I’m grateful, in an odd sort of way, to the Corinthian church. Those poor people; if they hadn’t been so troublesome, there are all kinds of things that we would not know. It’s because of their trouble, their confusion, their getting it wrong, that the apostle Paul sat down and wrote First Corinthians. And in First Corinthians he spoke to them about the Passover. It’s not entirely clear whether he wrote it going in, or just after the Passover, but it was very much on his mind. And in First Corinthians 11, verse 23, he makes this interesting statement:

I have received of the Lord that which I delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus the same night in which he was betrayed took bread. 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. After the same manner, also, he took the cup when he had supped saying, This cup is the new testament in my blood, this do as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.

There were a lot of ways that Paul could have referenced this particular occasion this evening. He could have said, for example, it was on the 14th day of the first month at even, and it would cleared up a number of questions for many of us. But he didn’t; he called it the same night in which he was betrayed. I don’t know why Paul chose that expression. I can’t tell you why he put it that way, but what I can tell you is what it evokes in me personally…