Three Streams and one cross 3/28/10 AM Sermon

How we read the first four books of our NT is a very interesting question.

Many read the Gospels as just books about the life of Jesus and stop at that – That is true but is not all.

Some read them about How I get to Heaven or How I get saved- that is true but it is not all the story.

The Gospels are a lot about the finishing the story of Israel and beginning of a new exciting chapter in God's story and plan.

The Gospels are gloriously complex documents -
Pond shallow enough to play in but deep enough to drown in.

This is about the story of Israel – BC- or before Christ being incomplete and it was in the story of Jesus that the OT finds its climax. - It is the beginning of our story – the story of the light going out to all the nations.

It is the story of Abraham becoming a blessing to all nations.

This morning we are going to take a journey through the Gospel of Luke and see three Rivers.


There is a train ride one can take in Knoxville, TN that begins at Volunteer Landing and goes near Neyland Stadium and eventually goes to where the Tennessee River is formed by two other rivers.
The train the reaches Three Rivers Trestle, where the French Broad River and the Holston River come together to form the Tennessee River.
The locomotive uncouples from the Train and goes around, re-attaches and takes the train back on the same route.

They say that after a big rain or certain times of the year the two rivers have a different color to them as they come together. When the mix into the Tennessee River they will keep their separate colors and then eventually mix into one color to form the TN.

This morning we will explore the meaning of the Cross of Jesus in the light of three rivers that flow through the Gospel of Luke. They will flow side by side all through this Gospel and then come together to one event in the Crucifixion of Jesus. Hopefully, by bringing these themes out the cross of Jesus will make much more sense to us today.

Intro:

In Luke's Gospel when you read it all the way from beginning to end you get the feeling that it is coming to a climax.
You know that Luke is going somewhere in his Gospel and it is reaching a creshendo.

You see a big transition in LUKE 9

Luke 9 – Transition chapter in Luke's gospel – verse 51
51 When the days were approaching for His ascension, He was determined to go to Jerusalem

The end of Luke chapter 9 to 19 Luke is taking on us on the road to Jerusalem. All kinds of themes are going to come out to tell us what is coming at Golgotha.

3 Rivers or themes that run through the Gospel of Luke - These three themes will come together in Luke's Passion Narrative.

1st theme – About the coming Judgment and the way through.


Some hate the idea judgment but Scripture says that we have to make wise judgments.
In the Bible the time of Judgment is good news for God's people.
Cosmic theme because God will sort it all out.



We see this theme come out when Jesus decides to put His face toward Jerusalem.

The common Jewish belief was that God would come in Judgment over the nations – those that would go down first would be the Samaritans – the hated half breed Jews – after that would be the Gentiles and especially those despised Romans.

Samaritans reject Jesus because he is going to Jerusalem
Luke 9: 52-56
52 and He sent messengers on ahead of Him, and they went and entered a village of the Samaritans to make arrangements for Him. 53 But they did not receive Him, because He was traveling toward Jerusalem. 54 When His disciples James and John saw this, they said, "Lord, do You want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?" 55 But He turned and rebuked them, [and said, "You do not know what kind of spirit you are of; 56 for the Son of Man did not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them."] And they went on to another village.

Verse 55 Jesus rebukes this attitude about the Kingdom – Will God not vindicate His true people? But then He goes on into what type of people God wants and it is almost disturbing as to the type of people that are fit for this new kingdom that Jesus is ushering in.


Luke 9: 58
58 And Jesus said to him, "The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head." 59 And He said to another, "Follow Me." But he said, "Lord, permit me first to go and bury my father." 60 But He said to him, "Allow the dead to bury their own dead ; but as for you, go and proclaim everywhere the kingdom of God." 61 Another also said, "I will follow You, Lord ; but first permit me to say good-bye to those at home." 62 But Jesus said to him, "No one, after putting his hand to the plow and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God."


When we read these words we find them uncomfortable because they are.

Jesus is calling out all of the common notions of his day about what the Kingdom would be like and He is crushing them.

When Jesus sends out the 70 in Luke 10 he warns them about those that will reject the message of the kingdom

And then he gives a warning that is sobering about those people that reject His message.

In verse 12 Jesus tells the 70 that it will be more tolerable for Sodom in the end than the cities that reject the message of the Kingdom.

These are passages that we want to look over in the Bible but they are there and Jesus makes it clear that God's judgment will come against Jerusalem and ultimately against this world.

Israel was called to be God's light but they had gotten so pleased with being the light of the world they didnt put windows in their light house but mirrors in their light house.
They didnt shine out the light that needed to go into the world. They wanted to keep the blessing to themselves and not to the world.

They believed that the Land and the Temple were bright places and the world was dark. They kept the message in and to themselves at their own peril.

They will not like it, they dont want to hear that kind of message.

PHARISEES
Chapter 11 of Luke warnings against the Pharisees
Pharisees –

People were the ones that wanted to bring scripture into every aspect of life
We would agree with that

They also thought serious about Scripture
We would agree with that view point.

So far the Pharisees look like good folks – people that wanted to bring religion to every aspect of life and to learn the Bible best they could.

They also believed that God would judge the Gentiles and vindicate Israel. They were missing the point. Jesus is judging them concerning this.

They did not have God's love in their heart but self righteousness. All this Bible knowledge and right living was not being used in the right way. They were supposed to share this light with the Gentiles.

Because of this Jesus issues some Parables in Luke's Gospel.

Many times we read the parables like personal morality stories just for us and sometimes we miss how tough they were on the 1st century people that heard them. Many times Jesus was talking to the Jewish authorities directly through this parables.

PARABLES
Chap 12 -
The parable of the rich fool.
In this parable a man builds bigger and bigger barns and hoards his wealth.
There is a lesson to be learned about hoarding possessions and not trusting God but in the time of Jesus to a 1st century Jew- the word Possession had a very technical meaning – It many times meant the Land of Canaan.
The attitude of many of the Pharisees was that they had the Land and the Temple and it was theirs and not the Gentiles.
Has a much bigger image – the nation as the whole – LAND as a possession and the Temple – everything outside is just darkness. A rich fool, you are storing it up you are under judgment

They were storing up judgment by keeping these gifts to themselves. God has always wanted them to be a light to the nations and the Temple as a sign of His persence.
They were identified as the ones that were holding on to the message.

There was a path that the Jews of Jesus were taking and it was leading to their own destruction.

In Luke 13 we read Jesus tell them that they must Repent. He says twice that they should repent or likewise perish.

Luke 13 - Galileans pilgrims were slaughtered by the Pilate's soldiers - the blood was mixed with the slaughtered sacrifice

Luke 13:2
2 And Jesus said to them, "Do you suppose that these Galileans were greater sinners than all other Galileans because they suffered this fate?

Were they worse sinners or culprits than the rest of the people in Jerusalem.

what about 18 that had the tower fall on them in Siloam?
were they worse sinners than everyone else.

Unless you repent you will also likewise parish.
Jesus is telling them that they are on a collision course with Rome. It is coming.

Josephus uses the same language found in chapter 13. Josephus is warning the Jews about rebellion against Rome and says exactly what Jesus said, Repent or Perish!

Jesus is giving them fair warning. Stay on this path of hatred for the Gentiles keep failing to be a light to the nations, fail in your mission and you will be replaced – Remember John the Baptist warning of the Axe being laid to the tree roots

Luke 3 – John the Baptist tells them not to rely on just being children of Abraham- it is time to bear fruit or be cut off.

Now think ahead just 40 years later- Jesus warning comes home to Jerusalem

But if you down this path – you will be destroyed – this is a national warning – Romans soldiers in the Temple – falling masonry in the suburbs of Siloam

Falling masonry and swords in the Holy Place will be just what happens.
Foretelling the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70.

Luke 16 – The rich man and Lazarus

Read this parable in the day and time – Nothing wrong with how we have read it but just look at it in a 1st century Jewish perspective in which Jesus spoke and a whole new meaning will open up to you.
The Rich man neglected Lazarus – What had the Jews done to those people around them? Had the Jews shared with the spiritually poor around them or had they hoarded God's good gifts to them?
When the richman finds himself in torment what does he ask of Father Abraham?

Send Lazarus to cool my tongue with a group of water and send someone back to warn my brothers.–

Think of Father Abraham's answer to the rich man in torment

they have Moses and the Prophets – even if someone rose from the dead they would not repent. Yes, and when this happens many will not repent.

Think about it, what happened when one did rise from the dead, did they repent – just a few days after this one will rise from the dead and the good news will go to Israel and many will still not repent.

Judgment is here and it begins with God's people. Impending judgment- a very specific judgment –
Israel is playing fast and loose with her vocation – doesnt take a lot of shrewd political instincts to see the path that Israel is taking.

2nd Stream or River -
Jesus and the renewed people of God

Luke 10 -17 – a picture of the new people of God.

Parable of the good Samaritan – God is doing a new thing and there are people that normally would have nothing to do with each other and now they will become neighbors. This new people may look different that anything you have ever imagined.

They may just be Samaritans – the very dogs you despise just North of here.

Mary and Martha – sitting at the feet of Jesus – she is being treated equal with the others.
Luke 10: 39 we see Mary seated at the Lord's feet. This is a term that is specific- to sit at a Rabbis feet was a place only for men. Now we can understand why Martha might have been upset. Mary is at a place that no woman should have been but in the Kingdom women's places will be elevated. In the Jewish rabbinical prayers of the time of Jesus there was one prayer that the Rabbis prayed that thanked God that they were not an inferior woman.

In this new Kingdom things will be different. There will be an equal place at that table for all. This is so radical for this time and it is hard for our 21st century minds to wrap around it.

New People- Victory in Prayer -
Chapter 11- prayer and victory – knock and the door and it will be opened.
God is not distant but is someone that wants to hear our prayer and grant our prayers.
He talks about How God wants to give them good gifts. He wants His children to ask of him and be blessed by God. He wants to give His Holy Spirit to those that ask for it.
This is truly a renewed humanity.


Chp 14 – A party is happening and you are invited but there is a cost of discipleship
It is a party and there is a free invitation but will be rejected by those that are invited first.
This is the Jewish people – as Paul says later the gospel is for the Jew first and then the Greek
Jesus gives out this invitation and the first ones invited – the ones that have the OT and all the prophecy will not heed his invitation but will make excuses about why they cant come and then he will go out and invite everyone -
then He ends chapter 14 with the cost of discipleship for this new type of humanity. Human relationships will be secondary to our relationship with God.
No longer will our heritage and family be more important than God. God will come before any human distinctions – tough teaching indeed but life giving and liberating teaching.


Chap 15 – the lost sheep, the lost coin, the Prodigal Son-
Jesus was celebrating with all the wrong people and people were grumbling – Jesus tells them the angels are celebrating and a party is happening in Heaven so we are having one on Earth.
In the story of the Prodigal the older brother is mad because the fatted calf is for free. How could his dad just let the prodigal sinner back in to the fold.
Jesus is illustrating to his Jewish detractors in all of these parables that God's grace is freely given to all.
They can no longer shut up God's kingdom to people they dont approve of.
Where Jesus is – Heaven and Earth are coming together.
New Humanity is changing people -
Chp 19 – Zaccheus – little man in the tree -
I am giving half of everything away - I will restore defrauded fourfold
Today salvation has come to this house

SON OF MAN CAME TO SEEK AND SAVE THE LOST – LUKE'S MISSION STATEMENT AND SUMS UP THIS 2ND STREAM OF LUKE
Third Stream - Return of the King

John the Baptist – Return to Zion
Theme of God coming back to Zion
1st century history at the time of Exile – God abandoned the city of Jerusalam – even though they had come back and rebuilt but they wondered if God had come to the city. Had God returned? Malachi deals with this idea. Isaiah the prophet deals with this idea that God is to return to the Temple.

John the Baptist – Makes the way straight for the coming of Christ – prophecy in Isaiah that is about the return from Exile

John the Baptist saw his ministry as the one ushering in this true return from exile.

They believed that this King returning to Zion would be God Himself. God would return to Zion and his glory would destroy the Gentile nations that were oppressing Israel.

Gerasene Demoniac- Go tell them what God has done for you and Luke tells us that the man goes and tells people what Jesus did for him. Jesus is equated in Luke with God and what God is doing.


Triumphal Entry
Palm Sunday
Luke 19: 38
38 shouting : "BLESSED IS THE KING WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD ; Peace in heaven and glory in the highest !"

The people of that day saw Jesus as the fulfillment of the King returning to Zion and with this week – Passion week we are going to see all three streams or rivers of Luke coming together and they are all flowing to the cross.



Chp 19: 41

He weeps over the city – recognize the things that make for peace -

No Gentiles, no Samaritans – we want to fight them we dont want peace.

YOU DIDNT KNOW YOUR TIME OF VISITATION
return from exile language – they had been waiting for Yahweh to return and here he is and they have no idea – they are headed for destruction.
You did not know the time of your visitation by God – God came and visited and coming back – The king returns but what does He find. The Temple was the sign of God's love but became something different.

At the Cross we see Luke bring it all together – all these themes of his gospel that have been running this course are now going to collide in a miscarriage of justice like no other.

1)The judgment -

Jesus will now take all the judgment that we all deserved and will be crushed by it. He will willingly take on all the sin -

As Paul says,
HE WHO KNEW NO SIN BECAME SIN ON OUR BEHALF

Pilate tells us that Jesus is innocent

The brigand on the cross with Jesus declares his innocence

The Centurion at the cross decries his innocence

He is the pure lamb of God who is sinless and innocent but takes on the punishment that we deserve.



Luke 23: 18-25

Barrabas was the one released – Luke is rubbing our noses in it. Barrabas was the very type that Jesus had been preaching about -

The irony- the people picked the very one that was guilty of the things Jesus vehemently preached against.

This is a moment that should not be lost on us as it comes to who should have God's judgment put upon them.

On the way to the cross He tells the daughter of Jerusalem not to weep for Him.
He tells them to weep for themselves and their own children.
He then tells them something strange – If they do this when the wood is green imagine what they will do when the wood is dry.
Here is the living branch of God whom the Romans will put to death.
What will the Romans do if the children of these women of Israel continue down this revolutionary path?
Just imagine what will happen to Jerusalem.
The evil of all the types found in the world come together against Christ
Satan enters into Judas- Jesus calls this His hour of darkness

All the evil is coming together against Jesus – Herod, Pilate, the Jewish authorities, the muddled disciples, the betrayer

All this evil is coming crashing down on Jesus to engulf Him

He will look at it straight way – He knows this on the Way to Jerusalem what awaits.
All that Evil has takes its best shot at Jesus and comes down on him at the cross but we know that evil does not win.Woman with an issue of blood is healed and made clean
He is eating with tax collectors – he is eating with the sinners
He transforms the life of Zaccheus

Now he is going outside the city walls and is being crucified with the brigands. The criminals.

Where are we in the story? Where do we find ourselves in the Gospel of Luke and the story of the cross of Christ?




Love wins in the end and Jesus takes its best shot for us. He walked through the fire on our behalf. That is the point Luke is trying to get across.
2nd Theme – New Humanity in Christ

This is evidenced by the Last Supper – Jesus is reforming what it means to be God's people.

It is at the Last Supper in Luke's Gospel where he tells His followers that they are to do this in Remembrance of Him

that this bread is his body to be broken for them and the cup is the New Covenant in His blood.
When God's new people are made it will be around His table they will gather.
Look just a few chapters later after the resurrection – the Road to Emmaus and in Acts 2 the earliest followers will gather around the table

It will be this new table fellowship that will be a signpost that a new humanity is being formed.

People the normally had no business eating together will now eat together. Jesus also shows servant leadership by washing His disciple's feet and showing that this is how the Kingdom will be structured.

The last will be first and the first will be last.

Table fellowship was the very thing that Paul rebukes Peter for hypocrisy in Galatians 2.
At Antioch Peter would not eat with the Gentiles when certain me were around from Jerusalem that would dissaprove of a Jew eating with Gentiles.
Table fellowship in the Church knew no distinctions because that is how Jesus wanted it to be.
So we see at the cross this stream running in Luke about a new humanity being fulfilled in the cross.
We also see in the thief on the cross this change taking place.

This day you will be with me in paradise- the Thief was being remade into this new humanity that Jesus was calling.

3) The Return of the King
God's kingdom is coming into conflict with Caesar's Kingdom and in Pilate

King – God coming back – In the person of Jesus

The king stands trial in front of the representatives of the Temple and the Kingdoms of man.

The very Creator of the Universe is being put on trial by the Jewish Temple authorities, the pseudo Jewish King Herod, and the Romans.

In John's Gospel we see straight through that Jesus saw the cross as his time of enthronement – He time and again talks about being lifted up in reference to the cross.

The irony of when Jesus's real identity is given in Luke's Gospel “THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS”

FINALLY IT IS ON THE CROSS THAT JESUS IS MADE KNOWN AS the KING.

THIS IS A THRONE THAT NO JEW WOULD HAVE EXPECTED FOR THE MESSIAH

conclusion:

The sad thing is that we find the evil at work in us that must be conquered in characters of this story.
I can see myself in many of the characters of Luke-

Anger of James and John – calling down fire from Heaven
Peter and his hardheadedness

Self righteousness of the Pharisees that cannot see God at work in others and wants to condemn everyone that doesnt look just like them and act just like them.

I can see all of those attributes in my life at various times and junctures.

What is Jesus saying to us?

He will gather us up like a hen in the barnyard and take on the fire for us. He has a way that is better, we can lay down our burdens, He will give us rest, He is the truly Holy one of God.

Come to Jesus and stand on the scorched earth that He took on for us. Sin did its best to Him and He was victorious.

The blood of the Covenant Exodus 24 - Mimosa AM sermon 3/21/10

Today we will see an offer made by God to Israel. It is a relationship that begins with a good deal of promise but will be a tragic story.

Last week we looked at Israel as they celebrated Pentecost and the giving of the Law and now we are to the moment in which Israel must decide if they are going to follow God.

Israel had been rescued by God from Egypt, had traveled from the Red Sea to Mt. Horeb

Israel had witnessed the power of God on Mt. Sinai as he came down in fire and loud noise upon the Mountain. God had just given Israel the Law.

Literally God had spoken His word to Israel. This would be a life changing Law that is the very breath of the Creator.

The Law of Israel would be so important to the Israelites that they would claim that one would have to be born again each time they read the Law.

Literally a man would have to be reborn when they engaged the very word of God.

The Hebrew writer tells us that the word of God is living and active. God's word is powerful.
Will Israel accept God's challenge to live by His word?
Will the marriage between God and Israel go through? Will Israel accept God's call to covenant?
Exodus 24

Will Israel accept the offer of God? Will they accept the Law and be His people?

Exodus 24: 1-11
1 Then He said to Moses, "Come up to the LORD, you and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu and seventy of the elders of Israel, and you shall worship at a distance. 2 "Moses alone, however, shall come near to the LORD, but they shall not come near, nor shall the people come up with him." 3 Then Moses came and recounted to the people all the words of the LORD and all the ordinances ; and all the people answered with one voice and said, "All the words which the LORD has spoken we will do !" 4 Moses wrote down all the words of the LORD. Then he arose early in the morning, and built an altar at the foot of the mountain with twelve pillars for the twelve tribes of Israel. 5 He sent young men of the sons of Israel, and they offered burnt offerings and sacrificed young bulls as peace offerings to the LORD. 6 Moses took half of the blood and put it in basins, and the other half of the blood he sprinkled on the altar. 7 Then he took the book of the covenant and read it in the hearing of the people ; and they said, "All that the LORD has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient !" 8 So Moses took the blood and sprinkled it on the people, and said, "Behold the blood of the covenant, which the LORD has made with you in accordance with all these words." 9 Then Moses went up with Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel, 10 and they saw the God of Israel ; and under His feet there appeared to be a pavement of sapphire, as clear as the sky itself. 11 Yet He did not stretch out His hand against the nobles of the sons of Israel ; and they saw God, and they ate and drank.


Intro to this Passage lets us know who is going up on the mountain with Moses. Moses will take up the Seventy Elders along with his brother Aaron and Aaron's two sons Nadab and Abihu.

This passage can be broken into three sections.

The first section is the introduction telling us who went up on the Mountain with Moses. The end of this passage is framed with the eating of the covenantal meal in verses 9 through 11.

It is the in between verses of verses 3 through 8 and it is in this passage we see God's marriage to Israel.


First sign that God gave Moses – Exodus 3 - 1st sign God gave to Moses that I have called you, at this mountain all these people will be gathered together and will celebrate a festival at Horeb or Sinai.

Verse 6 – half of the blood in basins and throws on the altar and half of the blood on the people. Israel and Yahweh share the same blood – This is a sign of kinship- blood kinship.

Blood is the key sign of the covenant. They share the blood in verse 6 - Adoption and marriage are the closest we can come to in our culture to understanding ancient covenants.

Verse 7 – the book of the covenant Moses reads – they respond that all that they is said they will do. The Torah is the marriage proposal – Israel has said Yes to God and enter into this covenant with God.



It is important to understand HOW this covenant is ratified by God. The people and God share the blood of sacrifice.

This takes us to our first point this morning.

1)Blood was involved.

Why did Israel offer sacrifices? Earlier in our lessons on Exodus we discussed that Israel was asked to sacrifice the very animals that were worshiped in Egypt. That is one reason they were asked to sacrifice.

Another reason is the point I want to focus on now and that is that the life of the animal was put in place of the life of the person that offered the sacrifice.

The penalty for breaking of a covenant is the life of the person that breaks the covenant. The animal stood in place for the life of the person.

Now in this covenant with God we see Israel share the blood of this covenant with God.

Moses calls this the Blood of the Covenant.

In the Gospels we will read in Matthew 26: 27-28
27 And when He had taken a cup and given thanks, He gave it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you; 28 for this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins.

Jesus tells us that His blood is the blood of the covenant- Just as Moses calls this the blood of the Covenant we see Jesus tell us that His blood is the blood of the Covenant.

Luke's Gospel adds to this and tells us in Luke 22: 20-
20 And in the same way He took the cup after they had eaten, saying, "This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant in My blood.

But what does this mean? When we say that Jesus' blood is the blood of the covenant or more specific the blood of the New Covenant?

You may wonder what connection there might be between Jesus and His blood to the Exodus story and the answer may be shocking to see how closely tied in the ministry of Jesus is to the Exodus account of Israel.





Let us just look at some of the similarities in Israel and the life of Christ especially found in the Gospel of Matthew -

What we are getting at is this – Jesus will become Israel – Jesus will do what Israel could not do. He will be born of a woman, under the Law.
IN this passage Israel says to God – We will do what you say but they will not, they will disobey- Jesus will become Israel and do exactly as the Law says- he will be perfect in obedience where Israel was disobedient.

1)Jesus was the Child of Promise – Just as Israel was supposed to be (Matt 1:18)
2)Jesus was delivered from a King that wanted to kill him as an infant just as Moses and Israel experienced (Matt 2:1)
3)Jesus will be called out of Egypt (Matt 2:15)
4)Jesus will pass through the waters of baptism (Matthew 3)- The Jews before Jesus day equated the Red Sea passing with baptism. When one wanted to be a Jewish proselyte they had to be circumcised, baptized and offer sacrifice. Baptism and the Red Sea were tightly bound together in Jewish thought.
5)Jesus entered the wilderness for 40 days (Matt 4)
6)Jesus calls 12 sons of Israel to become the new twelve tribes (Matt 4:18)
7)Jesus gives His law or teaching from a mount (Matthew 5-7)
8)Jesus performs 10 miracles in Matthew (Matt 8-9) just as there were 10 plagues in Egypt
9)Jesus sends the 12 into the Land – just like the 12 spies (Matt 10:1)
10)Jesus feeds the multitudes just like God fed the Israelites with manna (Matt 14:15 and Matt 15: 32)
11)Jesus is transfigured on the mount of Transfiguration, remember Moses had to wear a veil because of his face shining from seeing the face of God (Matt 17)

We could continue with these images of How Jesus literally fulfilled the mission of Israel but we get the point.

But where does all this lead us?
I think it is one of the most fascinating things about the Gospel and what God did through Jesus.

This takes us back to the blood of Christ.

This morning I want to talk specifically and concisely about what the blood of Jesus does for us.

1)Jesus blood brings peace

Israel was disobedient. Man was separated from God by sin.

The Temple was a great place to illustrate that point. In the Temple in Israel there was what was called the wall of Separation. The entire Temple system was an elaborate zone of holiness and it was a constant reminder that we are separated from God.

First of all the blood of Jesus destroyed the dividing wall with God.
Ephesians 2: 12-16
12 remember that you were at that time separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. 13 But now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 14 For He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall, 15 by abolishing in His flesh the enmity, which is the Law of commandments contained in ordinances, so that in Himself He might make the two into one new man, thus establishing peace, 16 and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross, by it having put to death the enmity.

The message of Paul here is specifically to the Gentiles of his day but it applies to us today. The wall in the Temple that once reminded the Gentiles that they were not allowed has been abolished.
The blood of the Christ that was shed on the cross brings peace.

We no longer have to worry about God being angry at us. God loved us so much that he became the sacrifice. The blood that the covenant required for disobedience was shed by Christ.

In Christ we have the perfect obedient servant but also the sacrifice for our own disobedience.
How radical is that thought?

Imagine how the message of the Gospel sounded to the people of the ancient world when they first heard it?
A God that cares so much that he did what we could not do and then turned around and took on the penalty for our offense.

That is earth shattering news.

Today we need to hear that message afresh. We are de-sensitized to that message.

It is not a head message but a heart message. We need to hear it with our heart and be reconverted every time we hear it.
There is a difference – the OT a sign of the kinship of the covenant but now in the New Covenant the blood is a reality - The blood of Jesus is freely offered.
2)Christ's Blood Justifies Us before God.

Further illustration of Christ's blood at work:
Romans 5: 8-9
8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him.

The simplest way to understand Justification is to go back to the scene of a Hebrew Law court.

In the Hebrew Law court you have a plaintiff, a judge, and a defendant. We are the defendants and Satan is the accuser. We stand in the great law court of God in which man is on trail for the breaking of God's covenant. God is covenantly faithful where man is faithless.

The very name Satan means Accuser- He is the one the brings the charge against God's elect.

A good picture of this Law court scene can be observed in the OT book of Zechariah 3: 1-4
1 Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the LORD, and Satan standing at his right hand to accuse him. 2 The LORD said to Satan, "The LORD rebuke you, Satan ! Indeed, the LORD who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Is this not a brand plucked from the fire ?" 3 Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments and standing before the angel. 4 He spoke and said to those who were standing before him, saying, "Remove the filthy garments from him." Again he said to him, "See, I have taken your iniquity away from you and will clothe you with festal robes."

In this passage we see God's high priest being accused by Satan before God but we see God vindicate this high priest and give him clean clothes.

As we stand before God, we know that we are sinners, we know that we have no hope, How do we stand before the most Just Judge of all and have any hope.

When Satan comes before God and says of any of us, He is a sinner! I would have to respond Yes I am.

So do we throw in the towel and just give up? We cant live up to the standards of perfection so what are we to do.

Revelation 12: 10-12
10 Then I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, "Now the salvation, and the power, and the kingdom of our God and the authority of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren has been thrown down, he who accuses them before our God day and night. 11 "And they overcame him because of the blood of the Lamb and because of the word of their testimony, and they did not love their life even when faced with death.

We win the victory by the blood of the Lamb – we overcome the accuser and stand justified before God by the blood of the Lamb.

In the ancient world of Jesus the word Justified is synonomous with the word vindicated.
By the blood of Christ we will be vindicated. We will be victorious. Because of the gracious gift of Jesus blood we can look forward to a day in which we will vindicated for the life we lived in Him. If we sacrificed in this life and are ridiculed for the Kingdom's sake, we will stand vindicated in the end and declared Justified in the great Law Court of God.

3)Jesus Blood is a propitiation for our sins.

Romans 3: 23-25
23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus ; 25 whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed ;

This is a big word but its meaning is fairly simple. One day a year the high priest of Israel could go into the most holy place and offer the blood of atonement for the people of Israel.
Blood was sprinkled on the mercy seat of the ark of the covenant and this blood was called the propitiation.

This was known as a place where God's presence would come and atonement would be granted for another year.

How does that apply to us?

It goes back to a term used a good bit in the Bible that is connected to the term atonement and that is redemption.



God went into the slave market of Egypt and bought back His son Israel. God literally redeemed Israel from the slave market of Egypt.


Now we need to see our own situation as a type of Cosmic slavery. The whole universe is in the bondage of sin. Paul tells us in Romans 8 that the entire world groans in travail because of the bondage of sin.


God created and that is true but what is more significant that that is that God redeemed us too.


God bought us back. Christ was the offering for our redemption. God has gone into the cosmic slave market of sin and offered His Son as our propitiation.
The blood of Jesus was given so that we can come back into God's family.


No longer slaves but children and heirs of the promise. We are no longer slaves to sin and treachery but Now our identity is Hidden in Christ and it is no longer I that live but Christ living in me.


Just as the Israelites shared the blood of offering with God, Now God shares with us the blood of His Son.


The family blood line is intact again and the blood that grafts us back into the family of God is the blood of Christ.






In Conclusion:

There is a little piece of silk in the museum of Springfield, Illinois, that could not be bought for any amount of money. Why the value attached to it? Because of its significance. That little bit of silk is all covered with blood. It was once a part of a dress worn by a beautiful girl, who sat by Abraham Lincoln when he was shot; and it was that beautiful girl who took his head in her lap, as a mother would receive the head of a baby, and it was that girl who held him while he bled his life out. The State of Illinois purchased that dress, and cut out this piece of silk covered with the blood of the great statesman, emancipator of an enslaved race, and the man who in the programme of God became a cohesive force in the salvation of this great nation.
If a state would do that for the blood of a man, what should the world do for the Blood of Jesus with all its emancipating power, and all its cohesiveness for a scattered race? For, if the race of man, without regard to nationality or colour or condition of life, is ever to be united and held, it will be by the cohesiveness of that Blood.
How important is the blood of Christ to you?

The blood of Jesus brings us peace with God

The blood of Jesus justifies us before a perfect Judge

The blood of Jesus brings us redemption and atonement from the slave market of sin.

Pentecost, The Call Israel, God's Love

Imagine you are traveling in the country side 2000 years ago in Palestine. You happen upon a group of men. You see 12 young men gathered around a person they seem to hold in high esteem. Some say He is a great Rabbi on the rise. Some say He may be a prophet and some even say He could be the Messiah of Israel. You learn that this man has a great following as well as people that hate His teaching.

You watch this man climb up a hill side and sit down. You see the 12 gather around him as well as the other followers. You always know that when a Rabbi or teacher sits down something important is going to come. The teaching you are about to hear is very important.

Matthew 5: 17-18
17 "Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets ; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. 18 "For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished.

Knowing that the person that you just saw is Jesus and to hear Him say this makes you think, What is this Law that he is talking about? Some translations translate this verse as Jesus saying that the Torah would be fulfilled by Him. What is so important about this Torah that Jesus tells us tha the came to fulfill that Torah?

This morning we come together in this time together to investigate what is so great about this Torah. Why did the Jews hold it in high esteem? Where did it come from?
How did it get here?
Let us go back to what we have been studying in the Exodus account on Sunday mornings.

After Passover and the crossing of the Red Sea we see the Israelites go into the wilderness on their way to Mount Sinai. The event at Sinai would shape the rest of the Bible story and will be one of the key events in the history of Israel. This morning we will look at the arrival at Mount Sinai and will look at what God is trying to do with Israel.

This arrival and final giving of the Law to Israel will be 50 days after the Passover feast and leaving of Egypt.

Exodus 19: 1-6
In the third month after the sons of Israel had gone out of the land of Egypt, on that very day they came into the wilderness of Sinai. 2 When they set out from Rephidim, they came to the wilderness of Sinai and camped in the wilderness ; and there Israel camped in front of the mountain. 3 Moses went up to God, and the LORD called to him from the mountain, saying, "Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob and tell the sons of Israel :4 'You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings, and brought you to Myself. 5 'Now then, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be My own possession among all the peoples, for all the earth is Mine; 6 and you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.' These are the words that you shall speak to the sons of Israel."


This is Pentecost – A Jewish Feast Originally.

Exodus 12 to 19 – We have an elapsing of 50 days

Pentecost – great celebration – God has given His very word or law at Pentecost.
This will be the very place that God will speak his word to man. This will be the place where God starts trying to reshape fallen humanity back into the image that we were intended to be.

This is the beginning of what some would call God's household rules. God was calling Israel to be His first born among the nations. This would be Israel's calling, vocation, and election.




I.God has called Israel to a specific vocation

Vocation and Election - God will make them a kingdom of priests – God chose Israel, this is not a selfish thing, this is a good thing. It is an election and calling for service.

Israel was called to be a light to the nations. A priest in the OT was one that acted as a go between man and God. It is better understood in our day as one that acted as a representative of God. God is actually calling Israel to be His representative to the nations.

Isaiah 42: 5-6
Thus says God the LORD, Who created the heavens and stretched them out, Who spread out the earth and its offspring, Who gives breath to the people on it And spirit to those who walk in it, 6 "I am the LORD, I have called You in righteousness, I will also hold You by the hand and watch over You, And I will appoint You as a covenant to the people, As a light to the nations,


Psalm 67 was an important Psalm in ancient Israel. The seven verses were of this Psalm were used in conjunction with the 7 lamps of the Menorah. Each verse of Psalm 67, which it has seven verses, each had a corresponding lamp in the Menorah. So the imagery would make sense to an Israelite. Just as the Menorah produced light, they were to be a light to the nations. This is their vocation, and this is a calling.
Psalm 67:
1 God be gracious to us and bless us, And cause His face to shine upon us- Selah. 2 That Your way may be known on the earth, Your salvation among all nations. 3 Let the peoples praise You, O God ; Let all the peoples praise You. 4 Let the nations be glad and sing for joy ; For You will judge the peoples with uprightness And guide the nations on the earth. Selah. 5 Let the peoples praise You, O God ; Let all the peoples praise You. 6 The earth has yielded its produce ; God, our God, blesses us. 7 God blesses us, That all the ends of the earth may fear Him.

In this Psalm we witness Israel praying for the pagan nations. We see a prayerful articulation of their call. This is what God had called them to be a light to the nations.

In the eleventh century, King Henry III of Bavaria grew tired of court life and the pressures of being a monarch. He made application to Prior Richard at as local monastery, asking to be accepted as a contemplative and spend the rest of his life in the monastery. "Your Majesty," said Prior Richard, "do you understand that the pledge here is one of obedience? That will be hard because you have been a king." "I understand," said Henry, "The rest of my life I will be obedient to you, as Christ leads you." "Then I will tell you what to do," said Prior Richard. "Go back to your throne and serve faithfully in the place where God has put you."

When King Henry died, a statement was written: "The King learned to rule by being obedient."

This is what it means to be called to a vocation to serve God. People have misshaped the word vocation to mean your job. Your vocation is to serve Christ in whatever capacity you find your self. Henry the III found that he could best serve Christ as being a King obedient to the true King.

That is really one of the true tasks of the Church today is to teach Christians to fulfill this vocation and call. To remember that it is not your job that shapes who you are but Christ. In other words we work in our jobs explicitly to represent Christ and show Christ to others.

If we want Christ back in our schools – then teachers must go to work everyday for the specific purpose of working for Christ first and then the board of education second.

If we want more godly business working people must first be an ambassador for Christ first and then run their business in that way.

We must constantly ask the question about our jobs, If God were in charge of this world what would it look like?

If God were in charge of our workplaces what would they look like?

II.God wants to build a relationship with Israel

One False charge made against the OT is that the God of the OT is a God of wrath and no grace.

Some would even say that God's grace is not manifested until the New Covenant. I would say to those people, what do you think the sacrificial system of the OT was all about?

God gave avenues for His grace all throughout our Bibles.
One thing that we neglect is the fact that God wanted a relationship with Israel.

God didn't just want to tell Israel what to do and give them a type of MEGA LEGALISM

SOME SEE THE OT AS SOME TYPE OF LEGALISM.

Imagine if I met my wife for the first time and I walked up to her and told her that there would be a set of rules that she had to abide by if she were going to go on the date with me.

I doubt very seriously that Allison would have wanted to go on another date with me if I laid down the ground rules for dating me on the first date.
Once a couple meets and develops a relationship a set of boundaries are established along the way.

These boundaries would be understood because of the relationship that we develop.

We see the same thing happen with God and Israel- we see a relationship develop. We see God call Israel. Israel is God's elect and his first born.

We will see throughout the OT that when God gives Israel commands He reminds them that He is the God that lead them out of Egypt and did wonderful things for them.

In Exodus 19 verse 4 God reminds them of His love and protection.

Exodus 19: 4 –
'You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings, and brought you to Myself.

A beautiful image that God gives of His love for Israel. He bore them up on Eagle's wings and brought them to Himself.

Morning Prayer – put it over their heads and hold it out and they say Psalm 36 as they put on their prayer shawl. The shawl was a reminder of God's protective wings that overshadowed them.

Psalms 36: 7
7 How precious is Your lovingkindness, O God ! And the children of men take refuge in the shadow of Your wings.

God is bringing them to Sinai not for law or legalism but for relationship

Prayer at night would also bring out this image of God's protection and love.

Psalm 91
1 He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High Will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. 2 I will say to the LORD, "My refuge and my fortress, My God, in whom I trust !" 3 For it is He who delivers you from the snare of the trapper And from the deadly pestilence. 4 He will cover you with His pinions, And under His wings you may seek refuge ; His faithfulness is a shield and bulwark.

God's gracious dealings with Israel – God wanted to protect and take care of Israel.



Exodus 20: verse 2 God reminds them before He gives the Law to Israel.

I am the Lord your God, that brought you out of bondage.

He develops a relationship and then gives the Law.

Verse 3 – Now the Laws are listed and it begins with:

YOU SHALL HAVE NO OTHER GODS BEFORE ME.

You – Singular – this is to each one individually – God wants you to change.

God wanted a personal relationship with each Israelite. Yes he wanted to redeem the entire nation of Israel out of bondage but He wanted the heart of each individual Israelite.

The same is even more so for the New Covenant that God wanted to establish with all men and not just Israel. In the New Covenant through Jesus God wants to capture the hearts and love of all men.

This new covenant would find its fulfillment in Christ and His Ministry, His Cross, and His glorious Resurrection

Jeremiah 31: 31-33
31 "Behold, days are coming," declares the LORD, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, 32 not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them," declares the LORD. 33 "But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days," declares the LORD, "I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people

In this new covenant God wants a relationship that captures our hearts. Just dead external works will no longer do. It will take a circumcision of the heart that the apostle Paul speaks of. It will take a personal, real relationship with Jesus Christ that God call us to.

What is even more beautiful is the image that Jesus give us in the New Testament.

III.God wants to recreate – reform – refresh Israel and mankind with His word

Much of the language in Acts 2 relies on Exodus 19

Exodus 20:18 – Not sound of trumpets – but voice of the trumpets- They saw the voice – Rabbis and Josephus called the voice of God at Sinai as 'tongues of fire'

God said all these words - Decalogue – Literally 10 words – 10 words or ten commandments

The Hebrew of the Exodus account literally states that the Israelites Saw the words of God and to the Hebrews they saw the word of God in the form of fire from the Mountain.

It is interesting that when the Peter and the apostles just 50 days after the Passover are in the Temple celebrating Passover we see something similar occur. We see in Acts 2 on the day of Pentecost that celebrating the giving of the Law – the Torah – we see the coming Holy Spirit come with power on the Apostles.

The very day that the Jews celebrated the giving the Scriptures through the breath of God, Peter and the apostles have a supernatural experience.

Acts 2: 1-4
When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. 2 And suddenly there came from heaven a noise like a violent rushing wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3 And there appeared to them tongues as of fire distributing themselves, and they rested on each one of them. 4 And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit was giving them utterance


In Acts 2 we see many of the parallels from the Exodus account. We witness sound from Heaven and fire. Literally tongues of fire upon the apostles.

We can start to draw out exactly what the Bible is telling us.

In John's account of the giving of the Spirit, we witness Jesus breathing upon the Disciples.

John 20: 21-23
21 So Jesus said to them again, "Peace be with you; as the Father has sent Me, I also send you." 22 And when He had said this, He breathed on them and said to them, "Receive the Holy Spirit. 23 "If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they have been retained."

This passage parallels the Genesis account

Genesis 2: 7
7 Then the LORD God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life ; and man became a living being.

God formed man and breathed the breath of life into his nostrils
We see that Jesus breaths the breath of new life into the Apostles.

This fits right into the picture that Paul gives us of Scripture

2 Timothy 3:16
16 All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness ;

Paul tells us that the Scriptures are Theopneustos – or Literally Breathed out by God.

The very breath of God that brought life to man has now been breathed into the Scriptures.

The Scriptures are live giving because they come from the very breath of God.

Now lets tie all of this together.

At Pentecost we see the Israelites celebrate the giving of the Torah or the word of God.
The same God that spoke the universe into existence with His very word has now given the Israelites his words in the Scripture.

We turn to the New Testament and in Acts 2 at the very celebration of that event of Pentecost we see God do the same thing to the Apostles. He gives them His word and it is the Apostles that will spread that word.

We see this word spoken by the apostles and preached and eventually they will make into our Bibles as the New Testament. The very words of God. The same life giving words that gave life to the first man and brought the physical world into existence.

This is powerful stuff but we just cannot fathom how powerful the Scripture can be.

The Jews understood that God's purpose of the Torah or the Law of Moses was to bring order back to a fallen world. God wants to reform and reshape humanity by obedience to His word.

How powerful is it when we read His word, digest into our soul, practice it in our lives, and then sometimes using the Psalms sing them back to God in praise or even pray those words back to God.

Do we really believe that God's word can transform lives?
How could we doubt that? IF the God that created everything we see, breathed these very words into existence from His infinite wisdom, how could we believe any different?

Conclusion:

In today's lesson we learned of how God wanted to take Israel up on His wings and lead them to safety.

Jesus states something similar in Matthew 23: 37:
37 "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were unwilling .

This is the image of a barnyard fire in which a hen would gather her chicks up under her wings and let the fire ravage her body but all the while protecting the chicks. The hen would take the fire for the chicks.

In the same way Jesus wanted to take the heat for Jerusalem. Just a short time after this statement Jesus would go outside the walls and be crucified. He would die so that we could be gathered up under His wings.

He wants to give us his loving protection. Not protection from hardship or trials in this life but protection from sin and damnation. He wants us to be saved from the coming wrath to come when God will put the world to rights.

We want to allow Jesus to wrap His wings around us and take the heat for us.

1 John 5:13 tells us that these things have been written so that you man KNOW that you have eternal life. You may KNOW you have eternal life.
Jesus wants us to be assured of His love. In a world that will change and be in flux we can be assured that God loves us and wants to take us into His wings.

The Passover and the cross of Jesus AM Sermon 3/7/10

Imagine you are on a road outside the city of Jerusalem in the 1st century. You come by the little hill known as Golgatha and you see three men being crucified. You notice a gathering of onlookers have come around this hill to watch this crucifixion. You notice one of the men being crucified has a sign on his cross in three languages that says, “THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS”
If you didn’t know anything about the circumstances or even if you had been one of Jesus followers what would have been your response to this?
- A terrible Martyr and wrongful death.
- A tragedy of a innocent man being killed.
- What you would not have concluded is, “This man is a sacrifice for my sin” This man is the LAMB Slain for my sin. There was nothing in just this event that brought this out.
Today we will go back to the Exodus account that we looked at last week. We will go back to Passover to answer, “How did the earliest Christians come to believe that Jesus death on the cross was a sacrifice for our sins?”
Let us go back to the story we left last week. God is bringing the final plague on Egypt and it will be the death of the first born. Israel will celebrate its first Passover feast to prepare for this event. The death angel will come that night and smite Egypt but Israel has been instructed to put the blood of the Lamb on the doorposts to prepare for this evening. If the blood of the lamb is on the doorposts then they have nothing to be concerned about. The angel will Passover their home and all will be well. The very next day Moses will lead them out of Egypt and their journey to the Promised Land will begin.

Exodus 12: 5-8, 14-15, and verse 22
5 'Your lamb shall be an unblemished male a year old ; you may take it from the sheep or from the goats. 6 'You shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same month, then the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel is to kill it at twilight. 7 'Moreover, they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and on the lintel of the houses in which they eat it. 8 'They shall eat the flesh that same night, roasted with fire, and they shall eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.
14 'Now this day will be a memorial to you, and you shall celebrate it as a feast to the LORD ; throughout your generations you are to celebrate it as a permanent ordinance. 15 'Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, but on the first day you shall remove leaven from your houses ; for whoever eats anything leavened from the first day until the seventh day, that person shall be cut off from Israel.
22 "You shall take a bunch of hyssop and dip it in the blood which is in the basin, and apply some of the blood that is in the basin to the lintel and the two door posts ; and none of you shall go outside the door of his house until morning.
A few things we need to note out from this story:
1) The lamb must be unblemished, perfect, with no broken bones, and it will be killed at twilight or what we will learn later 3pm. The blood will protect the Israelites from God’s punishment for Egypt’s sin.
2) The feast of unleavened bread would be instituted during this time. All of the leaven will be taken out of the home for seven days. Later the Hebrews would hide the leaven in the house and the kids of the family would search for the leaven and find it and remove it from the home. This would be something like our Easter egg hunts for their children. So all the leaven would have to leave.
3) The Passover meal will be a meal of the lamb, unleavened bread, and wine.
4) They used Hyssop to put the blood on the door posts.
The Passover Meal:
1. Festival Blessing - Drink from 1st cup of wine
2. Passover Narrative and Little Hallel (Psalm 113) - Drink from 2nd cup of wine
3. Main Meal: Eat the roasted lamb, unleavened bread, and the bitter herbs and spices - Drink from the 3rd cup of wine (Cup of Blessing)
4. The Passover is completed with the singing of the Great Hallel (PSALMS 114-118), the drinking of the 4th cup of wine, and closed when the presiding priest or host says the phrase, “TEL TELESTI” which is interpreted as “IT IS FINISHED” or “IT IS CONSUMATED”.
Keeping this in mind we will now turn to the account of Jesus last supper with His apostles on that Thursday evening.
Matthew 26: 26-30
26 While they were eating, Jesus took some bread, and after a blessing, He broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, "Take, eat ; this is My body." 27 And when He had taken a cup and given thanks, He gave it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you; 28 for this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins. 29 "But I say to you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in My Father's kingdom." 30 After singing a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.


The apostles and Jesus were eating a Passover meal that evening. They would have followed the order for Passover that Jews had followed since Moses.

Many Jewish scholars have poked fun at Christianity and questioned why Jesus violated the Passover order. We see that the Lord Supper institution was the third cup of blessing.

In other words when Jesus said this is the New Covenant in my blood, this would have been the third cup and he never finished the Passover. He did not partake of the fourth cup and proclaim ‘It is Finished’

If he were the preside over the Passover then it would have His job to close it out with the statement, “It is Finished”

Back in verse 30 we see that the Apostles and Christ sing the great Hallel hymns of Psalm 114-118 but they never finish the last and great cup to close it out.
So did Jesus just skip it?
I think the 4th cup is the key to understanding the link of the cross with the Last Supper.

Let us turn to the account of the Watch in the Garden-
Matthew 26: 36-39 and verse 42
36 Then Jesus came with them to a place called Gethsemane, and said to His disciples, "Sit here while I go over there and pray." 37 And He took with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be grieved and distressed. 38 Then He said to them, "My soul is deeply grieved, to the point of death ; remain here and keep watch with Me." 39 And He went a little beyond them, and fell on His face and prayed, saying, "My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as You will."
42 He went away again a second time and prayed, saying, "My Father, if this cannot pass away unless I drink it, Your will be done."

Jesus knew that He had a final cup to consume. What would this cup be? He further discusses this final cup in John 18

John 18: 10-11
10 Simon Peter then, having a sword, drew it and struck the high priest's slave, and cut off his right ear ; and the slave's name was Malchus. 11 So Jesus said to Peter, "Put the sword into the sheath ; the cup which the Father has given Me, shall I not drink it?"

Jesus has a cup that the Father has given Him and we have always thought this to be just the cross. It is the cross but it is more than this.

We need to wrap our minds around this crucifixion account and how it ties to the Passover feast of the Jews and the Last Supper.

This will also shed light on the question we began this morning with, Why would you have considered Jesus death on the cross a sacrifice?

Pilate, Herod, the Centurion, and Judas Iscariot all remarked about the innocence of Jesus. They all made the point clear that Jesus was innocent and had committed not crime.

If you remember from the Passover account the Lamb was to be without blemish and perfect, free from defect.
In Jesus we start to see this picture form up.

We see that it is 3pm when Jesus dies on the cross and this was the very hour that the lambs were slain in the Temple.
The word for the garments of Jesus on the cross were the same words used for the vestments of the priest in the Temple.

In Jesus we see that He is not just the sacrificial victim but He is also the priest. He is the priestly sacrifice.


Mark 15: 22-23
22 Then they brought Him to the place Golgotha, which is translated, Place of a Skull. 23 They tried to give Him wine mixed with myrrh ; but He did not take it.

In this account we find that Jesus rejects this wine mixed with Myrrh. Some say it is because he wanted to feel the full effects of the cross and there may be truth to that but I think it is more than just this. I think He is waiting for the right moment.

John 19: 28-30
28 After this, Jesus, knowing that all things had already been accomplished, to fulfill the Scripture, said, "I am thirsty." 29 A jar full of sour wine was standing there; so they put a sponge full of the sour wine upon a branch of hyssop and brought it up to His mouth. 30 Therefore when Jesus had received the sour wine, He said, "It is finished !" And He bowed His head and gave up His spirit.

In this passage we see Jesus finish what He started on Thursday. He started the Passover meal on Thursday night with the first three cups and the Hallel Psalms but wait until now to drink the fourth cup. He finally, as the host of the Passover, states, “It is finished”

He has become the true Passover lamb and you see that the Lord’s Supper is connected to the cross.

Look back through the NT and try to find where Jesus gives a teaching about His theology of the cross and the only place you will find it is at the Last Supper. Now at last the words, Take eat this is my body!, This is the New Covenant in my blood! Make sense. He is the Lamb that will be slain and all the Passovers through the ages looked forward to the consummation of this true Passover Lamb.

We must remember that you cannot disconnect the Lord’s Supper from the cross. It should bring so much more meaning when we come together to take this meal to understand that the meal describes this sacrifice.

It was the meal that helped the early Church understand this fact.

Now let us turn to the earliest Christian’s view of the sacrifice of Jesus. If we just were to look at the Apostle Paul we will not find any teaching on this until you get to 1st Corinthians.

In this book we find the profound statement in 1 Corinthians 5

1 Corinthians 5: 7-8
7 Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed. 8 Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

Paul tells us plainly that Jesus Christ is our sacrifice of the Passover. Jesus is the lamb.
He brings out things practical for the Corinthian Church – Because of this we are to throw out the old leaven.

What was the feast of unleavened bread a foreshadowing of? It was to teach us that our lives must be clean of malice and wickedness and be replaced with sincerity and truth.

Because Jesus is our sacrifice, our sins will be passed over if we have been sprinkled with his blood. If just like the blood on the doorposts, we have Jesus blood applied we will have salvation from the wrath to come on the entire earth.

The final plague on Egypt is a foreshadowing to the final judgment God will bring on an unrepentant Earth. We must have the blood applied before it is too late.
The next profound statement by Paul is found in 1 Corinthians 10

1 Corinthians 10: 16-17
16 Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ ? Is not the bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ ? 17 Since there is one bread, we who are many are one body ; for we all partake of the one bread

This is profound for a former Pharisee to say. Paul was a convert from the party of the Pharisees. The Pharisees used this word for ‘sharing’ in their teachings. Paul was very familiar with this term ‘to share’ in Phariseeism. The only way this word was used by the Pharisees was in reference to fellowship to your fellow Law abiding Jew. If one was keeping the Law you had fellowship with that person. Horizontal concept but never refers to our relationship with God.

Now Paul is saying in the Lord’s Supper we have communion with Christ, we have communion with each other. It is both not just horizontal. This is revolutionary. When we partake of the bread and the cup there is communion. That is why some people call it Communion.

We are one body- we are together in Christ. We are so individualistic in our thinking that we cant grasp that we are Christ’s body. God has put us together in his Kingdom.

Romans 12: 1-2 is so familiar to us all but we miss a major point by Paul. He says let your bodies be a living sacrifice. The term Bodies in this passage is plural but the word sacrifice is singular. Our common act of Christian service and sacrifice for Christ bonds us together so much so it becomes one sacrifice. The Lord’s Table is that time we come to the Table with our burdens and sacrifices and give them to Christ. Our common sacrifice becomes one in Christ, we become one body.

This totally changes how we should look at our Sunday’s together and the meaning of this supper that we take.
Why Have I shared this with you this morning? Why did I use an entire sermon for this topic?

Because Jesus said “Do this in Remembrance of Me”
He didn’t say Write this, Preach this, or argue about this - He said Do this.

Paul also tells us that it declares the Lord’s death until He comes.
Anytime a habit or teaching becomes a tradition or ritual that we just do then it must be challenged. I will propose that how we treat the Lord’s Supper is a habit and ritual that is a groove.

If Christ were physically here right now, How would that change how we celebrated the Lord’s Supper or how would our body posture change, how would we act different?

Would it be more somber, more celebratory? Would more of us, go into it?

When a visitor comes in, what do they think about the cross by how we celebrate the Lord’s Supper?
Would they ever know that the original Lord’s Supper was linked completely to the cross.

There is a concept that I want to leave you with as we close this lesson.

Do we believe that Jesus is really with us on Sunday mornings during our assembly?
Do you ever wonder why Jesus told us it would be better for Him to return to the Father?

I know that when one advocates revisioning the Lord’s Supper people panic because some people in the religious world have gone to one extreme with it. That reasoning would be like looking at a person that has an OCD problem with cleanliness that freaks you out and you say to your self well, I guess I don’t want to take a bath anymore because that person has gone to the extremes with his personal hygene.

We have to be bigger than that and reject that way of thinking. I do think many churches have been influenced by a strain of the Protestant Reformation that went to the extreme of saying that all baptism and the Lord’s Supper are is symbols and that is it.
This comes from a man named Ulrich Zwingli and it is not Biblical. Zwingli was very off base on the Lord’s Supper and he has been the one to influence many people’s belief on the Supper.

But I think it is telling to look back at Luke 24. I have shared this with you before but I want you to consider something as we close out this morning.

Luke 24: 30-35
30 When He had reclined at the table with them, He took the bread and blessed it, and breaking it, He began giving it to them. 31 Then their eyes were opened and they recognized Him; and He vanished from their sight. 32 They said to one another, "Were not our hearts burning within us while He was speaking to us on the road, while He was explaining the Scriptures to us?" 33 And they got up that very hour and returned to Jerusalem, and found gathered together the eleven and those who were with them, 34 saying, "The Lord has really risen and has appeared to Simon." 35 They began to relate their experiences on the road and how He was recognized by them in the breaking of the bread.

The very same four verbs we find in Luke 22 in the Lord Supper account we find Jesus doing here, He took, he blessed, he broke, he gave. This is another Lord Supper account.

In verse 35 we see the clincher of this passage – Jesus identity was hid from them until he broke the bread. When He broke the bread. He made Himself manifest to them and then He disappeared.

This speaks volumes for us today.
The very next time we see this in the life of the Church.
Luke writes the 2nd volume of Luke which is Acts, we see in Acts 2:42 that the earliest Christians they had teaching, breaking of bread, and fellowship.

Christ is telling us something in the Emmaus road story. He was able to ascend to the Father in his glorious resurrected body because we were ready.
Through His Spirit that he sent on Pentecost we now can gather, learn from Scripture, take the communion, and fellowship with one another. That is how we experience Christ’s presence in our lives. He is here, He is fully present in ways that one day we will fully understand when that veil is lifted. It will all make sense and we might just be shocked. Let us this morning just imagine for just a minute, that Christ is here, He is the Host of the Supper, but also His cross, know that His cross only makes sense from what he taught at the last Supper.