In this audio message, Scott Brown discusses the topic of the Passover. There is much that we can learn about sin and the Gospel. Specifically, families would search for leaven in the house. They would sweep it up and burn it. Are you letting any leaven, or sin, linger in your heart? Have you secretly fostered sin somewhere in a dark corner? If so, leave no stone unturned to rid it from your life.

1 Corinthians 5:7 (NKJV) - "Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us."

We're going to be in Matthew 26 starting in verse 17. Now on the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread the disciples came to Jesus saying to him, Where do you want us to prepare for you to eat the Passover? And he said, go into the city to a certain man and say to him, the teacher says, my time is at hand. I will keep the Passover at your house with my disciples. So the disciples did as Jesus had directed them, and they prepared the Passover.

When evening had come, He sat down with the 12. Now as they were eating, He said, assuredly I say to you, one of you will betray me." And they were exceedingly sorrowful, and each of them began to say to him, Lord, is it I? And he answered and said, He who dipped his hand with me in the dish will betray me. And the Son of Man indeed goes, just as it is written of Him. But woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed!

It would have been good for that man if he had not been born. Then Judas, who was betraying him, answered and said, Rabbi, is it I? And he said to him, You have said it. And as they were eating, Jesus took the bread and blessed it and broke it and gave it to the disciples and said, Take, eat, this is My body. And then He took the cup and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink from it, all of you.

For this is the blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. But I say to you, I will not drink of this cup, of this fruit of the vine, from now until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom. And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives. Let's pray. Oh, Heavenly Father, You're so kind to give us words for us to obey.

Lord, You're so kind to give us instructions. Lord, I pray that we would have ears to hear and eyes to see what You have for us. Lord, I pray that You would bless the preaching of the Word, that You would be in every word of it. Amen. This great passage of Scripture, the Passover, the Lord's Supper, is something that we will linger on for two or three weeks.

We'll be focusing primarily today on the whole matter of the Passover. And then after that we'll continue to speak of the bread and the cup next week. But I'm really here to say, you know, in different ways over and over again, behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Come and eat at his table. Eat his bread.

Drink his cup of blessing. Enter in. Come and be relieved of the burden of sin. This is the message of the Passover. And we're really invited to come to a table.

You know, all of us have come streaming from all over the community. Families have come to really eat at a family table. The preparations that we engaged in in order to come and then now to actually come and to eat as a family is really a mirror of what was established by the Lord Jesus Christ here and previously in the great celebration of the Passover of Israel where the families of Israel would come together and they would eat together and they would eat the Passover lamb gathering together to have a great meal together and to commemorate wonderful things that would bless their souls and call all of them to recognize their sins and to recognize the great and wonderful mercy of God. In the same way that the family would gather together in the Passover, It was a family meal where if it was a really small family, a couple of families would gather together. But it was a family meal in which there was interaction among the family.

The head of the household would have things to say and he would lead this great meal. And here the Lord Jesus Christ does the same thing. He's the head of the household and he's leading the meal and he's with his family. We already know who his brothers and mothers and sisters are. They are those who love Him and keep His commandments.

And here, the Lord Jesus Christ is gathered together with His family. And so it's another family meal. And here what you find is in this great celebration. It really is a celebration of the love of God in a family. And this passage of Scripture, I think, is such a help to help us to see the greatness of the mercy of God, to see His hands of grace extended to His people, to provide atonement for His people in their sins.

And so it is a help. It's a reason for us to be happy today and tomorrow and forever Because this meal that was started in the Passover, in Exodus chapter 12, was celebrated by the Lord Jesus Christ. And we'll celebrate it again in a different way, again in heaven. Except then it will be new wine it'll be like no wine you ever drank here on the earth and so here what the Lord does is he's he does what his kingdom is all about and he demonstrates it here that in Jesus Christ there's just an escalation of joy of satisfaction of mercy of Goodness it just keeps getting better. It's like when the water was turned into wine everyone observed Oh, he brings the best wine out last and he does it just gets better and better and better.

It began with a bloody sacrifice and it continues on with bread and wine and then something even greater in heaven. This is God's plan for His people. It just gets better and better and better and better. And this snapshot in time in the Passover shows us another increment of the outpouring of the goodness of God. His mercies are new every morning, and His promises are sweetened in every era.

We now live in the era of the New Covenant. Better promises, better everything, a better covenant. And now the Lord Jesus Christ is entering in with his disciples in a historical moment that we experience the blessing of even now as we've brought our families together to come and to drink the cup of blessing, to eat the bread of life, and to experience the mercy, the great, great mercy of God towards sinners. And so here the Lord has prepared a table before us in the presence of our enemies in the same way that he did with David. And I'm here to say this morning, come to the table.

We're a family recognized as great mercies. You know, this passage is so pivotal to help you understand the love of God in Christ Jesus. This is a picture of the love of God for mankind. It's an angle, it's an illustration that provides different images to help you understand the love of God. And here you have a Passover meal, you have bread and you have wine.

You have these remarkable images. I was talking to someone just before the service. I was tempted to just walk through The many, many images that are given by God to describe so great a salvation, it would take a long time to walk through them. I mean, you have trees, you have rivers, you have water, you have rocks, you have mountains, you have all these images and now we come to bread and wine and the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world and the Lord is just piles up one image after another in his mercy toward you to give you another picture of his love of his grace and How right and how good it is to turn to him because he is so good and so here set before us are these images and there are four of them here in this passage the Passover the Lamb of God the lamb without blemish and then the bread of life and then the cup of blessing The Gospels began with this statement in John chapter 1 when John saw the Lord Jesus and he said, Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

And so this is the context of everything we've been reading. Matthew chapter 26 has its focus on the sacrificial Lamb of God. That's what Matthew 26 is about and all the things that have led up to it. There's a big focus on the betrayer of the Lamb of God and how the Lamb of God came to be slain through the work of the betrayer. It's also a beautiful illustration of the interplay between the Old Testament and the New Testament.

This is a New Testament explanation of an Old Testament ordinance. And that blood sacrifice is being replaced by the fruit of the vine and the bread of life. It's a sign of the New Covenant. It really is one of those illustrations to help you understand how to conceive of the meaning of the Old Testament, that it is cast in types in order to take us to fulfillments in Christ, to show us the great plan of God throughout all the ages and how Christ fulfills every aspect of the law. Here this aspect of the law of the celebration of the Passover is fulfilled in Jesus Christ and no longer would there be blood sacrifice but there would be a completely new way for sinners to come before God for the families under heaven to come and gather and celebrate the grace of God.

And so here it is we're here now in our studies in Matthew in the Last Supper, the great Passover meal. With that as an introduction, let's dive into the text. Verse 17, what we see is the preparation for the Passover. Now on the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the disciples came to Jesus saying to Him, Where do you want us to prepare for you to eat the Passover? So again, this harkens back to Exodus chapter 12, which we just read in the service.

And the Lord's Supper is appointing back to this great event called the Passover. And there's this New Testament replacement of the Old Testament type. What we know is that the Lord Jesus Christ kept the Passover from the time of his youth. Luke records that his parents went to Jerusalem every year at the Feast of Passover And when he was 12 years old, they went up to Jerusalem, according to the custom of the feast. That's in Luke Chapter two, verses 41 and 42.

The Lord Jesus Christ has been celebrating the Passover ever since he was a baby. And now and now He is the Lord of the Passover. He's finally taking His place as He had been a participant in it all His life long. And His godly parents were so kind to engage Him in the ordinances of the Lord and to engage Him in it. The disciples also kept the Passover.

You can see that in Luke chapter 22, verses seven through 13. This Passover is happening on the first day of the Feast of unleavened bread. And this feast of the unleavened bread lasted an entire week. It's another one of those great examples of the way that God brings his people into feasting and celebration. This is what God does.

If you want to know what God is like, just go look at the feasts of the Old Testament. If you want to know what the people of God should be like, they should be feasting and celebrating people. They should be the happiest people in the world. They take their resources, and they spend it on celebrating and rejoicing in the goodness of God. We've been trying to figure out how to do that in this church, haven't we?

And we throw these feasts and celebrations every once in a while, and we'll spend the resources that we've gathered together to eat a meal together, even sometimes so that we could just sit and be served a meal and to rejoice in the goodness of the Lord. Those are such sweet times. We're trying to learn how to rejoice and celebrate in the way that God would have us to do that. And I don't think we've arrived yet. I think there's more celebration.

There's more feasting and enjoyment ahead of us as we consider just how do we become a living picture of The things that we read in Scripture But this feasting is a critical aspect of in fact we were so compelled to do we had Dan Horne give a whole sermon on the whole matter of feasting. You should go back and listen to that sermon. Here is a feast of unleavened bread and it lasted an entire week. And during that feast of unleavened bread, the families of Israel would search for leaven in the house. They would sweep up the leaven and take it out and burn it and that's why modern Jews today they have this sort of funny ritual where the mother will clean the house.

You know it's like a spring cleaning and she's dedicated to clean the house but she hides a little bit of leaven somewhere in the house. And it's a big dramatic moment. Hopefully, she'll hide it in the same place so that the father can find it quickly. But she hides a piece in the back of the refrigerator or over the edge of the oven or something like that and the head of the house Will go search for it the children gathering around you know Happily just wondering if he's going to be able to find it They may even know where it is and the father is searching desperately for the leaven to get the sin out of the house, to get the contaminations out of there, to make sure every single article of sin is gone from the house. And then he finds it and he's given a, you know, according to Jewish tradition, this is certainly not biblical, you know, He has a feather and a napkin.

And he sweeps that piece of leaven into the napkin and he takes it out and throws it into the bonfire. It's a symbol of the role of the head of the house to remove the household of sin. This is the Feast of unleavened bread. It's getting the leaven out of the house. What a dramatic thing.

Have you ever done anything like that? To look for every article, everything that points to sin, everything that could be sinned or has become sin. To deal with it, to get it out of the house. It's such a critical thing. And here the Jews celebrated this Feast of Unleavened Bread in order to remove the leaven from the house.

In that great passage on church discipline in 1 Corinthians chapter 5, we see that this very act is the reason that church discipline ought to be engaged in. In 1st Corinthians chapter 5 verse 6, Your glorying is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump? Therefore purge out the old leaven that you may be a new lump since you are truly unleavened For indeed Christ our Passover was sacrificed for us Did you ever think that church discipline is actually connected with Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread and the removal of leaven? That whole picture that should be part of our life should also be part of our church life as well.

And then he says, therefore let us keep the feast not with the old leaven nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. So this whole celebration is about bringing sincerity and truth back into the house by an honest acknowledgement of sin of leaven that has been allowed to linger in the house. Let me just take this moment to ask you this. Are you letting any leaven linger in your house? Well it really begins in your heart.

You live in your house and in order to cleanse your house you've got to start in your heart. That's the first place. Is there any anger in your heart? Is there any bitterness in your heart? Is there any immorality in your heart?

Is there any greed in your heart? Is there any theft in your heart? Is there any bearing a false witness in your heart? Deal with the leaven in your house first in your own heart. That's where we begin.

We are priests who get out the leaven of our houses. And here, this is the whole imagery. And then it extends to the house of the family of God, to the church. We do it first in our houses, from our hearts. And then we come into the church and we enter into the Lord's table and we examine ourselves to eliminate the leaven from our hearts.

And we repent of our sins. We cry out to God so that times of refreshing would come in. There's no happier church than a church that confesses its sin. There's no happier home that confesses its sin and removes it, and there's no happier heart that has acknowledged sin and then allowed the streams of living water to flow again. So it's the Feast of Unleavened Bread that's being spoken of here and then the disciples ask a question, where do you want us to prepare it?

Where? Where do you want us to go? Because you know, remember that there are thousands, hundreds of thousands of people coming in to Jerusalem to celebrate this whole feast. The city is packed And the disciples are saying, where do you want to eat it? Now they know the rooms are getting filled up.

You've experienced that. You're going to a big event, and there are lots of people going there. And you may just be caught short, and there's no more room in the inn for you. And that's what was happening here. The disciples are saying, where do you want us to do this?

And the Lord Jesus begins this whole process of preparation. They said, where do you want us to prepare for you? This is the whole matter of preparation. The celebration of the Passover required preparation. We've spoken of this a number of times.

In fact, I sent a note to the whole church yesterday just speaking of this whole matter of preparation and how important it is to prepare. Well, there was a time of preparation for this meal. The celebration of the Passover wasn't something that somebody did for you. It's something that you did yourself. You engaged in it yourself.

One of the problems of the modern church environment is that it's kind of a come and be entertained environment, rather than come and prepare yourself and enter in. And you're part of it all together. But rather, we often think of our times of gathering as you come and one person will do something for you, or all this fellowship will do something for you. Well, these are good things. But we have to recognize that in this whole image of the pastor, there was preparation, that the heart was prepared.

And there was a cost to the worship. The worship that costs something is always the sweetest worship. And that's why we should always recognize how important it is for us to prepare our hearts, even before we come to worship. And the whole matter of Sabbath worship included a time of preparation on the night before, just like this time of preparation here. This actually was the preparation day for the Passover.

You learn that in John 19 Verse 14. It was a preparation day. And so it brings us to the whole matter of the preparation of the heart that God has built into this rhythmic Sabbath worship. Yesterday, I was quoting the English Puritan George Swinnock on the importance of preparation for the Lord's day. He speaks of the heart like an oven and he says you should prepare the oven the night before.

Get the oven hot the night before so that when you go to sleep and you wake up it's still warm. You know the embers are still alive so that when you get up, you know, the fire jump starts and you're really ready to worship. I thought that was a beautiful image that your heart is like an oven. He says, the oven of thine heart thus baked in as it were overnight, would be easily heated the next morning. The fire so well raked up that when you went to bed, it would be the sooner kindle than when you should rise." So the soul imagery of preparation.

There were all these preparations and we could go into detail about what those preparations were but it had To do with the lamb there were bitter herbs to gather there was wine there was bread there all these things that were being gathered For this passover So this is a celebration of the Passover. This is really the central matter of our focus this morning, which is why I've entitled this sermon Christ Our Passover. Because here the Lord Jesus Christ is presenting himself as that Passover lamb. And you Remember how all of this came about the children of Israel are in bondage in Egypt And God calls Moses as a deliverer to deliver them from their harsh taskmaster Pharaoh, Pharaoh the picture of the devil the hard taskmaster the one who destroys your soul the one who will rip you up one side, down the other, the one who will destroy your emotions, the one who will tear down your relationships, the one who will burn down your household, the one who will wreck your church, and the one who will wreck your whole society. He poisons everything.

He hates you. You never stop working for him. He never gives you even a day of rest. And It's more, more, more, and there's no grace in it at all. The bondage of Egypt is symbolic of the bondage of sin, how harsh he is.

In contrast, how good Jesus is. He says, come to me, all you who are weary and heavy laden and I'll give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Take my yoke. For I'm gentle and humble in heart and I'll give rest to your souls." Jesus Christ is such a different master.

He's a good master and he blesses his children. He never abuses his children. Nobody ever got abused under the authority of Jesus. Nobody ever did. And so this is the great contrast.

And God sends plagues upon Pharaoh and the Egyptians. The children of Israel were protected from nine of the plagues, but not the last one, except by the blood on the doorpost from the shed blood of the Lamb." Remember how that went? It went dark for those who were in Egypt, except it was not dark for the children of God. It's so true like that, how dark it is without God, how discouraging it is without Him. You can't even see.

You don't even know why you're alive. You don't even know where the world is going. You don't even know that God is in control. You're just left in black darkness to figure it out on your own. And you can't see past the end of your nose.

You don't know how to act, you don't know how to feel, but with Jesus Christ it's not true. You know all those things. He counsels you in every situation. He gives light. He's the light of the world.

And you see this pattern in the plagues of Israel where the children of Israel are protected they have the mercies of God resting upon them. It goes well with them because they honor their Father in heaven. There's no greater joy in the world than to know the Savior and there's no greater hardship. There's no greater disappointment Than to be under the rulership of this terrible taskmaster favor he looks so sunny on the outside, but he will tear you up from the inside out. And so here, the Passover is in this context of bondage and deliverance and plagues against the people who do not love the Lord.

And central to the Passover is the lamb that was sacrificed and the blood spread on the doorposts. This one plague, the tenth plague, all of the children of Israel were not protected from. Only those who'd been covered in the blood of the Lamb. And so Exodus chapter 12 is the is the key text for this. It's an entire chapter dedicated to this, and it's a long chapter.

And that should teach us something. I had thoughts of really of walking through every line of Exodus chapter 12, because Jesus is saying, this is that. He's fulfilling all righteousness, as He said He would do. And in order to properly understand this meal, Exodus Chapter 12 is critical that you understand it. And so let's just do a brief flyover of it.

If you could turn to Exodus Chapter 12, I just want to stop on a couple of points here in this very, very long chapter. An exposition of this would take several days because it's so detailed and it speaks of so much of the ministry of Jesus Christ. So first what we notice in verse 1 in Exodus 12 is that the Lord is speaking to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt and they are telling them when Something is going to happen and he's saying this month shall be your beginning of months It shall be the first month of the year before you." It's the beginning of the month. It's a new beginning. It's the beginning of the year.

You know, we've just gone through the month of January where we're conceiving of the year. It was like a new year. It was like a new slate. This is what I've always loved about my Savior. Every day is a new, clean slate.

And the mistakes of yesterday, I can put in the past and I can look forward. And I can walk on fresh ground again. And here, the Passover is really all about new beginnings, new life. The Christian can have a new beginning at really every moment. And here the Passover is initiated by this whole matter of a new beginning.

This is the beginning of the year, the beginning of the months for you. It's really the beginning of new life. And then in verse 3, Moses is commanded to speak to the congregation of Israel. And he gives some instructions, particularly about taking a lamb. And there's one lamb for each household and then in verse 4 he talks about well if you have a small household Too small for a lamb then bring your neighbors in so here you have this imagery of the family of God now It's not just your biological family.

It may also include your big family. And when we celebrate the Lord's Supper today, we're not celebrating His biological families. We're celebrating it as the big family. It's a family affair, but it is the big family. And here we are, fathers and mothers and brothers and sisters in the family of God you have more than one father spiritually you have more than one sister spiritually more than one mother spiritually what a blessing that is And I pray that God teaches us how to really fulfill that.

How to treat one another as brothers and sisters and grandmothers and grandfathers in the faith. To look at one another in the eye and to recognize what we are to one another. So then this lamb is taken, verse 5, without blemish. This is so pivotal. This might be the heart of the matter.

It's a lamb without blemish. Because of our blemishes are so deep, We must have an external sinless Lamb. External to us to come and make atonement for our own internal sins. And this is what the sinless, spotless, unblemished lamb was all about. Was so that there would be spotlessness for the people of God.

Nothing that they ever had on their own, but it was the spotlessness of the blood of the Lamb. This sacrifice given. Verse 7, and they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and on the lintel of the houses where they eat it. Then they shall eat the flesh on that night, roasted in fire with unleavened bread, and with the bitter herbs they shall eat it." Here the whole family is gathered around. The aromas, the tastes are there, the children are gathered there, the father, the mother, there they are.

They're roasting this lamb that has been sacrificed for their good. And there are all these instructions that come out. And then in verse 13, the sign of the blood. Now the blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you are. And when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and the plague shall not be on you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt." This is the heart of the Passover here.

The blood spread on the temple, on the lentil, and the death angel passing by. And this is what salvation in Jesus Christ is. Not by your own righteousness, but by the spotless righteousness of the blood of the Lamb, whose blood was shed. And the death angel passes over. Do you deserve the death angel to Pass over you?

Do you? Do you deserve the death angel? No, you don't deserve the death angel to pass over you. Not when you first came to Christ and not today. Even the sins of this morning are enough to cause the death angel to come and take you away and sweep you away.

But a spotless lamb has been sacrificed. A spotless lamb has received the anger of God, the propitiation. The quelling of God's anger was exercised through a lamb that was slain. And so the priest would put his hand on the head of that lamb in symbolically transferring the sins of Israel onto that lamb. And that's what's happened with the Son of God.

Your sins drained away, just drained right out. And the wrath of God not upon you any longer, but the mercies of God, the smile of God upon you. I hope you can sense that. Hope you can sense the smile of God, his tender kindness towards sinners. Because what he has done is he has diverted his wrath.

And his wrath no longer rests upon those who trust it in the blood of the Lamb. So we could go on all the way through this passage. There's so much detail. But this spreading of the blood on the doorpost was symbolic. And the doorposts were symbolic of your whole life.

You go in and out of the door. So it symbolizes your goings in and your goings out, who you are when you're in the quietude and the solitariness of your own house, who you are when no one else sees you, and when you go out, and when they do see you. The doorpost symbolizes your entire life, everything going on in your heart, everything going on in your public life, every evil, every flagging, every betrayal, all of these things as you're going in and as you're going out. It's your whole soul. And what this is saying is that the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses every infirmity of your soul.

Your goings in and your goings out. Every single part of your life is covered in the blood of the Lamb. And so Jewish families would gather, they would be led by the head of the household, And they would make all these elaborate preparations. The whole family would be involved. A young son would be asked a question, or he would ask a question, Father, why are we doing this?

And then he would answer. What a beautiful picture. This family gathering, this family worship of God. It really does bring up the whole matter of family worship and what happens in a family. One of the most powerful things that ever happens in a family is when a father takes this book and opens it up and reads it.

I don't understand this, but it's the most powerful thing that happens in the culture. And I've seen it happen so many times. When a father opens up this book and just reads it in his house, the world changes, The earth shakes, everything changes. It's so remarkable. And this is what is happening here.

Here's a father, he's opening up the treasuries of salvation to his family. He's opening up the mercies of God. He's showing them the judgments of God against sin, His wrath, and how you must escape the wrath of God. He says, Father, who is true, He tells them both heaven and hell. He doesn't just say everything is beautiful.

He says there is a wrathful God in heaven who will destroy you If you don't trust in him So we come to this first preparation for the Passover. That's point number one in your outline point number two Jesus instructions for the preparation of the Passover. And here we find such a beautiful explanation, or actually just an example, of who this Jesus Christ is. And he said, go into the city to a certain man and say to him, the teacher says my time is at hand. I will keep the Passover at your house with my disciples.

So the disciples did as Jesus had directed them and he prepared the Passover. Here's another data point in the omniscience of Jesus Christ. He tells his disciples to go find someone in a city of hundreds of thousands of people. Mark says go find a man who's carrying a water pot. Go into the city, find a man who's carrying a water pot.

And that's what they did. The women would typically be carrying water pots on their heads. Men would carry, typically, water in plasks. So in that sense, it would be kind of abnormal for a man to be carrying a water pot. But this man was carrying a water pot in the midst of these hundreds of thousands of people.

And there the disciples are, you know, walking through the city. Can you imagine that? He told us to go find a guy with a water pot. You can't find men with water pots. Men don't carry water pots.

And so they're walking through the city. They're just doing what Jesus told them to do. You know, Jesus does that. He sends you off on missions. You don't really understand why.

You don't understand how it's even going to happen and yet he says what I said will happen will happen and that's exactly what happened you know this happened before you know he they were sent in and they found a donkey And now they're finding a landlord with a room who's carrying a water pot. It's just wonderful to see his grasp of all things. He says, the message to the man, the teacher says, my time is at hand. I will keep the Passover at your house with my disciples. How's that for an announcement?

I'm coming to your house today. Now during this period, during the Passover, Landlords were obligated to give their property to the people who had come in from the surrounding area. So if someone came up to you, if you were a good Jew, you were supposed to do it. You were supposed to give him your space for free. No charge.

But Jesus says for his disciples to say to this man, my time is at hand. And he uses this word kronos, it's my time and it indicates a significant event. It indicates that a plan is being carried out. My time is at hand. This is now the time.

Jesus is entering into that time. That time in history. He's in control of history. He's in control of the chronology, of the chronos. He's in control of everyone's chronology.

He's in control of your chronos. And he says it's mine, mine, my time. All of time is his time. He owns it all. He's the governor of it.

And he's even governing his betrayers in this scene here. We plan, we pray, we cry out to God, but we have to recognize that all of time is in his hands. He is the invisible hand that moves the clock of the world. And here the Lord Jesus is proclaiming his sovereignty and his centrality, his authority. In verse 18 he says, it's my time.

Later in verse 18 he says, it's my disciples. In verse 26, my body. In verse 28, it's my blood. In 29, it's my Father's kingdom. Here Jesus is proclaiming Himself as the exclusive authority over absolutely everything and here in this case.

He's saying time my time and This should comfort this should comfort all of us That our times are in his hands that he's carrying out a chronology to glorify himself The Bible says he makes all things beautiful in his time. Do you believe that? He might be a young person today. You're waiting to get married. You're hoping to get married You're wondering why you're not married, but you have to recognize your times are in his hands.

He controls the chronology of every person in the world, and you can rest. You can know that he will fulfill all righteousness through the times and seasons that he establishes from eternity past. I don't know what you're waiting for, but Jesus Christ is not waiting around for anything. He is executing perfectly His timeline. And He's doing it for His own glory.

And so He says, yes, it's My time, My disciples, My body, My blood, My Father's kingdom. All things are Mine, He says. There's no greater happiness of the soul to recognize that. That God is in control. You can rest.

You can soothe your fevered brow today knowing that your times are in His hands. And His time is this very particular time, this very particular dramatic hour, the most dramatic hour in the history of the universe is at hand. And that's what he's saying here. And then thirdly, in your outline, you'll see the betrayer is identified. And he's identified during the Passover meal.

Imagine that! It's a time of worship, it's a time of celebration and a betrayer is identified. And you know, it kind of added some emotions into the meal, you know, it caused consternation. So in verse 20, when evening had come, he sat down with the twelve. Now as they were eating, he said, assuredly I say to you, one of you will betray me.

And they were exceedingly sorrowful, and each of them began to say to him, Lord, is it I? And he answered and said, He who dipped his hand with me in the dish will betray me. The Son of Man indeed goes just as it is written of him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed. It would have been good for that man had he not been born. Then Judas who was betraying him answered and said, Rabbi is it I?

And he said, You have said it. So Jesus is announcing that His betrayer was at hand, evening had come, and then you find this reaction. You have these different reactions and you have these questions that come from Judas and from all the disciples. And I'd like to just sort of unpack this for a moment to help us understand what's happening here. First of all the reaction of the disciples they were sorrowful.

It broke their hearts and each of them began to say, Lord is it I? And they were asking it in humility. They weren't accusing Judas from all we can tell. They all didn't rise up and say, yep, There he is. We knew it all along.

No one's saying that. They don't seem to understand that. It's humble distrust in themselves. They recognize their frailty. They recognize their sinfulness.

It's like the people in Matthew who said, Oh Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me. I think it's like the man who said, I believe, help me in my unbelief. It's this honest, heartbroken realization that you may sin, And that your Savior has called you out in your sin, and it makes you sorrowful that you would sin. It's sorrow over the thought of sin. That you would participate in betraying your Savior.

It's that kind of a heart there. Christ went to the cross for sinners and here perhaps you have the disciples examining themselves and they're saying, is it me? Would I do such a thing? Oh Lord, cleanse the leaven from my heart. And then Jesus speaks very specifically.

He says, He who dipped His hand with me in the dish will betray me. Now we don't know if it was just Judas who dipped or they all dipped. They probably were all dipping but we don't have enough information But Judas Judas is different Judas is saying it with knowledge When Judas says is it I he's saying it with a completely different understanding in his heart The disciples are saying is it I and they're heartbroken Judas says is it I and he knows because he has 30 pieces of silver burning in his pocket. He already has the betrayal money with him. He laid the plan, and he presented it.

And the scribes and the Pharisees took him on it. He's asking the question really as an imposter. He's the person who sits in church and knows that he does not love Jesus, but he keeps going through the routines. And he's not sorrowful for his sin. His sin doesn't break his heart.

And he doesn't turn from his sin. That's the difference between a disciple and a betrayer. And we find here that the Lord Jesus, He knows of the conspiracy, But he's not focused on the conspiracy at all he is Exercising his time and This betrayal also we see it's a fulfillment of prophecy It says in verse 24 the Son of Man indeed goes just as it is written of Him. So this is expected. I mean, it's not a surprise that there would be a betrayer.

We know that the Lamb was slain before the foundation of the world, as it says in Revelation. We know that He would be delivered into the hands of men. And so Judas is betraying Him. And what do you learn about betrayal? There's a lot to learn about betrayal in this very text here.

I'm going to give you several things you learn about betrayal. Number one, betrayal can come from people who seem to be following Christ. This betrayal theme runs throughout the entire chapter, chapter 26. You learn a lot about betrayal. It's about betraying Jesus Christ.

And what we find is Judas betrays Christ for almost nothing. A very small thing. Really, people's betrayal of Christ usually happens on small things anyway. They want some small pleasure that is so fleeting and irrelevant, and they trade eternity for it. They trade eternity for a hop in the sack in an act of adultery.

They betray it with a click of a button. They betray Christ for so little. And here we learn that betrayal can come from people who seem to be following Christ. Number two, some of the most trusted people may betray. Remember, Judas was handling the money box.

Jesus gave authority over the money box to Judas Knowing he was the son of perdition from the beginning of time There's something deep here number three a Betrayer may be your friend A betrayer may betray Christ and He's your friend. In John chapter 13 verse 8 we read, He who eats bread with me has lifted up his heel. Fulfilling the prophecy in Psalm 41 verse 9. Even my own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, who ate my bread, has lifted up his heel against me. But You, O Lord, be merciful to me, and raise me up, that I may repay them.

So a betrayer may be your own familiar friend in whom you trusted, the person you ate with over and over again. If it happened to the Lord Jesus Christ, it can happen to you. And the betrayal of Jesus Christ before you will be a fulfillment of this as well. Number four, it's appropriate to admonish the lost betrayer. Jesus actually condemns Judas.

He speaks to him. It was appropriate to warn him, and he does so. It's appropriate to admonish the lost and warn them of betrayal, to warn them of the dangers of betrayal, that it's better that you weren't even born than to betray Jesus. Now don't think of this just about Judas. When it says it was better that he was never born, it's better for anyone not to be born if they betray Jesus Christ.

This is not just for Judas. This is for every person in the world. To betray Jesus Christ is the worst thing that you can ever do. Number five, betrayers have a terrible future. Woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed.

Woe to that man. You have to think about the betrayal of Christ rightly and how disastrous it is. And often how small the betrayals look on the surface. Number six, how does Christ treat his betrayers? He dips in the bowl.

He treats them kindly. He allows them to be kissed on the cheek. And he sends them on his way. This betrayer did not partake of the Lord's Supper. He was in the big part of the meal, but In the Gospel of John, I think it makes it clear that he left.

Jesus said, what you do, do quickly. And he immediately left. He did not partake in the supper. In the same way that those who do not love Jesus Christ, loving his appearing, loving his word, loving the sound of his voice, they should not partake. They should recognize who they are.

So in the Lord's Supper there's also this great division. The division of light and darkness, sheep and goats, betrayers and disciples. Number four, the bread and the cup of the Passover are revealed here, verses 26 through 28. Now, here is where we'll spend all of our time next week. And so I won't develop this, but just to give you an overview here.

Here you have these four verbs about the bread. As they were eating, verse 26, Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to the disciples and said, take, eat, this is my body. We'll develop this in detail next week, but you notice these four verbs. He took it, he blessed it, he broke it, he gave it. We'll speak of each of these as we gather together again you have this imagery of bread and Then you have this imagery of the cup.

That's so beautiful. He took it and He gave thanks for it. He gave it to them and then He told them what to do. And it's such a remarkable image. I think it stands near the pinnacle of the peak of all the imagery in the Bible that has been given to us all the way from the tree of life to the rock now we come to the bread and the wine the sweetness the life-giving nature of these things that we receive life from.

In 1 Corinthians 11 we read, For this blood is my blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. Not for all, but for many. Not for a few, but for many. All this beautiful imagery is here and then you have the heavenly future of the Passover in verse 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 the Lord Supper is also another type of something greater there's again this escalation this beautiful escalation God has wired life that way for His children.

He escalates to the better. And He will drink it new. We'll talk about that in more detail next week. But I think what we should recognize is that the pleasures of God are like a banquet Of a whole family sitting together being fed being refreshed by him in Matthew 8 we read and I say to you that many will come from east and west and Sit down with Abraham Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven But the sons of the kingdom will be cast into outer darkness and there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth again the banquet and then the desert on each side. And then finally there's a hymn sung at the end of the Passover meal.

And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives. And here we find you know God appointing singing as a part of this time. They sang, they brought together this gift of music to soothe the emotions, to teach the mind, to help the heart to remember, to put a song in the heart as the days pass. And what a blessing it is to sing something and then somehow it just keeps coming back to you throughout the day. I love that about singing in the morning.

I'll walk out the door and I'll catch myself humming something that we just sang. It lives on in the heart. It's such a beautiful thing. Music and singing is such a great part of our lives together. Herbert Lockyer wrote a book on the matter of music in the Bible he says there are twice as many references to praise and singing than there even are for prayer and Here there is this closing out of this celebration with the hymn, and then they went to the Mount of Olives.

There you have it, the Passover, Christ, our Passover. The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, the bread of life to keep you alive, to nourish your soul, the cup of blessing to refresh you, to help you to remember how free you are, To remember that the blood of the Lamb has cleansed everything. All of your goings out and all of your comings in, every dark corner of your heart, Jesus Christ has cleansed by His blood. And just to recognize the freedom that there is, the happiness that there is, that He takes your burdens upon Himself and He gives you a yoke that fits you. He says it's His yoke, it fits you, it's light.

So here in this passage really is a an explanation of the remedy of all of our miseries, the washing of all of our impurities, and the destruction of our greatest enemy, all at a family table, with the church there gathered, concerned for their sins, but so grateful for the bloodshed, the perfect, spotless blood of the Lamb. So the question is, do you believe in Jesus Christ? Have you repented of your sins? Do you hate your sins? Do you desire to be saved?

Have you cried out to him and said, have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David. Have you said, oh, Jesus Christ, fill my life. Oh, Lord, I don't want to be the shepherd of my life anymore, but I want you to be my shepherd. I believe in you, and I want to follow you. I pray that God would use this passage to help any who have not bowed their knee to Jesus Christ, to just see what a good shepherd He is.

And for those of you who have, just to glory in it, to relish in it, to relax in the mercies of His grace, to drink in the wonderful wine and eat the wonderful bread that he's given to you. He is the bread of life. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you for bringing before us this remarkable moment of love and betrayal, of mercy and judgment, of faithfulness and sovereignty. Oh Lord, thank you for showing it to us today.

And that you would help us now to feed on it all day long, to fill our minds with all these things. That we would delight in them as the day passes speaking of them when we sit in our house when we walk by the way when we lie down and when we rise up amen