Jesus knows what’s about to happen.
Within hours, He’ll be arrested.
By the next day, He’ll be hanging on a cross.
But before any of it happens…
Jesus explains what His death will mean.
He takes the cup and tells His disciples:
“For this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.”
— Matthew 26:28
Don’t rush past that word:
Covenant.
Because Jesus didn’t invent it at the table.
Hundreds of years earlier, through the prophet Jeremiah, God had promised:
“Behold, the days are coming… when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah.”
— Jeremiah 31:31
Israel already knew covenant.
God had made covenant with His people before.
But Jeremiah said something new was coming.
And this one would reach down deeper than commands written on stone:
“I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people.”
— Jeremiah 31:33
For generations, God’s people waited.
Then Jesus lifts the cup…
and essentially says:
This is it.
The disciples aren’t merely eating Jesus’ final meal.
They’re watching a promise made centuries earlier begin to unfold in front of them.
And there’s another detail here I love.
Jesus explains the cross before the cross happens.
That matters.
Because His death wasn’t an unfortunate tragedy that His followers later tried to give spiritual meaning.
Jesus tells them beforehand exactly why His blood will be poured out:
“For the forgiveness of sins.”
He knows He’s going to die.
He knows why He’s going to die.
And He willingly walks toward it.
The cross isn’t Jesus getting caught in someone else’s plan.
It isn’t God improvising after humanity rejected His Son.
The Lamb had been foreshadowed.
The covenant had been promised.
And now Jesus tells them the price by which it will be established:
His own blood.
The cross wasn’t Plan B.
It was the covenant God had been preparing all along.
And the promise wasn’t merely that we could try harder.
Or clean ourselves up.
Or somehow repay what our sin had cost.
It was forgiveness.
Purchased by His sacrifice.
Offered through Christ.
Made possible because the One holding the cup was about to give Himself for us.
Praise be to God.
— Drew
P.S. One of my favorite things about studying Scripture is discovering promises separated by centuries that suddenly come together in Jesus.
That’s what I hope my books help you do too—trace the threads, understand the story, and see Christ more clearly through all of it.
Forward this to someone
who needs it today!
And reply with any thoughts or questions,
I respond to every one!
Join other believers discovering not just what they believe—but why it’s true.
|
