The first day of the feast of unleavened bread had now come and the disciples ask the Lord, “Where wilt Thou that we prepare for Thee to eat the passover?” He instructs them to go into the city to such a man and to say to him, “The Master saith, My time is at hand; I will keep the passover at thy house with My disciples.” It is noticeable that the Lord acts as the One who has authority over the place. In Mark He speaks of it as His guest-chamber. He might be rejected, yet He speaks with the calm dignity of One conscious of who He was — the rightful Messiah and Lord of all.
When the evening comes, He sits down with the twelve. Now He tells them of the deep grief of His heart. “Verily I say unto you,” He says, “that one of you shall betray Me.” His sorrow draws out the grief in the hearts of the disciples and they begin to ask, “Lord is it I?” Judas hears his own doom when the Lord answers, “He that dippeth his hand with Me in the dish . . . it had been good for that man if he had not been born.” Then, afraid that he might be detected if he kept silent, Judas also asks, “Master, is it I?” and the Lord tells him, “Thou hast said.”
The Lord’s Supper
“And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is My body. And He took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it; for this is My blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.” The Lord well knew that Satan would enter into Judas to betray Him, that the leaders were plotting His death, that the multitudes whom He had healed and fed would turn against Him, and that His own disciples would flee and leave Him alone. Yet nothing could stop the outflow of His love. His heart was filled with thoughts of infinite love, both for His own and for man, of which these memorials of His death so simply speak.
How precious to us now that He should say, “this is My blood . . . which is shed for many.” It was in those purposes of love that we, who were outside Israel, sinners of the Gentiles, should come under the blessing of the new covenant, for in Him “we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace” (Eph. 1:77In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace; (Ephesians 1:7)).
Then the Lord tells them, “I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I drink it new with you in My Father’s kingdom.” A Nazarite must not drink wine nor strong drink (Num. 6:1-211And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, 2Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When either man or woman shall separate themselves to vow a vow of a Nazarite, to separate themselves unto the Lord: 3He shall separate himself from wine and strong drink, and shall drink no vinegar of wine, or vinegar of strong drink, neither shall he drink any liquor of grapes, nor eat moist grapes, or dried. 4All the days of his separation shall he eat nothing that is made of the vine tree, from the kernels even to the husk. 5All the days of the vow of his separation there shall no razor come upon his head: until the days be fulfilled, in the which he separateth himself unto the Lord, he shall be holy, and shall let the locks of the hair of his head grow. 6All the days that he separateth himself unto the Lord he shall come at no dead body. 7He shall not make himself unclean for his father, or for his mother, for his brother, or for his sister, when they die: because the consecration of his God is upon his head. 8All the days of his separation he is holy unto the Lord. 9And if any man die very suddenly by him, and he hath defiled the head of his consecration; then he shall shave his head in the day of his cleansing, on the seventh day shall he shave it. 10And on the eighth day he shall bring two turtles, or two young pigeons, to the priest, to the door of the tabernacle of the congregation: 11And the priest shall offer the one for a sin offering, and the other for a burnt offering, and make an atonement for him, for that he sinned by the dead, and shall hallow his head that same day. 12And he shall consecrate unto the Lord the days of his separation, and shall bring a lamb of the first year for a trespass offering: but the days that were before shall be lost, because his separation was defiled. 13And this is the law of the Nazarite, when the days of his separation are fulfilled: he shall be brought unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation: 14And he shall offer his offering unto the Lord, one he lamb of the first year without blemish for a burnt offering, and one ewe lamb of the first year without blemish for a sin offering, and one ram without blemish for peace offerings, 15And a basket of unleavened bread, cakes of fine flour mingled with oil, and wafers of unleavened bread anointed with oil, and their meat offering, and their drink offerings. 16And the priest shall bring them before the Lord, and shall offer his sin offering, and his burnt offering: 17And he shall offer the ram for a sacrifice of peace offerings unto the Lord, with the basket of unleavened bread: the priest shall offer also his meat offering, and his drink offering. 18And the Nazarite shall shave the head of his separation at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, and shall take the hair of the head of his separation, and put it in the fire which is under the sacrifice of the peace offerings. 19And the priest shall take the sodden shoulder of the ram, and one unleavened cake out of the basket, and one unleavened wafer, and shall put them upon the hands of the Nazarite, after the hair of his separation is shaven: 20And the priest shall wave them for a wave offering before the Lord: this is holy for the priest, with the wave breast and heave shoulder: and after that the Nazarite may drink wine. 21This is the law of the Nazarite who hath vowed, and of his offering unto the Lord for his separation, beside that that his hand shall get: according to the vow which he vowed, so he must do after the law of his separation. (Numbers 6:1‑21)). Here the Lord sets Himself apart as the true Nazarite. If He must give up the companionship of His disciples, it is that He might accomplish their redemption. Now He waits, and we wait too, to renew it in better and brighter scenes above — in His Father’s kingdom.
After the supper they sang a hymn together, and then they went out to the mount of Olives where the Lord frequently went.
Further Meditation
1. Why did the Lord take the place of a Nazarite?
2. What are some differences between the passover and the Lord’s supper?
3. More on the subject of this chapter can be found in the simple pamphlet The Lord’s Supper by C. H. Mackintosh.