The Eucharist

So when the Apostles had their next fellowship meal together after the Crucifixion, they obeyed Our Lord’s command to do as he had done at the Last Supper by offering him to God as the Saviour of the world and by using the same words as he had used: This is my Body which is given for you…This is my Blood of the New Covenant which is shed for you and for many for the remission of sins.  In this way the Last Supper led into the first Eucharist, of which it was a pattern.  And in the Eucharist he continued to make that same offering of himself that he had made at the Last Supper and on the Cross itself.  Soon the fellowship supper was given up, leaving behind what had been the grace before and after, but which Jesus had now made into his own Service by giving it this new meaning.

So to this day the Eucharist is the central act of Christian worship, and we should attend it every Sunday because it is Our Lord’s own Service which he has given us with his own hands, a few hours before the nails were driven through them, and which he commanded us to continue.

Next week we shall talk about how in the Eucharist, when we offer Jesus to God, he becomes present in his Risen and Ascended Body under the forms of the Bread and Wine on the altar, and how by receiving him in Holy Communion we can be made like him.