Pastor Barry's   "Chapter & Verse"  Day 298

October 25;      I Corinthians 11:24;       144/260(III);        ‘His Broken Body’

1 Corinthians 11:24 and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, "Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me."

The Lord taught Paul concerning communion.  Understanding that the bread represents the Lord Jesus’ broken body is one way Christians can be healed.  If you think about what the Roman soldiers did to the Lord Jesus’ body, it is hard to understand why He would want us to remember such a gruesome sight.  The Prophet Isaiah (Isaiah 52:14) tells us that the Lord Jesus would be so brutalized that He was scarcely recognizable as a human being.  Isaiah prophesied this about 700 years before it happened.  I believe we get a clue here in this verse.  Jesus, talking about the bread that represents His broken body says that He broke the bread.  Jesus allowed the Roman soldiers to whip Him.  No one could take His life, He freely laid it down for us.  Jesus tells us at any point He could have called twelve legions of angels to rescue Him.  But no, He let them beat Him.  His broken body represents our physical healing.  Communion is two elements.  The wine or juice represents the blood shed by the Lord Jesus to cleanse us from our sins.  Everyone seems to know this.  His body was broken for our healing.  Again, prophetically, Isaiah tells us that ‘by the stripes Jesus received, we were healed (Isaiah 53:5).  The Bible confirms this in Matthew 8:16-17, teaching Jesus fulfilled what Isaiah prophesied about our healing.  When you partake of communion, do so in a ‘sacred’ manner.   Thank Jesus for His love exemplified by our forgiveness of sins and healing.