth my voice.
2. Bitter herbs were also to be eaten at the Passover. Not because ahoy would give flavor to sweeter food, nor as a mere accompaniment to it, but as an essential part of the feast. The bitter bondage of Egypt was thereby represented, which was overpowered by the sweetness of the lamb. It may symbolize the bitter sorrow with which we should mourn our guilt.
IV THE PASSOVER WAS A SOURCE OF PEACE, A PLEDGE OF PROGRESS.
1. The Israelites in Egypt knew that judgment was falling around them, and in that ominous dreadful night the peace of each one was proportioned to his trust in the appointed means of deliverance.
2. Those who partook of the feast were prepared for the march through the Red Sea and the wilderness, until Canaan was reached and won. A.R.
Vers. 12-16, 22-26. The Lord"s Supper.
During the process of the betrayal, the "first day of unleavened bread" came round, and "the Master," with "his disciples" in "a large upper room furnished and ready," sat and together partook of the Passover. It was the last time. The long series of observances begun in Egypt had now come to an end. Before the next year should bring round the time of the Passover, it would be "fulfilled in the kingdom of God." A deeper and wider meaning would be given to it. Another Lamb would be slain, whose blood, sprinkled by faith, would cleanse the "conscience from dead works." New symbols would supplant the old, by means of which the Lord"s death should be showed forth until his coming again. The simplicity of the newly appointed ordinance stands in marked contrast to all the elaborate rites of the earlier service, and to the scarcely less elaborate forms of the extreme schools of the Christian Church.
I THE ELEMENTS. Taking up the common articles of their daily food, he made them symbolize himself. The "bread" his "body;" the "wine" his "blood." Anything more simple could not have been conceived, anything more ready-at-hand, more truly universal. At the same time, he glorified that food by making it to represent, to memorialize, himself his body given and his blood shed, through which spiritual life and nourishment were secured for them. Thus materials and spirituals are united; and a portion of our daily food may be taken in remembrance of him who gives life to the world, and "feeds the strength of every saint.
II THE REPRESENTATION. To the simple "This is my body" of St. Mark, St. Luke adds, "which is given for you given up unto death on your behalf. He who "gave himself his entire personality for our sins, gave his body "unto death, yea, the death of the cross." This is the sacrifice offered "once for all," "when he offered up himself." The blood represents, he says, "my blood of the covenant;" or, in St. Luke"s words, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood, even that which is poured out for you." It is "shed for many unto remission of sins." Both are to be taken with the impressive and tenderly touching words, "This do in remembrance of me.
III THE COMMAND. "Take ye;" "Take, eat;" "Drink ye all of it;" "This do in remembrance of me;" "This do, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me." With these words our Lord enjoins on his disciples the observance of this simple, central Christian rite; and they form the warrant for the observance of the Lord"s Supper. Gathering together the several words of direct and indirect reference to this Christian service, we see how it is the center from which radiate many lines of relation to the entire circle of the Christian life.
1. It is an affectionate memorial service, bringing to remembrance the entire self-devotion of the Redeemer remembrance of me." It calls up all that the one word me represents, with an especial allusion to the supreme act of self-immolation, "I lay down my life.
2. It is a covenant service. He who drinks of the cup places himself under the bonds of the new covenant, and receives at the same time the seal of the certain inheritance of all covenant blessings. (see Heb_8:6-12)
3. It is a service of communion. It symbolizes our joint participation with the whole body of Christ. (1Co_10:14-17) It. declares the perfect oneness of the Church of Christ: "We, who are many are one bread, one body;" and it affirms our perfect community of interest: we "all eat the same spiritual meat;" we "all drink the same spiritual drink.
4. It is at once a service of lowly confession and humble faith, of exulting hope often as ye eat this bread, and drink the cup, ye proclaim the Lord"s death till he come of brotherly love. It is to the believer the pledge of all blessing and help; while from him it is the pledge of all obedience. And the Eucharistic song speaks of the life, the fellowship, and the joy of heaven. G.
Vers. 12-21. The Paschal supper.
I THE DUTIFUL MIND IS THE CLEAR-SEEING AND THE PREPARED MIND. What struck the evangelists was the calm foresight and method of Jesus. It was like the strategy of a general; the presence of mind of one who holds the clue to events, because he knows the moral sequence. On another occasion "Jesus himself knew what he would do." Here the disciples "found even as he told them." So generally, "everything will be found as Jesus has declared.
II THE PUREST SOCIETY IS NOT FREE FROM AN IMPURE LEAVEN. A Judas among the twelve; and an incipient Judas in the conscience of the rest. Better for us, instead of looking round for the Judas, to look into the heart to discover how much of Judas is there.
III THERE MAY BE A COINCIDENCE OF]DIVINE APPOINTMENT AND HUMAN GUILT IN THE SAME ACT. It is in the law of things that the good should suffer from human violence. But it is not in the law of things that any man should take part in that violence. We may not be able to seize the secret unity of principle behind the seeming contradiction of the knowledge of God and the responsibility of man. But the latter is our fact, clear and definite. The former is of the "secret things that belong to the Lord our God. J.
Vers. 12-17, 22-25. Parallel passages: Mat_26:17-19, 26-29 Luk_22:7-13, Luk_22:19, 20 1Co_11:23-34. The old dispensation merging in the new.
I THE PASSOVER AND THE INSTITUTION OF THE SUPPER.
1. Comparison of the records. The memorial Passover differed from the Egyptian or original Passover in several points. A still greater change is now made. The substance now takes the place of the symbol. The antitype supersedes the type. The true Paschal Lamb Christ our Passover, about to be sacrificed for us being come, the Jewish Paschal lamb disappears. The unleavened cakes and wine, formerly only secondary and subordinate, now become the primary and principal elements of the feast, as representing the body and blood of the Lamb to be slain. The idea of Christ"s sacrificial death, previously intimated with more or less clearness, is now fully exhibited. In the fact of the particulars being foretold there is a close resemblance to that prediction which preceded the triumphal entry. The record of the Lord"s Supper is fourfold. It is, recorded by three evangelists and by one apostle. These are the evangelists Matthew, Mark, and Luke; with Paul, the apostle of the Gentiles. Some points are brought out more fully or distinctly in one, and some in another, of these; accordingly, a brief comparison of their respective records with each other helps to a better understanding of the whole.
(1) Instead of "blessed," used by St. Matthew and St. Mark, St. Luke and St. Paul employ the expression, "gave thanks.
(2) In addition to the statement of "This is my body," found in St. Matthew and St. Mark, St. Luke and St. Paul give an explanation, the former adding, "which is given for you;" the latter, "which is broken for you;" while both enforce it by the suitable exhortation, "This do in remembrance of me.
(3) St. Luke and St. Paul append a note of time supper," or "when he had supped.
(4) Whereas
(a) St. Matthew and St. Mark say simply, "This is my blood of the new testament, St. Luke and St. Paul introduce the word "cup," and alter the arrangement of the sentence, in this way rendering the whole clause clearer and more explicit; thus, "This cup is the new testament more correctly " covenant," Revised Version in my blood." Mark alone
(b) supplements the accounts of the other evangelists by stating the fact, "They all drank of it.
(5) St. Matthew and St. Mark have, "shed for many," using the preposition peri equivalent to in behalf of, or for the benefit of; but St. Luke has "shed for you," employing uper which, from the idea of superposition, covering, defense, or protection, may mean in the stead, or place, or room of, and so conveying the idea of substitution, though not so distinctly and definitely as anti .
(6) St. Matthew alone points out the purpose in the expressive words "for the remission of sins.
(7) It is also to be noted that the original word for "shed" is ekcunomenon , a present participle passive, and so signifying literally being shed, as though the sufferings were already begun, the passion entered on, and the sacrifice commenced. These four records of the inspired penmen, each writing from his own standpoint, but all under the direction of the Holy Spirit, furnish a full exhibition of this ordinance in its different aspects; while they impress us with its solemnity and sacredness, deepening the interest we should take in it and the importance to be attached to it. Besides, there is usually this difference between the record of the same fact or truth when presented in a Gospel and then in an Epistle, that the record of the former is historical, that of the latter doctrinal; the former contains the plain narrative, the latter its practical application; the concise enunciation of the former finds its complete development in the latter; the direct statement of the Gospel is commented on or treated somewhat controversially in the Epistle.
2. The Author of this ordinance. The Lord Jesus Christ is the Author of this solemn institution; both evangelist and apostle refer its appointment to him. He is sole King and Head of his Church. His kingship is the result of a Divine decree. "I have set my King," says Jehovah, "on my holy hill of Zion." The government, both legislative and executive, is in his hand, as the prophet had foretold, "and the government shall be upon his shoulders." He is also "Head over all things to the Church." Not only so; this ordinance in particular is his special appointment, for it is the memorial of his death, and keeps the memory of his dying love green in the Christian"s soul. To him, therefore, we owe its institution, the manner of its observance, the time of its continuance, and the persons admissible to its enjoyment. Nor is there any ordinance more closely identified with the Savior than this ordinance of the Supper. He is its "all in all," its Alpha and Omega. The words are his, and speak of him; the symbols are his, and point to him; the blessings embodied are his, being the purchase of his blood; the praise is his, for "unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood,... to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever." The new covenant, with all its benefits, present and prospective, is his, for he ratified it.
3. Abuses. Little more than a quarter of a century had elapsed when human abuses were beginning to overlay this holy ordinance in the Church of Corinth, so common is it for man to leave an impure print on all his hand doth touch. A reformation of the holy rite had become necessary, and a republication followed. The abuses removed, and the ordinance restored to its original simplicity and sanctity, St. Paul received it by revelation, and republished it in his First Epistle to the Corinthian Church, as he says, "For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you." With this fresh publication of it, we have a fuller exposition of its nature, and increased obligation for its observance; while it is restamped, as it were, with the seal, and resanctioned by the signature of the Church"s Head.
4. The time of its appointment. The time of its appointment was "the same night in which he was betrayed." This of itself, apart from all other evidence, is proof positive that Jesus was more than man. It was the night when the Jewish Sanhedrim concerted measures for his apprehension; when chief priests and scribes and rulers were planning his condemnation and plotting his death; the night when one of his own disciples played the part of traitor and betrayed him into the hands of his deadliest foes; when another disciple denied him, and all forsook him; the night when he was to be delivered to his persecutors to their malice and mockery and the worst tortures that their malevolence could devise. on that night, when doom"d to know The eager rage of every foe, That night in which he was betray"d, The Savior of the world took bread. It was the eve of his crucifixion; nor were the events of the coming morrow unknown to him. From the unrelenting hatred of his enemies, and the steady purpose of their persecuting fury, he might have anticipated them; he might, without much risk of error, have forecast them. But with him it was no forecasting of probabilities; he clearly foresaw all, and consequently in a measure foretasted all. Had he been a weak mortal and nothing more, the certainly approaching danger and disaster must have occupied his thoughts and oppressed him with grief. In this case he would have been insensible to the wants, and incapable of administering to the comforts, of others; he would have been too much occupied with himself and his own position to spare any thought for the concerns, or make any provision for the consolation, of his friends. On the contrary, instead of concentrating his thoughts on himself and the crisis just at hand, his thoughts were engrossed with his followers then, thenceforth, and onward for ages yet to come. All his thoughts, all his feelings, all his sympathies, were enlisted on the side of his disciples, and exercised for their benefit. The self-abnegation that had characterized the whole course of his life became yet more conspicuous, if that were possible, at the period when he came within measurable distance of death and dissolution. Self was absolutely lost sight of, the interests of his people bulked so largely that they occupied the whole field of vision.
5. A comparison. A comparison has frequently been instituted between the life and teaching of the Savior and Socrates-between the Prince of peace and the prince of pagan philosophers. Their respective sentiments on the eve of execution may for a moment be compared, or rather contrusted, here. On the part of Socrates we find a sort of posthumous ambition, present doubt, and practical indifference. There was posthumous ambition; for he allowed his vanity to be flattered by reckoning on the praises of posterity, and referred, with a feeling half of self-gratulation and half akin to revenge, to the false position in which his death would be sure to place his enemies, and especially his accusers. There was present doubt; for beautifully as he reasoned on the subject of immortality and a future state on previous occasions, now, in the presence of the great change, he doubted whether he himself or his friend Crito, who was to survive him, were likely to fare better. There was practical indifference; for the interests of his family and the upbringing of his children appear to have cost him little or no concern. With our Lord, on the other hand, there was no borrowing of comfort from the praises of posterity; his chief concern was for the well-being of posterity. There was no shadow of a cloud upon futurity; all was bright and blissful there. There was, instead of indifference, the deepest and most absorbing concern for the spiritual well-being and everlasting welfare of his friends and followers through all coming time. Far be it from us to undervalue the sage of Athens he was one of the lights of heathendom; but we find him to the last human, intensely human; while Jesus was both Divine and human unmistakably Divine, and yet truly human.
6. Use of monuments. Monuments draw attention to the facts of history and to the incidents of biography. How many thousands there are who would never have heard of Nelson, or Wilberforce, or Wellington; or who would have remained ignorant of their great achievements, and of the stirring times in which they lived, were it not for the monuments erected to their memory! How many have had their minds directed by some monument or other memorial to the life and times of men of whom otherwise they would never have heard even the names, or studied the history, or reflected on the lives however eventful! Thus it is, in a higher sense, with the institution of the Supper; it is a monument to Christ, and helps to keep up the remembrance of him, which would else have been more or less forgotten. It reminds men of his death, and shall continue to do so till he come again; it reminds us of the debt of obedience we owe to his dying command, "Do this in remembrance of me;" it reminds us, too, of a day when he will come "to be glorified in his saints, and admired in all them that believe.
II THE NATURE OF THE ORDINANCE. A sacrament, not a sacrifice. The Lord"s Supper is a sacrament, not a sacrifice. We reject and reprobate the teaching of those who regard the bread and wine in the Lord"s Supper as a sacrifice the so-called sacrifice of the Mass or the offering up of the bread and wine converted into the flesh and blood of Christ; and who represent it as a bloodless, yet true, proper, and propitiatory sacrifice for both the living and the dead. Nothing could be more contrary to or contradictory of the Word of God. In forming a correct notion of this ordinance, of which the passage before us contains the institution, it may be helpful to clear away the rubbish which, in the course of time, accumulated round it. In doing so it may be well to state what it is not, and then what it is to exhibit the negative side of this sacrament, and then the positive.
1. In the first place, then, we reject the doctrine of transubstantiation held by the Latin Church. This doctrine, first formulated by the Abbot of Corbey, Paschasius Radbert, in the beginning of the ninth century, first denominated transubstantiation by Hildebert of Tours in the beginning of the twelfth century, and made an article of faith by the Lateran Council in the beginning of the thirteenth century, means the conversion or change of the elements of bread and wine into the real body and blood of our Lord. We repudiate this dogma
(1) as opposed to Scripture; for St. Paul calls the elements after blessing by the same name as before, saying, "For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup;" thus they are still bread and wine as much and the same as ever. It is
(2) contradicted by the evidence of the senses; for handle them, and they remain the same; taste them, they are the same; smell them, they are the same; they are still bread and wine, with all their sensible qualities or accidents, as they are called, unchanged. Now, the testimony of the senses ranks the highest the testimony of the most credible witnesses cannot overthrow it, and to refuse the information of the senses overturns the certainty of all knowledge; while one of the acknowledged tests of Scripture miracles is an appeal to the senses. It may fairly be admitted that one single sense may, under certain circumstances, err, but it can be corrected by the others; whereas all the senses together cannot and do not err. It is
(3) repugnant to reason, which convinces us that the material body of Christ cannot possibly be in heaven and on earth at the same moment; that is, at the right hand of the Majesty on high and on thousands of earthly altars at the same time. In this case the flesh and blood of Christ would be present, while their sensible qualities are absent; on the contrary, the sensible qualities of bread and wine would be present, while those substances themselves are absent. Thus we should have the subject without the accidents in the one case, and the accidents without the substance in the other. But this is palpably absurd, for substances are known by their qualities, and qualities do not exist apart from their substances. Once more,
(4) this dogma is derogatory to the sacrifice of Christ that great sacrifice offered once for all and forever, because it represents it as needing continuous repetition in the so-called sacrifice of the altar. Moreover,
(5) it destroys the very nature of a sacrament, for every sacrament necessarily consists of two parts, a sign and a thing signified outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace;" in other words, a sensible object and certain spiritual blessings set forth and sealed by that object. But transubstantiation does away with the sign altogether, and puts the thing signified in its place. We reject the doctrine of transubstantiation, then, because of the absurdities it involves, as also because of the superstitions connected with it, and the idolatrous practices engrafted on it.
2. In the second place, we reject the Lutheran doctrine of consubstantiation, which teaches that though the substance of the elements is not changed, yet the body and blood of Christ are mysteriously but really and corporeally present in, with, and under the elements, and are received corporeally with the mouth by communicants along with the symbols. Though this opinion is rather speculative than otherwise, though it does not convert the sacrament into a sacrifice, though it does not lead to the adoration of the elements, and though it does not impart to the sacrament a physical virtue apart from the dispositions of the recipient, yet it involves several grave difficulties. It necessitates a literal interpretation of the words of institution, and so a substantial presence of the body and blood of Christ in this sacrament. The Lutherans are at pains to define this presence. It was not a change of one substance into another (metousia ), nor the mixing of one substance with another (sunousia), nor the inclusion of one substance in another (enousia), nor the absence of substance (apousia); but the real coexistence or presence (parousia ) of the one substance with the other, that is, the earthly with the heavenly. For this purpose, however, a communication of properties is requisite, so that the humanity of Christ shares the omnipresence of his divinity. The Lutheran doctrine, it is true, makes the ubiquitous presence of the body of Christ unique and peculiar to the Lord"s Supper. It is further alleged that the humanity of Christ is at the right hand of God, and that the right hand of God is everywhere; therefore Christ, as to his humanity, is everywhere present. It is plain, however, that this omnipresence of the flesh and blood of Christ in the sacrament of the Supper is contrary to the nature of a body, and thus self-contradictory. Besides, this omnipresence of the body and blood of our Lord would imply their presence in every ordinary meal as well as in the Lord"s Supper. Neither is it a sufficient or at all satisfactory answer to this to say, as Lutherans do, that omnipresence in this case means no more than accessibility, that is, the fact of being everywhere given, for the body and blood, if thus given and received everywhere, would be everywhere operative.
3. In the third place, we do not agree with the Zwinglians, including Zwingle himself, Carlstadt, Myconius, Bucer, Bullinger, and the reformers of Zurich, who went to the opposite extreme from the Lutherans. They regarded the elements as signs or symbols, and nothing else and nothing more; these they held to be memorials of the absent body of our Lord. The tendency of the Zwinglian doctrine was to lessen the efficacy and lower the character of this sacrament. Looking upon the elements as mere signs, viewing them as memorials and not means of grace, denying the special presence of the Savior, they made the sacrament of the Supper little, if anything, more than a bare act of commemoration or a mere badge of profession. And so it happens that the doctrine of the Supper, as set forth by Zwingle himself, is that still held by Remonstrants and Socinians to the present day. Here we are reminded of the memorable conference that once took place on this subject. For a full account of the discussion, the district where it was held, and the disputants on the occasion, we must refer the reader to the description by D"Aubigne, which, as usual, is at once picturesque and instructive. We can only notice the fact in its bearing on the subject of the Supper. On an eminence overlooking the city of Marburg stands an ancient castle. Away in the distance sweeps the lovely valley of the Lahn. Further still, the mountain-tops rise one above another till they are lost in the clouds or disappear in the remote horizon. In that old castle was an antique chamber, with vaulted roof and Gothic arches. It was called the Knight"s Hall. There, more than three centuries and a half ago, a conflict took place, not with carnal weapons, but intellectual and spiritual. Princes, nobles, deputies, and theologians were there. The combatants were the mighty Luther and the mild Melancthon on the one side, with the magnanimous Zwingle and the meek OEcolampadius on the other. It was this very subject that formed the ground of debate. Luther held by the literal sense, dogmatically repeating "This is my body," while his opponents urged the necessity of taking the words figuratively. And here, in passing, it may be observed that much as both Romanists and Lutherans insist on the literal sense of the words, they are figurative even according to their interpretation. As used by the Romanists they are an instance of the figure synecdoche, as used by Lutherans they are a metonymy, while as used by Protestants in general they are admitted to be metaphorical.
4. Now, in the fourth place, and in opposition to all these, we give in our adhesion to the creed of the great majority of the Reformed Churches on this doctrine. Here it is necessary to bear in mind that, among the Reformed themselves, Zwingle occupied one pole, Calvin held the opposite, while the form of the doctrine ultimately agreed on and acquiesced in by the great body of Reformed communions was intermediate. Zwingle"s view, as already seen, made the sacrament of the Supper symbolical and commemorative, reducing it to a mere sign; Calvin, on the other hand, held that believers receive an emanation or supernatural influence from the glorified body of Christ in heaven. The illustration he employed made his meaning plain: it was to this effect, that the sun is absent and distant from us in the heavens, but his light and heat are present with us and enjoyed by us on earth. The Reformed, however, maintained that believers received the sacrificial virtue of Christ"s atoning death. Eventually the Consensus Ligurinus (1549 A.D.) was drawn up by Calvin. The immediate object was to harmonize the Zwinglians and Calvinists; but it accomplished much more than this. It embodies the doctrine of the Supper which is held by all.the Reformed Churches. The various Reformed Confessions are in harmony with it. The second Helvetic Confession and the Heidelberg Catechism, which constitute the doctrinal standards of the Reformed Churches of the Continent; the Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England; the Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechisms, are in full accord with it. The doctrine of these Churches and Confessions may be expressed in, or rather compressed into, the following brief statement, slightly modified from the Westminster Confession: body and blood of Christ are as really but spiritually present to the faith of believers in this ordinance as the elements themselves are to their outward senses." Hence it comes to pass that while we outwardly and visibly partake of the sensible signs, which are bread and wine, we inwardly and faithfully receive Christ and him crucified with all the benefits of his death. The real presence of Christ is enjoyed by his people in this sacrament; but that presence is not bodily, it is spiritual. His body broken and blood shed are present, not materially, but virtually; by this we mean that the beneficial effects of his sacrificial death upon the cross are conveyed to the faithful recipient. These benefits are received, not by the mouth, but by faith. The whole is made effectual by the Holy Spirit to our spiritual nourishment and growth in grace.
III THE DOCTRINES MADE VISIBLE BY THE SUPPER. Nature of a sermon. A sermon is intended to explain some doctrine, or enforce some duty, or both. The great object to be attained is the glory of God in Christ and the Christian"s good. The sacrament of the Sapper has often been compared to a sermon; but it is a sermon to the eye a visible sermon, if the expression be allowed. It is a sermon, too, that thus visibly sets forth several of the leading doctrines of our holy religion.
1. The first doctrine visibly exhibited in the Lord"s Supper is the Incarnation. The Incarnation, or Christ"s coming in the flesh, was the great event of the ages; for "when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman." "The everlasting Son of the Father," when he took upon him to deliver man, "did not abhor the Virgin"s womb;" and so, in the language of one of the Church"s creeds, he "was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary." Now, the bread symbolizing the body, and the wine the blood, both together set forth the body of flesh with the living fluid that circulates through it; and thus the elements of bread and wine teach the doctrine of the Incarnation, speaking to us the same language as the Evangelist John, when, in the first chapter of his Gospel, he tells us, at the first verse, that "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God;" and then adds, at the fourteenth verse, "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." The bread and wine, therefore, inculcate the same sacred truth as the inspired writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews, when he says, "Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same.
2. The second doctrine visibly taught in the Supper is that of the Atonement, or the setting-at-one of persons alienated. The parties in this case are God and men, the latter alienated, and enemies in their minds by wicked works, the carnal mind being enmity against God; while "the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men." This setting-at-one is the work of reconciliation, from which, however, atonement only differs as being the more comprehensive term, and including not only the reconciliation itself, but the means by which reconciliation is effected. The atonement, then, or those sufferings of the Savior by which reconciliation is accomplished, in other words, the bruising and breaking of Christ"s body and the shedding of his blood, are set forth visibly by breaking the bread and pouring out the wine in the Lord"s Supper. "Bread of the world, in mercy broken, Wine of the soul, in mercy shed, By whom the words of life were spoken, And in whose death our sins are dead; "Look on the heart by sorrow broken, Look on the tears by sinners shed; And be thy feast to us the token That by thy grace our souls are fed.
3. The third doctrine presented to the eye in the sacrament of the Supper is that of Faith, by which we feed on Christ to our spiritual nourishment and growth in grace. The exercise of faith on the Son of God is symbolized by our eating the bread and drinking the wine. These same acts of eating and drinking are employed by our Lord in the sixth chapter of John to symbolize and signify the exercise of faith. Thus he says in the chapter cited, "Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you;" and again, "Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day;" still further it is added, "He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him." Thus the most intimate fellowship with Christ, the closest union and communion with him, life spiritual here and everlasting hereafter, together with part in the resurrection of the just, are conditioned by and connected with that faith of which eating and drinking are the symbols. "Sweet feast of love Divine; "Tis grace that makes us free To feed upon this bread and wine, In memory, Lord, of thee. "Here conscience ends its strife, And faith delights to prove The sweetness of the bread of life, The fullness of thy love.
4. The fourth doctrine thus visibly taught in the Lord"s Supper is the Communion of saints. The word communion" implies our discharging some duty together (munus) doing something in common. At the Lord"s table we partake of bread in common and of wine in common the same bread and the same cup; and this common participation is a visible manifestation of the doctrine of the communion of saints. Hence the apostle says, "The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? For we being many are one bread, and one body: for we are all partakers of that one bread." This communion of saints is based on union to Christ. As branches, we are grafted into the living Vine, and thence draw life and strength and nourishment; as living stones, we are built up into a spiritual temple, the foundation being apostles and prophets, with Jesus Christ as the chief Corner-stone; as members of his mystical body, we are knit by joints and bands to him as the living Head. By virtue of this union of all true Christians with Christ, they have communion each with the other. We have common privileges, common benefits, common blessings, and common duties. We have hopes and fears in common, joys and sorrows in common, trials and triumphs in common; and all these not merely in connection with the same congregation or the same Christian communion, but to some extent "with all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours." Oh that Christians realized this more in their own souls, and exhibited it more in their lives, and manifested it more to the ungodly world around! Oh, when shall the great intercessory prayer be fulfilled: "That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me"! Oh, when will that proof of the divinity of our Lord"s mission be given to an unbelieving world and a misbelieving age! Oh, when shall the holy Church cease to be rent asunder by schisms, distressed by heresies, and oppressed by the scornful! "Elect from every nation, Yet one o"er all the earth, Her charter of salvation One Lord, one faith, one birth; One holy Name she blesses, Partakes one holy food, And to one hope she presses With every grace endued.
5. The fifth doctrine is that of the glorious second Advent that advent which the Church is looking for and hasting to. But this doctrine is presented in the communion, not visibly, but orally; not to the eye, but to the ear, in the words, "Ye do show the Lord"s death till he come.
IV THE SACRAMENTAL SIGNS; THEIR SIGNIFICANCE.
1. The sacramental elements. These are two in number bread for nourishment and wine for refreshment. One of these might serve the purpose; then why are two employed? Two are employed instead of one
(1) for assurance. Thus we read in relation to Pharaoh"s dream, "The dream is doubled to Pharaoh twice, because the thing is established by God, and God will shortly bring it to pass." In like manner the two signs show the certainty of the covenant and strengthen our faith in its provisions. Like the everlasting covenant made with David, well ordered in all things and sure, the promised blessings of the New Testament are firmly established, being "Yea and Amen in Christ Jesus." Their bestowal on the specified conditions is sure, soon, and certainly coming to pass. Again, they are
(2) for apprehension; that is, in order that they may be rightly and more readily apprehended. Thus two signs were granted to Moses, as it is written, "If they will not believe nor hearken to the voice of the first sign, they will believe the voice of the latter sign;" the reason assigned being the character of the Israelites, stiff-necked and hardhearted as they were. So God, because of our slowness of apprehension and hardness of heart, has added sign unto sign, mercifully accommodating himself to us, the frail and fallen children of men. But
(3) they imply abundance. While they quicken our faith and help us to a clearer view of Christ, they exhibit the plenitude of his resources, for "it pleased the Father that in him should all fullness dwell," and "in him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge," the ample supplies he has in store for our necessities, the full forgiveness and plenteous redemption that are found in him, the rich abundance of all needful gifts and necessary graces, as also the sufficient nourishment he bestows on us.
2. The sacramental actions. Some of these are performed by the administrator, others by the recipient. On the part of the former they are taking, blessing, breaking, and giving. The taking symbolizes the assumption of our nature, "the mystery of the holy incarnation." The blessing signifies separation from a common to a special purpose, from an ordinary to a sacred use, as also thanks-giving to God for the unspeakable gift of his Son, for the means of salvation thus made available, and for this solemn ordinance itself as a sign and seal of the benefits bestowed in a word, for all the mercies of his covenant, for all his love to our souls, for all his faithfulness to his promises, for all he has done, is doing, and has promised to do. The breaking is expressive of the breaking and bruising of his body; that is, the painful death on the cross, the pouring out of his life unto death, the making of his soul an offering for sin to satisfy Divine justice, to pacify Divine wrath, and purchase salvation for us. The giving denotes the gift of the Father, who "so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life;" the gift of the Son, of whom the believer can say, "He loved me, and gave himself for me;" every needful gift, for "he that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, shall he not with him also freely give us all things? the gift of all things, for "all things are yours, because ye are Christ"s, and Christ is God"s." The Christian"s inventory is as follows: or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come;" all are yours, because Christ is yours Christ, in the glory of his Godhead, in the dignity of his person, in the suitability of his offices, in the perfection of his work, in the sufficiency of his atonement, in the power of his resurrection, in the prevalency of his intercession, in the preciousness of his promises, in all the blessedness of his benefits; no benefit kept back, no blessing withheld, and no promise excepted. Thus he is "made of God to us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption;" and thus we are "complete in him." There are also sacramental actions on the part of the recipientstaking, eating and drinking, dividing. These also are significant. Our taking implies intelligent acceptance of Christ and cordial reception of him. We embrace him fully as he is offered freely. We take him in all the capacities pertaining to his person or identified with his work. We take him as our Teacher, to be taught to know and believe and do the truth; as our Sin-bearer, who bore our sins in his own body, suffering, the just for the unjust, to bring us to God; as our King, to rule in us and over us and for us. We take him as our Savior and Redeemer, the mighty One of Jacob, that we may be saved from the guilt and filth of Sin, from the pollution and power of sin, from the defilement and dominion of sin; we take him as "the Lord our Righteousness" and Strength; as the Beloved of our soul the chief among ten thousand in our esteem. We take his laws for our direction, his love for our consolation, his precepts to guide us, his promises to gladden us; his cross in time, his crown in eternity; for if we bear the cross now, we shall wear the crown hereafter. Thus St. Paul says, "God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ;" and again, "Henceforth is laid up for me a crown of glory, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give me at that day." By eating and drinking we understand the necessary application. Bread must be eaten in order to nourish, and wine drunk that it may refresh. The elements thus entering our bodies incorporate with our system and become part of our frame. As the application of Christ by faith unites us with Christ, so by this symbolic application of his body and blood that union becomes still closer.
By such sacramental action, too, we profess publicly our union with Christ, and proclaim to the Church and to the world that Christ is one with us and we with him Christ formed in our heart the hope of glory, and our life hid with Christ in God. By eating and drinking we say in action what Thomas said in words, "My Lord and my God;" we claim sacramentally that mutual relationship which the Spouse in Canticles claims verbally when she says, "My Beloved is mine, and I am his." The dividing, according to the direction in St. Luke, "Take this and divide it among yourselves," is expressive of practical communion with each other in the charities and amenities of life; consequently of hallowed fellowship, Christian affection, and brotherly love; of the widest, yet tenderest, sympathies with all followers of our common Lord, with all fellow-travelers to the heavenly home, and with all fellow-heirs of the future glory in our Father"s house above.
3. The sacramental words. These comprise an injunction, an explanation, and an obligation. The injunction or command is comprehended in the following terms: eat;" This do in remembrance of me; Drink ye all of it;" "This do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me." The explanation consists of the two following sentences: is my body, which is broken for you;" "This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is shed for many for the remission of sins." Here there is an obvious reference to the words of Moses, "Behold the blood of the covenant, which the Lord hath made with you". (Exo_24:8) The obligation or enforcement applies to the whole, and is contained in the single sentence, "For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do show "ye proclaim," Revised Version the Lord"s death till he come.
4. Concluding observations. The Lord"s Supper is thus not a sacrifice, but a feast after a sacrifice, and a feast upon a sacrifice. It is a wellspring in the wilderness, a green spot in the desert, a feast to refresh us on our pilgrimage, and a foreshadowing of that feast above, where "many shall come from the east, and west, and north, and south, and sit down recline with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven." We are constrained, somewhat reluctantly, to pass over several interesting topics in this connection the reasons for partaking of this sacrament, the uses to be made of it, the benefits to be derived from it, as also the qualifications for worthily observing it. Here we may just notice in regard to the latter
(1) that a man must prove himself, and so partake;
(2) discern or discriminate the Lord"s body by faithful apprehension and spiritual appreciation; and
(3) discern or discriminate himself and his relation to his Lord. Failing these he incurs judgment, viz. judicial visitation. Yet mercy mingles with such judgment, for it is the chastening of our heavenly Father for our good, and to prevent our final condemnation with the ungodly world. J.J.G.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain When they killed the Passover.
Mar_14:12
When they killed the Passover.
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The Passover, a typical observance
No other festival was so full of typical meaning, or pointed so clearly to good things to come (Heb_10:1).
I. It was a feast of redemption, foreshadowing a future and greater redemption (Gal_4:4-5).
II. The victim, a lamb without blemish and without spot, was a striking type of the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world (Joh_1:29; 1Co_5:7; 1Pe_1:19).
III. Slain, not by the priest, but by the head of the Paschal company, the blood shed and sprinkled on the altar, roasted whole without the breaking of a bone, it symbolized Him who was put to death by the people (Act_2:23), whose blood during a Paschal festival was shed on the altar of His cross, whose side the soldier pierced, but break not His legs (Joh_19:32-36).
IV. Eaten at the sacrificial meal (peculiar to the peace offering) with bitter herbs and unleavened bread (the symbol of purity), it pointed to that one oblation of Himself once offered, whereby Christ has made us at peace with God (Eph_2:14-15), in which whosoever truly believes must walk in repentance and sincerity and truth (1Co_5:7-8).
V. It was at a paschal supper that its antitype, the Christian eucharist, was instituted by our Lord (Mat_26:17). (G. F. MacLean, D. D.)
The Passover
The Passover, commemorating the exodus of the children of Israel from Egypt, was the annual birthday of the Hebrew nation. Its celebration was marked with a popular joy and impressiveness suited to its character. The time of its observance was the fourteenth of the month Abib, called Nisan after the Babylonish captivity. It corresponded to that part of our year included between the middle of March and the middle of April. It is the fairest part of the year in Palestine. Fresh verdure covers the fields, and innumerable flowers of brightest tint and sweet perfume bedeck the ground. The fields of barley are beginning to ripen, and are almost ready for the sickle. To crown all, the moon, the Paschal moon, is then at the full, and nightly floods with splendour the landscape. As early as the first of the month, Jerusalem showed signs of the approaching feast. Worshippers from all parts of Palestine and other countries began to arrive, in increasing numbers, down to the very day of the Passover. They came in companies of various sizes, in family groups, in neighbourhood groups, in bands of tens, twenties, and hundreds. The city was filled to overflowing, and thousands encamped in tents in the environs. Josephus says that more than two-and-a-half millions of people gathered at Jerusalem in the time of Nero to attend the Passover. Universal hospitality was shown. Wherever a guest chamber could be found, it was thrown open. The only recompense allowed or taken was that the occupant of the apartment might leave behind for their host the skin of the Paschal lamb and the earthen vessel used at the meal. (A. H. Currier.)
Significance of the Passover
I. Considering the events and circumstances attending its original institution (Exo_12:1-51) we may say, in general, that it signified deliverance through the lamb. The angel of death entered not where its blood was sprinkled. It declared that the corruption incurred in Egypt was expiated.
II. But the meaning of the Passover was not exhausted in the idea of atonement. For it consisted not only in the slaying of the lamb and the offering of his blood, but in the joyful eating of it. The wine at the feast was a symbol of its blood. The quaffing of this as a cup of refreshment, and the feeding upon the savoury flesh, expressively indicated that it was the privilege of Gods reconciled people not only to be saved from death by the lamb, but to receive from it conscious satisfaction, joy, and strength. They felt the benefit of His surrendered life in all their renewed and quickened powers.
III. Leaven, as producing fermentation, was a symbol to the Jews of corruption. It represented the influence of idolatrous Egypt, which they were utterly to put away. Unleavened bread, therefore, was an emblem of purity. It signified that they who ate it had put away sin.
IV. The bitter herbs are emblematical of the trials and discipline which form an essential and wholesome part of the Christian life. Such trials are shadows made by the light. They are inseparable accompaniments of the gospel in its work of subduing the world to submission to Christ. (A. H. Currier.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain 12–16. On the first day of unleavened bread. See…
12–16. On the first day of unleavened bread. See notes on Matt. 26:17–19.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain Mar_14:12. The first day, etc.—14th Nisan—Thursday in Holy Week.…
CRITICAL AND EXEGETICAL NOTES
Mar_14:12. The first day, etc.—14th Nisan—Thursday in Holy Week. The previous day had been spent in seclusion at Bethany, which “was reckoned as regards religious purposes part of Jerusalem by the Rabbis, and the lamb might be eaten there, though it must be killed at the Temple” (Lightfoot, Hor. Heb.).
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Mar_14:13. Two of His disciples.—Peter and John (Luk_22:8). A man bearing, etc.—It being essential to Christ’s plan that He should not be arrested before His celebration of the Passover, He did not divulge to His apostles until the last moment the place where it was to be held. Probably He had made some private arrangement with a trusty disciple living in Jerusalem to send a man-servant (instead of a woman, as was usual) for water at a particular time of day. Possibly the man-servant was also a disciple and in the secret.
Mar_14:14. The guest-chamber.—My lodging-place: κατάλυμα, rendered “inn” in Luk_2:7.
Mar_14:15. Furnished.—The couches for reclining on set in order and spread with carpets. Prepared.—Ready for the due celebration of the Passover, so far as the room was concerned—every particle of leaven having been cleared out. There make ready.—By procuring the lamb, the unleavened cakes, the cups of wine and water, the bitter herbs, and the sauce. Some of these would perhaps be provided by the master of the house, but there is great uncertainty as to what exactly took place.
Mar_14:16. The Passover.—An account of the ritual may conveniently be inserted here.
(1) Two or three flat cakes of unleavened bread, and four cups of red wine mixed with water, were placed before the master of the house, or the most eminent person present, who was called the Celebrant or President.
(2) All present having reclined, he took one of the cups, known as the “Cup of Consecration,” gave thanks, tasted the cup, and passed it round.
(3) Water was brought in, and the President washed his hands ceremonially.
(4) There were placed on the table the bitter herbs (lettuce, endive, beet, succory, horehound), the sauce called “Charoseth” (made of dates, raisins, figs, vinegar, etc., pounded and mixed together), and the Passover lamb.
(5) After again thanking God for the fruits of the earth, the President took a portion of the bitter herbs “the size of an olive,” dipped it in the Charoseth and ate it, and his example was followed by the rest.
(6) The second cup of wine was filled, after which began the “Haggadah” or “Shewing forth” (1Co_11:26). A child or proselyte inquired, “What mean ye by this service?” (Exo_12:26), and the President answered according to a prescribed formula. The first part of the “Hallel” (Psalms 113, 114) was then sung, and the second cup solemnly drunk.
(7) The President again washed his hands (the rest doing so also), and taking two of the unleavened cakes, broke them, gave thanks, and distributed to the company. Each, on receiving his portion, wrapped bitter herbs round it, dipped it in the “Charoseth,” and ate it.
(8) The flesh of the lamb was then eaten.
(9) After thanksgiving, the third cup (“Cup of Blessing”) was handed round.
(10) Thanks were given for the food received and for redemption from Egypt, the fourth cup (“Cup of Joy”) was drunk, the second part of the “Hallel” (Psalms 115-118) was sung, and the company dispersed.
Mar_14:17. In the evening.—After sunset on Thursday—the beginning of 15th Nisan—the proper paschal night.
Mar_14:18. Sat.—Reclined on the divans. The original standing posture (Exo_12:11) had long been abandoned. Render last part of verse: One out of you (among you, but not of you) will deliver Me—he that is eating with Me.
Mar_14:21. The order of the words in the last clause, and the intrinsic meaning of καλόν, incline one to render thus: An excellent thing were it for Him (the Son of Man) if there had not been born that man (the man who, while an apostle, becomes a traitor); and the meaning may perhaps be, that the burden pressing on Christ’s soul would have been infinitely easier to bear had His apprehension not come about by the agency of His own familiar friend. Earlier in the verse He exclaims, Alas for that man! thinking, apparently, of the self-reproach that would overwhelm Judas, almost the moment the deed was done.
Mar_14:22. Took bread.—One of the unleavened cakes lying on the table. Blessed.—Spoke the word for good; the word (λόγος), for good (εὐ). so in the Latin, benedicimus = we utter the word bene, i.e. bene fiat. “Cum Deus bene dicit, tum bene est: cum homo, tum ut bene fiat.” See the profound note by Prof. T. S. Evans on 1Co_10:16 in the Speaker’s Commentary. Eat.—Imported from Mat_26:26, where genuine. A very natural addition, as of course it is implied. This is My body.—The copula means neither “represents” nor “symbolises,” but simply is. The Lord is pleased to establish the most intimate relation possible between the consecrated elements and His sacred humanity. The faithful communicant, when he receives the Eucharistic bread and wine, eats the flesh and drinks the blood of the Son of Man (Joh_6:53-56). It ought not to be necessary to add that “this is a great mystery,” and that the eating and drinking are purely spiritual acts—and, because spiritual, therefore most real and true.
Mar_14:23. Given thanks.—I.e. for εὐ or God’s good gifts of bread and wine: the idea of thanks is exhausted in the χάρις. So Prof. Evans on 1Co_11:24.
Mar_14:24. Of the new testament.—Omit “new,” and render: of the covenant—i.e. of the arrangement (διαθήκη) which God has graciously made for restoring to man his lost inheritance. From first to last God has entertained but one grand scheme of mercy to our fallen race; but this scheme, when our Lord spoke, had been manifested in its initial stage only (see Exo_24:4-8), which was a shadow cast before of the great reality to be revealed in due time. Since, however, the Jews had mistaken the shadow for the reality, and were for the most part content to offer and rest in material sacrifices which could never take away sins, it became necessary to differentiate the true plan of salvation through the blood of Christ from the preparatory sacrificial system of Israel which merely typified it. This was done by terming the one the “old covenant,” and the other the “new.” See Jer_31:31-34; Luk_22:20; 1Co_11:25; Heb_9:15; Heb_9:18-22; Heb_12:24. But both here and in Mat_26:28 the word “new” is not found. Shed.—Being shed: Christ was there and then offering His precious blood for the sins of the whole world. For many.—In behalf of many: ὑπέρ = super, over, the essential idea being that of a person bending over another—in New Testament never in a physical, always in a moral sense. The Redeemer bent His mind over many—even the whole race of men—when He laid down His life to effect their salvation (1Jn_2:2).
Mar_14:25. See Rev_19:9. Kingdom of God.—With the announcement of the kingdom’s immanence Christ’s ministry began (Mar_1:15); with the prophecy of that kingdom’s perfect consummation and bliss it fitly ends.
Mar_14:27. An hymn.—Second part of Hallel (Psalms 115-118.); for no doubt the first part (113, 114) had been sung in its usual place earlier in the evening.
Mar_14:27-31. See R.V. for reading and rendering.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Mar_14:12-31
(PARALLELS: Mat_26:17-35; Luk_22:7-38; John 13-17)
The Christian Passover.—It is a noteworthy fact that of the sacred times and seasons of the old economy we have nothing left but the Feast of the Passover. The perpetuation of that feast was provided for and announced in its original institution (Exo_12:14). On the night when Jesus was betrayed He ate the Passover with His disciples, and at the same time established the Holy Communion as its successor. He thus rescued the Passover feast from among the vanishing shadows of the ceremonial economy, and gave it in a simpler form but with unbroken continuity a perpetual place among the ordinances of the new dispensation.
I. The original Passover feast was observed at night.—It was the night of the 14th Nisan. King and people were asleep, unmindful of approaching danger. But the Hebrews were awake; lights glimmered in their homes. They had been forewarned that in their behalf the Lord was about to make bare His arm. The years of their oppression were at an end. Staff in hand they crossed the threshold, passed along the streets and out through the gates into the wilderness, then on through toil and danger and weariness to the land of which the Lord had said, “Behold, I will give it you.” It was a darker night than that when our Lord hung dying on His Cross. At high noon the shadows closed around Him. Earth never saw so deep a darkness, nor was night ever pierced with a cry so dismal, “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?” His cry of abandonment was the signal of our deliverance. When His anguish had reached its utmost, we, healed by His stripes, passed forth into the glorious liberty of the children of God.
II. The Passover feast was kept within-doors.—This was true of no other of the great festivals. On other days the ties of kinship might be ignored, but on that day blood was always thicker than water. It was a time for praising the Lord because He hath set the solitary in families. The father presided; the children hearkened to his counsels and joined him in gratitude for the blessings of the roof-tree. The Holy Communion is our family feast. Here the Elder Brother takes our hands and places them in the strong grasp of the Infinite One, bidding us say after Him, “Abba, Father.” We here commune with one another in the household of faith and with Him who is the God and Father of us all.
III. The lamb was at the centre of the paschal feast.—It must be a lamb of the first year and without blemish. The four days previous to the Passover were set apart for careful inspection. The lamb was placed in the hands of judicious persons, who were instructed to see that there should be no spot nor blemish in it. By a providential coincidence the four days previous to our Lord’s crucifixion were days of peculiar trial. The eyes of many were upon Him to discover any possible spot or blemish. And when the preparation was over He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so He opened not His mouth.
IV. The blood of the paschal sacrifice was sprinkled on the door-posts and the lintel.—It was not enough that the lamb should have been slain. The head of the household must arrange for the sprinkling of the blood where the destroying angel might see it. For so it had been promised, “When I see the blood, I will pass over you.” The Rabbis tell, in one of their sacred books, of a sick girl who on that memorable night was troubled with apprehension lest due precautions had not been taken. She called her father to her couch, saying, “Father, I greatly fear lest the blood hath not been sprinkled on the lintels of the door. I pray thee, see to it.” He laughed at her fears, but at her persistent entreaty he went and looked, and lo, his servant had neglected his task. The basin and the branch of hyssop were speedily brought, the blood was sprinkled, and the household saved. In like manner the merits of the Saviour’s blood are effective only for such as appropriate it. Faith is the condition of life. Faith is the hyssop branch that sprinkles the lintels of the door. The night is dark, the black-winged angel is above us; but we are quite secure if we have entrusted our welfare to the only begotten Son of God.
V. The lamb was eaten with bitter herbs and unleavened bread.—The bitter herbs were a reminder of the toil and weariness of Egypt. The unleavened bread was a symbol of the sinless life. The two together set forth the nature and necessity of repentance. For repentance is on the one side sorrow for sin, and on the other an abandonment of it. At the Holy Communion we remember with sorrow our Lord’s passion for us and with joy His breaking of our bonds. In memory of His sacrifice we renew in this sacramentum our vows of devotion and signify our abhorrence of and departure from sin. Wherefore Paul enjoins upon us to purge out the old leaven (1Co_5:7-8).
VI. The children of Israel ate their Passover with sandals on and staff in hand.—They were ready for the signal of departure. “As thy days, so shall thy strength be.”—D. J. Burrell, D.D.
The Holy Eucharist.—It is part of the manifold wisdom of God that His gifts, in nature and in grace, minister to distinct and, as it often seems, unconnected ends, manifesting thereby the more His own unity as the secret cause and power of all things, putting itself forward in varied forms and divers manners, yet itself the one cause of all that is. The element which is the image of our baptism cleanses alike and refreshes, gives health and nourishment and growth. And if in nature, much more in the gifts of grace. For therein God, not by will or by power only, but by Himself and the effluence of His Spirit, is the life of all which lives through Him. It is, then, according to the analogy of His other gifts that His two great sacraments have in themselves manifold gifts. Baptism containeth not only remission of sin, actual or original, but maketh members of Christ, children of God, heirs of heaven, hath the seal and earnest of the Spirit, the germ of spiritual life; the Holy Eucharist imparteth not life only, spiritual strength, and oneness with Christ, and His indwelling, and participation of Him, but, in its degree, remission of sins also. As the manna is said to have “contented every man’s delight and agreed to every taste,” so He, the Heavenly Manna, becometh to every man what he needeth, and what he can receive; to the penitent perhaps chiefly remission of sins and continued life, to those who have “loved Him and kept His word” His own transporting, irradiating presence, full of His own grace and life and love; yet to each full contentment, because to each His own overflowing, undeserved goodness.
I. The penitent’s joy, then, in the Holy Eucharist is not the less deep because the pardon of sins is not, as in baptism, its direct provision.—The chief object of the Holy Eucharist, as conveyed by type or prophecy, by the very elements chosen, or by the words of our Lord, is the support and enlargement of life, and that in Him. In type the tree of life was within the paradise of God, given as a nourishment of immortality, withheld from Adam when he sinned: the bread and wine wherewith Melchizedek met Abraham were to refresh the father of the faithful, the weary warrior of God: the paschal lamb was a commemorative sacrifice; the saving blood had been shed; it was to be eaten with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth, and with bitter herbs, the type of mortification, and by those only who were undefiled. The manna was given to them after they had passed the Red Sea, the image of cleansing baptism, and, as He Himself interprets it, represented Him as coming down from heaven to give life unto the world, the food of angels and the holy hosts of heaven; the shewbread was eaten only by those hallowed to the priesthood (as the whole Christian people has in this sense been made kings and priests), and, when once given to David and those that were with him, still on the ground that the “vessels of the young men were holy” (1Sa_21:5). In verbal prophecy it is foretold under the images of the very elements, and so of strengthening and overflowing joy. See Pro_9:5; Psa_22:26; Psa_23:5; Psa_4:7; Psa_104:15; Isa_55:1; Son_5:1. In all these varied symbols—strength, renewed life, growth, refreshment, gladness, likeness to the angels, immortality—are the gifts set forth; they are gifts as to the redeemed of the Lord placed anew in the paradise of His Church, admitted to His sanctuary, joying in His presence, growing before Him, filled with the river of His joy, feasting with Him, yea Himself feasting in them, as in them He hungereth. Hitherto there is no allusion to sin; it is what the Church should be, walking in the brightness of His light, and itself reflecting that brightness. And when our Lord most largely and directly is setting forth the fruits of eating His flesh and drinking His blood, He speaks throughout of one gift—life; freedom from death, life through Him, through His indwelling, and therefore resurrection from the dead and life eternal. See Joh_6:50-51; Joh_6:53-54; Joh_6:56-58. No one can observe how this whole discourse circleth round this gift of life, and how our Lord, with unwearied patience, bringeth this one truth before us in so many different forms, without feeling that He means to inculcate, that life in Him is His chief gift in His Sacrament, and to make a reverent longing for it an incentive to our faith. Yet although life in Him is the substance of His whole teaching, the teaching itself is manifold. Our Lord inculcates not one truth only in varied forms, but in its different bearings. He answers not the strivings of the Jews, “How can this man give us His flesh to eat?” Such an “How can these things be?” He never answereth; and we, if we are wise, shall never ask how they can be elements of this world and yet His very body and blood. But how they give life to us He does answer; and amid this apparent uniformity of His teaching each separate sentence gives us a portion of that answer. And the teaching of the whole, as far as such as we may grasp it, is this: That He is the living bread because He came down from heaven, and as being one God with the Father hath life in Himself, even as the Father hath life in Himself; the life then which He is He imparted to that flesh which He took into Himself, yea, which He took so wholly that Holy Scripture says He became it, “the Word became flesh,” and since it is thus a part of Himself, “Whoso eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood” (He Himself says the amazing words), “eateth Me,” and so receiveth into Himself, in an ineffable manner, his Lord Himself, “dwelleth” (our Lord says) “in Me, and I in Him,” and having Christ within him, not only shall he have, but he “hath” already “eternal life,” because he hath Him who is “the only true God and eternal life”; and so Christ “will raise him up at the last day,” because he hath His life in him. Receiving Him into this very body, they who are His receive life, which shall pass over to our very decaying flesh; they have within them Him who is life and immortality and incorruption, to cast out or absorb into itself our natural mortality and death and corruption, and “shall live for ever,” because made one with Him who alone “liveth for evermore.” But where, one may feel, is there here any place for the sinner? Here all breathes of holy life, life in God, the life of God imparted to man, the indwelling of the All-holy and Incarnate Word, the presence of God in the soul and body, incorruption and eternal life, through His holy presence and union with Him who, being God, is life. Yet although most which is spoken belongs to Christians, as belonging already to the household of saints and the family of heaven and the communion of angels and unity with God, still, here as elsewhere in the New Testament, there is a subordinate and subdued notion of sin; and what wraps the saint already in the third heaven may yet uphold us sinners, that the pit shut not her mouth upon us. The same reality of the Divine gift makes it angels, food to the saint, the ransom to the sinner. And both because it is the body and blood of Christ. To him its special joy is that it is his Redeemer’s very broken body, it is His blood, which was shed for the remission of his sins. In the words of the ancient Church, he “drinks his ransom,” he eateth that, “the very body and blood of the Lord, the only sacrifice for sin,” God “poureth out” for him yet “the most precious blood of His Only-Begotten”; they “are fed from the Cross of the Lord, because they eat His body and blood”; and as of the Jews of old, even those who had been the betrayers and murderers of their Lord, it was said, “The blood, which in their frenzy they shed, believing they drank,” so of the true penitent it may be said, whatever may have been his sins, so he could repent, awful as it is to say, the blood he indeed despised, and profaned, and trampled underfoot, may he, when himself humbled in the dust, drink, and therein drink his salvation.
II. In each place in Holy Scripture where the doctrine of the Eucharist is taught, there is at least some indication of the remission of sins.—Our Lord, while chiefly speaking of Himself, as the bread of life, the true meat, the true drink, His indwelling, resurrection from the dead, and life everlasting, still says also, “The bread that I will give is My flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.” As amid the apparent identity of this teaching each separate oracle enounces some fresh portion of the whole truth, so also does this; that His flesh and blood in the Sacrament shall give life, not only because they are the flesh and blood of the Incarnate Word, who is life, but also because they are the very flesh and blood which were given and shed for the life of the world, and are given to those for whom they had been given. This is said yet more distinctly in the awful words whereby He consecrated for ever elements of this world to be His body and blood. “This is My body, which is given for you”; “This is My body, which is broken for you”; “This is My blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins”; “This cup is the new testament in My blood, which is shed for you.” He saith not, “which shall be given,” “shall be broken,” “shall be shed,” but “is being given,” “being broken,” “being shed” (διδόμενον, κλώμενον, ἐκχυνόμενον), and this in remarkable contrast with His own words, when speaking of that same gift, as yet future, “The bread which I will give is My flesh, which I will give [ὃν ἐγὼ δώσω] for the life of the world.” And of one of the words used St. Chrysostom remarks how it could not be said of the Cross, but is true of the Holy Eucharist. “For ‘a bone of Him,’ it saith, ‘shall not be broken.’ But that which He suffered not on the Cross, this He suffers in the oblation for thy sake, and submits to be broken that He may fill all men.” Hereby He seems as well to teach us that the great act of His passion then began; then, as a Priest, did He through the Eternal Spirit offer Himself without spot to God; then did He “consecrate” Himself, before He was by wicked hands crucified and slain; and all which followed, until He commended His Blessed Spirit to the hands of His Heavenly Father, was one protracted, willing suffering. Then did He begin His lonely journey, where there was none to help or uphold, but He “travelled in the greatness of His strength”; then did He begin to “tread the winepress alone,” and to “stain all His raiment”; then to “wash the garments” of His humanity “with” the “wine” of His blood; and therefore does the blood bedew us too; it cleanses us, because it is the blood shed for the remission of our sins. There is, accordingly, an entire agreement in the Eucharistic liturgies of the universal Church, in prayer, in benediction, in declaration, confessing that in the Holy Eucharist there is forgiveness of sins also. Those of St James and St. Mark so paraphrase the words of consecration as to develop the sense that they relate not only to the past act of His precious bloodshedding on the Cross, but to the communication of that blood to us now. “This is My body, which for you is broken and given for the remission of sins.” “This is My blood of the New Testament, which for you and for many is poured out and given for the remission of sins.” Again, the liturgies join together, manifoldly, remission of sins and life eternal, as the two great fruits of this Sacrament. Thus in the prayer for the descent of the Holy Ghost on the sacred elements, “that they may be to all who partake of them to the remission of sins, and to life eternal”; or in intercession, “that we may become meet to be partakers of Thy holy mysteries to the remission of sins and life eternal”; or in the words of communicating, “I give thee the precious and holy and undefiled body of our Lord and God and Saviour Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and life eternal.”
III. Since, then, this Divine Sacrament has, as its immediate and proper end, union with Him who hath taken our manhood into God, and the infusion into us of His Spirit and life and immortality, making us one with His glorified humanity, as He is one in the Godhead with the Father, and, besides this, it is ulteriorly the cleansing of our sins, the refining our corruptions, the repairing of our decays, what must be the loss of the Church of the latter days, in which Communions are so infrequent! How can we wonder that love should have waxed cold, corruptions so abound, grievous falls have been among our youth almost the rule, to stand upright the exception, heathen strictness reproach Christian laxity, the Divine life become so rare, all higher instances of it so few and faint, when “the stay and the staff,” the strength of that life is willingly forfeited! How should there be the fulness of the Divine life, amid all but a month-long fast from our “daily bread”! It implies a life so different from this our commonplace ordinary tenor, a life so above this world as knit with Him who hath overcome the world, so angelic as living on Him who is angels’ food; an union with God so close, that we cannot mostly, I suppose, imagine to ourselves how we could daily thus be in heaven, and in our daily business here below—how sanctify our daily duties, thoughts, refreshment, so that they should be tinged with the hues reflected by our daily heaven, not that heavenly gift be dimmed with our earthliness—how our souls should through the day shine with the glory of that ineffable Presence to which we had approached, not we approach to it with earth-dimmed souls. It must ever be so; we cannot know the gift of God if we forfeit it; we must cease mostly even to long for what we forego. We lose the very sense to understand it.
IV. But, however we may see that our present decay and negligence should not continue, restoration must not be rashly compassed.—Sound restoration must be the gift of God, to be sought of Him in humiliation, in prayer, in mutual forbearance and charity, with increased strictness of life and more diligent use of what we have. He who alone can make more frequent Communion a blessing, and who gave such strength to that one heavenly meal, whereby through forty days and forty nights of pilgrimage He carried Elijah to His presence at the Mount of God, can, if we be faithful and keep His gift which we receive, give such abundant strength to our rarer Communions, that they shall carry us through our forty years of trial unto His own Holy Hill, and the vision of Himself in bliss. Let us each suspect ourselves, not others; the backward their own backwardness, the forward their own eagerness; each habitually interpret well the other’s actions and motives; so, while we each think all good of the other, may we all together, strengthened by the same bread, washed by the same blood, be led, in the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace and holiness of life, to that ineffable feast, where not, as now, in mysteries, but, face to face, we shall ever see God, and be ever filled with His goodness and His love.—E. B. Pusey, D.D.
The feelings suited to our last Sacrament,—The last words of a man of God, at the close of a religious solemnity, are regarded with peculiar attention. The parting warnings, counsels, and encouragements of such a man have counteracted the influence of temptations to folly, kept the mind steadfast in seasons of difficulty, excited to the most arduous duties, and reconciled the heart to the most painful separations. Our text presents to us the last words of the Lord Jesus at the observance of the Holy Communion—words rich in admonition and in comfort—words which have melted many a heart in pious affection, and inspired many a fearful soul with the most blessed hopes.
I. Consider these words as an intimation of our Lord’s speedy departure, and of the termination of all the present intercourse of His disciples with Him.—
1. Our Blessed Saviour made frequent references to His death during the course of His life. To reconcile His disciples to an event so necessary, He expatiates on its blessed results, and generally connects with it consequences of the most happy description both to Himself and to them.
2. The intercourse of our Lord with His disciples had been of the most affectionate kind. But that intercourse was now to close; from the circle of love and peace in which He now sat He was about to be removed into the assembly of the wicked, and to suffer all the ignominy and pain which their unrestrained malice could inflict.
3. Mark with what mild resignation our Lord contemplates this event. What was dear to Him in life He willingly sacrificed; what was painful in death He cheerfully bore.
4. Our Lord’s language intimates the necessity of His dying to His mediatorial glory and to the future happiness of His people.
5. Our Lord, in contemplating this as His last participation of the Holy Sacrament with them, may be viewed as anticipating the close of all that worship which was suited to His state of humiliation and suffering.
II. Consider the intimation our Lord gives of a reunion.—There are two considerations which stamp a peculiar beauty on this assurance. The termination of His intercourse with them was to be closed in a manner no way creditable to their attachment or their courage. His generous heart could forgive their weakness and cowardice, and friends and foes were the objects of a charity which was stronger than death. I may add that this promise of reunion, following so immediately the notice of His separation, shews, in a most affecting manner, how unwilling He is that His people should mourn in hopeless grief, and how ready He is to solace and to encourage. It has been much disputed to what place or scene our Lord refers as that of reunion with His disciples. Some have supposed that it refers to His renewed intercourse with them after His resurrection; and in this view it intimated to them that the death of their Master, to which they looked forward with so much terror, would only be a temporary subjection to the last enemy, and that He would rise in heart unchanged, with the same delight in their society and the same solicitude for their welfare as ever. But as it appears to me that our Lord meant to suggest the fullest consolation, it seems better not to limit the passage to an intercourse with them on earth, which was to lie in a few meetings during the space of forty days, but to consider it as pointing to the communion of the world of glory.
1. Considering it as referring to the heavenly state, this promise suggests that the reunion of the disciples with their Lord is certain. Men have often spoken of meeting their friends in heaven when parting with them in death; but they speak of a place whose gates they have no power to open, whose bliss they have no power to allot. It is in many cases the language of ignorance and presumption, which reason will not sanction, which conscience condemns; but the Speaker in the text is the way, the truth, and the life. Every heart is in His hands, every lot is in His sentence, every region is in His power, and all futurity is in His eye.
2. It intimates that this reunion should be in the most glorious place, even in the kingdom of His Father. It will take place in a scene where naught can occur either to embitter or to terminate it. In that kingdom the highest honours were destined for Himself; but to them, poor and despised as they now were, He would grant to share in His dignity, and to rejoice in His joy. His love deemed no abasement too low for Himself, and no exaltation too high for them.
3. It suggests that, when thus reunited, their intercourse should be most intimate and affectionate. In His intercourse with them here Judas mingled, though he had probably gone out before the institution of the Holy Communion; but in heaven there should not be one whose heart was not sincere in friendship, nor one whose presence should in the least check the freest disclosure of the Redeemer’s feelings. Here too the idea of the termination of this intercourse afflicted the disciples; but in heaven they should reign in life, never see their Saviour’s countenance less complacent, nor behold the last enemy but in his final destruction.
4. It intimates that in this reunion they should enjoy together the purest and most blissful delights.
(1) They shall enjoy these delights with the Saviour. His presence shall heighten the beauty of paradise, and render more delicious all that proceeds from its living fountains. In all the tokens of their Father’s complacency Ho shall share, and in all their attainments in excellence He shall be the pattern.
(2) The enjoyments of the heavenly state shall be the same in kind with those of the sanctuary on earth, however they may differ in degree. They are excited by the same objects and directed by the same spirit.
(3) These enjoyments in heaven shall, like the Holy Communion on earth, bear a direct reference to the Cross. Every feeling of rapture will attest its efficacy, every song of the redeemed celebrate its glory.
(4) Their reunion with one another is intimated in this assurance.
III. Consider these words as a memento intended for every observance of the Holy Communion.—At one Sacrament or another these words will be addressed to every pious communicant, and sooner probably to the most vigorous and. healthy than he is aware; for “we are strangers before God, and sojourners, as were all our fathers: our days on the earth are as a shadow, and there is none abiding.” It would be proper that all of us should consider our situation in this light; for none can promise himself another solemnity of this nature, and none will improve this ordinance properly who does not observe it as his last Sacrament.
1. It should be received with resignation.
(1) It is made by Him who hath the power of life and death, and whose will it is both impious and vain to resist.
(2) The kindness of the manner in which He intimates this is another reason for resignation. It is with the voice of invitation and persuasion that He addresses you, rather than with that of authority.
(3) You cannot, in this scene, mark the resignation of your Lord to His Father’s will, nor hear Him saying, “The cup which My Father giveth Me, shall I not drink it?” and be disposed to rebel against the determination of His providence.
2. It should be received with gratitude. It shews His goodness to you that He apprises you of this event, that you may use all the appointed means of preparation for it. He wishes to save you from the anxiety and horror of those who shall be awakened from the sleep of security by the notice of His approach. 3. It should be received with love. Here we see Christ submitting to death to redeem us from destruction, laying open to us the kindness of His heart, revealing the everlasting felicity for which He hath destined us, and solacing Himself in the prospect of being happy with us for ever. That heart must be lost to all proper feeling which is not kindled into affection by this statement of the Saviour. It ought to be heard with increasing affection to our Christian brethren. Aged persons have been sometimes charged with implacability of temper, with brooding over the injuries of former times, and instilling their prejudices and animosities into their descendants; but let your conduct shew that you have fully imbibed the forgiving spirit of the Cross, and that every malignant feeling is extinguished within you.
4. It should be received with a determination to shew increasing diligence in preparing for our departure. Nobler objects solicit your affections; let them now engage your whole heart.
5. It should be received with hope of the felicity here promised. This is the promise of Him who is the faithful witness, and, while such love breathes in it, you cannot question His intention to fulfil it.—H. Belfrage, D.D.
Mar_14:26. The Hallel, and Jesus singing.—The best scholarship warrants us to assume that as Psalms 113-118 formed the Hallel or hallelujah songs of praise associated with the Passover, so the closing hymn sung by Jesus and His disciples was Psalms 118, as being that which rounded off the partaking of the fourth festal cup (“the cup of salvation”).
I. Psalms 118 opens with a burst of hallelujahs over the mercy of God.—The sum of these hallelujahs is, “O praise God for His mercies of old and now.” It is easy to understand how at that moment thoughts of the mercy of God would gird the Redeemer as with new strength to go forward to His appointed work. That work was to lay open the channel along which the mercy of God should flow “in righteousness” toward our fallen race. So that we cannot help feeling that it was Divinely ordered that this jubilant refrain should come in as part of the Lord’s last singing on earth. You remember how similarly this was the keynote of the dedication of the first Temple: “He is good; His mercy endureth for ever.” And so throughout. The great heart of the world—as of a sick, weary giant—ached for the ultimate manifestation of this mercy; and it could not but bring to the Lord a strange and awful joy that now at long, long last the manifestation was about to be made. I covet for myself and you all deeper insight into the wonder and grace, benediction and righteousness, of God’s ever-enduring and unchanging mercy in Christ Jesus. Grasping it, how may we dare to go to the guiltiest, even vilest, and whisper, “God loves you.” Behold the proof in the Cross, in the Crucified!
II. The suitableness to the Lord’s circumstances and to the continuous dangers of His Church (Mar_14:5-13).—It was the hour and power of darkness. Personally the shadow of Gethsemane was already blackening over His path. There lay before Him the betrayal—the arrest—the forsaking—the denial—the arraigning—the judgment—the suborned witnesses—the insults—the mockery—the loathsome spitting—the blows—the scourging—the condemnation—and, beyond, the spectre and spectacle of the ghastly cross. Is it not, then, affecting and yet again sustaining to find here written beforehand, in this last psalm of the Hallel, great words of strength and cheer (Mar_14:5-6): “Out of my distress”—plumbless, measureless distress—“I called upon the Lord: the Lord answered me, and set me in a large place. The Lord is on my side; I will not fear what man can do unto me.” We can again conceive the Lord flinging Himself on the vast breadth of these exultant words. Amid all dangers and tribulation the Church, like her Divine Head, may well find in this portion of the final Hallel psalm inexhaustible consolation. Martin Luther in the throes of the Reformation and of his own peril, and when even Catherine de Bora seemed to counsel retreat and compliance, turned to this psalm and “waxed valiant” as he sang (Mar_14:17), “I shall not die, but live, and declare the works of the Lord.” Let us not fear. The waves of the tempest-trampled sea may toss to and fro and make a mighty noise, but the blue heavens beyond the clouds are calm. God lives. God reigns. The once pale hand grasps the sceptre of the universe, and sways ebb and flow of event and circumstance to His “everlasting purpose.”
III. The joy set before the Redeemer and before us through Him (Mar_14:14-21).—Joy is the sublimation of sorrow. Sorrow opens the door for joy to come in. Sorrow and joy are strangely akin, or, as we say in Scotland and old English, “sib.” Sorrow turns into joy—not merely is followed by joy, but turns into it. So was it with the disciples. “Your sorrow shall be turned into joy”—the very event that seemed so black and calamitous becoming the centre and source of everlasting light. Some of you, doubtless, have seen Dore’s great picture of “Pilate’s Wife’s Dream.” Those of you who have seen it will remember that whilst the horrid cross in the foreground looms up large and hideous, yet away in the radiant distance that same cross is shewn transformed and glorified, and glorifying all that it shines upon. So if sorrow is deep, I think it leads to and issues in something deeper still, and that is joy. Hence in the Epistle to the Hebrews, by one of those deep glances into the heart of the mystery of things that make this letter so great, we have all this summed up (Mar_12:2). Be it yours and mine, like our Lord, to rest on this Hallel psalm and see all around us demonstration, that the Lord’s mighty prayer was no idle breath like “idle tears”: “These things I spake in the world, that they may have My joy fulfilled in themselves” (Joh_17:13).
IV. The great Messianic symbol (Mar_14:22-23).—As we turn and return on the favourite texts of Jesus, it moves and melts us to discover how they nearly all revolve around His redemptive work. The present is no exception. For we all carry in our heart of hearts the “exceeding great and precious promises” and teaching that set forth the Lord Christ as a “stone.” Even the glazing eye of dying Jacob beheld it (Gen_49:24). And so Isaiah sang (Isa_28:16). It is therefore just what might have been expected, that earlier the Lord turned to those very words now before us, and uttered from them some of His most barbed and searching words to rejecting Israel. And as we to-day think of the supernatural structure—part on earth and part in heaven—that along the nineteen centuries has been raised on this one Stone, do we not thrill to the song of Christ’s last singing, and exclaim, “This is from the Lord: it is marvellous in our eyes.”
V. Finally, in Mar_14:25-29, we have thanksgiving. I can but accentuate Mar_14:27 : “Bind the sacrifice with cords, even unto the horns of the altar.” Once more to the vision of faith this sacrifice has been set forth—once more it has been our privilege by the memorial symbols appointed to remember the Lord’s death “until He come.” And so as thus again we behold “the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world,” thanksgiving may fitly close our service as thanksgiving closed His, as perchance falteringly He sang for the last time the Hallel of His own sacrificial death: “He filleth our mouths with songs.” In our outlook I see no call for despondency, I discern no omens of failure—I catch a light of glory on the mountain-tops that is descending to the plains, and is making the Cross still more refulgent, and rallying more and more myriads of tired feet and wearier hearts to the great broken heart. Yea, I see our blood-ransomed world girdled by mightier rings than Saturn’s, swung back into its primal orbit of unsullied light; and by-and-by we shall hear reverberating from sea to sea and from shore to shore (Rev_11:15).—A. B. Grosart, D.D.
Mar_14:27-31. Man’s need of Divine support.—We are taught by our holy religion that man’s ability to perform the appointed duties of his Christian calling is derived from the co-operation and assistance of the Holy Spirit, which must be sought by humble and fervent prayer. Some, however, have entertained doubts on the subject, in consequence of their inability to discriminate between the natural movements of their minds and the influences of Divine agency, forgetting that we are required not to give account of the nature or extent of the assistance vouchsafed from above, but only to receive it thankfully and to use it diligently. Others have questioned the existence of such spiritual aid, because not conscious of their own need of it. To them this discourse is addressed.
I. The circumstances connected with the fall of St. Peter.—
1. If ever an unassisted mortal might have been expected to stand by his own strength, it was Peter—the Rock-man. The instructions he had received, the miracles he had witnessed, the variety of motives with which his intercourse with Christ must have supplied him, might have been considered almost as an equivalent for inspiration. Yet he fell. Betrayed by ignorance of his own heart and presumptuous confidence in his own resolution, he caused himself to be recorded for an everlasting memorial of human weakness and frailty.
2. The Master, as the time of His betrayal approached, with a view doubtless of consoling His disciples under their coming disgrace, gave them a previous intimation of it in the kindest and most soothing terms (Mar_14:27-28). The effect of this announcement upon the others is not recorded. Perhaps conscious of their own weakness, they remained silent; or perhaps, while inwardly trusting that they would be found ready for any emergency, they did not presume to express that confidence. Peter alone ventured to proclaim his imaginary fortitude (Mar_14:29). Christ thereupon revealed a lower depth even than desertion to which Peter would descend (Mar_14:30). Such seeming distrust of the sincerity of his attachment drew from the warm-hearted disciple a vehement protest (Mar_14:31). But in the hour of trial, how did he behave? Whence that equivocating answer, conveying falsehood under its most subtle guise (Mar_14:68)? Whence that second denial (Mar_14:70)? Whence that cursing and swearing with which the third accusation induced him to accompany the repetition of his assertion (Mar_14:71)? Alas! human nature must bear the shame of these reiterated falsehoods and blasphemies. Though selected for the apostleship, Peter yet remained dependent only on mortal resources, and in the hour of trial they proved utterly inadequate.
II. The admonition to be derived from St. Peter’s sad fall.—
1. Is there to be found a man who, in face of such an example, dares to refuse the proffered aid of the Holy Spirit, and to encounter life’s conflict in his own unaided strength? Let him attend to an exposition of the delusion under which he labours.
(1) Such a man may have persuaded himself that his reliance on his own strength is not the effect of presumption, but only of a fervent wish and sincere resolution to tread the path of holiness. But such we know was equally the disposition of Peter’s mind. On his first introduction to our notice we are even struck with his exceeding humility and self-abasement (Luk_5:8); and the same meek and modest distrust of himself is again evinced only a few hours before his fall (Joh_8:6-9).
(2) The self-confident man may imagine that there was a perverseness in the character of Peter from which he is himself free. But the Gospel history lends no countenance to such a theory. On more than one occasion the extreme openness and warmth of his disposition led Peter to so unreserved a discovery of the opinions and prejudices of his heart as exposed him to sharp reproof (Mat_16:23; Joh_18:11). Yet we find that he was ever submissive to the correction and ever obedient to the direction of his Master.
(3) A man may flatter himself that he possesses a firmness, an energy, and a zeal which were wanting in Peter. But what reason has he for thinking so? He surely must have had no inconsiderable degree of firmness who merited and received from Christ the name “Cephas”; and he certainly could not be accused of want of energy and zeal who, when his Lord was arrested, instantly drew sword in His defence, and wielded it so effectually as to incur the displeasure of Him for whom he fought!
2. How, then, came Peter’s resolution to miscarry in the scene of his Master’s dire extremity? The reason seems to be this: he had grounded the execution of that resolution upon a sudden feeling of immoderate self-confidence,—nothing doubting but his will was in his own power, whether God’s grace assisted him or not; fully satisfied that what he had courage to resolve so honestly he had likewise ability to perform. He had not sufficiently considered that He who forewarned him of the failure of his resolution was the Searcher of hearts, and needed not that any should testify of man, for He knew what was in man—and what was not. Had he only reflected on the Master’s own declaration, “Without Me ye can do nothing,” the empty boast would have died away upon his lips, and given place to a humble petition for Divine assistance.
III. The need of prayer to ensure preservation from a like fall.—In contemplating the failure of a man who seems to have possessed all the elements of moral strength, and all the qualities requisite for a life of consistent integrity and undeviating holiness, are we not irresistibly led to the conclusion that our natural powers are insufficient for the work which we have to do, and that consequently an appeal must be made to heaven for grace to help in time of need? If we reach this conclusion by a comparison of ourselves with St. Peter in those faculties which we may be supposed to possess in common with him, must not the conviction of our insufficiency be increased tenfold, when we reflect that he must have had many opportunities and incentives to perseverance which we naturally cannot have? Yet he fell! His familiar association with Christ—hearing His words, witnessing His actions, and consequently receiving continual accessions of information and continual confirmations of his faith—must necessarily have enlarged his understanding and strengthened his judgment. Yet he fell! Who, then, at the distance at which we are placed by nature from intercourse with Christ, can possibly hope to stand alone? Who that sees an apostle vanquished will dare to go forth to the battle of life unaided by that Divine Spirit “without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy”?
Mar_14:29-31. How best to promote the accomplishment of our good resolutions.—Perhaps it is not taking for granted too much to suppose that few Christians have come to a due conviction of their own sinful weakness and infirmity of purpose without having themselves so fallen under some trying occasion or temptation as afterwards to bewail from the heart their own irresolution, and, like Peter, to go out and weep bitterly. For however strong the mind, however sound the faith, and however fixed and confirmed by habit the religious principles, there are occasions when the Christian’s armour seems to stand him in little stead. He appears taken by surprise,—either his situation is new to him, or the allurement unusually great, or the opportunity too auspicious, or the alternative attended by great dangers, or the advantage of compliance sure and important, or the favourable concurrence of circumstances not likely to occur again. One or other or even all of these considerations perhaps prompts him to decide quickly; and, alas! to determine wrongly. He falls, therefore, because he never contemplated such a trial of his strength; or having contemplated it, thought himself quite safe. But how, it may be asked, is such success to our best purposes and resolves to be secured, that we may be, as much as possible, prepared for every temptation—that we may, as far as human infirmity will permit, prevent “sin from getting dominion over us”—that we may be able to withstand in the evil day, and, having done all, “to stand”?
I. To give stability to our good resolutions we must be convinced of our own weakness as well as wickedness.—No man can be ignorant of his besetting sin—his peculiar bias towards some one vice, temper, or failing; and whatever it may be, to that he should principally direct his attention in forming his resolves. For without having made this part of his moral nature his especial study, without understanding clearly what little reliance he can place upon himself, in the case of allurement and temptation addressed to this his prevailing sin, his most deliberate purpose will avail him nothing. He will seek occasions and places and persons from which he never yet escaped without guilt, and thus perhaps continue to impute to circumstances the fault which belongs only to his own heart.
II. We must have minutely considered our former lapses and relapses before we presume to make a resolve.—The causes of our fall should be accurately ascertained, and the leading incitement to each relapse be singled out and set up as a kind of beacon to warn us effectually where our danger lies. The repeated practice of sin has made this admonition by no means difficult for the sinner to obey. For he has only to select any one transgression, and he will for the most part trace in it the usual course of his progress in the commission of sin. Above all, he will perceive that with each relapse his resolves have become less efficacious, the path to his favourite vice has become smoother, his compunctions less bitter, his heart more hardened.
III. The sense of your weakness and of your frequent relapses should induce such a distrust of your own strength as to deter you from exposing yourselves to trials which may be avoided.—It is easy to attribute to yourselves powers of resistance or forbearance and self-denial which are far beyond your present attainments in Christian discipline. Your resolves should therefore be made in all humility. Nothing too high and hard for your present strength should be attempted. We are all to expect trials; but it is a criminal degree of rashness to go out needlessly to meet them, and much more so when a little reflexion might teach us that we have not arms sufficiently strong for the encounter.
IV. There must be after every lapse an act of sincere and sorrowful repentance before we presume to make a fresh resolve.—Where there have been shame and confusion, and remorse and fear, there may be some promise of our “taking heed to our ways,” of our hating sin, of our “recovering ourselves out of the snare of the devil.” But when the sinner, in order to pacify at the moment the fearful misgivings that ever attend guilt, satisfies himself with the bare resolution to offend no more, what grounds can he have for accepting so insignificant a pledge of his own actual improvement?
V. Even after repentance we must not consider our resolves as any warrant of our safety without two other safeguards.—
1. The first of these is vigilance. Our minds must be thoroughly imbued with that important truth that ours is a life of warfare—that we are, as it were, in an enemy’s country. Our own corruption within and constant temptations without should keep us ever in the state of sentinels. For the greatest security for the sinner, after all, is to avoid every occasion of sin—to be beforehand in shunning the dangerous opportunity, the depraved associate, the convenient hour, the favourable situation.
2. The other principal safeguard to our resolves is prayer. We have only to be earnest and sincere in our applications to the throne of grace for spiritual aid, through the intercession of that Redeemer who is “able to save them to the uttermost that come unto God through Him,” and we shall not fail to receive the blessing that we ask.
VI. Among the religious offices which come in aid of the means above recommended, none is more efficacious than the “spiritual food and sustenance” properly received in the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.—On no occasion does the heart of man come into closer intercourse with his God and Saviour; on no occasion does he draw more freely from the fountain of Divine grace. For he not only receives remission of his sins, and peace and comfort past all understanding, but he is endued with new vigour for his conflict with the world, the flesh, and the devil; and all his holy purposes and resolutions receive the sanction and support of his approving Maker. Thus renewed in the inner man, he cometh forth from that holy ordinance as “a bridegroom out of his chamber, and rejoiceth as a giant to run his course.”—A. B. Evans, D.D.
OUTLINES AND COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
Mar_14:12-16. Christ’s preparation for the Passover.—Not even Peter and John are to know beforehand the man’s name and address, lest, if Judas should suspect them of knowing, he should worm, or try to worm, the secret out of them. Perhaps he did suspect—perhaps he did try to get at their secret; but even Peter could not tell him what he did not know. In His love and pity, His love for them, His pity for Judas—to save them from a mistake they would have found it hard to forgive, and to hold him back from a sin which man has not forgiven yet, though we have no right to assume that Christ has not forgiven it long ago—He rendered it impossible for them to betray Him to Judas, and for Judas to betray Him to the priests. The incident, thus viewed, has many lessons for us.
1. Even when He seems most unlike Himself our Lord is most truly Himself, and is leading us where we would be, though by ways we know not, and which do not seem likely to lead us there.
2. His prescience extends to the minutest details as well as to the main lines and critical occasions of life: nothing which really concerns us is overlooked or forgotten by Him; no, not even the pitcher, or the cup of cold water we need to slake our thirst, or are carrying to a neighbour who needs it even more than we do.
3. If we love Him, and are bent on serving Him, He will save us from those innocent, because unconscious and unintentional, transgressions of His goodwill for us which must inevitably inflict their natural punishment upon us, however guiltless we may be—just as He saved Peter and John from innocently betraying a secret to Judas of which he would have made an evil use.
4. Even when we are traitors to Him in our hearts, when we are meditating some sin which will cast us from His grace, He will do all He can, short of forcing our will, to save us from our sin; He will place hindrances and impediments in our way as He did in the way of Iscariot, and will not abandon us to our evil hearts, until, against all the remonstrances and warnings of His love, we overleap all hindrances and plunge into what we know to be a path of death.—S. Cox, D.D.
Mar_14:14. Preparation for Christ as our guest.—At all seasons of the year, and on festivals and ordinary days alike, the question, which is at once a warning and an invitation, is addressed to each one of us, “Where is My guest-chamber?” And we, far more than the owner of that honoured house in Jerusalem, have had opportunities of knowing all that that question means. It is no guest-chamber built with hands that He needs, but the temple built without hands, which temple we are. If that hospitable disciple would do so much for His entertainment during a few hours, surely we may do as much when we aim at having Him for our guest for ever—throughout life and in eternity.
1. It must be an upper room, in the highest part of our being, the best that we have to offer to any one. It must be in our heart of hearts, where we can love Him, not in word and tongue, but in deed and truth, with all our soul and all our strength. There are those who think that they have done much if they have given Him a welcome in some transitory emotion of religious excitement. But these heated feelings are not the upper room, which is ever calm and quiet; they are more akin to the common hall, where noise and excitement are frequent.
2. It must be a furnished room and ready: furnished with those things which He loves, and which will enable Him to rest and abide—prayers and hymns, thanksgivings and intercessions, holy thoughts, kind words, and good deeds. “Alms all around and hymns within”—that is the atmosphere in which Christ can abide; and the heart that is furnished with these can offer Him a home in which He may bestow His goods. For Christ is no man’s debtor. If He comes as a guest He comes open-handed, and bestows blessings without measure or stint.
3. And therefore we must prepare a large room. As we are niggardly in what we offer to Him, so also we are half hearted and little-minded in what we ask from Him. We do not desire His graces enough, and we do not desire enough of them. We must open our hearts freely to receive the good measure, pressed down and shaken together, which He yearns to bestow. It is His own command, His own promise, which says, “Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it.”—A. Plummer, D.D.
Mar_14:17-19. A traitor among the twelve.—
1. In the holiest society on earth the unholy may have a place.
2. The highest goodness may fail to win to the obedience of faith.
3. There may be moral wrong without present consciousness.
4. The knowledge and appointment of God do not hinder the freedom and responsibility of man.—J. H. Godwin.
The traitor.—
1. At first it seems strange to find a traitor amongst the select disciples of Christ. Yet there is nothing in this selection of a bad man to be an agent in carrying on a good design which is not in harmony with the general scheme of the Divine government. It is a condition of the visible Church that “the evil should be ever mingled with the good,” and that sometimes the evil should have authority and pre-eminence over the good. Thus the small circle of Christ’s select disciples presented a sort of epitome of the world into which they were to be sent and the Church over which they were to preside.
2. The next thing which challenges observation here is the unfruitfulness of this unhappy man under the extraordinary religious advantages which he enjoyed. We plainly see, in this instance, that mere means of grace, unaccompanied by an actual operation of Divine power upon the heart, are nothing. Even the Holy Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ, then for the first and last time administered by Christ Himself, and of which Judas was permitted to partake, as the type of all who should thereafter profane those holy mysteries, had no effect upon him, except to make him worse than before (Joh_8:27).
3. The commonness of the sinful lust by which Judas was enticed. What is there singular in a man’s rejoicing because his wealth is great, or desiring that it may be still greater? This is, in fact, the ruling passion of mankind. The desire of acquiring is one of the most powerful springs of human conduct. Rightly directed and strictly regulated, it is not only innocent, but laudable. Unregulated and misdirected, see what it leads to!—F. Field, LL.D.
Mar_14:18. A question of propriety as to quality and time of news.—Christ then breaks news at table that operates distressfully. He knew it would. That was a violation of hygienic law. At such times, to secure the best results, cheerfulness should reign. He who made the Sabbath for man would surely not thoughtlessly or wantonly establish a precedent the observance of which would be against man. It cannot be. The gospel tends to gladness. Its trend makes for the good of man as man, body and soul, in all the phases of his being. But there is a disturbing element in him. The otherwise beautiful equipoise, adjustment, and beneficent operation of the laws of human life have been rudely shattered by sin. Anarchical times demand different treatment from the “piping times of peace.” Just when and where the province of one law should be invaded in deference to another and higher were questions which the Saviour, we may be sure, in His own case settled righteously. That He had good reason therefore we may rest assured. But what that was we may not be so sure. Possibly the “needs be” was this: His hour was at hand. The goal was being reached without the unnecessary introduction of the miraculous either in forcing or retarding. God does not work by miracles when ordinary means will suffice. Were Christ to utter these words sooner, Judas might, humanly speaking, have perfected arrangements and precipitated matters. Jesus would then have been betrayed before “His time,” unless a miracle of prevention were wrought. Had He spoken them later, Judas might not have the requisite time to compass his plans and be on the ground at the right moment for “his hour,” unless a miracle of hastening were wrought. And then, again, these words may have been uttered at that moment to secure the absence of this disturbing element from the feast of love that was to follow.—Wm. M. Campbell.
Mar_14:19. The moving of conscience.—This question indicates a deep stirring of conscience, quickened by God. It is a question of which every human soul at some time or other is more or less cognisant, whatever may be the answer given to it. It is a question which is vital to any adequate conception either of the sinfulness of sin, or of the standard of personal duty, or of the ideal walk of the regenerate spirit with God.
I. Consider it in some of the various motives and intentions with which a human soul may conceivably put the question to God.
1. Clearly it may be put (God protect us from it!) in a spirit of insolent hardness. Thus Judas put it. A man to whom sin is not sinful, to whom self-gratification is the law of his being, who neither fears God nor regards man, may say, “Lord, is it I?” But he will not care for an answer, nor wait to hear it given.
2. It may be put also in a spirit of shallow and ignorant levity. We little know what possibilities of good and also of evil are hidden in our wonderful and complex nature—to what heights of goodness we may rise, into what abysses of infamy we may fall.
3. It is also the question of a holy self-distrust. There are so many pitfalls at our feet, such woful surprises, such mortifying recollections of hopes disappointed, opportunities neglected, duties omitted, blessings lost, that “Lord, is it I?” is often the aching, frightened question of a bewildered though honest spirit, fearful of losing itself in the mazes and obscurities of its unknown tendencies, and quite distinct from the morbid self-questionings of spiritual egotism.
II. There are circumstances which from time to time suggest if they do not compel it; and so sinuous and intricate are the windings of the human heart, so apt are even true natures to be deceived by refined sophistries, or encouraged to mistake transient emotion for the continuous action of dominant principles, that it is almost necessary for us, if we would adequately know ourselves, and habitually rule ourselves, to be forced to find ourselves out as we stand in the light of God.
1. The sight of a brother’s sin may be wholesome though humbling in making us recognise that only by the grace of God we are what we are. Had we been tempted as he was tempted, might not we have fallen perhaps lower? Or we may ourselves have been exposed to the fiery trial of temptation and been saved, yet so as “by fire.” We never knew till now how strong was the strength of God, how weak the weakness of man.
2. There are also occasions in life which, like mountain-peaks rising out of a level plain to break its monotony and form its landmarks, bring us face to face with hidden corners in our personal life, and make us feel with a thrill of gladness the good hand of our God upon us. Sometimes it is a special mercy, which makes us wonder how God can be so good to us.—Bishop Thorold.
“Is it I?”—It was a good sign that the first thought of each of them was about the possibility of his own sin. When a man foresees a great temptation that is coming, it is always better that, instead of turning to his neighbours and saying, as he searches their faces, “I wonder who will do this wicked thing?” he should turn to himself and say, “Is it possible that I am the man who will do it?” When the wind is rising, it is good for each ship at sea to look to its own ropes and sails, and not stand gazing to see how ready the other ships are to meet it. We all feel that we would rather hear a man asking about himself anxiously than to see him so sure of himself that the question never occurred to him. We should be surer of his standing firm if we saw that he knew he was in danger of a fall.
I. There are times in the lives of all of us, I think, when that comes to us which came here to Christ’s disciples.—Beneath us, as beneath them, the worst possibilities of our nature sometimes reveal themselves. Such times are not our worst times certainly. Often they are times which, by their very sense of danger, are the safest and strongest of our lives. But they are often moments that dismay us. They come in upon our self-complacency and shock it with their ominous presence.
1. One of them is the time when we see deep and flagrant sin in some other man. When some great crime is done, when through the community there runs the story of some frightful cruelty or dreadful fraud, I think that almost all of us are conscious of a strange mixture of two emotions, one of horror and the other of a terrible familiarity. The act is repugnant to all our conscientiousness; but the powers that did the act, and the motives that persuaded the doing of it, are powers which we possess and motives which we have felt. When you read the story of yesterday’s defaulter fleeing to-day, an exile and an outcast, or sitting gloomily behind his prison bars, it is not with an angel’s innocent wonder what a sin like this can mean; it is with the understanding of a man who has felt the same temptation to which this poor wretch has yielded, that you deplore his fate. With simple wonder an angel might walk through our State prison-halls; but a man must walk there full of humbleness and charity; for as the best man that ever lived finds something of common humanity in us which makes his goodness seem not impossible to us, so the worst of men stirs by the sight of his human sin some sense of what human power of sinfulness we too possess.
2. Another of the occasions which let us see our own possibility of sin, which open to us a glimpse of how wicked we might be, is when we do some small sin and recognise the deep power of sinfulness by which we do it. A pure, honest boy cheats with his first little timid fraud, and on the other side, the bad side of him, the door flies open, and he sees the possibility that he too should be the swindler whose enormous frauds make the whole city tremble. The slightest crumbling of the earth under your feet makes you aware of the precipice. The least impurity makes you ready to cry out, as some image of hideous lust rises before you, “Oh, is it I? Can I come to that?”
3. And yet another occasion when we become aware of our own bad possibility is the expression of any suspicion about us by another person. I think that for you or me to find our names linked to-morrow in this community with some great crime of which we knew that we were totally innocent must stir the mystery of our inner life, and make us see what capacity of sin is lying there. I think our disavowal of the sin that we were charged with would be not boisterously angry, but quiet and solemn and humble, with a sense of danger and a gratitude for preservation. I think that ought to be the influence. And even the boisterousness with which some men deny a charge against their characters is still a sign in a worse way of how their conscience has been touched. Would you want the clerk in your store to be charged with dishonesty, and not go back to his work, when the charge had been disproved, with a deepened perception of temptation and a quickened watchfulness and care?
4. By a strange but very natural process the same result often comes from just the opposite cause. Not merely when men suspect us and charge us with wrong-doing, but when men praise us and say that we are good, this same recognition of how bad we have the power to be often arises. A man comes up to our life, and, looking round upon the crowd of our fellowmen, he says, “See, I will strike the life of this brother of ours, and you shall hear how true it rings.” He does strike it, and it does seem to them to ring true, and they shout their applause; but we whose life is struck feel running all through us at the stroke the sense of hollowness.
5. Is it not also true that every temptation which comes to us, however bravely and successfully it may be resisted, opens to us the sight of some of our human capacity of sin? The man who dares to laugh at a temptation which he has felt and resisted is not yet wholly safe out of its power.
II. What is this but saying that in every serious moment of life the possibility of sin stands up before us?—None but the man who has no serious moments, none but he who makes all life a play, escapes the sight. To every other man—nay, may we not say to every man, since no man is literally always a trifler?—to every man at some time the clouds roll back, the spell is broken, and he sees what a power of being wicked as of being good belongs to him just as man.
1. Is it good for him to see this? Will it help him or harm him? That will depend upon the way it works in him. It may become in him either paralysis or inspiration. One man sees his danger, and stands powerless. Another man sees his danger, and every faculty is strung to its intensest strength. If the feet are set more resolutely toward goodness, and the hands lay hold more firmly upon help, it is good for us to know how wicked we may be, how great our danger is.
2. What is it that makes that difference? How is the consciousness of our danger prevented from becoming a depressing emotion and turned into an inspiring motive? It must be by opening the life upon the other side. It must be by realising the possibilities of our human life for good as well as for evil, by seeing and never forgetting how good we have a chance to be, as well as how bad we may become. This is the power of hope; and hope is the true master of fear. A merchant hopes to be rich, and the fear of being poor, instead of being a vexing anxiety, becomes the humble servant of his expectation, and helps him on toward wealth. The fear of death is terrible to a sick man until the hope of life and strength and activity opens before him; and then in his convalescence the fear of death has ceased to depress him as a feeling, and only remains with him as a motive to caution and watchfulness. Thus fear is always good when it has hope to rule it.
3. Now if you saw a young man overwhelmed with the sight on which our eyes have been fixed to-day; if you saw him so full of the consciousness of the power of sin in his life, the possibility of the badness that he might do and be, that he was wretched and paralysed,—what would you do for him? Would you try to make him forget what he had seen? Would you try to shut out the mystery of his life from him, and make him live again the life of narrow satisfaction in the present which he lived before he looked down into the deep gulf? You could not do it. But if you could, would it be well? Surely not. What you need to do for him is to make him lift up his eyes and see the heights above him. You want to make him like the climber on a ladder, who looks up and not down, who climbs not to escape the gulf below him, but to reach the top above him, and who feels the gulf below him only as a power that makes the hold of foot and hand on every round of the ladder which they strike more firm. Now it is the glory of the Christian gospel that in the treatment of man’s spiritual nature it preserves this true relation between hope and fear perfectly.
4. I suggested just now the analogy between our physical and moral consciousness, between our consciousness of the power to be sick and the consciousness of the power to sin. It is an analogy which illustrates what I have just been saying. There is a nervousness about health which is all morbid. It is full of imaginations. There are people who can never hear a disease described without thinking that they have it. They never hear a sick man talk without feeling all his symptoms repeated in themselves. You think of such a person and realise his wretchedness. Then you look away from him to a perfectly healthy man who seldom thinks about being sick at all. But yet he is something different from what he would be if there were no power of sickness in him. Unconscious for the most part, but now and then coming forth into consciousness, there is always present with him a sense of his humanity, with all the liabilities which that involves. He does not do what a man would do who had literally a frame of iron. And that is just the condition of the man with the healthy soul. He does not nervously believe, when he hears of any flagrant crime, that he is just upon the brink of that crime himself. He lives in doing righteousness, but all the time he keeps the consciousness that sin, even out to its worst possibilities, sin even to the cruelty of Cain, the lust of David, the treachery of Judas, is open to him.—Bishop Phillips Brooks.
Mar_14:21. A wail in the woe.—There is a wail in the word for “woe,” a tone of lament, if also a tone of reprobation. Indeed, we shall get nearer the meaning of the whole verse if we think of it as an elegy, rather than as a formal sentence on the traitor. Jesus could not lose even “the son of loss” without sorrow. That any man should be base enough to betray “the best Man that e’er wore flesh about Him” might well make even an angel weep. There must have been something good in Judas, or he would not have been “called to be an apostle”; but there must also have been something horribly mean in a man who, while affecting great love for the poor, could habitually steal from the purse which commonly held so little, but always a little for the destitute and helpless. And how could He who loved all men but mourn over one in whom much that was good and of fair promise had been blighted by a sordid selfishness and covetousness, one who had given place to the devil, and to the meanest of all devils, the most sordid of the spirits that fell? “Good for that man,” etc., was a proverbial expression of blended pity and blame, and must not be taken too literally, since nothing could be good or bad for an unborn man. It means simply that not to have been at all would have been better than to have become such a man as Iscariot was. And there are many of whom this might be said. Judas is not the only man who has been unfaithful to his ideal, nor the only man who has played the hypocrite and proved a traitor to Christ from selfishness and greed.—S. Cox, D.D.
The grace of God received in vain.—Judas was treated even as the rest of the apostles up to the moment of his defection. That he was meanwhile so ill disciplined in heart as to be robbing the common purse of his little fraternity almost certainly denotes that he had received this favour before he had become “like a little child”—that he was an exception, in short, to the general rule of the Messiah’s ministry while on earth, and of the Comforter’s dispensation ever since. It was an exception which, considered in all its bearings, was sure to be always remembered and recorded, and might therefore have been made and exhibited in a strong light for the purpose of shewing that the rule from which it was a departure was really no limitation to the free mercy of God in Christ. In the same manner as Adam’s fall proved that the whole human race were incapable of standing without Divine assistance added to their natural powers, even so Judas’ case was perhaps designed to shew that if in the recovery of fallen man the grace of God were more lavishly dispensed, if His Son while on earth or His Spirit now required of us no preparatory frame of heart and mind, we should not be the better for the removal of the apparent restriction in the offer of mercy. To man in that unprepared state of heart the grace of God would be the pearl thrown to swine.—S. Hinds.
Warning from the fall of Judas.—The Lord, when He pleases, can employ bad men in His service, and bestow splendid abilities and extraordinary spiritual gifts upon them, which He perhaps denies to His dutiful and beloved children. If it be asked why He does this, and why He permits hypocrites, covetous and deceitful workers, to appear among men as angels of light, it may be answered that He has a right to do what He will with His own, that He giveth no account of His matters, and that from what He has revealed of His character we ought to believe, whether we can always see it or not, that He is righteous in all His ways, holy in all His works, and wise in all His proceedings. But since the fact is so, that Satan can transform himself into an angel of light, and his ministers appear as ministers of righteousness, that Balaam can prophesy, Judas work miracles, and wicked men preach and pray with great eloquence, we ought to be aware of it, lest we be dazzled or misled, and therefore excited to covet splendid gifts instead of those graces of the Spirit which essentially accompany salvation, and mark us out as real members of Christ, children of God, and inheritors of the kingdom of heaven.—W. Richardson.
Mar_14:22-24. The Holy Communion.—When the earnest Christian kneels at the altar to take the Holy Communion, he performs a sixfold Acts 1. It is an act of obedience. Not a suggestion merely, not a time-honoured custom only, but a command, explicit, emphatic.
2. It is an act of remembrance. Not that Christ needed a memorial, but that we needed a memory.
3. It is an act of thanksgiving—a eucharist. This is worthy. Nations honour themselves in honouring their heroes. Thus Garibaldi is honoured in Italy, Luther in Germany, Napoleon in France. Thus Italy, and France, and Germany, and all Christian people honour the world’s Hero, the world’s Saviour, in this sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving, in this eucharistic feast.
4. It is an act of fellowship—a communion. We join with angels and archangels and all the company of heaven and of earth to magnify the glorious name of God.
5. It is an act of testimony. Every celebration of this Sacrament is one new link in the continuous chain of testimony that comes down through the ages from the upper chamber of Jerusalem. Every hand that takes this bread and cup joins hands with the unbroken chain of priestly hands that reach back to the pierced hands of Jesus.
6. It is an act of expectancy. We shew forth the Lord’s death till He come. We look back, and we look forward “till He come.” It is going up to the altar on the mountain-top and looking to the eastern sky to see if there be any sign of the coming dawn.—R. S. Barrett.
The Holy Communion the most solemn Christian service.—
1. If any one were to ask what is the most sacred, solemn, and consoling part of our religious service, that where God has gathered together most abundantly the greatest of His truths and the richest of His graces, where it is that in our life on earth we are brought nearest to heaven, and are most lifted up in heart and spirit, calmly and awfully to feel the presence of the God whom we serve, no well-instructed Christian would doubt how to answer. He would say at once, “In the Holy Communion.”
2. What is it that makes it so different from all other acts of prayer and praise? What gives it its matchless solemnity, its matchless savour of heaven, its deep comfort?
(1) It is the communication to us of the death and passion of Christ, and in it we are carried back for the time to that One Sacrifice, in which our own pardon was involved, and from which flowed God’s mercy to the world.
(2) It is the link and bond, while Christians are living in the flesh, between earth and heaven, the meeting-place between the redeemed and their Redeemer, out of sight, but not far off, the communion in which we are again and again joined to the risen and glorified Lord, who is the heavenly strength and life by which our spirits live.
(3) Here we have communion also with the whole Church of Christ. Here we who are so separated are one. Here we who most deeply sympathise with one another, and we who never could be brought on earth to understand each other, are practically joined in one; for both break the bread and pour the wine, and receive it as the token that the Lord had died for them, that the Lord hath pardoned us, that the Lord is nigh.—Dean Church.
The presence of Christ in the Eucharist.—
1. I say and confess with the Evangelists and with St. Paul that the bread on the which thanks are given is the body of Christ in the remembrance of Him and His death, to be set forth perpetually of the faithful until His coming.
2. I say and confess the bread which we break to be the communion and partaking of Christ’s body with the ancient and the faithful Fathers.
3. I say and believe that there is not only a signification of Christ’s body set forth by the Sacrament, but also that therewith is given to the godly and faithful the grace of Christ’s body—that is, the food of life and immortality; and this I hold with Cyprian.
4. I say also, with St. Augustine, that we eat life and we drink life; with Emissene, that we feel the Lord to be present in grace; with Athanasius, that we receive celestial food which cometh from above; the property of natural communion, with Hilary; the nature of flesh and benediction which giveth life, in bread and wine, with Cyril; and, with the same Cyril, the virtue of the very flesh of Christ, life and grace of His body, the property of the Only-Begotten, that is to say life, as He Himself in plain words expoundeth it.
5. I confess also, with Basil, that we receive the mystical advent and coming of Christ, grace, and the virtue of His very nature; the Sacrament of His very flesh, with Ambrose; the body by grace, with Epiphanius; spiritual flesh, but not that which was crucified, with Jerome; grace flowing into a sacrifice, and the grace of the Spirit, with Chrysostom; grace and invisible verity, grace and society of the members of Christ’s body, with Augustine.
6. Finally, with Bertram, I confess that Christ’s body is in the Sacrament in this respect—namely, as he writeth, because there is in it the Spirit of Christ, that is, the power of the Word of God, which not only feedeth the soul, but also cleanseth it. Out of these I suppose it may clearly appear unto all men how far we are from that opinion whereof some go about falsely to slander us to the world, saying we teach that the godly and faithful should receive nothing else at the Lord’s table but a figure of the body of Christ.—Bishop Ridley.
Christ’s presence in the Eucharist to unworthy receivers.—May we say, then, that Christ is really present in the Sacrament as well to the unworthy as to the faithful receivers? Yes, this we must grant, yet must we add withal that He is really present with them in a quite contrary manner; really present He is, because virtually present to both—because the operation or efficacy of His body and blood is not metaphorical but real in both. Thus the bodily sun, though locally distant for its substance, is really present by its heat and light as well to sore eyes as to clear sights, but really present to both by a contrary real operation; and by the like contrary operation it is really present to clay and to wax, it really hardeneth the one and really softeneth the other. So doth Christ’s body and blood, by its invisible but real influence, mollify the hearts of such as come to the Sacrament with due preparation, but harden such as unworthily receive the consecrated elements. If he that will hear the Word must take heed how he hears, much more must he which means to receive the Sacrament of Christ’s body and blood be careful how he receives.—T. Jackson.
The mystery of the Eucharist.—The words, “Take, and eat: it is My body. Take, and drink: it is the cup of My blood,” understood in their true meaning, literally and without metaphor, are to human reason a mystery unheard of and impenetrable. The bread that Jesus offers to His apostles is no longer merely bread, but His body which is about to be sacrificed; the cup which He gives them to drink is no longer merely wine, but His own blood which is about to be shed. The apostles understood it so. They did not ask, “How can this be done?” In the simplicity and fulness of their faith, knowing that the power of the Master was boundless, and that the truth was in Him, they believed on His words, and partook of His body and His blood under the forms of bread and wine. What Jesus had said a year before to the people of Galilee at Capernaum (Joh_6:35, etc.), He realised on this day a few hours before His death. He taught them that He was the “Bread of Life,” that in eating of Him they should live; that if they ate not the flesh of the Son of Man and drank not His blood, they should not have life; that His flesh was the true meat, and His blood the true drink; that he who ate of His flesh and drank of His blood should dwell in Him. The people, shocked and scandalised, had turned away, asking ironically how He would give any man His flesh to eat. “How” was now explained.—Father Didon.
The significance of the Eucharist.—This scene contains the whole religion of Jesus. In this single moment of His life He realises it at one stroke in its perfection. He appears at once as Priest and Victim, as creating the eternal priesthood and the eternal sacrifice. He reveals without metaphor or parable the reason of His death. John had rightly called Him “the Lamb of God which taketh away the sins of the world.” How are men to profit by the personal atonement which the Son of God comes to accomplish? They must be incorporated in the Victim who delivers Himself up and dies for their sakes. And Jesus requires not only that there should be a spiritual union with His spirit and His person—His design is a grander one. His aim is a spiritual and material union together; His design is that man, being both spirit and matter, body and soul, should be united in spirit and reality to His whole being—to the Son of God and the Son of Man—to His Divinity and His humanity, to His soul and His body. His design is that he should believe on His Word, and become through faith one and the same spirit with Him—that he should eat of His body and drink of His blood, and be incorporated in the flesh of the Son of Man.—Ibid.
The Eucharist an extension of the Incarnation.—Gregory Nazianzen defines the Eucharist, “a communion of the incarnation of God.” For in that He affirms the bread to be His body, and the wine to be His blood; by receiving this body and blood of Christ, and so changing it into the substance of our body and blood by way of nourishment, the body of Christ becomes our body and His blood is made our blood, and we become in a mystical manner flesh of His flesh and bone of His bone. And as in His conception of the Holy Virgin He took upon Him the nature of man that He might save man, so in His Holy Sacrament He takes upon Him the nature of every man in singular that He might save every man who becomes one with Him in the Divine Sacrament of His body and blood. His real incarnation was only in one, but His mystical incarnation in many; and hence comes this Sacrament to be an instrument whereby Christ is conveyed unto us, His benefits applied, and so our faith confirmed.—J. Mede.
The Eucharist is on the one side the perfection of the sustenance of life in personal communion, on the other a use of the products of the earth as instruments of communion, implying the necessity of taking the whole nature into communion if it is to be real, the symbols of creation and of the Lord’s body in one. The life of the disciples with Christ was exchanged for a life in Christ: they abode as branches in the Vine of which His Father is the Husbandman. The bread took for them the place of the body through which they had first learnt to converse with a living Lord. The wine took for them the place of the blood in which His life had dwelt. In that feast of blessing and thanksgiving, that joyful participation of accepted sacrifice, no life was found too earthly to be offered on the altar of the Cross, or to become a means of human fellowship and Divine communion.—Prof. F. J. A. Hort.
Communion.—
1. Communion is permanent, yet needs times of revival.
2. All Christian life is sacramental. Not alone in our highest act of communion are we partaking of heavenly powers through earthly signs and vehicles.
3. This neglected faith may be revived through increased sympathy with the earth derived from fuller knowledge, through the fearless love of all things.—Ibid.
Mar_14:22. Analogies between Christ’s body and bread.—
1. As bread is the strength and state of our natural life, so Christ is for our spiritual, being all in all.
2. As bread is loathed of the full stomach, but most acceptable to the hungry soul, so Christ is most welcome to such as “hunger and thirst after righteousness.”
3. As bread is usual and daily, so Christ should be to the Christian, feeding on that bread which came down from heaven, the soul’s ordinary refection.
4. As bread is made one loaf of many grains, so we that are many are one bread and one body, because we are all partakers of one bread.
5. As corn is cut down with the scythe, threshed in the barn with many stripes, torn in the mill with much violence, then bolted and sifted, last of all baked with extreme heat in the oven, and all this that it may be fit meat for our body, so Christ in His ripe age was cut down by cruel death, His body was whipped, His flesh rent asunder, His soul was as it were melted in the fiery furnace of God’s anger; and all this that He might become food for our soul, that we might eat of this bread and drink of this cup.—Dean Boys.
Mar_14:23-24. The blood of Jesus Christ becomes, through His goodness, milk for His children, a band of union to His members, the seal of His covenant, and the ransom of His slaves; and, on the contrary, through the wickedness of the imitators of Judas, it becomes to them a mortal poison, a sword of separation, the seal of their reprobation, and the cause of an eternal captivity.—P. Quesnel.
Mar_14:25. The new Passover.—Jesus never partook afterwards of the Passover—never, that we know of, celebrated the Eucharist with His disciples. It is said, indeed, that after His resurrection “He was known of them in breaking of bread”; but this can hardly be so applied. Rather say that the Holy Spirit of Christ is in His Church, which is His new body, even as His fleshy frame was when this declaration was made. When, therefore, after the descent of the Holy Ghost—when, at this day, a Christian congregation partakes of the new Passover, Christ is in the midst of them, they are His body and members in particular. He is then as truly present, and as truly a partaker in the ceremony of “drinking the fruit of the vine,” as when His Divine nature was united only with the Man Christ Jesus. In this sense He fulfilled His declaration to the apostles, and in this sense continues, in every age of the Church, to drink the fruit of the vine in His own kingdom, the kingdom of God on earth. He said that He would drink it new, because it was thenceforth to assume a new character and efficacy. He came not to destroy, but to fulfil, God’s former appointments—to make all things new.—S. Hinds.
Communion in heaven.—Let us take care to raise our hearts from the sacramental communion here on earth to the eternal communion in heaven, to be celebrated there not under veils or sensible symbols, but openly and without veils. The sight of truth, unveiled and perfectly disclosed to our eyes, is a torrent of delight and joy, which as it were inebriates the soul, makes it forget all the afflictions and miseries of the earth, and transports it out of itself, in order to its living only in the truth, upon the truth, and for the truth.—P. Quesnel.
Mar_14:26. Jesus singing.—That song is like an aureola encircling that little company in the gathering gloom. There is no concord between light and darkness, no real affinity between woe and song. One is from above, the other from beneath. One is a daughter of the skies, the other a child of perdition. Musical harmonies are not heard in the outer darkness, breaking sweetly on the ear amid the awful discords of despair. But heaven is a land of song. Joyous strains are heard constantly echoing in sweetest refrain over the “bright plains” of paradise.
1. Christ singing! And at such a time! The hour and power of darkness approaching. The agony of Gethsemane and the darkness of the Cross near. He knows it all, yet calmly sings. What a vision is here of holy confidence and anticipated triumph! Apparently Christ on the eve of defeat; the powers of darkness on that of victory. But He sings. Glad omen for the cause of redemption. Such singing does not indicate a discouraged leader or a defeated cause.
2. The disciples sang. This would have a tendency to neutralise the effect of the “exceeding sorrow” that oppressed them. It would prevent a panic until the “hour” had come.
3. In time of danger and in the face of the coming storm, how much depends, under God, on the leader! Napoleon in the hearts of his soldiers fights and wins an Austerlitz or a Jena. The spirit of Wellington pervades Waterloo and saves Europe. Jesus can sing on the eve of the Waterloo of the world’s redemption. Such a leader, such a spirit, such a song, animates His people to meet foes, “fight the good fight of faith,” and conquer. Blessed paradox! The darkest hours may still be bright with the light of the heavenly sun. The Eternal Father and Friend is “at the helm.”—Wm. M. Campbell.
The spirit in which to meet the trials of life.—Praise is an exercise in the spirit of which we should meet the trials of life. I use the term “spirit” as distinguished from the outward act, from the mere utterance of words or melody of sounds, and to guard against the idea that apart from those feelings of which it ought to be the expression and accompaniment any form of worship is entitled to the commendation given in Scripture to the exercise of praising God. The exercise is founded on a knowledge and belief of the Divine perfections; it is not so much a mechanical as a spiritual act—it is not the exercise of musical taste, but of devotional feeling—it is the admiring contemplation of the Divine perfections, expressed in the appropriate forms of inspired devotion. Be it yours to rise from the contemplation of second causes to the contemplation of the First Cause, in adoring admiration of Him who appoints and arranges all according to His unerring will. Be it yours to remember that the hand which removed the gourd you delighted in likewise bestowed it,—that the worm which withers has been sent by Him, not in wrath, but in love; not to leave your heads defenceless against the scorching sun or the pelting storm, but to lead you to abide in a safer and sweeter peace under the shadow of the Almighty. Trials thus met would be deprived of their sting. And did either your own interests or those of Christianity require that sufferings as great as those which martyrs have endured should be appointed you, encountering them in the same spirit, you would come out of them with the same triumph.—R. Brodie.
Mar_14:27. Christ the Shepherd—
1. As descending from ancient patriarchs who were shepherds. They were types of Him.
2. He knows His sheep, and marks them for His own (Joh_10:3; Joh_10:14). God sets His seal on them (2Ti_2:19).
3. He feeds their souls and bodies in green pastures (Psalms 23), and drives them to the sweet streams and waters of comfort by the paths of grace and righteousness.
4. He defends them from the wolf and enemies; they being timorous, simple, weak, shiftless creatures, unable to fly, resist, or save themselves.
5. He nourishes the young and tender lambs.
6. He seeks them when they go astray, and rejoices to find them.
7. He brings them to the fold.
(1) The fold of grace.
(2) The fold of glory.—T. Taylor, D.D.
Christ smitten, an example to us.—
1. He suffered for no necessity or desert, but by voluntary humility, whereas we deserve fiery trials.
2. He suffered not for His own cause, but ours; and shall not we for His?
3. He despised the shame; and why should not we?
4. The end of His Cross was the exaltation at God’s right hand; and we expect the same.—Ibid.
The sheep scattered.—Why were the disciples thus scattered?
1. Their own weakness and carnal fear made them fly to save themselves. They had not counted the cost of their profession. Nor had they yet received the Holy Spirit, which afterwards kept them strong and steadfast.
2. God in His wisdom would have Christ deserted, because He was to be known to tread “the winepress of God’s wrath alone.”
3. Thus it behoved the Scripture to be fulfilled, in regard of Christ Himself, who, voluntarily undertaking the grievous burden of our sin, must be forsaken by all for the time.
4. To teach us that all our safety depends on our relation to the Chief Shepherd. Without Christ we lie dispersed, ungathered, and forlorn.—Ibid.
Mar_14:28. The promised meeting in Galilee.—Why in Galilee?
1. That our Lord and His disciples may more surely enjoy one another without fear of the Jews, and that He may instruct them in the things concerning the kingdom of heaven.
2. Because Christ had more disciples and favourites in Galilee to whom He would familiarly offer Himself and manifest His resurrection than in Judea.
3. His disciples belonged to Galilee, and He would bring them to the place where He found them.
4. They must follow their calling till Christ came, and for the time before they can get into Galilee He will be there before them, waiting for them.—Ibid.
Christ going before.—It is a very great consolation to the diseased and infirm members to be assured that their Head will not abandon them when they fall, but that He will even go before them. If Jesus did not vouchsafe to come to meet us in the power of His new-raised life—that is, by powerful graces—how should we be able ever to rise and go to Him?—P. Quesnel.
Christ the Leader.—He is always going before His followers as an Infallible Teacher, as a Faithful Friend, and as a Mighty Leader; He went before Joseph to Egypt; He went before Moses to the land of Midian, and through the wilderness to the Promised Land; He went before Daniel to the lions’ den; He went before the three brave-hearted Babylonian nonconformists to the fiery furnace; He went before Paul to Rome and John to Patmos. And He will faithfully go before us in our paths of duty, in all our trials and temptations, and in sickness and death we shall find Him going before us.
Mar_14:29. The rashness of the heart.—When we love, we think ourselves capable of anything. Suffering or death seems nothing to us. Of all kinds of rashness, the most incurable and the most unreflecting, and at the same time the most excusable, because it is the most sincere, is not the rashness of the mind or the will, but the rashness of the heart.—Father Didon.
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 14
Mar_14:18-19. Betraying Christ.—Upon the mouldering walls of the refectory at Santa Maria delle Grazie, in Milan, are the faded outlines of the most famous fresco in the world. It is the Last Supper of Leonardo da Vinci. The artist has taken the moment when the Master has said to His disciples that one of them would betray Him, and the disciples have started up and fallen into excited groups, and they are depicted in every variety of surprise and consternation, sorrow and self-searching. Is the artist right in so representing it? There was only one traitor amongst them, surely! Judas knew he meant to betray the Master; but the others were loyal men—nothing farther from their thoughts than handing over the beloved Lord to His persecutors and judges. I think, if you will reflect, you will see that the artist is right, for this reason—these men realised the possibilities which lay in their nature. They did not mean to betray, and yet they might be on the moment of betrayal. And all of us have understood how a sudden question applied to us, a sudden charge made against us, however unjustly, or a charge made against another justly, will sometimes reveal ourselves, as it were, and shew what we little suspected, that we were capable of enormities which, in our better moments, we condemned, and that we were even at that moment standing upon the very brink of a precipice, which is revealed to us by a lightning-flash. The artist, then, was probably right in shewing all the disciples equally anxious, though only one was conscious of treachery.
“Is it I?”—A preacher in a certain village church once gave an easy lesson in Christian ethics from the letters of the alphabet. It was to this effect: “You say, A lies, B steals, C swears, D drinks, F brags, G goes into a passion, H gets into debt. The letter I is the only one of which you have nothing to say.”
Mar_14:22-25. The Holy Communion.—All our churches contain the apparatus for a certain sacred ceremony. And this is no novel introduction; for when we examine the most ancient sanctuaries, or excavate the ruins of the oldest structures, we find this arrangement existing—nay, even when we descend into the catacombs of Rome, where, underground, the infant Church of Jesus worshipped in the days of persecution, we find due provision made for celebrating the Holy Communion. Up then almost to the very era of the Saviour’s mission do we trace this ancient institution, and every time we behold the Lord’s table standing in its appointed place we see an evidence of the truth of Christianity; for there is no way of accounting for its existence, or for the appearance of a new rite amongst the religions ceremonies of mankind, at a particular period, except by assenting to the truth of the gospel narrative that, on a certain eventful night, Jesus of Nazareth established the Blessed Sacrament of His Body and Blood, and commanded it to be observed for an everlasting memorial.—Dr. Hardman.
Spiritual nourishment.—When General Grant took the Federal army at Chattanooga, it was feeble and dispirited because it was almost destitute. The food of the army was hauled with difficulty over mountain roads and the supply was totally insufficient. His first movement, on assuming command—and it was that which eventually led to victory—was to repair the railroads and open up communication, so that the army soon had everything it needed. There is a like necessity in the spiritual life of Christ’s army. We are worth very little in the service of Christ except as we are spiritually nourished. The soul is easily starved by lack of appropriate food. And our spiritual nourishment must come from Christ.
Sacramental grace.—Were a king to offer grants of land to any who would serve in a war for the defence of the country, it would be a foolish question, “Can we not obtain a grant without serving in the war?” The king might give a grant to some who served him in a, different way, but in ordinary cases he would not. God may save a man without the sacraments; but those who reject the sacraments are, to say the least, in great peril. There was a labouring man some time since in one of our northern towns who, owing to some mistake, had been misinformed as to the hour of service. He came when the celebration of the Holy Communion was just over, and when they came out of church they found him waiting sadly outside. The clergyman explained how the mistake had arisen, and expressed his sorrow for it. “Never mind, master,” said the man; but the poor fellow could not help adding, “only I did so build upon it.” He knew his own weakness, and his need of Divine grace and supernatural assistance; and so he was coming, not as if there was any virtue in the bare act of coming, not as if the Sacrament itself could save him, but because he had grasped the great truth that it is through the Sacrament that God imparts grace and strength and life to us His children, unworthy as we are of the least of His benefits.
The Eucharist a feast of consecration.—Here we renounce the idols of the world and put on more and more devotion to our God. Not long ago a foreign potentate was received with much pomp and circumstance by the Lord Mayor of London. He came along the Strand with courtiers and attendants to Temple Bar, at the borders of the old city, where the Lord Mayor met him and delivered to him the keys of London, so signifying that he was welcome not merely to the freedom of the city, but also to the custody of it. As we at this sacramental gateway of promise pass out into the larger and better life, let us turn over the keys to our Prince. Come in, Thou Blessed One I Come in and possess Thine own.
The Eucharist prized.—In times of persecution men would risk their lives to get their Communions. A hundred years ago, during the French Revolution, when religion was abolished by the French Parliament, when Sunday was done away with, the clergy were hunted into the thickets like beasts of prey, and none might conduct or attend a service on pain of death, did people go without this means of grace? No I From time to time a messenger hurried with a mysterious watchword from house to house. “The black swamp,” he would mutter, and pass on without greeting or farewell. But the persons addressed understood him. Shortly after midnight, men and women, dressed in dark clothes, would meet silently by the black swamp below the village, and there, by the light of a carefully guarded lantern, one of the homeless priests would give the Body and Blood of the Lord to the faithful of the neighbourhood. They all knew that at any moment, before the alarm could be given, the soldiers might be upon them, and a volley of grape-shot might stretch them bleeding and dying on the ground. What matter? Man might kill their body, but Jesus had said that He would raise them up at the last day.
Benefit of the Sacrament.—A poor woman was once asked by a neighbour what good she got by receiving the Blessed Sacrament. “Can you understand it?” asked her neighbour. “No,” said the woman, “I cannot understand it, I cannot explain it; but this I know, that I go to the altar empty and I come down full.”
The Holy Grail.—Such was the name given long ago to the actual cup out of which our Saviour dispensed the first Lord’s Supper. This cup, it was believed, had been taken up to heaven, but was revealed miraculously to every one whose heart was pure. And it was thought that the sight of this cup imparted pardon and peace to all who were favoured with a vision of it. This was the tradition believed by our forefathers, and there is a beautiful truth in it which all who consider may understand. For beneath the outward symbols of the Holy Eucharist there is a Divine reality which is seen only by those whose hearts have been purified. Everybody sees the bread and wine, but few see the Divine Flesh and Blood behind them that purchased salvation for us on the bitter cross. Long ago people used to set out on painful pilgrimages in the hope of seeing the Holy Grail. They prayed, they fasted, they wrought good works, they longed for a sight of the wonderful vessel that would give them blessing and joy. But these painful pilgrimages were needless. The Holy Grail was nearer than they thought. For the wonderful vision is to be seen at every Communion, and all we need to see it is a pure heart.
Mar_14:24. Bloodshedding as an expression of love.—A certain Asiatic queen, departing this life, left behind her three accomplished sons, all arrived to years of maturity. The young princes were at strife as to who should pay the highest respect to their royal mother’s memory. To give scope for their generous contentions they agreed to meet at the place of interment, and there present the most honourable gift they knew how to devise or were able to procure. The eldest came, and exhibited a sumptuous monument, consisting of the richest materials, and ornamented with the most exquisite workmanship. The second ransacked all the beauties of the blooming creation, and offered a garland of such admirable colours and delightful odours as had never been seen before. The youngest appeared without any pompous preparations, having only a crystal basin in one hand and a silver bodkin in the other. As soon as he approached he threw open his breast, pierced a vein which lay opposite to his heart, received the blood in the transparent vase, and, with an air of affectionate reverence, placed it on the tomb. The spectators, struck with the sight, gave a shout of general applause, and immediately gave preference to this oblation. If it was reckoned such a singular expression of love to expend a few of those precious drops for the honour of a parent, oh, how matchless, how ineffable, was the love of Jesus in pouring out all His vital blood for the salvation of His enemies!
Mar_14:26. Affliction, producing song.—In his Hunting for the Nightingale in England, John Burroughs tells of listening one black night to the song of the sedge-warbler in the hedge. It was a singular medley of notes, hurried chirps, trills, calls, warbles. When it stopped singing, a stone flung into the bush set it going again, its song now being so persistently animated as to fill the gloom and darkness with joy. Samuel Rutherford’s most gladsome letters are those from his prison. The saints have sung their sweetest when the thorn has pierced their heart.
The power of a hymn.—A little boy came to one of our city missionaries, and holding out a dirty and well-worn bit of printed paper, said, “Please, sir, father sent me to get a clean paper like this.” Taking it from his hand, the missionary unfolded it, and found it was a paper containing the beautiful hymn beginning, “Just as I am.” The missionary looked down with interest into the face earnestly upturned to him, and asked the little boy where he got it, and why he wanted a clean one. “We found it, sir,” said he, “in sister’s pocket after she died; she used to sing it all the time when she was sick, and loved it so much that father wanted to get a clean one to put in a frame to hang it up. Won’t you give us a clean one, sir?”
Mar_14:29-31. Mistaken self-complacency.—It was well said once by a remarkable man, and the words are worth remembering, “Bear in mind that you are just then beginning to go wrong when you are a little pleased with yourself because you are going right.” Let us watch against this as a snare of Satan, and endeavour ever to maintain the apostolic attitude: “In lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than himself.” And let me caution you not to make the mistake of supposing that this self-complacency can be effectually guarded against by a mere use of the recognised theological expressions duly ascribing all the merit and all the praise to God. These are too often merely the garments of Spiritual pride, and by no means must they be mistaken for true humility.
Presumption.—Henry Winstanley, who built the first Eddystone Lighthouse in 1696, had such confidence in the structure that he expressed a wish that he might be in the lighthouse during the fiercest possible hurricane. In November 1703 he had his wish gratified; and the morning after the tempest not a vestige of the lighthouse remained.
Danger of presumption.—A scientific gentleman, deputed by the Government, was, not many years ago, examining the scene of a fatal explosion. He was accompanied by the underviewer of the colliery, and as they were inspecting the edges of a goaf (a region of foul air), it was observed that the “Davy “lamps which they carried were afire. “I suppose,” said the inspector, “that there is a good deal of fire-damp hereabouts.” “Thousands and thousands of cubic feet all through the goaf,” coolly replied his companion. “Why,” exclaimed the official, “do you mean to say that there is nothing but that shred of wire-gauze between us and eternity?” “Nothing at all,” replied the underviewer, very composedly. “There’s nothing here where we stand but that gauze wire to keep the whole mine from being blown into the air.” The precipitate retreat of the Government official was instantaneous. And thus it should be with the sinner; his retreat from the ways of sin—those “goafs” of poisonous air—should be instantaneous. Sir Humphry Davy’s lamp was never designed as a substitute for caution if accidentally or unknowingly carried into foul air, whereas many do so knowingly and habitually.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
William B. Godbey 1900 · Public Domain Mat 26:17-19; Luk 22:7-13; Mar 14:12-16. It is now…
PREPARATION FOR THE PASSOVER
Mat 26:17-19; Luk 22:7-13; Mar 14:12-16. It is now Thursday morning, the Passover beginning properly on the following Sabbath; but these two preceding days are occupied in preparation for the great national solemnity. Josephus says it was not uncommon for them to slaughter two hundred and fifty thousand lambs during a single Passover. O what a wonderful symbolization of Calvary’s bleeding Lamb! “On the first day of unleavened bread, when they were accustomed to slay the Passover, His disciples say to Him, Where do You wish that, having gone, we may prepare that You may eat the Passover? And He sends two of His disciples, and says to them [Peter and John — see Luk 22:8], Go ye into the city, and a man carrying a pitcher of water will meet you; follow him. And whithersoever he may go in, say to the landlord that the Teacher says, Where is the guest-chamber, where I may eat the Passover with My disciples? And he will show you a large upper room, furnished, ready; there prepare for us. And His disciples departed, and came into the city, and found as He said to them, and prepared the Passover.” They escorted me, during both of my tours in Jerusalem, to a large upper room in the City of David, on the summit of Mount Zion, which they claim to be identical with the one here mentioned, which received imperishable notoriety for the Last Supper, the winding up and abolishment of the Passover, which had been so prominent since that memorable night when they began their exodus out of Egypt, no longer slaves, but a free and independent nation, Jehovah, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, having broken every chain; meanwhile its celebrity was augmented by the imperishable memories of the wonderful Pentecost, when the Holy Ghost and fire fell on the disciples, the full-orbed gospel dispensation, under the auspices of entire sanctification, pouring down from heaven like a deluge, converting three thousand, and in a day or two five thousand more, giving a boom to the Church of the Nazarenes which shook the world with the tread of an earthquake, and, glory to God! It is still heaving and quaking.
William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain
Mark
THE NEW PASSOVER
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A SECRET RENDEZVOUS
Mar 14:12 - Mar 14:16.
This is one of the obscurer and less noticed incidents, but perhaps it contains more valuable teaching than appears at first sight.
The first question is-Miracle or Plan? Does the incident mean supernatural knowledge or a preconcerted token, like the provision of the ass at the entry into Jerusalem? I think that there is nothing decisive either way in the narrative. Perhaps the balance of probability lies in favour of the latter theory. A difficulty in its way is that no communication seems to pass between the two disciples and the man by which he could know them to be the persons whom he was to precede to the house. There are advantages in either theory which the other loses; but, on the whole, I incline to believe in a preconcerted signal. If we lose the supernatural, we gain a suggestion of prudence and human adaptation of means to ends which makes the story even more startlingly real to us.
But whichever theory we adopt, the main points and lessons of the narrative remain the same.
I. The remarkable thing in the story is the picture it gives us of Christ as elaborately adopting precautions to conceal the place.
They are at Bethany. The disciples ask where the passover is to be eaten. The easy answer would have been to tell the name of the man and his house. That is not given. The deliberate round-aboutness of the answer remains the same whether miracle or plan. The two go away, and the others know nothing of the place. Probably the messengers did not come back, but in the evening Jesus and the ten go straight to the house which only He knew.
All this secrecy is in strong contrast with His usual frank and open appearances.
What is the reason? To baffle the traitor by preventing him from acquiring previous knowledge of the place. He was watching for some quiet hour in Jerusalem to take Jesus. So Christ does not eat the passover at the house of any well-known disciple who had a house in Jerusalem, but goes to some man unknown to the Apostolic circle, and takes steps to prevent the place being known beforehand.
All this looks like the ordinary precautions which a man who knew of the plots against him would take, and might mean simply a wish to save his life. But is that the whole explanation? Why did He wish to baffle the traitor? {a} Because of His desire to eat the passover with the disciples. His loving sympathy.
{b} Because of His desire to found the new rite of His kingdom.
{c} Because of His desire to bring His death into immediate connection with the Paschal sacrifice. There was no reason of a selfish kind, no shrinking from death itself.
The fact that such precautions only meet us here, and that they stand in strongest contrast with the rest of His conduct, emphasises the purely voluntary nature of His death: how He chose to be betrayed, taken, and to die. They suggest the same thought as do the staggering back of His would-be captors in Gethsemane, at His majestic word, ‘I am He. . . . Let these go their way.’ The narrative sets Him forth as the Lord of all circumstances, as free, and arranging all events.
Judas, the priests, Pilate, the soldiers, were swept by a power which they did not know to deeds which they did not understand. The Lord of all gives Himself up in royal freedom to the death to which nothing dragged Him but His own love.
Such seem to be the lessons of this narrative in so far as it bears on our Lord’s own thoughts and feelings.
II. We note also the authoritative claim which He makes.
One reading is ‘my guest-chamber,’ and that makes His claim even more emphatic; but apart from that, the language is strong in its expression of a right to this unknown man’s ‘upper room.’ Mark the singular blending here, as in all His earthly life, of poverty and dignity-the lowliness of being obliged to a man for a room; the royal style, ‘The Master saith.’
So even now there is the blending of the wonderful fact that He puts Himself in the position of needing anything from us, with the absolute authority which He claims over us and ours.
III. The answer and blessedness of the unknown disciple.
{a} Jesus knows disciples whom the other disciples know not.
This man was one of the of ‘secret’ disciples. There is no excuse for shrinking from confession of His name; but it is blessed to believe that His eye sees many a ‘hidden one.’ He recognises their faith, and gives them work to do. Add the striking thought that though this man’s name is unrecorded by the Evangelist, it is known to Christ, was written in His heart, and, to use the prophetic image, ‘was graven on the palms of His hands.’
{b} The true blessedness is to be ready for whatever calls He may make on us. These may sometimes be sudden and unlooked for. But the preparation for obeying the most sudden or exacting summons of His is to have our hearts in fellowship with Him.
{c} The blessedness of His coming into our hearts, and accepting our service.
How honoured that man felt then! how much more so as years went on! how most of all now!
Our greatest blessedness that He does come into the narrow room of our hearts: ‘If any man open the door, I will sup with him.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain J. W. McGarvey's The Fourfold Gospel [CXVII. Preparation for…
J. W. McGarvey's The Fourfold Gospel [CXVII. Preparation for Passover].
CXVII. PREPARATION FOR PASSOVER. DISCIPLES CONTEND FOR PRECEDENCE. (Bethany to Jerusalem. Thursday afternoon and, after sunset, beginning of Friday.) aMATT. XXVI. 17-20; bMARK XIV. 12-17; cLUKE XXII. 7-18, 24-30.
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c7 And the day of unleavened bread came, on which the passover must be sacrificed. [See Exo_12:8), and a room for the feast must be secured.] 13 And he sendeth { csent Peter and John, btwo of his disciples, csaying, God and make ready for us the passover, that we may eat. 9 And they said unto him, Where wilt thou that we make ready? 10 And he said { bsaith unto them, Go into the city, and cBehold, when ye are entered into the city, there shall meet you a man bearing a pitcher of water; follow him into the house whereinto he goeth. b14 and wheresoever he shall enter in, say to c11 And ye shall say unto the master of the house, aGo into the city to such a man, and say unto him, cThe Teacher saith unto thee, aMy time is at hand; I keep the passover at thy house with my disciples. cWhere is the bmy guest-chamber, where I shall eat the passover with my disciples? [It was customary for the residents of Jerusalem to open their houses for guests during this feast, and therefore Jesus might have presumed on the hospitality of almost anyone; but the probability is that the man to whom he sent this message was an acquaintance and a friend. It is not improbable that Jesus let Peter and John thus find the place that Judas might not know its whereabouts in time to bring the officers of the Sanhedrin so as to interrupt the feasts which meant so much to him and to his church.] 15 And he will himself show you a large upper room furnished i and ready: and there make ready for us. 16 And the disciples went forth, and came into the city, and found as he had said unto them: and they made ready the passover. a19 And the disciples did as Jesus appointed them; and they made ready the passover. b17 And a20 Now when even was come, bwhen it was evening he cometh with the twelve [The law required that the paschal lamb should be slain "between the evenings." The Jews reckoned the two evenings as from three o'clock to sunset, and from sunset to nine o'clock, which was the end of the first watch. But [645] Josephus tells us that the lambs were killed from the ninth to the eleventh hours, or between the hours of three and five. It would take some time to dress the lamb and to roast it, so that it must have been about sundown or shortly afterward when Jesus and his disciples sat down to the feast.] c14 And when the hour was come, he sat down, and the apostles with him. 15 And ahe was sitting at meat with the twelve disciples; 21 and che said unto them, With desire I have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer: 16 for I say unto you, I shall not eat it, until it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God. [Jesus had desired to keep with his disciples this last type which stood so close to the thing typified. It was a feast commemorating a great deliverance from death through the sacrifice of a lamb, and the real sacrifice and deliverance of which it was typical were about to be fulfilled in the unfolding of the kingdom of God.] 17 And he received a cup, and when he had given thanks, he said, Take this, and divide it among yourselves: 18 for I say unto you, I shall not drink from henceforth of the fruit of the vine, until the kingdom of God shall come. [Luke brings out the parallelism between the passover and the Lord's supper. Each consisted in eating followed by drinking, and the closeness of the parallel is emphasized by the use of almost the same words with regard to the cup. The passover was typical of the Lord's suffering before the event, and the Lord's supper is typical of the same thing after the event.] 24 And there arose also a contention among them, which of them was accounted to be greatest. 25 And he said unto them, The kings of the Gentiles have lordship over them; and they that have authority over them are called Benefactors. 26 But ye i shall not be so: but he that is the greater among you, let him become as the younger; and he that is chief, as he that doth serve. 27 For which is greater, he that sitteth at meat, or he that serveth? is not he that sitteth at meat? but I am in the midst of you as he that serveth. [In sending to secure the room in which [646] the paschal supper was being eaten, Jesus had said, "My time is at hand." Such expressions were falsely construed by the apostles. They thought that Jesus was about to set up his kingdom, and began at once to contend for the chief places. Jesus rebukes this false ambition in much the same manner as he had previously. See Jam_1:2, Jam_1:3). For the rest of the passage compare the remarks on 2Sa_9:7, 2Sa_19:28), and indicate that the apostles, being about to participate in the Lord's condemnation and suffering, should in the end share his exaltation and its attendant joys.]
[FFG 644-647]
J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain The preparation for the Passover:
The preparation for the Passover:
v. 12. And the first day of unleavened bread, when they killed the Passover, His disciples said unto Him, Where wilt Thou that we go and prepare that Thou mayest eat the Passover?
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v. 13. And He sendeth forth two of His disciples and saith unto them, Go ye into the city, and there shall meet you a man bearing a pitcher of water; follow him.
v. 14. And wheresoever he shall go in, say ye to the goodman of the house, The Master saith, Where is the guest chamber, where I shall eat the Passover with My disciples?
v. 15. And he will show you a large upper room furnished and prepared; there make ready for us.
v. 16. And His disciples went forth, and came into the city, and found as He had said unto them; and they made ready the Passover.
It was on the day from Wednesday evening to Thursday evening, the day when the Jews carefully swept out all leaven and leavened bread out of their houses, and which they therefore reckoned with the days of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, in the wider sense, that the disciples of Jesus came to Him with the question whether they would celebrate the festival as usual. Jesus, as a member of the Jewish Church, observed all the outward forms of the Jewish cults. It was necessary to know this at this time, since on this day the Passover lamb was sacrificed at the Temple. So they wanted to know where He would have them go and make everything ready for the eating of the Passover lamb. Jesus complied with their request by selecting two of the disciples and giving them very explicit directions. They should go to the city, where they would meet a man carrying a vessel with water. Him they should follow, and at the house where he would enter they should ask the master of the house for the location of the dining-room where Jesus might eat the Passover with His disciples. These directions of Jesus the two apostles followed, for they had thereby become His representatives and were acting in the name of the head of the company, which, according to Josephus, numbered between ten and twenty. They went to Jerusalem, purchased a lamb that met the requirements of the law, and took this up to the Temple one hour after the evening sacrifice, when all the priests were busy with the Passover sacrifices. One of them killed the lamb himself, its blood being caught by one of the officiating priests to be poured out at the foot of the altar. They then took the lamb to the house which had been designated by Jesus and made arrangements to have it roasted and all the other dishes of the Passover meal prepared. The dining-room they found in an upper story of the house, with the necessary sofas all ready. Thus all preparations for the paschal meal were completed. With sunset the Feast of Passover began; it was the 14th
of Nisan.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 Connecting Statement:
Connecting Statement:
Jesus sends two of the disciples to prepare the Passover meal.
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when they sacrificed the Passover lamb
At the beginning of the Festival of Unleavened Bread, it was customary to sacrifice a lamb. AT: "when it was customary to sacrifice the Passover lamb" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)
bearing a pitcher of water
"carrying a large jar full of water"
The Teacher says, "Where is my guest room ... with my disciples?"
This can be written as an indirect quote. Translate this so that it is a polite request. AT: "Our Teacher would like to know where the guest room is where he may eat the Passover with his disciples." (See: Direct and Indirect Quotations)
guest room
a room for visitors
eat the Passover
Here the "Passover" refers to the Passover meal. AT: "eat the Passover meal" (See: Metonymy)
translationWords
unleavened bread
sacrifice
lamb
Passover
disciple
teacher
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 14:12-32 The preparation for the Passover meal (14:12-16) introduces…
14:12-32 The preparation for the Passover meal (14:12-16) introduces the story of the Last Supper (14:22-25). • The Last Supper is associated with the Passover meal (14:12, 14, 16; Matt 26:17-19; Luke 22:7-8, 11, 13, 15; cp. John 18:28; 19:14). Many pilgrims celebrated Passover in Jerusalem, where God’s Temple was located (see Deut 16:2).
14:12 The time when the Passover lamb is sacrificed was twilight on the 14th of Nisan (Exod 12:6). This date falls in March or April each year.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.