[The Passover was instituted only for a time, till the more perfect dispensation of the Messiah should be introduced. For both the occasion of that ordinance, and the ordinance itself, were altogether typical. The occasion of that ordinance was the redemption of Israel out of Egypt, which was typical of the redemption of the world from sin and Satan, death and hell. The Paschal Lamb also, which was to be roasted, and eaten with bitter herbs, and not a bone of which was to be broken, was typical of the Lord Jesus Christ, who was to endure the extremest agonies both of soul and body as a sacrifice for sin, yet was not to have one bone of his body broken. To the completion of this type in the Lord Jesus Christ the Apostle Paul bears witness, saying, " Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us ; therefore let us keep the feast." This therefore was the deliverance which was henceforth to be celebrated in the Church ; and in comparison of it the deliverance from Egypt
was no more to be rememberedf From this time
the shadows were to flee away, seeing that the good things which they prefigured were now arrived : the new covenant, with every thing relating to it, was now established; and therefore the old covenant, with all its carnal ordinances, having waxed old, was to vanish awayg.
Now it was of great importance to the whole Church that this matter should be fully understood : and therefore our blessed Lord informed his Disciples, that, since " the Passover would now be fulfilled in the kingdom of God," or in the dis- pensation which he was about to introduce, there would be no more occasion for the Jewish rites and ceremonies, not even for that which was the most solemn and sacred of them allh.]
2. Because other memorials of his love were now to be established —
[The Lord's Supper was now instituted for the purpose of exhibiting to the world the wonders of his love, and of perpe- tuating in the Church the remembrance of it to the end of time. In the bi'eaking of the bread, was represented the rending of his body on the cross ; and in the pouring out of the wine, the effusion of his blood : and the partaking of those sacred elements which nourish the body, represented the nourishing of our souls by a believing application to Christ as our atoning sacrifice. This is the feast which his people are now to keep : of this all are to partake, provided they desire to have redemption through his blood, and can partake of it with the bitter herbs of real humiliation. This feast he will keep
f Jer. xxiii. 5 — 8. & Heb. viii. 13.
h The word " until " does not import, that our Lord would keep the feast after it had been accomplished in him, but that he never would keep it again. It is an Hebraism, frequent in the Scriptures.