A Funeral for Jesus?

So often we throw together the Lord’s Supper at the last moment. We spend all of our time explaining what it does not mean. . . . And yet in so doing, we often forget to do exactly what Jesus is doing here, which is saying what this does mean and why this is significant and why this is important. Instead, we live out this dirge-like experience, usually once a quarter, almost like a funeral for someone we don’t quite know. . . . Why is it that our Lord’s Supper services are so funereal? Why is it that even in churches that have had a very celebrating atmosphere, when it gets to that point, we roll out that table: it looks like a corpse covered in a white sheet. We stand up and believe that what we ought to do right now is to scrunch up our faces and feel sorry for Jesus. Jesus doesn’t want you to feel sorry for him. When Jesus says, “Proclaim my death,” that is a proclamation of victory. It is also a magnificent proclamation of the liberating power of God. . . . What we are doing in the Lord’s Table is announcing to one another with the authority of Jesus himself, “I am a sinner. I ought to be in hell right now. And yet, the blood of Jesus washes away all sin.” –Russell D. Moore, “Jesus, Take the Meal: Why We’re Afraid of the Lord’s Table (Luke 22:7-30)”, 2,4,5,6