Blessed art Thou, O Lord our God, King of the Universe

There are two very ancient prayers prayed by men and women of faith for centuries: Blessed are you, O Lord God, King of the Universe, who brings bread up from the earth. Blessed are you, O Lord God, King of the Universe, who creates the fruit of the vine.

These two prayers, prayed during the festival of Passover (Pesah) remind the Jewish people of the promises of God as they break bread and share a cup. They serve as a reminder that once, long ago, God heard the cries of His people and rescued them with “a mighty hand and an outstretched arm” (Deut.7:19), bringing them up out of slavery into freedom, out of exile into the land of promise, out of death into life, out of hell into heaven. And in the first century world, they serve as a source of hope that, once again, God would act within history to save his people from their bondage.

Call it Eucharist, the Lord’s Supper, Mass, Communion; this tradition was translated into our faith as Jesus appropriated upon himself the symbols and meanings of the Passover meal. Now, not only blessed are you Lord God for bringing up bread from the earth, but for becoming for us a new kind of bread – a bread of life. Blessed are you Lord God for creating the fruit of the vine and pouring it out for many for the forgiveness of sins, the return from exile (Mat.26:26-27, cf. Mat.9:1-8).

There are very few things in the Christian tradition that are as remarkable and sensational as this: while we were still in bondage, in exile, in hell, dead; Jesus broke his body, both figuratively with a loaf of bread, and literally on a Roman tool of execution; Jesus poured out his blood, in a cup among friends and from the agonizing height of a cross; Jesus wrote himself into the story of Passover so that we could be rescued into freedom, lead into the land of promise, born into new life, enter into heaven right now, right here (cf. Rom.5:8).

At a table.

Around some bread.

And a cup of wine.

This Sunday is Communion. And as we receive the elements: the bread and the wine, the choir will be singing an anthem which beautifully merges these two concepts – the story of Passover and the story told with its new meaning in Jesus. Listen carefully as the choir sings simultaneously that “you are the bread of life, take and eat, never hunger again” and “Blessed art thou, O Lord our God, King of the Universe, who bringest forth bread from the earth.”

~ by sholander on February 26, 2008.