But there is another point of deepest interest presented in verse 11 of our chapter,--"And thou shalt _rejoice_ before the Lord thy God." We have no such word in the paschal feast, or in the feast of unleavened bread. It would not be in moral keeping with either of these solemnities. True it is, the passover lies at the very foundation of all the joy we can or ever shall realize here or hereafter; but we must ever think of the death of Christ, His sufferings, His sorrows--all that He passed through when the waves and billows of God's righteous wrath passed over His soul. It is upon these profound mysteries that our hearts are, or ought to be, mainly fixed when we surround the Lord's table and keep that feast by which we show the Lord's death until He come. Now, it is plain to the spiritual and thoughtful reader that the feelings proper to such a holy and solemn institution are not of a jubilant character. We certainly can and do rejoice that the sorrows and sufferings of our blessed Lord are over, and over forever--that those terrible hours are passed, never to return; but what we recall in the feast is not simply their being over, but their being gone through, and that for us. "Ye do show the Lord's death;" and we know that whatever may accrue to us from that precious death, yet when we are called to meditate upon it, our joy is chastened by those profound exercises of soul which the Holy Spirit produces by unfolding to us the sorrows, the sufferings, the cross, and passion of our blessed Saviour. Our Lord's words are, "This do in remembrance of _Me_;" but what we especially _remember_ in the supper is, Christ suffering and dying for us; what we _show_, is His death; and with these solemn realities before our souls, in the power of the Holy Ghost, there will, there must be, holy subduedness and seriousness. We speak, of course, of what becomes the immediate occasion of the celebration of the supper--the suited feelings and affections of such a moment. But these must be produced by the powerful ministry of the Holy Ghost. It can be of no possible use to seek, by any pious efforts of our own, to work ourselves up to a suitable state of mind. This would be ascending by steps to the altar, a thing most offensive to God. It is only by the Holy Spirit's ministry that we can worthily celebrate the holy supper of the Lord. He alone can enable us to put away all levity, all formality, all mere routine, all wandering thoughts, and to discern the body and blood of the Lord in those memorials which, by His own appointment, are laid on His table.