That ye may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom, and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel.
That ye may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom, and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel. See the note at Luke 18:29.
Remarks:
(1) The feelings of Jesus Himself have been too much lost sight of in attention to His work, in such portions of the History-a somewhat selfish way of reading it, which punishes itself by the dry and not very satisfactory views thence resulting. Blessed Jesus! Do I hear thee, on seating Thyself at the Paschal table, laying open the burden of Thy heart to the Twelve, saying, "With desire I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer," telling them it was the last Passover Thou wouldst eat with them on earth, and the last time Thou wouldst drink with them here below of the fruit of the vine? In this I read, so as I am not able to express it, Thy oneness with us even in our social sympathies. All that makes a last meeting and a last meal with one's family, whole and unbroken, or with friends with whom one has gone in and out for years in joy and sorrow, alike in the commonest and the loftiest intercourse, an occasion of special solemnity and tender interest-all this, it seems, was felt by Thee; and if felt at all, felt surely on this occasion with an intensity unknown to us.
For it was more than Thy last meal-it was the last Paschal meal ever to be partaken of even by Thy disciples. Ere another such season came round, the typical Passover was to be exchanged for the commemorative Supper; and even at that very table, the one was sweetly to be transfigured into the other. One can understand, then, the emotion that filled Thy heart, when, surrounded by the Twelve in that upper room, Thou foundest Thyself arrived at this stage, And yet, how can we enough bless Thee for giving utterance to this; because who else would have ventured to presume it? But there is something else here, which is at least as noteworthy as this. The treason-hatching, the traitor, the plan, the end-and all so near, so very imminent-were full before Thee, blessed Saviour; yea, the traitor himself was sitting at that table: and yet, with what holy calmness Thou reclinest at this meal! One word Thou utterest of direct allusion to it - "Before I suffer" just to reveal the spring of surpassing interest Thou didst feel in that Passover; but only one.
When after this the new Feast was instituted for all that should believe on Thee through their word to the world's end, it was only to explain the deep intent of that Feast that the bloody scene was again alluded to-and so serenely! not at all in the light of the dishonour done to Thee, but of the benefit thereby accruing to thee-not in the light of Thy suffering, but of the expiatory virtue of that blood of Thine to the salvation of a lost world! But here I see another thing, which at once ravishes and melts me. This Feast Thou wouldst have kept up "lN REMEMBRANCE OF THEE" - not Thy death merely, and the benefits thence resulting, but Thyself. No one who has a heart at all would like to be forgotten of those he loves; everyone would like to be remembered when he is gone. And is it even so with Thee, O Thou whom my soul loveth? Thy love, it seems-like all other love-seeks a response; it will have itself appreciated and reciprocated, and in that Thou hast all Thy desire; thus to see of the travail of Thy soul is Thy satisfaction, Thy reward (Isaiah 53:11).
But had sufficient provision not been made for that without this Supper-in that Thy love is shed abroad in Thy people's hearts by the Holy Spirit given unto them-a love constraining them to live not unto themselves, but unto Him that died for them and rose again? True, but Thou art not yet contented. Thou wilt be enshrined in the Church's visible services-and that not in the glory of Thy Person, Thy character, Thy teaching, Thy miracles, or all of these together, but of that Decease which was accomplished at Jerusalem, of that dearest act of Self-sacrifice by which Thy people's ransom was paid; Thou wilt be held visibly up as the bruised Messiah, the bleeding Lamb that taketh away the sin of the world. And who shall say what shallow faith has not been deepened, what languishing affections have not been afresh enkindled by this most blessed ordinance, and how much of its spiritual nourishment in all time to come the Church of Christ will not owe to this ordinance? O yes, as we sit at that eucharistic table with robes washed and made white in the blood of the Lamb, and as our faith gazes, through its instituted elements of bread and wine, on that bleeding Lamb, now in the midst of the Throne, does not the hymn of redeeming love go up to Him fresher and warmer than ever before, "Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and His Father; to Him be the glory and dominion forever and ever, Amen"?
(2) In the light of these views, what are we to think of the monstrous abuses of this ordinance, on the one hand by Unitarians-who can celebrate it and yet see in it no atonement, and nothing beyond a memorial banquet in honour of a most heroic sufferer for virtue-and, on the other hand, by Romanists, who bury its precious truths and destroy its quickening efficacy under the detestable abuses of transubstantiation and the mass! On the 'Real Presence' and other eucharistic controversies, see the note at 1 Corinthians 11:23, etc.
Here must be taken in an important particular, omitted by our Evangelist, but supplied in the first two Gospels.
DESERTION OF JESUS BY THE APOSTLES FORETOLD
(Matthew 26:31-32; Mark 14:27-28)
Had we only the first two Gospels, we ahould have concluded that this was spoken after our Lord had left the upper room, and either reached or was on His way to the Mount of Olives. But from the Third and Fourth Gospels, it would appear to have been spoken while they were yet at the supper table. Some suppose that part of it was spoken before they left the supper room, and the rest during that last and most mournful of all His walks with them, from the city to the Mount of Olives. But we prefer to conceive of that walk as taken in silence. Matthew 26:31, "Then saith Jesus unto them, All ye shall be offended because of Me this night" х skandalistheesesthe (G4624) en (G1722) emoi (G1698)] - 'shall be stumbled in me;' temporarily staggered on seeing their Master apprehended. In the expression, "All ye," there may be a reference to the one who had just "gone out." Great as was the relief, now for the first time experienced by the Saviour Himself, on the traitor's voluntary separation from a fellowship to which He never in heart belonged, (see the note at John 13:31), even in those who remained there was something which burdened the spirit and wounded the heart of the Man of Sorrows.
It saddened Him to think that, within one brief hour or two of the time when their hearts had warmed toward Him more than ever at the Paschal and Communion Table, they should every one of them be 'stumbled' because of Him: "for it is written (Zechariah 13:7), I will smite the Shepherd, and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered abroad." Matthew 26:32. "But after I am risen again, I will go before you into Galilee." He falls back upon this striking prophecy, partly to confirm their faith in what they would otherwise hardly think credible; and partly to console Himself with the reflection that it was but one of "the things concerning him" which "would have an end" - that they would be but links in the chain, "doing what God's hand and purpose determined before to be done." The whole of this marvelous prediction, as it stands in the prophet, runs thus: "Awake, O sword, against My Shepherd, and against the Man that is My Fellow х `al (H5920) geber (H1397) `ªmiytiy (H5997)], saith the Lord of hosts: smite the Shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered; and I will turn mine hand upon the little ones" Here observe, first, that in the prophet, Yahweh calls upon the sword to awake against His Shepherd and smite Him; here, Jesus receives the thrust direct from the Father's own hand: compare John 18:11, "The cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?" Each view of it presents an aspect of sublime and affecting truth.
Next, in the passage, as it stands in Zechariah, two classes are spoken of - "the sheep," who are "scattered" on the striking down of their Shepherd (as might be expected, whether literally or figuratively); and "the little ones," on whom Yahweh's hand is to be lovingly "turned," to gather or collect them. The former class are the unbelieving nation, who, being staggered and stumbled at a suffering Messiah, turned away from Jesus, and were thereafter nationally scattered or dispersed. The latter are, of course, the little flock of Christ's disciples, who, on the dispersion of the nation, were gathered not only into safety, but to honour and blessedness unspeakable as a redeemed Church. Now mark what turn our Lord here gives to the prophecy. Making no mention, at that solemn moment, of the dispersion of the unbelieving nation, He represents the disciples themselves as both the dispersed and the gathered.
When He their Shepherd, who up to that moment had been their one bond of dear union, should be smitten-even that night, when the first blow was to be struck at Him by His apprehension-their faith in Him would be momentarily shaken, and "for a small moment" their unbelief would have the same effect as on the nation at large, making them start back and run away, like a flock of sheep when their shepherd is struck down. "But" - now viewing them as "the little ones" on whom Yahweh was to turn His hand. - "after I am risen, I will go before you into Galilee;" like a true Shepherd, who, "when He putteth forth His own sheep, goeth before them, and the sheep follow Him" (John 10:4). The scattered in Gethsemane were to be the gathered in Galilee! How very explicit He is in His announcements now, when on the eve of parting with them until after His resurrection. This manifest allusion to the remainder of the prophecy - "I will turn mine hand upon the little ones" - how beautiful is it! This He only began to do when He went before them into Galilee; for though after His resurrection He had several interviews with them at Jerusalem before this, it was in Galilee that He appears to have collected and rallied them, as the Shepherd of His lately scattered flock, and to have given them some at least of those parting instructions and commissions which maybe termed the initial organization of the Church. But to return to our Evangelist, whose narrative now is the fullest.