“The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are, and when I see the blood, I will pass over you.”

— Exodus 12:13

One of the fun things about celebrating holidays is that we often enjoy special foods that we might not have at other times of the year.

What are some foods or drinks that you enjoy on special days?

When Jesus first gave his disciples the special meal that we call the Lord’s Supper, they were actually already celebrating a holiday called Passover.

Hundreds of years earlier the Israelites had been slaves in Egypt. But the Lord rescued them through a number of power­ful acts. On the day that God led them out of Egypt, the Israelites prepared a lamb as a sacrifice, and they spread the lamb’s blood on the doorframes of their houses as God had told them to. Then God allowed a plague of death to pass through Egypt, taking the firstborn of every household, but the plague “passed over” all the homes where the doorframes were covered with blood, and the firstborn in those families were spared.

Every year after that, God’s peo­ple celebrated a special Pass­over meal, and Jesus and his friends did the same. But on this particular Passover, things were different. God was again rescuing his people, and this time he was preparing Jesus to rescue them from sin, death, and evil. On this Passover, Jesus took the place of the lamb, once and for all, and he was the only firstborn who died. And today we, his followers, are marked by his blood so that we can escape death and have life in him.

Lord, thank you for rescuing us from sin, death, and evil. Help us to live for you. Amen.