John 19:30
The Celebration of "It Is Finished"

Tonight, we celebrate the Lord’s Supper.  This is a unique service where the
sermon is not the important thing.  Your worship is.  So for a few minutes before
we partake, let us consider what it is we are doing.

    I. We are celebrating.
        A. This the Lord’s Supper and I think it should be conducted with some
            measure of reverence.
            1. However, that doesn’t mean it must be a dearth.
            2. Christ’s life was not taken from Him.
                a. It was offered.
                b. And it was not offered to be a defeat, but a victory.
            3. It is a not a wake we have before us, but a celebration of God’s
                success.
        B. It is a celebration of the power of God and of what God has given to us
            in Christ Jesus—or rather what God has finished for us in Christ
            Jesus.

   II. We are celebrating the conclusion of somethings.
        A. The waiting for Christ to come has finished.
            1. For an estimated 5,000 years, the world looked for the Savior.
            2. God told Adam about Him.

Gen 3:15  And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed
and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.

            3. Enoch spoke of Him.

Jude 1:14 And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying,
Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints,

            4. Noah built an ark as a picture of Him.
            5. Abraham looked for the city made with His hands.
            6. Moses heard His voice and worshipped Him.
            7. Joshua bowed at His feet outside of Jericho.
            8. David wrote hymns to praise Him.
            9. Isaiah described His conception, birth, life, death, and
                resurrection.
           10. For thousands of years, hungry hearts waited for Him to come.
           11. He’s come!
           12. Celebrate that fact.

        B. Offering the sacrifices has finished.
            1. We do not offer sacrifices today.
                a. Because Jesus came and fulfilled them.
                b. In the Lord’s Supper, we celebrate that fact.
            2. The Old Testament sacrifices fall into three main categories.
                a. Sin sacrifices
                    (1) Sin Offering
                    (2) Trespass Offering
                    (3) Burnt Offering (to some degree)
                b. Worship Sacrifices
                    (1) Burnt Offering (to some degree)
                    (2) Trespass Offering (to some degree)
                    (3) Meat (meal) Offering
                    (4) Peace Offering (to some degree)
                c. Thanksgiving Sacrifice
                    (1) Peace Offering
                    (2) Wave Offering are Peace Offering
            3. Tonight, we are admonished to do all three of these things without
                a single offering.
                a. Why?  Because Jesus has fulfilled them all.
                b. Celebrate that fact.

        C. Sin’s rule over us is finished.
            1. Of course it is not just the coming of Christ that we celebrate.
                a. It is His death.
                b. Our Lord told us as often as we celebrate this supper, we are
                    to do in remembrance of Him.
                c. The two elements that our Lord left us point specifically to
                    His death.
                d. So in some measure, it is His death and what He accomplished
                    with His death that we should be remembering tonight!
            2. The death of Jesus is the empowerment of the Christian.
                a. It is that death that paid sin’s price for us.
                    (1) This is a complicated thought to understand, but after
                         studying again the book of Hebrews again, I am even more
                         convinced that no Old Testament sacrifice ever removed a
                         sin.
                    (2) It just put it off!  (As they say with the government debt
                         ceiling, they just "kicked the can down the road.")
                    (3) The days of putting off sin is gone!
                b. It is that death that restored our fellowship with God.
                    (1) Since Adam and Eve, the fellowship between God and man has
                         been damaged.
                    (2) The best the Old Testament saint got was a through the
                         veil, by the High Priest, once a year-or-so fellowship.
                    (3) We have complete access to God 24/7, from anywhere,
                         without anyone’s help.
                    (4) This earthly fellowship is just the prelude to the
                         fellowship that is ours in eternity.
                         (a) Heaven our home.
                         (b) No more faith, all by sight.
                         (c) Being in a place with Christ Himself.
                c. It is death that broke sin’s mastery over us.
                    (1) We see the spiritual frailty of the Old Testament saints.
                         (a) Noah spent 120 years building an ark, saving the
                              human race, and then gets drunk.
                         (b) Moses delivers the people of God from Egypt and then
                              loses his temper and can’t go into the Promised
                              Land.
                         (c) Gehazi, the servant of Elisha, helped in miracles but
                              himself got greedy and ended up with leprosy.
                    (2) I know we have a sinful nature within us, but we no longer
                         have to let it dictate what we do.
                    (3) We have liberty in Christ.

We have much to celebrate tonight!

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