Luke's account stresses Jesus' linking of His self-giving with the bread and His giving Himself for the disciples specifically, instead of for the "many"generally (Matt. 24:28; Mark 14:24; cf. Jer. 31:31-34; 32:37-40). According to Matthew and Mark, Jesus announced that He would not drink the fruit of the vine until He did so in the kingdom after instituting the Lord's Supper (Matt. 26:29; Mark 14:25). Perhaps Jesus repeated this announcement then. If so, this would have been Jesus' third reference to the coming kingdom (cf. vv. 16, 18). On the other hand, Luke probably rearranged the order of events and recorded Jesus instituting the Lord's Supper after His promise not to drink again.
Luke's account is more similar to Paul's in 1 Corinthians 11 than it is to Matthew or Mark's. This seems to be one indication that Paul influenced Luke as he wrote his Gospel as well as Acts. Alternatively Luke may have influenced Paul.
Jesus invested the common elements of unleavened bread and diluted wine with new significance. The bread represented His body given sacrificially for His disciples. The disciples were to eat it, as He did, symbolizing their appropriation of Him and their consequent union with Him. The cup, representing what was in it, symbolized the ratification of the New Covenant with Jesus' blood (Jer. 31:31-34; cf. Exod. 24:8).474
". . . Jesus meant that the new covenant would take effect through that which the contents of the cup signified, namely, his sacrificial death."475
Much of the New Testament is an exposition of the significance of Jesus' sacrificial death to which He referred so cogently here. Luke stressed that Jesus gave His body and poured out His blood "for you."However "in remembrance of me"encouraged the disciples to focus on the person of Jesus Christ and not just the benefits of His death for them.476Jesus commandedHis disciples to remember Him. This is not optional for us (cf. 1 Cor. 11:24-26).
