Apr 5 - Mark 14:41

He came a third time and said to them,

"Are you still sleeping and taking your rest? Enough!

The hour has come; the Son of Man

is betrayed into the hands of sinners.

Mark 14:41

Every week at worship we hear the words, “on the night he was betrayed.”

Each week, indeed, we remember that Jesus took bread and wine, blessed them, called them his body and blood, and instituted the ongoing feast of Holy Communion.

But what else happened on that Holy Thursday?

As you read this today, take a moment to journey along with Christ through your prayers. Read each event. Reflect on what it meant for him. Consider what it means for you.

·         Jesus gathered his disciples, desiring to share a final Passover supper with them.

·         Jesus broke bread and passed a cup, telling them that this represented a body that was broken and bloody – his body which by the end of the day would be broken and bloody and given for me and you.

·         Jesus predicted that one of them – whom he loved – would betray him.

·         Jesus told his closest follower, Peter, that this so-called “Rock” would deny his Messiah – his friend – repeatedly that night.

·         Jesus prays in the garden for his current disciples … and his future disciples.

·         Jesus, as he prays in anguish for “this cup” and this trial to pass from him, has his sweat fall like great drops of blood.

·         Jesus was arrested under the cloak of darkness.

·         Jesus was whipped and beaten.

·         Jesus underwent the sham of a trial in which the judge knew he was innocent, but allowed his execution to stave off a hostile crowd.

·         Jesus had to listen to the voices of the people he love, the people he came to save, crying angrily, “Crucify him. Crucify him.”

·         Jesus was whipped and beaten again, mocked and spat upon.

·         Jesus was stripped of his clothes and dressed in supposedly royal clothes with a crown of piercing thorns on his head.

·         Jesus, exhausted from violent abuse, was forced to carry his own cross through the streets.

·         Jesus was nailed to the cross.

… all on the night (and into the next day) when he was betrayed …

and … all for your sake.

In Christ’s Love,

a humbled, unworthy, and thankful man