Preparation for the final Passover. For Peter and John ritual becomes reality Matt 26:17-19; Mark 14:12-16; Luk 22:7-13; John 13:1

The fifth day is preparation for the Passover.

 

Matt 26:17-19

Now on the first day of Unleavened Bread the disciples came to Jesus, saying, "Where do You want us to prepare for You to eat the Passover?" 18 And He said, "Go into the city to a certain man, and say to him, 'The Teacher says," My time is at hand; I am to keep the Passover at your house with My disciples. "'"  19 And the disciples did as Jesus had directed them; and they prepared the Passover.

 

Mark 14:12-16

And on the first day of Unleavened Bread, when the Passover lamb was being sacrificed, His disciples said to Him, "Where do You want us to go and prepare for You to eat the Passover?" 13 And He sent two of His disciples, and said to them, "Go into the city, and a man will meet you carrying a pitcher of water; follow him; 14 and wherever he enters, say to the owner of the house,' The Teacher says, "Where is My guest room in which I may eat the Passover with My disciples?"' 15 "And he himself will show you a large upper room furnished and ready; and prepare for us there."  16 And the disciples went out, and came to the city, and found it just as He had told them; and they prepared the Passover.

 

Luke 22:7-13

Then came the first day of Unleavened Bread on which the Passover lamb had to be sacrificed. 8 And He sent Peter and John, saying, "Go and prepare the Passover for us, that we may eat it."  9 And they said to Him, "Where do You want us to prepare it?" 10 And He said to them, "Behold, when you have entered the city, a man will meet you carrying a pitcher of water; follow him into the house that he enters. 11 "And you shall say to the owner of the house, 'The Teacher says to you," Where is the guest room in which I may eat the Passover with My disciples? "'  12 "And he will show you a large, furnished, upper room; prepare it there."  13 And they departed and found everything just as He had told them; and they prepared the Passover.

 

John 13:1

Now before the Feast of the Passover, Jesus knowing that His hour had come that He should depart out of this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end.

 

Judas had returned to from his treachery and the city is a buzz with travelers and pilgrims who have come to celebrate the feast that was the birth of their nation.

 

This was a very happy time for the Jews, in fact a Jew would glory in his heritage as this time was celebrated. Preparations began a month before. For at least two weeks before the Passover would have been the topic of teaching in the synagogues and the temple.

 

Families and friends would reunite to celebrate the birth of their nation in great joy.

 

Preceding Passover’s would have been met with joy by the disciples, but on this Passover they will not be able to get out of their minds the words of the Lord from the day before, “On the Passover I will be crucified.”

 

The supper was to be celebrated in the house of the man that the disciples Peter and John found walking with a pitcher of water and that the room would be furnished and ready. Many believe this to be the father of Mark.

 

The Greek word used for “room” is used only in one other place in the Bible where it is translated “inn” as referring to the room that was denied to Joseph and Mary so that she could give birth.

 

All has come full circle. That for which He was born would now be fulfilled and the room denied to Him at birth would now be His at death. It wouldn’t be out of the ordinary for a Passover to be celebrated by more than one family in a single room. Think of how crowded Jerusalem was with 3 million. There would be women and kids running around - only the unclean would have been excluded.

 

But this is the room prepared for the Lord and in this room He would celebrate the Passover alone with His disciples. In this room is the beginning of the Church and so far the only men who are in it.

 

The room had to be searched with a candle for any leaven, which was discarded or burned. It is likely that the owner of the house would have done this, but John and Peter would have also.

 

John and Peter saw the transfigured Lord and John and Peter would be the first disciples to run to the tomb to see it empty. These two would become leaders of the disciples in Jerusalem after the ascension of the Lord.

 

And now they are sent to prepare the Passover.

 

If the view formerly expressed is correct, that the owner of the house had provided all that was needed for the Supper, Peter and John would find there the Wine for the four Cups, the cakes of unleavened Bread, and probably also ‘the bitter herbs.’ Of the latter five kinds are mentioned, which were to be dipped once in salt water, or vinegar, and another time in a mixture called Charoseth (a compound made of nuts, raisins, apples almonds, &c.). The wine was the ordinary one of the country, only red; it was mixed with water, generally in the proportion of one part to two of water.

 

All things being, as we presume, ready in the furnished upper room, it would only remain for Peter and John to see to the Paschal Lamb, and anything else required for the Supper.

 

For the lamb the disciples would, of course, have to attend earlier in the Temple. The cost of the Lamb, which had to be provided, was very small.

 

All the while the minds of Peter and John are repeating to themselves, “I will be crucified on the Passover.”

 

The sheep market was in proximity to the sheep gate. The sheep’s gate was the place where not long ago they heard the Lord teach that He was the shepherd and they were the sheep and that He would give His life for the sheep.

 

Imagine it all coming back to them as they purchase the sheep, looking over to the sheep gate and on their way to the temple with the small lamb so it could be inspected and then killed, and they themselves would cut its throat in order to collect the symbolic blood that the priest would cast on the brazen altar.

 

We see the scene of thousands and thousands of joyous people leading their lambs to the temple ready to enjoy the Passover feast and two men somber, solemn, and contemplating. Maybe for the first time they actually realize the very meaning behind the Passover sacrifice. For them, ritual is becoming reality.

 

At the temple they would have heard Psa 81 chanted in three sections.

 

Before the incense was burnt for the Evening Sacrifice, or yet the lamps in the Golden Candlestick were trimmed for the night, the Paschal-Lambs were slain. The worshippers were admitted in three divisions within the Court of the Priests. When the first company had entered, the massive Nicanor Gates - which led from the Court of the Women to that of Israel - and the other side-gates into the Court of the Priests, were closed. A threefold blast from the Priests’ trumpets intimated that the Lambs were being slain. This each Israelite did for himself. We can scarcely be mistaken in supposing that Peter and John would be in the first of the three companies into which the offerers were divided; for they must have been anxious to be gone, and to meet the Master and their brethren in that ‘Upper Room.’ Peter and John had slain the Lamb. In two rows the officiating Priest stood, up to the great Altar of Burnt-offering. As one caught up the blood from the dying Lamb in a golden bowl. he handed it to his colleague, receiving in return an empty bowl; and so the blood was passed on to the Great Altar, where it was jerked in one jet at the base of the Altar. While this was going on, the Hallel (Psa 113-118) was being chanted by the Levites. Only the first line of every Psalm was repeated by the worshippers; while to every other line they responded by a Halleluyah, till Ps. 118 was reached, when, besides the first, these three lines were also repeated:

 

It’s amazing to read through these Psalms and hear what they heard that afternoon. Right through to the end of Psa 118 the songs are all about the power and compassion of Jehovah. That’s what they’ve seen in the Lord for the last 3.5 years, but then at the end of Psalm 118 the words take a different coarse.

 

Ps 118:25-26

O Lord, do save [Hosanna], we beseech Thee;

O Lord, we beseech Thee, do send prosperity!

26 Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord;

We have blessed you from the house of the Lord.

 

Where have we heard these words before? 4 days ago, the first day of the passion week at the Lord’s triumphal entry.

 

Matt 21:9

And the multitudes going before Him, and those who followed after were crying out, saying,

"Hosanna [save us now] to the Son of David;

Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord;

Hosanna in the highest!"

 

Do you think the disciples remembered this? Of course they did. And also ringing in their ears is the context of this Psalm.

 

The last stanza of the Psalm reads:

 

Ps 118:22 The stone which the builders rejected

Has become the chief corner stone.

 

Peter and John would remember the Lord quoting this passage after He had taught the parable of the evil vine-growers who killed the son of the owner.

 

Matt 21:42 Jesus said to them, "Did you never read in the Scriptures,

'The stone which the builders rejected,

This became the chief corner stone;

This came about from the Lord,

And it is marvelous in our eyes'?

 

Matt 21:43"Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you, and be given to a nation producing the fruit of it.

 

Matt 21:44"And he who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; but on whomever it falls, it will scatter him like dust."

 

Ps 118:23This is the Lord's doing;

It is marvelous in our eyes.

 

Ps 118:24This is the day which the Lord has made;

Let us rejoice and be glad in it.

 

Ps 118:25O Lord, do save, we beseech Thee;

O Lord, we beseech Thee, do send prosperity!

 

 

 

Ps 118:26Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord;

We have blessed you from the house of the Lord.

 

Ps 118:27The Lord is God, and He has given us light;

Bind the festival sacrifice with cords to the horns of the altar.

 

Ps 118:28Thou art my God, and I give thanks to Thee;

Thou art my God, I extol Thee.

 

Ps 118:29Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good;

For His lovingkindness [grace] is everlasting.

 

Imagine what they must be thinking when they hear these words.

 

Little more remained to be done. The sacrifice was laid on staves which rested on the shoulders of Peter and John, flayed, cleansed, and the parts which were to be burnt on the Altar removed and prepared for burning. The second company of offerers could not have proceeded far in the service, when the Apostles, bearing their Lamb, were winding their way back to the home of Mark, there to make final preparations for the ‘Supper.’

 

The Lamb would be roasted on a pomegranate spit that passed right through it from mouth to vent, special care being taken that, in roasting, the Lamb did not touch the oven.

 

Everything else, also, would be made ready: the unleavened cakes, the bitter herbs, the dish with vinegar, and that with Charoseth would be placed on a table which could be carried in and moved at will; finally, the festive lamps would be prepared.

 

‘It was probably as the sun was beginning to decline in the horizon that Jesus and the other ten disciples descended once more over the Mount of Olives into the Holy City. Before them lay Jerusalem in her festive attire.

 

All around, pilgrims were hastening towards it. White tents dotted the sward, dazzling with the bright flowers of early spring, or peered out from the gardens or the darker foliage of the olive plantations.

 

From the gorgeous Temple buildings, dazzling in their snow-white marble and gold, on which the slanting rays of the sun were reflected, rose the smoke of the Altar of Burnt-offering.

 

These courts were now crowded with eager worshippers, offering for the last time, in the real sense, their Paschal Lambs. The streets must have been thronged with strangers, and the flat roofs covered with eager gazers, who either feasted their eyes with a first sight of the sacred City for which they had so often longed, or else once more rejoiced in view of the well-known localities.

 

It was the last day-view which the Lord could take, free and unhindered, of the Holy City till His Resurrection. Once more, in the approaching night of His Betrayal, would He look upon it in the pale light of the full moon.

 

He was going forward to accomplish His Death in Jerusalem; to fulfill type and prophecy, and to offer Himself up as the true Passover Lamb - “the Lamb of God, which takes away the sin of the world.”

 

They who followed Him were busy with many thoughts. They knew that terrible events awaited them, and they had only shortly before been told that these glorious Temple-buildings, to which, with a national pride not unnatural, they had directed the attention of their Master, were to become desolate, not one stone being left upon the other.

 

Among them, revolving his dark plans, and goaded on by the great Enemy, moved the betrayer. And now they were within the City. Its Temple, its royal bridge, its splendid palaces, its busy marts, its streets filled with festive pilgrims, were well known to them, as they made their way to the house where the guest-chamber had been prepared. Meanwhile, the crowd came down from the Temple-Mount, each bearing on his shoulders the sacrificial Lamb, to make ready for the Paschal Supper.’

 

 

 

 

 

John 13:1 Now before the Feast of the Passover, Jesus knowing that His hour had come that He should depart out of this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end.

 

The feast of the Passover is the first in the Levitical series. It is described in Exodus 12 and mentioned doctrinally in 1 Corinthians 5:7.

   

1 Cor 5:7

Clean out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed.

 

It portrays the death of Christ on the cross. With the feast of the Passover Jesus Christ is terminating His public ministry. By nine o’clock the next morning Jesus Christ will be on the cross.

 

So what we have in chapters 13, 14, 15, 16, and 17 all occurs approximately 16 hours before the crucifixion.

 

Jesus Christ has stopped all public teaching and focuses His attention on the disciples, which He has been doing for the last two days.

 

The discourse—called the upper room discourse—begins at this point.

 

Jesus Christ is going to give two messages on this evening. The first message will be given in the upper room; the second message will be given after they departed from the upper room and went out to Gethsemane.

 

One is given in a banquet hall on the second floor and the second is given in a garden at the foot of the Mount of Olives. These two discourses are the prophetical preparation for the Church Age.

 

The recipients of these two messages are the eleven born-again disciples, and part of it was heard by Judas Iscariot.

 

John 13:1 Now before the Feast of the Passover, Jesus knowing that His hour had come that He should depart out of this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end.

 

“Jesus [always refers to the humanity of Christ] knew” - prefect active participle of o)idaused as a present tense for His omniscience. Jesus is always the name for the humanity of Christ; o)idais used for His omniscience. Here we have the hypostatic union, the God-Man. Knowledge also resided in His right lobe—in His frame of reference, vocabulary and categorical area of His humanity.

 

Also He had an ECS, He GAPed to supergrace, so that in His humanity, as well as in His deity, was thoroughly cognisant of the plan of God the Father. Now, in His cognisance He is going to communicate.

 

“that his hour” - reference to the cross, John 12:23; 17:1; Mark 14:41. The word hour is not used for 60 minutes here. The word is often used in a dramatic time of victory and that is exactly the way that God the Holy Spirit uses it from the pen of John the Apostle. It took six hours but it was the Lord’s finest hour, His hour of victory in the angelic conflict.

           

“was come” - aorist active indicative of e)rxomai. This is a culminative aorist—had come; “that” - purpose clause, i(naplus the subjunctive.

           

“he should depart” - aorist active subjunctive of metabainwwhich means to go from one place to an entirely different place.

 

It refers to the physical death of Christ when His body went into the grave—Luke 23:53; His soul went to Paradise in Hades—Psalm 16:10; Luke 23:43; Acts 2:27; Ephesians 4:9; His spirit went to the Father—Luke 23:46.

 

To indicate that these are all out of the world we have e)kplus the ablative of kosmoj—“out from the world.” Therefore the emphasis is on His soul and spirit. His body went into a grave and the grave was on the earth.

 

So out of the trichotomous disposition of Christ at His physical death it is the soul and the spirit which are emphasised and definitely not the body.

           

“unto the Father” - projmeans face to face with the Father.

 

“having loved his own [possessions]” - aorist active participle of a)gapaw. The amazing thing about a)gapawis the fact that while Jesus Christ also had filewthis indicates His mental attitude love, the love of His soul for the disciples—eleven born-again believers—even though in the next 16 hours not only did they not hear His discourse, were very poor in their attention, but as soon as they got out into the action all of them, with the exception of John, really blew it.

 

They were a total and complete flop. Only John managed to come through with anything that looked like honour, and a)gapawexpresses His mental attitude toward those whom He knows are going to fail completely—and that is grace.

 

“in the world” - His mental attitude toward them was relaxed; “he loved them to the end” - in other words, Jesus Christ went all the way to His death and yet His attitude never changes toward the disciples. That is grace.

 

 

 

This indicates that Jesus Christ on the cross was totally relaxed. He loved these disciples as God in eternity past, so He was willing to become true humanity. He loved these disciples in time; He was willing to go to the cross for them and for the entire human race. He loved them on the cross while He was being judged for their sins. His love never changed. And while the other type of love could have been mentioned it is the mental attitude love that is the basis for the other.