The Lord's Supper
The Lord’s supper was instituted by the Lord
and is to be observed until He returns to this Earth.
The Lord’s Supper is a commemoration of the shedding of His blood and His death as our substitute.
This is strictly a church ordinance to be observed by the members of a local church.
This is a restricted communion, only to those who are members of a particular body.
The elements of the Lord’s supper are unleavened bread and wine.
We each eat a piece of bread in remembrance of Jesus.
When we drink the wine, we remember that Jesus' blood was shed for us,
and that it signifies the new covenant.
We are instructed what to do and how to do it,
but we are given liberty as to the timing.
The Lord said "as oft" as you do it, do it in remembrance of me.
Some churches may observe the Lord’s Supper weekly, some monthly,
some quarterly, some yearly, and others at their discretion.
While scriptural descriptions of the original communion use the terms bread, the cup, and fruit of the vine,
it may be conclusively inferred that the bread was unleavened and that the drink was fermented wine.
This follows from:
. 1. The communion took place immediately after the Passover.
This was a time in which leavened bread was prohibited, both by scriptural law and by Jewish tradition
(Ex 12:3-8, Num 9:9-11, Deut 16:1-3, Mt 26:17, Mk 14:12, Lk 22:7).
. 2. Leaven is used in the scriptures as an emblem of sin (Lk 12:1, I Cor 5:6-8, Gal 5:7-9)
and is therefore an unsuitable representative of the Lord's body.
. 3. Wine is symbolically consistent with unleavened bread in that neither contain leaven.
On the other hand, unfermented grape juice would contradict all that is portended by the unleavened bread
because grape juice typically does contain leaven.
. 4. Wine was a traditional part of the Jewish Passover.
. 5. Without modern methods of refrigeration, grape juice could not be preserved for all times of the year.
The Passover season was not conducive to grape juice since it was well between harvests.
. 6. The Corinthians obviously used a fermented substance in their communion service
since they perverted it into a drunken festival (I Cor 11:20-30).
