As a proclamation of the gospel, this meal represents the great exchange. We were dead in our sins, and in Christ God exchanges us His life for our death. We were in abject poverty, and so in Christ God exchanges us His riches for our rags. We were slaves, chained to the dungeon walls of our own selfishness and pride, and so in Christ God exchanges us His liberty for our slavery.
He took our curses, and we walked away with His blessings. He took our iniquity, and we walked away with His righteousness. He took our guilt, and so we walked away with a song in our hearts and on our lips. He took our shame, and we walked away with His glory.
God made the one who had never known sin to be sin on our behalf, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. That is what this meal declares, embodies, and enacts. As often as we partake of this meal, we declare the Lord’s death until He comes, and that is what our declaration is talking about. That is what His death, burial and resurrection mean.
So the Lord Jesus is at the head of the Table, and the lowliest Christian seated at the foot of the Table is in full possession of all the riches of this great house. Another way of saying this is that there is no foot to this Table. In Christ, we are all seated at the head. In Christ, nothing is withheld. In Christ, we do not lack for any good thing.
In Christ, we have far more than the blessing of what He took from us. He never takes anything from us, however tawdry, without replacing it with something glorious.
So this is the Table of the great transaction. This is glory through vicarious substitution. This is staggering wealth through sheer and infinite grace. This is too good to be true . . . but it is true nonetheless.
So come, and welcome, to Jesus Christ.
Too amazing to take in! …
“to be sin”
Is there a sense that He continues to carry our due in Himself — continuously and evermore experiencing our poverty, rags, slavery and death?
Yes he defeated death — but is it possible the he did so by forever absorbing it in our place?
We were due eternal death.
Is He experiencing eternal death for us?
Great stuff. Although we’d differ on the definition of those “lowliest Christian” heirs. The reason the least in the kingdom is greater than John the Baptist, who was the greatest born of women, is that everyone in the kingdom has been born again. We can certainly inherit the Gospel from our parents, just like the Jews did (Romans 3:2) and that is what Circumcision was about, but the sacraments are about inheriting from a different Father. Paedobaptism is quite clearly all about earthly fathers and childhood training. Covenant theology is great, but New Covenant theology is greater. The world is… Read more »
Christ continuing now as under a curse, and forsaken by the Father? I don’t think so! It’s like the Star Trek empath who takes wounds from others, and then the wounds go away.
Mike
Paedobaptism is indeed totally about earthly father faith – except when it’s not.
And it’s not when God is that young ones’ Father.
Surely you would not have objected had Joseph baptized Jesus, would you?