We know Jesus’ blood paid the price for our sins, but what about His body? Jesus referred to more than forgiveness when He said, “This is my body broken for you.” He took upon Himself all sin and all sickness, humiliation, abandonment, and abuse. Why? So that through faith in Him, we could be reconciled to God and made whole in Him. “My body broken for you” is the foundation of our whole redemption in Christ!
My Body Broken For You
When mankind fell in the Garden of Eden, their actions allowed sin, sickness, poverty, and death into our world. However, God instantly had a plan to redeem us from all of those things through Jesus on the cross! Jesus described this redemptive plan when He said, “My body broken for you.”
Isaiah prophesied about the Lord’s physical sacrifice hundreds of years before the birth of the Messiah:
3 He was despised and rejected and forsaken by men, a Man of sorrows and pains, and acquainted with grief and sickness; and like One from Whom men hide their faces He was despised, and we did not appreciate His worth or have any esteem for Him.4 Surely He has borne our griefs (sicknesses, weaknesses, and distresses) and carried our sorrows and pains [of punishment], yet we [ignorantly] considered Him stricken, smitten, and afflicted by God [as if with leprosy].5 But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our guilt and iniquities; the chastisement [needful to obtain] peace and well-being for us was upon Him, and with the stripes [that wounded] Him we are healed and made whole.
The Hebrew word for “healed” is rapha, which means to mend, repair, cure, and make whole. The word “peace” is the Hebrew word shalom, and this word is fantastic because it doesn’t just refer to a feeling. This peace means completeness, soundness, welfare, security, and even prosperity! This is complete well-being across spirit, mind, body, and relationships. This promises total restoration everywhere sin has broken something.
Jesus Became Sin
For thousands of years, humanity has faced grief, abandonment, rejection, humiliation, poverty, fear, famine, sickness, and death. However, God’s perfect plan sent Jesus to carry all of those evils on Himself..
The Bible says that He actually became sin for us on the cross: “For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Corinthians 5:21). Our human minds can’t even imagine how horrible that was for Him. He lived a perfect life, yet took the corruption of sin into His own body, taking on the full penalty of sin, so that we could live free from it!
Jesus’ sacrifice covered poverty too! Paul wrote that Jesus, though rich, became poor so his poverty could make us rich (2 Corinthians 8:9). The same cross that purchased forgiveness and healing also purchased provision.
When His body was broken for you, He became the all sufficient sacrifice.
The Lamb of God
John the Baptist called Jesus “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). Like a sacrificial lamb, Jesus shed His blood to atone for the sin of the world: past, present and future. But if His blood sufficiently paid for our sins, why was Jesus beaten?
Old Testament sacrifices symbolized the once-for-all, forever sacrifice of Jesus (Hebrews 10:12). Priests killed sacrificial lambs in the most humane way they could. They certainly didn’t scourge the animals first.
However, Jesus sacrificed Himself in a way that wasn’t even remotely humane. He was stripped, beaten, whipped. A crown of thorns was forced onto His head, and then He was nailed to a cross.
Who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness—by whose stripes you were healed.
The Lord accomplished a great work through His body as well as His blood. His body was broken for you, literally. Just as He became sin so you could be righteous, He endured the torture of the cross so that your body could be well, whole, and healthy. He wore a crown of thorns so that your mind could be filled with peace.
Some Among You are Sick
Paul told the Corinthian church that some among them were sick because they took communion without discerning the Lord’s body.
For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body. For this reason many are weak and sick among you, and many sleep.
Context matters here! If we refer back to 1 Corinthians 11:20-22, Paul was addressing specific abuse. Back then, the Lord’s supper was a meal eaten together. Some believers were eating and drinking ahead of others, taking too much and leaving none for the rest. They focused on the physical act of eating a meal without even considering the purpose of remembering the Lord’s sacrifice!
Some have concluded that this somehow is an explanation of why some believers are sick and die today, but that isn’t the context at all. However, the point remains: when you take communion, remember that the bread and wine (or crackers, juice, whatever it is) represents the broken body and shed blood of your Savior.
Receiving through Communion
Bless the Lord, O my soul, And forget not all His benefits: 3 Who forgives all your iniquities, Who heals all your diseases,4 Who redeems your life from destruction, Who crowns you with lovingkindness and tender mercies,5 Who satisfies your mouth with good things, So that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.
We have to remember all the benefits Jesus purchased for us on the cross. One way we remember Jesus’ sacrifice is by partaking in communion. Taking communion is a point of contact through which we can receive healing in our physical bodies. When we take communion, we are focusing on the finished work of Jesus on the cross.
23 The Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was betrayed took bread; 24 and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, “Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.”25 In the same manner He also took the cup after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.”
When you take the cup, remember that you have been fully forgiven because Jesus shed His blood. Likewise, when you eat the bread, remember you’ve been healed and made whole because His body was broken for you. When you take communion, you’re saying, “I’m ingesting the power of God and the Word of God. I receive all of His healing power and forgiveness!”
Additional Resources
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