Christ gives His body and blood for you.

Today

Sermon for Maundy Thursday, April 2, 2026

Mercy, peace, and love be multiplied to you in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.

Matthew 26:26-29 ²⁶While they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to the disciples. He said, “Take, eat, this is my body.” ²⁷Then he took the cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it all of you, ²⁸for this is my blood of the new testament, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. ²⁹I tell you that I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom. (EHV)

Christ gives His body and blood for you.

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus,

We have been preparing for this night for the past six weeks, but what have we been doing to prepare? To be honest, perhaps not much. Some may have given up some treat or activity for Lent. Many of us have attended midweek services in which we heard about the last few days and hours of Jesus’ passion. On the other hand, I pray that you have spent these six weeks of Lenten preparation considering your guilt and need for a Savior, and therefore, have spent these six weeks, as we should always, in repentance so that you are ready to receive the forgiveness of our Lord.

For about three years, Jesus had been preparing His disciples for this night, preaching the Good News of the Messiah entering our world, healing the sick, performing miracle after miracle that showed His divine power, calling sinners to repentance, and announcing in advance what He was prepared to do as Christ gives His body and blood for you.

As part of our ongoing review of our catechism, this evening we look at the list of questions Luther recommended before partaking of the body and blood of God’s Son. I encourage you to open your hymnal now to that list on pages 38-39. Luther gave us 20 questions to consider as we prepare for the Lord’s Supper. Most likely, when you were in confirmation class, your pastor encouraged you to use this list every time you were coming to the altar of our Lord for this meal. If you are like me, however, you’ve likely grown a bit lackadaisical about doing that review. This evening, permit me to review with you just the first nine questions, all very short, and I pray these are your answers:

Do you believe you are a sinner? Yes, I believe it; I am a sinner.
How do you know this? From the Ten Commandments, which I have not kept.
Are you sorry for your sins? Yes, I am sorry that I have sinned against God.
What have you deserved from God by your sins? His wrath and displeasure, temporal death and eternal damnation. (Romans 6:21 & 23)
Do you also hope to be saved? Yes, such is my hope.
In whom, then, do you trust? In my dear Lord Jesus Christ.
Who is Christ? The Son of God, true God and man.
How many Gods are there? Only one; but there are three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
What, then, has Christ done for you that you trust in Him? He died for me and shed His blood for me on the cross for the forgiveness of sins.

The questions that follow on Luther’s list are not less important, and I encourage you to give them your attention going forward, but for tonight, this is the highlight I want to focus on, that Christ gives His body and blood for you.

As we reviewed these questions, what did we offer to God to induce Him to sacrifice His Son so that we might have forgiveness and life? The true answer is that we did nothing, except the sin that Jesus died to pay for. From the very beginning, God rightly commanded our obedience, and almost from the very beginning mankind has been sinning against our Creator and God. You and I were no different. King David recognized that from the moment of conception we are inclined to sin. In fact, David understood that because our first parents rebelled against God, their sin-infected nature has been passed down to each and every one of us, with the result that as we are formed in our mothers’ wombs, we have no trust in God or what He has done for us.

In the confession of sin inserted in this list of questions, we said we are sorry for our sins, but being sorry doesn’t pay the price our guilt required. The law demands perfection, and justice demands death for sin. As sinners, we deserved God’s wrath and everlasting exile in the punishment of hell. At the same time, what kind of God would subject His children to such a fate? Well, the answer to that question is a God who is both perfectly holy and perfectly just. His holiness demands that we must be righteous and without any sin to be in a relationship with Him. God’s justice requires that the consequence of breaking the law must be carried out. There can be no exceptions, or God would be neither holy nor just.

Sometimes, people ask, why does God allow so much death in our world? In truth, it is because of sin that death comes to all people, and whether that is when they are young or old, it is not because God is indifferent. Rather, God wants to save us from the curse of sin. Now, you and I couldn’t purchase release from the death sentence we deserve. We owed that debt to God for our guilt. Yet, the only way we could pay the debt would be to spend eternity in hell’s prison.

Still, our God desired a relationship with mankind. This was God’s whole purpose in creating this world. And, as the apostle declared, “God is love.” (1 John 4:16) Therefore, because our Lord Jesus is the embodiment of God’s love, He put Himself in our place on that cross. God sent His Son to be the atoning sacrifice that allows Him to punish our guilt at the same time that He declares us justly innocent of all charges.

Now, since the time God rescued Israel out of Egypt, He had commanded the sacrifice of a lamb in remembrance of His plan of salvation. The night of the last plague on Egypt, God commanded that the blood of the lamb be painted on the doorposts and lintels of Israel so that as He was wreaking vengeance on Egypt for rejecting Him, the Lord would pass over those houses, and the people inside were spared from death. God commanded that Passover sacrifice be repeated annually until the final sacrifice it foreshadowed would be accomplished. God wanted all people to know and remember that the sacrifice of His Lamb would finally set them free from slavery and death.

Therefore, it is in this His last Passover celebration that Jesus gives us a new covenant. The old covenant painted a picture of what Jesus was doing for us, but now, the real event was at hand. Thus, “While they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to the disciples. He said, ‘Take, eat, this is my body.’ Then he took the cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, ‘Drink from it all of you, for this is my blood of the new testament, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.’” Just as those sacrificial lambs fed the people of Israel repeatedly for all those many years, so now, as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, Jesus gives us His own body and blood: His body to nourish our souls for eternity; His blood to paint the doorposts of our hearts marking us as His own chosen people.

In the corrupted reasoning of natural man, the argument is often made that Jesus couldn’t really give us His body and blood for all these years. Many various reasons are imagined. Yet, being true God as well as true Man, our Lord does exactly as He promised. His very blood is in, with, and under the wine; His true flesh is in, with, and under the bread Jesus hands to us at His table. How can this be? That we must leave up to our Lord through whom God created the heavens and the earth. We don’t need to know the how, only what Jesus does, and what Jesus does is promise that in this eating and drinking, we receive again the forgiveness of all our sins. He promises that as we partake of this holy meal, we again receive peace with His Father in heaven.

So we now know the benefit that is ours through the amazing gift of Jesus’ body and blood given and shed for our sins. Yet, for whom is it given? Just those twelve disciples? Just the Jews descended from Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? Not hardly, for Jesus boldly proclaimed, “This is my blood of the new testament, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.” Therefore, we can be confident that if we are sinners, Jesus offers His blood for us. If we believe in Jesus as Savior and Redeemed, this body and blood is intended for you and me. If we repent our sins, this is the remedy for our guilt. If we are under the curse of sin, but God has brought us into His kingdom of grace through Baptism, and if we have been properly instructed in the Christian faith, this holy meal is medicine and food for eternal salvation.

There is one other question in Luther’s list that I want to mention. There are times when people don’t think they need the Lord’s Supper. Sometimes, they feel little or no guilt. Others occasionally feel so guilty they assume they are unworthy of God’s grace (which, of course, is always true for all people). Therefore, Luther gives an answer for anyone who doesn’t feel the need or desire to partake of this forgiveness and life. Question 20 asks, “But what shall a person do if he is not aware of such trouble and feels no hunger and thirst for the Sacrament?”

To such a person no better advice can be given than that, in the first place, he put his hand into his bosom, and feel whether he still have flesh and blood, and that he by all means believe what the Scriptures say of it in Galatians 5 and Romans 7. Secondly, that he look around to see whether he is still in the world, and keep in mind that there will be no lack of sin and trouble, as the Scriptures say in John 15 and 16; 1 John 2 and 5. Thirdly, he will certainly have the devil also about him, who with his lying and murdering day and night will let him have no peace within or without, as the Scriptures picture him in John 8 and 16; 1 Peter 5; Ephesians 6; 2 Timothy 2.

In other words, dear friends, if you are still living in the flesh and blood and believe the truths and promises of the Holy Scriptures, Jesus has the cure for all your sins and guilt, and He offers it to you freely without cost or any service required on your part. The Son of God, your Savior, has loved you so much that He willingly carried your sins into suffering, shame, death, and hell, so that you can be set free from all guilt and condemnation, so that you might enjoy forgiveness of all sin and life everlasting in heaven. Now, may all those who walk in fellowship with Jesus and this congregation come forward to receive this great gift of forgiveness and peace as Christ gives His body and blood to you. Amen.

Now may the God of hope fill you with complete joy and peace as you continue to believe, so that you overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen.