Read: Mark 14:12-21
How do you celebrate major holidays? At Christmas time, do you decorate a tree in your home and hang stockings over the fireplace? At Easter, do you have lunch with family before hunting for Easter eggs? On Thanksgiving, do you gather with family and eat turkey and pumpkin pie before watching the Lions game? Families have traditions at holidays where they remember important things with those they love. Passover (or the festival of Unleavened Bread) was THE major holiday for Jewish people in the first century. On this holiday every year, Jewish people would remember God’s deliverance of their people from Egypt in the past, and look forward to the redemption God would bring in the future. They did this by offering a sacrifice and by sharing a very special meal with their family. In today’s verses, Jesus celebrates this meal with His disciples. Not only were they looking back on God’s faithfulness in the past, but the disciples were looking (in the eyes) THE REDEMPTION God would provide in just one day’s time through Jesus Christ. As they sat there in that city full of lambs being sacrificed, I wonder if any of the disciples remembered John the Baptist’s declaration about Jesus years earlier, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.” (John 1:29)
Question of the Day: What are some things you can do to celebrate Easter this year that will help you remember the salvation God gave to us through Jesus Christ?