The Lord's Supper is a means of grace, and I can think of a couple of reasons why it was given to me. The primary reason is I wrote a book on it. And just to let you know about that book. That book came about as a result of me being asked by ARBCA, the Association of Reformed Baptist Churches of America, to address their general assembly on the issue of the Lord's Supper as a means of grace. And I was asked to do that in a time in my life when I was I think I was teaching elementary Greek. I'd already taught through a whole year of elementary Greek once or twice before, so there wasn't a lot of prep. And I wasn't preaching very often and I had just finished my dissertation. So I was still in, you know, thinking critically, studying mode. And so they gave me, I don't know, a six month advance notice or whatever it was. So I was able to do a lot of study on the subject. It's one of those subjects like baptism for me that I could say, yeah, it's a means of grace that it was a means of grace. I could affirm how was was the big question. And so, it's probably because that lecture was given and developed into a book that I was asked to do that. It doesn't mean I have all the answers to all the questions. And it also means I have way too much material to address you on Friday night for hours. So, Larry, didn't you say I could have three hours? You didn't say that one either? So I have to reduce the material. Now, what I did at the ARPCA General Assembly, and if you heard that message, you know what I did. I brought three hours of material and and just gave it to him in one hour. I just went, I figured I have a hundred or one hundred and twenty pastors primarily at that meeting. I'm going to go for it. Anybody that's not a pastor and doesn't get it, sorry, go after your pastor at home. It was that kind of thing because and the book is written to pastors and theological students as well. So I don't necessarily like my wife's not going to read the book. She might look at it and say, nice cover or something. So I'm not saying everybody here needs to go get the book or anything like that. It'll put some of you to sleep. You'll say, why did they publish this? But others who are more developed maybe and have time to sit and think, it'll walk you through the process I had to go through to get to where I am now. And probably the primary text that I personally had to deal with and then the theology behind it. is found in the text that was read this evening. First Corinthians 10. I want to look at verse 16. That will be the primary focus where in the New American Standard Version we read is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing. Other versions have participation or communion. In the blood of Christ, other translations say of the blood of Christ, we'll talk about that in a minute, is not the bread which we speak a sharing, a participation, a communion in the body of Christ, two questions that Paul asks. And the assumption is that the answer to both questions. is a resounding yes. You can see that this is a rhetorical question. He assumes they know the answer and that the answer is in the affirmative. The cup of blessing is a sharing in the blood of Christ and the bread which we break is a sharing in the body of Christ. We could say that that is true every time. this mean? In this passage, which deals with, look at verse 14, chapter 10. Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. Now, in my New American Standard, verse 14 is in bold and then verse 23 is in bold print. That means the editors of this version believe that's a section. And I think they're right. They're right. That's a section all its own. I think versus one through 13 is a section. I think versus 14 through 23 is a section. And then 23 through the end of the end of the chapter is a section. And the section, the proposition that begins the section is three idolatry. How in the world or why in the world would Paul bring up the Lord's Supper in the context of exhorting people to flee idolatry? And how could Christians in the first place be assumed to be committing idolatry? Because that seems to be Paul's assumption. So I'm going to have to show you why he does that. OK, and I think it's fascinating to understand the context in order to see why Paul brings up the Lord's Supper and how he uses it as an argument against idolatry. To do that, we're gonna have to put this in a context, right? And the context begins in Genesis 1.1, right? In the beginning, God the Creator... I'm not going to go down that route again. I could, though, very much so, because the Lord's Supper is essential for sinners who have been redeemed in the not yet or in the already of salvation that we enjoy in Christ. But I won't do that. I will say this. I think the broader section in 1 Corinthians starts in chapter 8, verse 1, and it probably ends in chapter 11, verse 1. So that's a section all its own. And in 1 Corinthians 8-1, Paul begins dealing with things sacrificed to idols. That's 1 Corinthians 8-1. And then more specifically, eating of things sacrificed to idols. Verse four of chapter eight. So this section also, as I said, ends at eleven one. Paul is arguing against the Corinthians participation, I think, and many others do in the religious syncretism so common in Corinth and ancient Greece and Rome in that day. And in the process of doing this, several practical matters come to the surface, which we'll see below. Now, this is way foreign to us, right? How many pastors here have to incur, have to exhort people? You know what? You can eat meat that was purchased at the marketplace that might have come from sacrificial pagan meals that wasn't that was leftover. OK. You can buy that and eat it. That's fine. Just don't mess your conscience up or anybody else's conscience. But you can't commit idolatry and you can't go down to the pagan to the to the pagan rituals and participate in their sacrificial meals. We don't have to pass for our people that way. OK, so it's a very unique context. But I think that's what was happening in this day and age, in that day and age, in the first 13 verses. of chapter ten that comes right before fourteen to twenty two. Paul refers to ancient Israel as an example of privileged people who abused their privileges. There's the first five verses who also committed idolatry. Verse seven. And in light of this, he exhorts the Corinthians to learn from their bad example and tells them don't crave evil things. Verse six. Avoid idolatry. Verse seven. Avoid immorality, verse 8. Don't try the Lord, verse 9, and don't grumble, verse 10. He admonishes them to learn from ancient Israel's bad example, verse 11. Take heed, verse 12, and be reminded of the faithfulness of God in the midst of temptations. Now, 1 Corinthians 10, 13 is one of those verses that's taken out, put on a little card, right? You write it down, you carry it around and you memorize it. And it's a wonderful truth here. No temptation is overtaking you, but such as is common to man. Now, what is the temptation in the context, though, that he's talking about? Not that the principle doesn't apply outside the context. OK, I think this is a principle being applied to the context. The specific temptation is religious syncretism, participating in pagan ritual meals. No temptation is overtaking you, but such as is common to man. And God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you're able. But with the temptation to participate in pagan ritual meals, which end up being an idolatrous activity, God will provide the way of escape also so that you will be able to endure the temptation to participate in pagan ritual meals, which constitutes ideology because you end up sharing with demons, as he's going to say later. So that comes right above our section. And then verse 23 through 33 comes right after our section. So we're going to understand the meat, the middle. We've got to see what kind of bread is on the outside. OK, so that's what we're doing. Context. In 1 Corinthians 10, 23 to 33, Paul deals with eating meat sold in the marketplace. That's what he says in verse 25. Though they are free to eat such meat, verses 25 to 27, there are times it's best not to, as he says in verse 28, for conscience sake. So this this is not like idolatry, plea idolatry. That's a violation of the law of God. This is an indifferent matter. You can do it. You're free to, but there are times when you probably shouldn't. That's a different matter. Whatever they do, they're not there to make sure it is not seeking their own good. Verse 24 and is done for the glory of God. Verse 31, giving no offense to Jews, Greeks or the Church of God. Verse 32, I think I already said this, but let me say it again. It's important to note that this section deals with an indifferent matter and not idolatry, which is a violation of the law of God. Paul envisions. of various scenarios in which Corinthian believers might have found themselves in their unique cultural circumstances. And he discusses various contexts in which food might be eaten. food purchased in the market. Food might be eaten as a part of a pagan religious meal. I think that's 10, 14 through following food purchased in the market for eating at home. I think that's verses 25 through 26. Food that one is offered when eating as a guest in another's home versus 27 to 30. And he gives advice for each context. And so it's vital. It's important. It's crucial to understand that there are various scenarios that these people could have found themselves could have found themselves in that Paul addresses each on its own. So it's not a blanket statement here. He he's a very wise counselor. And the section where 1 Corinthians 10, 16 occurs, which is what we had read versus 23, 14 to 22 deals with. What does it deal with idolatry, OK? Verse 14, therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. It's not an indifferent matter. It's not like, well, under certain circumstances, you can go ahead and do this. What he's going to discuss in the passage there. Just make sure you don't offend other people. And if you feel kind of dirty, I guess you should stop doing it because anything apart from faith is sin. It's not what he's talking about here. OK, this is don't do this. Flee from it. Don't participate in this form of religious syncretism that's in our culture all around us. You can do other things. You can you can eat meat at the market, buy meat at the marketplace. You can go to other people's house. Don't ask any questions. Just be thankful. But this thing you can't do. So it's a different context. Having mentioned the fact of the idolatry of some in ancient Israel, chapter 10, verse seven, he now deals with contemporary idolatry in the context of church members at Corinth. And I'm not going to read the whole text. But I think because you already heard it and this is the last session and I don't know about you, but if I was sitting down during the last session at the four o'clock session, I would have probably had a hard time staying awake. So I want to make sure I don't take too long, but I want to get to the point here. So I'm not going to read the entire passage. I had it read. It brings up many questions. This is one of those passages. Maybe if Peter had a copy of 1 Corinthians when he wrote 2 Peter 3 and he said, hey, some of the things that Paul wrote are hard to understand. Maybe this is one of those sections. I'm not sure it brings up a lot of questions, but this much seems to be clear so far in 1 Corinthians. Paul deals with several church problems, one of them being Idolatry. Apparently, some Corinthians thought, and these are the words of a commentator, they were free to continue participating in pagan sacrificial meals. The commentaries worth consulting all agree that in the background here is some sort of pagan sacrificial meals that the people were involving themselves with. Paul, however, strongly disagreed with them. 1014, flee from idolatry. So he's combating the sin of idolatry committed by some of the Corinthians by their participating in pagan religious meals. Now, this is where verse 16 comes up in that kind of a context, and I want to look at it first and then answer and answer a couple other questions from the passage that you might be scratching your head about that, I think. shed light on on the issue of the Lord's Supper as a means of grace. I think that I believe that Paul ends up shedding light on the nature of the Lord's Supper in this verse, verse 16, and he's doing this as proof. that participating in pagan sacrificial meals versus 20 and 21, which we'll look at, is a form of idolatry and must be avoided. And the important word for our purposes here is translated by the new American standard sharing. Most of you have heard the Greek word koinonia. I think the ESV says it's a participation and the new King James and maybe the King James and I think the old 1901 American Standard Version have communion translating koinonia. So it's important. What does that word mean? We're going to have to Try to give an answer to that, but also important are the qualifying phrases. Notice it's not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing participation of communion in the blood of Christ. What does that mean? And then. Sharing in or communion or participation in the body of Christ. What does that mean? So what does the word sharing, koinonia, mean in this context? And what does it mean with those with those qualifying phrases attached, attached to it? So there's two questions we need to answer before we can proceed. What does koinonia mean in this text and how should we understand its modifying phrases in or of the blood and body of Christ? So, first of all, koinonia. Now, the way we don't determine what a word means is we say, well, what's the Greek word there? And then we open a lexicon and we go find the first definition for it or the second definition for it. Because all words take on their meaning based on their use in context. When we're defining biblical terms, although there are some that have technical meaning to them, they basically mean the same thing every time they're used. That's usually normally not the case. Words can take on various shades of meaning depending on how they're used. And for us in the 21st century, some of these old words that we use like fellowship, what does fellowship mean to you? It means I'm going to see other people, right? I mean, I'm going to be with Christians. Is that necessarily what Paul meant by Koinonia here? Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a being with other Christians in the blood of Christ? You know, I don't think that's what it means. But oftentimes, that's what we import into the text is our contemporary usage. When trying to figure out what it means, you know, you've got to look at the context. Another way to help find out what this word means is to ask, did the author use it elsewhere in a similar context or maybe not in a similar context? In this case, Paul uses first in first Corinthians one nine, he uses the same word koinonia. Look what it's how it's translated there, which is a good translation here. God is faithful through whom you were called into fellowship koinonia. with His Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord." Notice that Paul is not talking about the experience of being together as Christians there, is he? That's not what he's talking about. The fellowship here in 1 Corinthians 1.9, the koinonia, in first Corinthians one nine is with God's son, not with each other. And God's son at this time, they had communion or fellowship called into communion or fellowship with him. He was exalted in heaven at the right hand of the majesty on high on the throne of grace. You know, Hebrews four sixteen. So if we just kind of take that, tuck it away and say, OK, I see what that means. It's not horizontal. There isn't is there. It's not what me sharing and you sharing together in things. It's it's sinners. sharing something with Christ. They're in communion with Christ. It's a vertical thing. So if we come back to first Corinthians 10, 16, with that in mind, one of the commentators that was helpful for me said this, the quantity here has a vertical and theological priority of emphasis over the horizontal and social. Now, somebody saying the Lord's Supper has horizontal and social aspects. Yeah, Paul deals with that in first Corinthians 11. Or I should have said 11. That's where he deals with all the horizontal issues, and there's a lot of problems there, wasn't there? In First Corinthians 10, he's not arguing about, he's not talking about the horizontal aspect of the Lord's Supper. That would defeat his argument. It's a vertical thing that happens at the Lord's Supper that he assumes they already know. He doesn't really tease it out much. He just, hey, you guys know this is not the cup of blessing which we bless. A sharing, a communion, a participation in the blood and body of Christ and the answer of, well, of course it is. The Lord's Supper certainly has horizontal and social aspects to it, but in first Corinthians 10, 16. In light of Paul's argument against idolatry, he's dealing with its nature, the nature of the Lord's Supper in terms of it's not as horizontal aspect, but it's vertical aspect. Or we might say that which we commune with the fact that we are actually communing or participating, participating with, he said, the body of Christ and the blood of Christ. We're going to have to really explain what that means, because that sounds weird. but he is not talking about the fact that we horizontally are communing. Koinonia then, in 1st Corinthians 10.16, expresses a vertical, top-down reality. A reality connected to the blood and the body of Christ. Paul's emphasis is not that believers are together when they partake of the Lord's Supper, though that's true. It is that koinonia constitutes some sort of relationship with the blood and the body of Christ. And I think this becomes clear when we understand the function of the two phrases modifying that word, which I said we had to deal with in the blood of Christ, in the body of Christ, the King James, New King James and the old American Standard Version translate the phrases of the blood of the body, and both of those are modifying fellowship, koinonia, participation, communion of the blood, communion of the body. I like the translation of, but however they translate the more important issue is what does it mean? I think we could read it this way. Present communion derived from or dependent upon the blood and the body of Christ as its source. Now, I know what I'm doing there. I'm reducing like three or four paragraphs in the book. So if you need to know where I got all that from and you're kind of technically minded, you can go you can go and go buy the book. Isn't that weird? Go buy the book. It's OK if it's somebody else's book, but once your own book, it's just still awkward for me. But I'm reducing a lot of material here. Present communion derived from or dependent upon the blood and the body of Christ as its source. The source of communion with Christ would be his blood and his body. The objects shared are Christ's blood and Christ's body. Somebody else, another commentator, says it could mean the common possession or enjoyment of something, namely The blood and the body of Christ. That is the common possession that the people have that partake of the Lord's Supper, or that's what they are enjoying together. The blood of Christ and the body of Christ. Now, how do believers possess or enjoy the blood of Christ and the body of Christ through the Lord's Supper? That's a good question, isn't it? How do we do that? Well, it can't be as you know, the physical blood of the incarnate son of God. It is finished. He already bled. It can't be as physically as crushed body on the cross. He died and he was buried. He rose from the dead. But could it be the benefits? of him having shed his blood, the benefits of him having his body crushed under the wrath of God for us. I think that's what it is. Paul is talking about a present communion with the blood and the body of Christ. But if Christ is no longer dying or dead, then the communion he's referring to is communion, not with the dead Christ, but with the having been risen and now exalted Christ. Remember, this is present tense stuff here is is is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the in the blood of Christ. Yes, it is present tense is not the bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ when we do it. Yes, it is present tense. So somehow, some way there is a connection. There's communion between Christ in heaven and believers on the earth who are properly partaking, those who have faith and I think have been baptized as well, connected to churches. There's communion, there's participation, there is vertical top down, vertical deliverance of benefits that came from Christ's blood and body when he was on the earth accomplishing our redemption. So this is present communion with the living and exalted Lord of glory. The communion must be with the present benefits procured by his broken body. and shed blood for his body is no longer broken. It's glorified and his blood has finished shedding. There's one commentator is really helpful. He said this through the Lord's Supper, that which is signified by bread and wine, the body and the blood of Christ as they benefit believers is participated in by worthy partakers. Let me read this again through the Lord's Supper. That which is signified by bread and wine, the body And the blood of Christ, as they benefit believers, is participated in by worthy partakers. The Lord's Supper is a means of grace, a means through which things in heaven come to us on the earth. Now, look down at verse 18, look at the nation Israel are not those who eat the sacrifices shares in the altar. Literally, this is a look at the look at Israel according to the flesh. are not those who eat the sacrifices, sharers in the altar." What does this sharers in the altar mean? It seems somewhat connected in his argument because he uses at least a similar word. It is important to realize that the word for sharers here is not the same exact word he used in verse 16. It's a different word translated the same, at least in the New American Standard. And whether or not he's referring to ancient Israel, old covenant Israel back in the recorded force in the Old Testament or the Judaism of his own day, we know this much. Some sort of identity is established between those who offer sacrifices and the altar upon which these sacrifices are offered. Notice again, look at the nation Israel are not those who eat the sacrifices sharers in the altar. And the answer is, yeah, they are. Remember, Paul uses a different word here for sharers, so I don't think there's a one to one correspondence here. He must be pointing to an analogous relationship between two things. The Lord suffer and this incident that he's referring to. Look at the nation. Israel are not those who eat the sacrifices, sharers in the altar. One commentator says those who eat the sacrifices appropriate the reality or influence which the altar of sacrifice represents and conveys. Paul's point seems to be to eat the food that had been offered in sacrifice was to participate in the cultic act of the sacrifice. What about shares in demons? There's another example he uses in verses 19 and 20. What do I mean, then, that a thing sacrificed to idols is anything or that an idol is anything? No, but I say that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice. Now, watch this to demons and not to God. And I do not want you to become sharers in demons again. That's the same word he uses in verse 18. Different word than verse 16, similar connotations, but a different word, which I think means he's probably telling us this is an analogy, not a one to one correspondence in terms of relationship. You guys know that something vertical, something happens, you share in the benefits, present benefits of the redemption that Christ accomplished for us in his shed blood and crushed body way back. Well, for them, 30 years ago. You know that something more than just a horizontal us meeting on a given day on the Lord's Day at certain time at a certain place, you know, something more than just horizontal stuff is happening. Vertical stuff's happening, just like when they commit idolatry. In these two examples, he gives. Or similar to to that. The words when Paul says and not to God, They sacrifice the demons and not to God are packed with inference. Remember, Paul is dealing with idolatry. In other words. The Gentile. Sacrificial meals were a form of idolatry, and some of the people were participating in them. And he tells them, flee. Let me give you some examples. These guys that do this, they're sharing. There's a there's a participation going on there that's more than just vertical. It's bad. It's a violation of the law of God. It's probably the case that Paul is alluding to Deuteronomy 32, 17 there, the song of Moses recounts ancient Israel's idolatry in sacrificing to demons. Chairs and demons. I think he means by this, similar to verse 18, he uses a different word. It must be that participating in pagan sacrificial meals opens one up to the influence of demons. Now, don't, after the sermon, don't come up and say, how? I don't know. It just does. OK, that's what it seems to mean here. This sharing involves some sort of contact with demons and is thus a form of idolatry. That's why Paul says you can't drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You can't partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons. You can't, in good conscience, come to the Lord's supper and receive all that the Lord has for his people in the supper and then think you can go out and commit idolatry and involve yourself in pagan sacrificial meals, probably at a temple with other people and act as if it's OK. It's not OK. What's the point of the text? And then I'll be concluding the point being made from the text is that bread and wine are signs which signify present participation or present communion in the present benefits procured by Christ's body and blood, grace, procured by what Christ did for us, becomes ours through the Lord's Supper. In other words, it's a means of grace. That's why Spurgeon said at this table, the Lord's table, Jesus feeds us with His body and blood. Koinonia, fellowship, participation, communion of the blood and body of Christ, means that spiritual nourishment is brought to believing souls during the supper. It is present participation in the present benefits of Christ's death for those properly partaking. In other words, the Lord's Supper is a means of grace. Paul brings up the nature of the Lord's Supper as a means of grace in this text. Actually, he just assumes that they know it is. to argue against participating in pagan sacrificial meals, which is idolatry. Or, as Charles Hodge asserts, it is here assumed that partaking of the Lord's Supper brings us into communion with Christ. If this be so, partaking of the table of demons must bring us into communion with demons. This is the apostles argument. OK, that's that. Now, the question is, so what? You know, what does this mean? Is there anything practical that we can take from this? I have five considerations to try to bring this to a conclusion. The first is this communion or sharing in this text is not horizontal. but vertical in First Corinthians 10, 16. You see that if it was only horizontal, the Lord's Supper was only a memorial meal, no divine activity in it, just human activity, something we do. Paul's argument wouldn't follow. Paul's argument is that some weird vertical stuff's happening that transcends just us. When you guys go do that stuff and eat those pagan ritual meals at those pagan temples, there's something invisible going on there outside, transcending the realm of just the human. And it's not good for you. Stop it. It's idolatry. If the Lord's Supper was only this way, then it wouldn't be a good argument. But if the Lord's Supper is this and he says, look, this is our dominically ordained meal. This is our covenantal meal. And during it, spiritual transactions occur. Well, similar to that, when you go commit idolatry, the demons and the devil, there's stuff going on there that you don't want to be involved with. was only horizontal. It wouldn't work. The argument wouldn't work. Has to be more to the Lord's Supper. Has to be something vertical that's happening. There has to be actual spiritual transactions that are occurring between heaven and earth. The spirit of Christ being the benefits of Christ to the people of Christ during the supper of Christ. So communion here has to be vertical. Secondly, since believers already have communion with Christ via faith. First Corinthians one nine called you into fellowship, called you into communion with Christ. Then the Lord's Supper must be viewed as a means to nurture what is already there, already have faith or have communion. But now I'm having communion with the benefits of his body and blood through the symbol signs of the supper, blessed by the by the spirit. Therefore, it must be enhancing what's already present, namely saving faith in Christ. Or as one man said, this passage indicates that there is real fellowship between Christ and his people at the supper. There's real transactions that are occurring that can't be seen by the eye, but are nonetheless occurring because the supper is one of the means ordained by Christ through which blessings come to his people. Third, Though it is not a converting ordinance, the Lord's Supper is a sanctifying or soul altering ordinance. Like the word of God, like baptism and like prayer, it is a means through which grace comes to us from Christ. It is not a means of special grace. But a special means of grace that I borrowed that from somebody else. Listen to Bob, he says there is not a single benefit of grace that withheld from us in the word is now imparted to believers in a special way by the sacrament. There is neither a separate baptismal grace nor a separate communion grace. The content of word and sacrament is completely identical, the benefits of redemption. That's the grace that I'm talking about, the grace, the grace of the covenant of grace. The things Christ came and won for us, the privileges, the benefits. That's what we get in word, in baptism, in supper, in prayer. So it's not a converting ordinance. Remember, the first church I planted was in 1990. I was only 12 years old at the time. And and we had a guy there. He was if you're a pedo Baptist or Presbyterian, I'm not picking on all pedo Baptist or Presbyterian. This guy just happened to be a pedo Baptist and a Presbyterian. And I don't know what he was reading, but I fenced the table once and he came up to me afterwards. He says, I don't think you should fence the table. And I said, why? He said, because God might convert him when they see the gospel visibly. And I thought, I said, well, I don't think it's a converting. No, I don't think I use this language because I didn't know. I knew the doctrine. I couldn't use languages. I don't know what I said, except something like, I disagree. And you know what it is, he goes, you and he never came again. But through his influence, Pastor Jim Butler came. So that's why God used that guy to bring Jim Butler, who's now an ARPCA pastor up in Southwest Canada. It's not a converting ordinance. It's for the souls who have been called into fellowship already through the instrumentality of faith, which is the gift of Christ to us by His Spirit to enhance, to strengthen, to bring more benefits to us. So it's a sanctifying, soul altering ordinance. I think this came up in the Q&A. Is the efficacy of the ordinance of the Lord's Supper necessarily tied to the actual partaking of it? And I think most of the guys would agree, not necessarily. God, you know, you can be driving home from the Lord's Supper and just joy is welling up in your soul and you're going, well, why didn't it well up in my soul back then? Well, maybe the Spirit of God is taking the benefits of Christ and using your mind and causing you to recall what just happened and then bringing the blessing. So it's a sanctifying ordinance, not a converting ordinance. Fourth, through the Lord's Supper, we receive something from Christ. This is argument. Hey, when you're at this pagan sacrificial meals that these possible temples, you're getting influenced by outside sources. The Lord's Supper is a means through which we get influenced from an outside source. We get the benefits of Christ's body and Christ's blood served to us. but not served to us by the elders and deacons. They might serve the symbols, which signify, which point to a person and elsewhere than just the signs themselves. They're pointing elsewhere. They're not pointing to the pastors and not pointing to the deacons. It's pointing to Christ. And Christ is serving us by means of the supper, by the gracious influence of the Spirit. We are served something from Christ. You know, that's why the older theologians call, you know what they call Sunday service? Dr. Anaheim. The divine service, right? The divine service. Are you going to go to divine service? We say, are you going to go to church? Which is okay. What do they mean by divine service? When we come, the divine serves the needy, sinful human. We are served grace by heaven. The benefits of his body and blood are brought to us. I think I said this earlier, special delivery by the spirit of Christ. To the people of Christ or a bobbing said this, he not only gave himself for his own. He also gives himself to his own. He gave himself for his own redemption accomplished. He gives himself to his own redemption applied. The supper is one of the means through which he gives himself to us. And then finally, we ought to look at the supper as an event. through which we receive and not only give very much connected to the fourth one. But usually it's like we're going to give ourselves to obey the Lord, to take the Lord's Supper, which is true. OK, we do. It's an obedience to a command. So we act. But I think in light of this, we should look at it as an event through which we get. We receive. And that which we receive, is a topped out gift from heaven to earth. From our glorified and exalted redeemer, our high priest who has passed through the heavens, he accomplished his work and now he's in the business of applying the fruits of his work and he's ordained means to do that through. And the Lord's Supper is one of those means now. When I gave this lecture, there's a lot more material at the RFGA. I discussed other things like wine versus grape juice and how the frequency and all those things. And when I started to discuss wine and grape juice versus grape juice and frequency, I asked Pastor Arden Hodgins. There's a side door. I said, before I get to my next point, is that door unlocked? So I knew it'd be controversial. I'm not going to bring up all those issues. You guys can work out all those details. I think the most important thing, though, is to understand it, you know, not fight over wine versus grape juice or even frequency, though I have my personal convictions about that. You can read about it in the book. The most important thing is to see that from this text is that Paul assumes. Watch this, Paul assumes a reform view, a Calvinistic view of the Lord's Supper. He assumed his people knew it, too. Because he asked some questions and the implied answer is yes. And then he just goes on and gives illustrations and arguments why, therefore, you can't be doing this over these pagan ritual meals. So the most important thing is to realize that top down vertical aspect of the Lord's Supper. It's a great privilege. We get to feed on, you know, Jesus as Spurgeon said, feeds his people. You can always just say Spurgeon once said, whatever you say, people are going to like it, right? He did say that, though, that's an actual quote in this table, in the supper. Jesus feeds his people, strengthens us, nourishes us. And so may the Lord bless his word. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you for your word, we thank you for the servant. Paul, the apostle Paul, and we know that unless your spirit blesses and brings the word home with clarity and power. It won't do us any good, but we know as well that you promised to do that very thing. Fulfill that promise. We ask in Jesus name. Amen.