Sermons

Maundy Thursday 2026

Maundy Thursday 2026

On the night in which He was betrayed, in which He went for to the slaughter, our Lord took the cup, blessed it and said, “Drink of it all of you. This cup is the new covenant in my blood, shed for you, for the forgiveness of sins.”

It needs to be said that the words “covenant” and “testament” are synonyms. Jesus said, “This is the blood of the new covenant.” Or, Jesus said, “This is the blood of the new testament.” Old Testament. New Testament. Old Covenant. New Covenant. Covenant and testament are synonyms.

Maundy Thursday. On the one hand, the disciples didn’t fully understand what was going on. On the other hand, they did. They recognized themes throughout the Old Testament leading up to this event. Themes of blood. Themes of covenant. Themes of what is required for the forgiveness of sins.

It’s been correctly said that the Scriptures are a bloody book.

The first instance of blood is the blood of righteous Abel crying out from the ground. Cain, envious his younger brother Abel rose up against Abel and killed him. Sinful envious mankind rose up against our older brother Jesus and killed Him.

With Abel, we learn that life is in the blood. Blood is sacred. Blood is to be guarded. In the time of Noah God said, “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for life is in the blood.” After the flood, God allowed mankind to kill and eat animals. But, God forbid drinking the blood. God forbid drinking the blood because life is in the blood. God guards blood. God guards life. And yet, paradoxically, without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins. Breaking the Law requires payment. Death, for the wages of sin is death. In order to forgive sins life must be shed. God guards blood, and God uses blood to forgive. A paradox of justice and mercy.

In the days of Abraham, God begins to use blood to make covenants, or promises. The first covenant God made with Abraham involved the shedding of blood; not man’s blood but the blood of animals. Abraham took several different types of animals and cut them in half—shedding blood and a lot of it. Then God passed between the animal halves and made a covenant promise with Abraham.

Later, God made a new blood covenant with Abraham. Circumcision. This covenant did not involve the shedding of animal blood. The shedding of man’s blood. Now a bit of man’s life is shed to be part of the covenant promise.

In Egypt, another blood covenant. Lamb’s blood smeared on doorposts and lintels in order that death would pass over. With the Passover, God instituted a yearly reminder that the way of life comes through a lamb given to death.

A culmination of blood covenant happens at Mount Sinai. At Mount Sinai, Moses told the people all the words of the Lord. The people answered with one voice and said, “All that the Lord has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient.”

Then Moses had oxen blood, so once again a lot of blood, put into basins. Moses took the basins and threw the blood out on the people, saying, “The blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you.” The people did not drink that blood. They didn’t smear that blood on doorposts. They didn’t shed that blood themselves. It was shed. It was thrown out on them. They were covered by the blood of the covenant.

That event, the event of Moses throwing the blood out on the people, is the central covenant event in the Old Testament.

Those events are the setup for the Lord’s Supper. By the time our Lord Jesus Christ took the cup, blessed it, and gave it saying, “Drink of it all of you. This cup is the new covenant in my blood, shed for you for the forgiveness of sins,” while the disciples cannot fully understand how it is that the wine is His true blood, they also knew that this was coming. The Lord had set the groundwork. Events and themes were building up to this final moment.

Sin requires bloodshed. Transgression demands life. Sin does kill you, repent and beware. Life is in the blood. The blood of the innocent spotless Lamb of God must be poured out for the forgiveness of sins.

And, because life is in the blood, the life that you need is the life of the holy Son of God, given and shed for you for the forgiveness of your sins. His blood was smeared out on this world of death. His blood is poured out as a river of life. His blood is not thrown on you or sprinkled on you. But given to you. His life, your life. His purity, your purity.

Like the disciples, though you do not fully understand it, you believe it and receive it for your good.

In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Palm Sunday/Sunday of the Passion 2026

Palm Sunday/Passion Sunday 2026

In the Passion reading from Matthew’s Gospel, you heard how the chief priests and religious leaders paid Judas thirty pieces of silver to betray Jesus. Then Judas, when he saw what would happen, came back to the chief priests and said, “I have sinned by betraying innocent blood.” They said to him, “What is that to us? See to it yourself.” And Judas, in despair, threw the money down in the temple, and went and hanged himself.

The chief priests took the money and said, “It is not lawful to put it into the treasury since it is blood money.” They took the money and used it to buy the potter’s field as a burial place for strangers.

Matthew writes that this fulfilled a prophesy from the book of Jeremiah, “And they took the thirty pieces of silver, the price of him on whom a price had been set by some of the sons of Israel, and they gave them for the potter’s field, as the Lord directed me.”

That’s a rather obscure-sounding prophesy, but I’m going to show that it has a number of beautiful promises.

Keep in mind four things: thirty pieces, treasury, potter, and blood-money.

In the book of Exodus, God told the people that if you have an ox that gores someone else’s slave, then you shall pay the owner of the slave thirty pieces. And for that, the idea of thirty pieces came to be associated with the price of a dead slave.

Jesus is the suffering slave, or servant, of the Lord. As Isaiah writes, “Behold, my servant (or slave) shall act wisely. He shall be high and lifted up and shall be exulted. As many as were astonished at you, his form was so marred beyond human semblance and his form beyond that of the children of mankind.”

Jesus is the servant, or slave, of God; the faithful servant who does the will of His Father, and a price of thirty pieces was paid to make Him dead.

Judas threw the money back into the temple. The chief priests said, “It is not lawful to put it into the treasury since it is blood money.” So they took it and bought the potters field as a burial place for strangers.

Remember: Thirty pieces, potters, treasury, and blood money.

The Hebrew words for treasury and potter sound alike. The chief priests said, “It is not lawful to put them into the treasury.” Instead, they buy the potter’s field as a burial place.

In the Bible, who is the Potter? God is. We are the clay. He is the Potter. We are the work of His hands.

The money is then used to buy the Potter’s field. Remember now the parable of the treasure hidden in the field. “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.”

In that parable, the field represents the whole world.

The Potter’s field is this world, a world that had made itself hostile to God, but God took upon Himself to reconcile it back to Himself through the blood of His Son.

Through the thirty-pieces of silver, which set in motion the death of the slave of God, the Potter’s Field is purchased for a burial place.

A burial place for whom?

For you. For we are dust, and to dust we shall return.

You also know that dust you shall not remain. For the greater price, the blood of the Son of God, has been spilt onto this earth, so that as surely as Jesus is risen from the dead, from the dust you too shall rise.

What they meant for evil, God meant for your greatest good.

In Jesus’ name. Amen.