Mark 14:12-26
Jesus' Last Supper
12 On the first day of the Festival of Unleavened Bread, when it was customary to sacrifice the Passover lamb, Jesus’ disciples asked him, “Where do you want us to go and make preparations for you to eat the Passover?”
13 So he sent two of his disciples, telling them, “Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water will meet you. Follow him. 14 Say to the owner of the house he enters, ‘The Teacher asks: Where is my guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?’ 15 He will show you a large room upstairs, furnished and ready. Make preparations for us there.”
16 The disciples left, went into the city and found things just as Jesus had told them. So they prepared the Passover.
17 When evening came, Jesus arrived with the Twelve. 18 While they were reclining at the table eating, he said, “Truly I tell you, one of you will betray me—one who is eating with me.”
19 They were saddened, and one by one they said to him, “Surely you don’t mean me?”
20 “It is one of the Twelve,” he replied, “one who dips bread into the bowl with me. 21 The Son of Man will go just as it is written about him. But woe to that man who betrays the Son of Man! It would be better for him if he had not been born.”
22 While they were eating, Jesus took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Take it; this is my body.”
23 Then he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, and they all drank from it.
24 “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many,” he said to them. 25 “Truly I tell you, I will not drink again from the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.”
26 When they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.
St. Mark wrote about the importance of Jesus' Last Meal...When Jesus ate His Last Supper with His Disciples, He took bread, and after blessing He broke the bread and gave it to them, and said, "Take; this is My body.”...And He took a cup, and when He had given thanks He gave it to them, and they all drank of it...And He said to them, “This is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many...Truly, I say to you, I will not drink again of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the Kingdom of God."...
St. Luke wrote it this way: For Jesus told them from now on He would not drink of the fruit of the vine until the Kingdom of God comes...And He took bread, and when He had given thanks, He broke the bread and gave it to them, saying, "This is My body, which is given for you...Do this in remembrance of Me."...And likewise the cup after they had eaten, saying, "This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in My blood."....
St. Paul said this of the importance of the Last Supper: "For I received from the LORD what I also delivered to you, that the LORD Jesus on the night when He was betrayed took bread, and when He had given thanks, He broke it, and said, “This is My body, which is for you...Do this in remembrance of Me."...In the same way also He took the cup, after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in My blood...Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me."...
After Jesus' Last Supper, He would go on to be arrested and be put on the cross to die for us...He would resurrect from His Own Death and be remembered for this event...Life would go on earth, but Jesus has left this lasting impression...As His Resurrection would happen in such a Way that we would always remember Him...He, also, knew His Last Supper would be done in such a Way that we would always remember Him - and take the time to remember Him...Jesus would live, die, and rise again...His resurrection is of Great Importance and we will always remember His Death at Calvary...So too, as we eat, break bread and drink each day, let us always remember Him -as He commands us to...
Bishop and Theologian N. T. Wright teaches us that: "We read scripture in order to be refreshed in our memory and understanding of the story within which we ourselves are actors, to be reminded where it has come from and where it is going to, and hence what our own part within it ought to be."..."Jesus died for our sins not so that we could sort out abstract ideas, but so that we, having been put right, could become part of God’s Plan to put His whole world right...That is how the revolution works."..."If you believe in resurrection, you believe that the Living God will put His world to right and that if God wants to do that in the future, it is right to try to anticipate that by whatever means in the present."..."What you do in the LORD is not in vain...You are not oiling the wheels of a machine that's about to roll over a cliff...You are not restoring a great painting that's shortly going to be thrown on the fire...You are not planting roses in a garden that's about to be dug up for a building site...You are -- strange though it may seem, almost as hard to believe as the resurrection itself -- accomplishing something that will become in due course part of God's new world...Every act of love, gratitude, and kindness; every work of art or music inspired by the LOVE of God and delight in the beauty of His creation; every minute spent teaching a severely handicapped child to read or walk; every act of care and nurture, of comfort and support, for one's fellow human beings and for that matter one's fellow nonhuman creatures; and of course every prayer, all Spirit-led teaching, every deed that spreads the gospel, builds up the church, embraces and embodies holiness rather than corruption, and make the Name of Jesus honored in the world -- all of this will find its way, through the Resurrecting Power of God, into the new creation that God will one day make."...
Wright adds: "After you die, you go to be "with Christ," but your body remains dead...Describing where and what you are in that interim period is difficult, and for the most part the New Testament writers don't try...Call it "heaven" if you like, but don't imagine that it's the end of all things...What is promised after that interim period is a new bodily life within God's new world."..."I am constantly amazed that many contemporary Christians find this confusing...It was second nature to the early church and to many subsequent Christian generations...It was what they believed and taught...If we have grown up believing and teaching something else, it's time we rubbed our eyes and read our texts again."..."Christian living means dying with Christ and rising again...That, as we saw, is part of the meaning of baptism, the starting point of the Christian pilgrimage."..."At the heart of Christian ethic is humility; at the heart of its parodies, pride...Different roads with different destinations, and the destinations color the character of those who travel by them."..."First, we break bread and drink wine together, telling the story of Jesus and His death, because Jesus knew that this set of actions would explain the meaning of His death in a way that nothing else--no theories, no clever ideas--could ever do.”...