Tuesday, April 11, 2006
Holy Week
TUESDAY -- THE WEEK THAT CHANGED THE WORLD
Matthew 26:1-5 Jesus . . . told his disciples, "You know that the Passover will take place in two days, and the Son of Man will be handed over to be crucified." Then the high priests and the elders of the people assembled in the courtyard of the high priest, who was named Caiaphas. They conspired to arrest Jesus by treachery and to kill him. But they kept saying, "This must not happen during the festival, lest there be a riot among the people."
MAN PROPOSES, GOD DISPOSES
On Tuesday of Passover Week, while teaching in the Temple for the last time, Jesus told the pointed parable of the wicked share-croppers who would not give the owner of the vineyard his due -- and finally killed the son he sent (Mt 21). When the religious leaders heard this story, they knew it was aimed at them. They called a meeting of the Sanhedrin that evening in Jerusalem. They met at the very same time that Jesus was meeting with His disciples some 2 miles distant -- on the other side of the Mt of Olives.
So, while Jesus was telling His disciples that He would be arrested and killed that Passover, the conspirators who planned to do this kept reminding each other that "This must not happen during the festival, lest there be a riot among the people."
But from the inception of the Jewish nation the LORD had made plain that His redemption of sinners would come through a substitutionary sacrifice of His choosing. This was graphically portrayed in the Passover Lamb -- the perfect lamb whose blood was the sign and symbol of its acceptance as a substitute for sinners -- by God and those who trusted His Word.
This Gospel promise with which the LORD had enwrapped Israel's beginning as a people could not and would not go unfulfilled. Nor dare there ever be any doubt of the connection between the blood on the doorposts and the blood on the cross of Calvary. Nor would the Lord let any plan of man prevent the Spirit from causing Jesus' men to look back on the way God had kept His promise and write,
"You were redeemed . . . with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. He was chosen before the creation of the world" (1 Peter 1:18-20).
