Hello siblings
Today’s Holy Nougat invites us to think anew about the validity of Y’shua’s new covenant.
1 Corinthians 11:25-26 CEVDCI
[25] After the meal, Jesus took a cup of wine in his hands and said, “This is my blood, and with it God makes his new agreement with you. Drink this and remember me.”
[26] The Lord meant that when you eat this bread and drink from this cup, you tell about his death until he comes.
The New Covenant 3
On a day like today, aligning to the covenant was a matter of faith for the disciples. Their Rabbi, whom they believed was the promised Saviour and worshipped Son of God had been assassinated, and made an example of, on the outskirts of the city. The second post-execution day was upon them, and despite it being the Sabbath, rest was probably far from their minds.
I suspect they asked themselves and each other the following questions:
Was anything Y’shua taught them true?
Having told them to arm themselves, why did He allow others to arrest and crucify Him outside the city like a common criminal?
Would they be next on the assassination list?
Y’shua may have referred to the priests and teachers of the Law as a generation of vipers. But they were the ones trying to find the pieces after their leader (their head) had been killed. No one, not even His mother, with whom YHWH had spoken, seemed to remember His prophecies and the signs. They had lost hope.
Self-Check
Would we have remembered? When Life is Lifing, can we remember that Y’shua has us covered?
Deeper Dive
What Y’shua’s followers forgot to do in their grief and confusion – every single one of them – was to revisit the Word. Both Y’shua’s words and the Torah. With all the questions that bubbled in their minds, it would have been worthwhile to do the credibility test:
A. Had Y’shua made claims that were validated by the Torah?
B. Had others testified to the truth of the signs?
Just about everything related to His life was fulfilment of prophecy. That was, in fact, a phrase Matthew used when writing about Y’shua to the Jewish community. Could it be that if Y’shua’s life fulfilled prophecy, His death was also prophetic fulfilment? They weren’t sure as yet. They were grieving deeply, and their spiritual senses were not attuned to what He had said three nights/days prior. (But, it did register, or rather, returned to the two with whom Y’shua walked to Emmaus after His resurrection).
In sharing the Passover meal with them, Y’shua referred to His body and out-poured blood as substitutes or atonement for sin. Making that claim at their Passover meal suggested that His blood carried the salvific substituting power for the blood of the Passover Lamb. The sign was there. He was the Son (lamb) of God. We may recall His cousin, John the Baptist, using a similar phrase to describe Y’shua in John 1: 29. John testified to that truth. As did others on several occasions, including the malefactor beside Him on the cross, and a centurion who witnessed the crucifixion.
Had His followers, like some of us, missed the significance of Y’shua’s words? On that Passover preparation night, He was establishing a new covenant in His blood …’.
A new covenant meant there was an old covenant that had been fulfilled or completely broken. We know that the covenants between God and humanity were generational or eternal. So, it is likely that the covenant has been broken. It was. God spoke about it in the prophecy of Jeremiah 31:31-34.
Jeremiah stated that the Mosaic covenant made in Egypt on that first Passover was broken by God’s elect. He prophesied about a new covenant to be established that would imprint God’s Word on the hearts of God’s elect. Those people would worship YHWH, and that new covenant would result in the forgiveness of sins.
Yes indeed, it’s all there. [It sounds like foot-washing and the Passover meal combined to me!!!!!]
Had His followers – in those 3 days after His death – remembered and reflected on Y’shua’s words at their Passover Feast, their grief would be less intense. They’d have realised that that meal they shared – the Passover Feast followed by bread and wine – meant that they were God’s firstfruits of the new creation. (This was later referenced in James 1:18 by Y’shua’s brother, James, who authored of the epistle).
Siblings, that feast in which we each share is not an ordinary feast. It’s true, we eat bread and drink wine instead of applying blood over our door posts and eating a lamb. But they serve as substitutes for the Lamb of God, our atonement.
Partaking of that Feast in His memory says we are participating with Y’shua in the new covenant. (More on that tomorrow)
Point to Ponder
How does Y’shua’s new covenant offer you and I hope in these times?
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May all we seek be found in Christ
