Preparations Finished (or not?)
Where do you want us to make preparations for you to eat the Passover? (Matthew 26:17b)
Birthday cards, Thanksgiving dinners, Christmas presents, New Year’s parties, Spring Break travel plans, Fourth of July fireworks, family vacations…the list goes on throughout the year of everything that requires preparations. It takes so much effort and time to get everything together, and then the event is over in an amount of time that doesn’t seem to justify the amount of planning it took.
Jesus and His disciples have made preparations to celebrate the Passover … the Upper Room is secured, Jesus and the twelve are reclined at the table, the food has been eaten. The celebration is finished, or is it?
Instead of finishing the celebration in the traditional way, Jesus takes the bread and wine, shares it with His disciples, and institutes the Lord’s Supper. Not an ending, but a new covenant and a new command for the forgiveness of sins.
Rev. John Heckmann
Senior Pastoral Counselor
Lutheran Women’s Missionary League
