Luke 22:14-23
These verses contain Luke’s account of the institution of the Lord’s supper. It is a passage which every true Christian will always read with deep interest. How wonderful it seems that an ordinance, so beautifully simple at its first appointment, should have been obscured and mystified by man’s inventions! What a painful proof it is of human corruption, that some of the bitterest controversies which have disturbed the Church, have been concerning the table of the Lord! Great indeed is the ingenuity of man, in perverting God’s gifts! The ordinance that should have been for his wealth is too often made an occasion of falling.
We should notice, for one thing in these verses, that the principal object of the Lord’s supper was to remind Christians of Christ’s death for sinners. In appointing the Lord’s supper, Jesus distinctly tells His disciples that they were to do what they did, “In remembrance of him.” In one word, the Lord’s supper is not a sacrifice. It is eminently a commemorative ordinance.