Question 80 - What difference is there between the Lord's supper and the papal mass?
Answer - The Lord's supper testifies to us, first, that we have complete forgiveness of all our sins through the one sacrifice of Jesus Christ, which He Himself accomplished on the cross once for all;1 and, second, that through the Holy Spirit we are grafted into Christ,2 who with His true body is now in heaven at the right hand of the Father,3 and this is where He wants to be worshipped.4 But the mass teaches, first, that the living and the dead do not have forgiveness of sins through the suffering of Christ unless He is still offered for them daily by the priests; and, second, that Christ is bodily present in the form of bread and wine, and there is to be worshipped. Therefore the mass is basically nothing but a denial of the one sacrifice and suffering of Jesus Christ, and an accursed idolatry.
Question 78 - Are then the bread and wine changed into the real body and blood of Christ?
Answer - No. Just as the water of baptism is not changed into the blood of Christ and is not the washing away of sins itself but is simply God's sign and pledge,1 so also the bread in the Lord's supper does not become the body of Christ itself,2 although it is called Christ's body3 in keeping with the nature and usage of sacraments.4
1 Eph. 5:26; Tit. 3:5. 2 Matt. 26:26-29. 3 I Cor. 10:16, 17; 11:26-28. 4 Gen. 17:10, 11; Ex. 12:11, 13; I Cor. 10:3, 4; I Pet. 3:21.
Question 75 - How does the Lord's Supper signify and seal to you that you share in Christ's one sacrifice on the cross and in all His gifts?
Answer - In this way: Christ has commanded me and all believers to eat of this broken bread and drink of this cup in remembrance of Him. With this command He gave these promises:1 First, as surely as I see with my eyes the bread of the Lord broken for me and the cup given to me, so surely was His body offered for me and His blood poured out for me on the cross. Second, as surely as I receive from the hand of the minister and taste with my mouth the bread and the cup of the Lord as sure signs of Christ's body and blood, so surely does He Himself nourish and refresh my soul to everlasting life with His crucified body and shed blood.
1 Matt. 26:26-28; Mark 14:22-24; Luke 22:19, 20; I Cor. 11:23-25.
"The governor of the feast called the bridegroom, and saith unto him, every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine; and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse; but thou hast kept the good wine until now." John 2:9-10
The governor of the feast said more than he intended to say, or rather, there is more truth in what he said than he himself imagined. This is the established rule all the world over: "the good wine first, and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse." It is the rule with men; and have not hundreds of disappointed hearts bewailed it? Friendship first—the oily tongue, the words softer than butter, and afterwards the drawn sword. Ahithophel first presents the lordly dish of love and kindness to David, then afterwards that which is worse, for he forsakes his master, and becomes the counsellor of his rebel son. Judas presents first of all the dish of fair speech and of kindness; the Saviour partook thereof, he walked to the house of God in company with him, and took sweet counsel with him; but afterwards there came the dregs of the wine—"He that eateth bread with me hath lifted up his heel against me." Judas the thief betrayed his Master, bringing forth afterwards "that which is worse." Ye have found it so with many whom ye thought your friends. In the heyday of prosperity, when the sun was shining, and the birds were singing, and all was fair and gay and cheerful with you, they brought forth the good wine; but there came a chilling frost, and nipped your flowers, and the leaves fell from the trees, and your streams were frosted with the ice, and then they brought forth that which is worse,—they forsook you and fled; they left you in your hour of peril, and taught you that great truth, that "Cursed is he that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm." And this is the way all the world over—I say it once again—not merely with men, but with nature too.
Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. I speak as to wise men; you judge what I say. Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ? Since there is one bread, we who are many are one body; for we all partake of the one bread. Look at the nation Israel; are not those who eat the sacrifices sharers in the altar? 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 to demons, and not to God; and I do not want you to become sharers in demons. You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons; you cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons. Or do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? We are not stronger than He, are we?
What 1 Corinthians 10 is about is the way the Corinthians had overestimated the power of the Lord's Supper as sacramental food, and had underestimated the purpose of the Lord's Supper as spiritual fellowship with Christ.
In other words, they saw eating the bread and drinking the cup as a kind of sacramental antidote to any ill effects that might come from tasting the poison of idolatry. And so they overestimated the power of the Lord's supper.
"Christ has appeared once for all at the climax of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. And just as it is appointed for men to die once and after that the judgment, so Christ, having been offered once for all to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for Him." (Hebrews 9:26-28)
The Son of God entered once into human history as Jesus of Nazareth primarily for the purpose of dying for our sins so that we who trust Him might have new and eternal life. And He is coming a second time into human history not to atone for sin or purchase life, but to complete and perfect our deliverance from all evil and pain. What I want to do very briefly this morning is describe some of the significance of that second coming and its relationship to the Lord's supper that we will celebrate in a few minutes.
