Wednesday, 17 April Luke 22:1-38
Written by Dr Graham Leo. ©2019.
It may be quite a long time since you read any myths or fairy tales, but I'm sure you're familiar with the genre. This reading today has all the hallmarks of those genres: there are wicked spirits entering people’s minds; the devil is asking favours from the King to have a power over the King’s most faithful servant; there is a secret sign of a man carrying a jar of water who, if approached with the secret code words, will lead them to a pre-planned meeting room; there are wicked plots to overthrow the King’s Son; there are grim prophecies of betrayals and promised redemptions; there are secret purchases of swords and stockpiling of resources.
Of course, this story is anything but myth. It is true in every detail. It really, truly happened. But it is a marvellous example of what J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis wrote about often – the ultimate truth of myth, and the ways that ancient myth has somehow been inspired to foretell the greatest and truest story of all – the rescue of the cosmos by the High King, through the blood sacrifice of his own son.
This story that we are reading today is the first and greatest story, and through it God has mysteriously inspired countless myths in ancient cultures and even as signs in the heavenly zodiac, long before Luke ever wrote it down.
Luke is quite clear in this reading about the role of Satan in this dark betrayal and arrest of Jesus (v3). Jesus himself, however, corrects any view that this might somehow decrease personal responsibility. The Son of Man will go as it has been decreed, but woe to that man who betrays him. (v22) This reminds us of Peter’s first sermon: This man was handed over to you by God’s set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross. (Acts 2:23)
We see here the clearest statement of the two apparently irreconcilable facts of God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility.
Again, Satan is implicated in a strange request – we simply cannot begin to explain this – that Peter be ‘sifted like wheat’. Yet, because of Jesus’ prayer for him, Peter would not be lost. Jesus even told him that when he returns to faith he is to strengthen his brothers.
This is difficult, but sometimes we have to confess that we do not understand scripture. In fact, sometimes we ought not seek to understand it at all but merely to stand under it.
In the middle of our reading, is Luke’s fairly short description of the Last Supper. Jesus introduces the meal to them with the marvellous statement that there is a long historical link between the Passover, the Lord’s Supper or Communion or Eucharist which he is about to institute, and the final completion of the Kingdom of God (v15-16).
Let’s recap the history. The Jewish Passover was the annual commemoration of the night that Israel was rescued from slavery in Egypt. On that night, all the first-born in Egypt were slain by the angel of death – except in those households which had taken the blood of a newly-slain, perfect lamb, and marked the doorposts and lintel of their house with the blood. Then the angel of death would ‘pass over’ that house. The household was then to roast the lamb and eat it as a meal before their journey out of Egypt.
God instructed Moses to institute this Passover meal as a regular annual feast, and it was celebrated more or less faithfully for hundreds of years when the nation was following God’s ways. The Passover was the symbol of the greatest deliverance story of Israel.
Jesus now links that Passover with his death and the last meal he shares with his disciples. But even more importantly, he links both of them (v16) with the anticipated Great Banquet that he promises at the end of time when he returns to earth and restores the cosmos to order and the kingdom of God is fully and finally established.
So when we share in weekly Communion, we are linking our faith with the ancient Jew, the death of Jesus, and the promise of his coming again. Not a moment to be taken lightly!
It is why the meal is traditionally taken with bread from a common loaf and wine from a common cup. Together, these represent the unity of the church of God, going back to that first Exodus and forward to the first meal with our Redeemer in the new Kingdom.
If we get nothing else from this chapter, we should take away with us the sense that this was a tremendously momentous occasion. It was an epoch-making moment of history. After this night, nothing would ever be the same again. That’s why I started this reflection talking about myth. Because true myth – as opposed to false myth – contains all stories in that story. It carries truth so deep that it is hard to put it into ordinary words. The magic of a thousand fairy-tales and myths looked forward to this night.
Eat the apples from the golden tree in the enchanted garden, and you will live forever.
Drink the elixir from the crystal vial in the mirrored, many-sided chamber, and you will gain all knowledge.
Take this bread; eat it. It is my Body given for you.
Take this wine; drink it. It is my Blood shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.
It sounds like the stuff of fairy tales. Don't seek to understand it; just stand under it. But depend upon it: it is deeply true. Never eat and drink lightly. Never give up partaking. It is the food of God, the Panis Angelicus, given to men and women; it will feed your souls more than your bodies. Eaten without proper confession, it may even harm your bodies!
And one day, not long now, the heavens will part with a loud noise, the Son of God will appear; and you and I will stand in the very presence of God in his Great Banqueting Hall.
We will be breathless with excitement. All around the great hall, we will see faces that we recognise and remember. The most magnificent angelic orchestras will be playing and angel choirs singing. The glorious person of the Lord Jesus Christ will be there, and in a way that I can’t explain to you just now, he will clink his glass with everyone’s and share his plate with everyone, all at the same moment, and we will all eat and drink together.
And we will be a very, very merry company, such as has never been seen in all the history of all the worlds, and our fellowship will go on for ever and ever and ever.
Prayer: Oh, Lord Jesus Christ, pray for me and my family, that we might stand strong. Preserve my soul, and all our souls, to everlasting glory and delight, for your own dear name’s sake. Amen.
