Sunday 30 Dec 2012

Sunday Reading: Matthew 26:26-30

Key Verse: Matthew 26:29
28  For this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.

Devotion:
If there is one thing that causes arguments amongst religions then this is it, the Lord’s Supper or the Passover supper and what it means to people. But no matter how you argue about what it means figuratively or physically we must all agree that Jesus Christ affirmed this based on the original Passover meal when the children of Israel had to demonstrate their belief in God by applying blood to the door posts so that the angel of death would not take their first born as God had promised would happen.

But notice the wording that Jesus gives here, that this is His blood of the New Testament. No, they did not have the New Testament as we know it now; rather this was telling the disciples and us that this was pointing to the blood that Christ would shed in order to pay for the sin debt that we now have because of our sin and unbelief. This era of grace was about to begin with Christ shedding His blood for our sakes.

Christ was about to usher in a new sacrifice that would pay for sin once and for all given mankind a new covenant that would last from that point onward until His final return. It was only a few years back that Christ was born and had to live as a human being, a time which in itself must have been tough to put up with knowing that He would be compared to other sinful men that walked around Him. But even knowing that and knowing what he would have to face, Jesus continued to do what had to be done for us.

I wonder how many of us would walk directly into a known bad situation just so that our friends and family could know something different in their lives. Jesus saw what He would have to do and still He went ahead for our sakes knowing that this would be the only way in which we could live under His grace rather than being under our own choice of eternal death because of our sinful lives.

Points to Ponder:
What are you looking forward to next year?

Are you looking to a walk with God?