Passover: Do it in remembrance of Me

Remember the old thing we say at communion, "Do this in remembrance of Me"? When Jesus said that to his followers, what was Jesus doing? What are we supposed to do in remembrance of Jesus?

Matthew's gospel spells it out plainly:

On the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the disciples came to Jesus and asked, "Where do you want us to make preparations for you to eat the Passover?"

He replied, "Go into the city to a certain man and tell him, 'The Teacher says: My appointed time is near. I am going to celebrate the Passover with my disciples at your house.' " So the disciples did as Jesus had directed them and prepared the Passover.

Here Jesus is celebrating Passover. When he says, "do this in remembrance of Me" a few verses later, he's talking about the Passover -- a Feast of the Lord which we're supposed to be celebrating, one that Jesus made complete by becoming the sacrifice Lamb. Passover is not only God-commanded and Jesus-approved®, it's also reinforced by Paul:

Purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new unleavened lump. For even Messiah, our Passover, is sacrificed for us. So, let us keep the Festival, not with the old yeast of malice and wickedness, but with bread without leaven, the bread of sincerity and truth.

This "leaven" talk is all Passover language: at Passover, we're to eat unleavened bread:

Additionally during Passover, we're to eat lamb meat, taken from a spotless lamb. It was done as a way of remembering the exodus from Egypt.

How does Jesus fit into all this? Leaven is a picture of sin, the lamb was spotless and had to be killed so that death would pass over Israel. Jesus, the sinless, spotless lamb of God, was killed. His blood covers us from death; by becoming an ultimate sacrifice for us, his death atoned for sin. Fulfilling Passover, in this light, was Jesus' real purpose.

If there is 1 Feast of the Lord that modern Christians should celebrate, it's Passover. Jesus himself celebrated it, his disciples celebrated it, Paul celebrated, Jesus commanded others to celebrate it, and Paul commanded others to celebrated it. We can and should do better than labeling it as "the Lord's Supper", pretending to celebrate it during a man-made ritual known as communion. [Ugh.] We can and should do better than that. We should celebrate Passover.

Getting back to the value of Passover and why Christians should celebrate it, I'll let First Fruits of Zion expound on that:

The value of Passover for believers in Messiah transcends mere ritual and symbolism. It speaks to us of the death and resurrection of the Master and the great salvation of human souls. It serves as a type and a shadow for the ultimate redemption that has been granted to us through Messiah. In every respect, it is a festival for believers.

Commentary:

Moreover, they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and on the lintel of the houses in which they eat it. (Exodus 12:7)

Moses commanded the children of Israel to mark their homes with the blood of the Passover lambs. They were to dip hyssop into the blood and smear it on their door posts. Although Passover was thereafter celebrated annually, the Israelite homes were never again smeared with blood from the Passover lambs. The smearing with blood was a one-time ritual. Every Passover thereafter, the blood of the Passover lambs was splashed on the altar in the Tabernacle/Temple as a remembrance of the plague of the firstborn and the blood on the doorposts of Israelite homes in Egypt.

Try to imagine the Passover in the Temple on the day the Master died. While His precious body hung dying on the cross, a short distance outside the city walls pilgrims were flooding the Temple courts, leading their lambs to slaughter. While His blood stained the stones beneath the cross, the priesthood of Israel was splashing basin after basin of Passover blood against the stones of the Temple altar. While the women wept at the foot of the cross, the Levites in the Temple courts were chanting the songs of the Hallel: Psalms 113–119. Once slaughtered, the lambs in the Temple were hung from iron hooks in crucifixion poses for skinning, and once skinned, they were bound by the hooves, hand and foot as it were, to wooden poles, to be carried from the Temple on the backs of the worshippers. Meanwhile, the Master hung in crucifixion pose from iron nails, bound hand and foot to a wooden pole.

Believers have traditionally interpreted the Passover blood on the doorway as a symbol of Messiah’s blood. Consider a few of the parallels. Messiah is called our Passover Lamb. He died at Passover time. Just as the death came upon Egypt to claim the firstborns, so too all mankind is given over to death. Just as those under the protection of the Passover lamb’s blood markings were protected from death, so too those who take refuge under the blood of Messiah are protected from condemnation. They are given eternal life and will overcome death in the resurrection.

What is more, Messiah’s blood marked the soil of Jerusalem, the city in which the Holy Temple is located. According to Jewish tradition, Jerusalem and the Temple therein are called the “gateway to heaven.” It is as if Messiah’s blood was smeared upon the doorposts of heaven.