Christ and the Communion.
I. This service carries us back over dim tracks of time to the beginning of the Gospel. We think of scattered bands of our ancient brethren, in the midst of surrounding heathenism, gathering as we do now around the Table of our Lord. They regard the crucified Jesus as the Son of God, and the Saviour of the world. It is not altogether difficult to place ourselves in the position of those ancient saints, and to enter into their state of heart as they gathered round the Lord's Table. There was an unconscious recognition all the more profound and joyful that it was unconscious of their being one through the love that embraced them all. It was not, however, that their minds were occupied about one another. It was the Lord Himself whom they thought upon; His holy form it was that rose up before the eye of faith; the festival was one of love, and memory, and hope, bringing up to faith the sacred Person of the Lord, and kindling all blissful emotions. In such experiences believing men may share today, to the same extent as believing men of the first century.
II. What is this communion to our Saviour? What was in His heart when He established this ordinance? The answer rises to our lips at once. (1) There was undying love to His own. That love is the abiding mystery of the Gospel. Never before did it get such utterance; never before did it appear so tender and intense, so full and overflowing. (2) There is another thing beyond even this. It tells out His desire for fellowship with His own just as when He took Peter and James and John with Him into the garden, and said, "My soul is exceeding sorrowful even unto death; tarry ye here and watch with Me." There is unfathomable mystery here that He, so to speak, should lean on us, but it is part of the blessed mystery of His brotherhood. Brotherhood is no mere name with Him; but a blissful verity. In all, save sin, His heart was like our own; and just as we have pleasure in the love that our friends bear toward us, and in knowing that we live in their memory, so does He delight in the love with which saved men love Him. It is part of the reward of His sorrows, part of the joy that was set before Him, for which He endured the Cross, despising the shame.
J. Culross, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xxii., p. 245.
References: Mark 14:22; Mark 14:23. Sermons on the Catechism,p. 252.Mark 14:22-24. R. Heber, Parish Sermons,vol. i., p. 186; J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons,9th series, p. 180. Mark 14:22-25. A. B. Bruce, The Training of the Twelve,p. 359; H. M. Luckock, Footprints of the Son of Man,p. 306; W. Hanna, Our Lord's Life on Earth,p. 439. Mark 14:23. J. H. Hitchens, Christian World Pulpit,vol. viii., p. 312.Mark 14:23-34. Clergyman's Magazine,vol. iv., p. 224.Mark 14:25. Preacher's Monthly,vol. iv., p. 250. Mark 14:26-30. Expositor,3rd series, vol. ii., p. 132.Mark 14:26-31. H. M. Luckock, Footprints of the Son of Man,p. 313.Mark 14:27. Homilist,new series, vol. ii., p. 109. Mark 14:27-30. W. H. Jellie, Christian World Pulpit,vol. vi., p. 296. Mark 14:29-31. A. B. Bruce, The Training of the Twelve,p. 393.