Maundy Thursday (April 1, 2010)
By Rev. Bert A. ThompsonSteve Bagnall

Blood: it’s the stuff of life. Blood carries nutrients to all parts of the body. The lungs might take in oxygen, but it’s the blood that carries oxygen to every cell. Blood is life. Too much loss of blood means loss of life. God’s Word is filled with blood – especially the loss of blood.

In the Garden of Eden, God creates Adam and Eve naked and without shame. Then comes sin. Sin causes shame. Adam and Eve try to cover their shameful sin with fig leaves, but fig leaves don’t do it. Sin can only be covered by blood, by the spilling of blood and death. God does the first killing. God sacrifices one of His own created animals. Of that first animal sacrifice, out of that first spilling of blood, God makes coverings of skin, that is, leather clothes for Adam and Eve. Through the spilling of blood, their sinful shame is covered.

For sinners, it’s either their blood, or the blood of a substitute in their place. It’s either our blood to pay for our sins or the blood of a substitute. The sacrifices in the Old Testament looked forward to the final Sacrifice of Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God. Abel offers God the best of his flock, sacrificed on an altar of bloody death. Immediately after the Flood, Noah offers God the blood of a sacrifice. Moses receives from God the liturgy of worship: the sacrifices in the Tabernacle and the shedding of blood. For four thousand years, God’s people come into God’s presence with blood, the blood of cattle and doves and goats and rams and sheep.

Passover is the greatest sacrifice of the Old Testament as it points to Christ. On the eve of their rescue from slavery in Egypt, God tells His people to prepare a lamb for slaughter, one for each family. It must be a lamb without defect, perfect in every way. The lamb is to be roasted over fire and eaten with unleavened bread. The blood of the lamb is to be taken and painted on the doorframes of their houses. When God sees the blood, He will pass over those houses and spare their lives.

Why blood? When we sin, we go the opposite way of God. God is life. To go away from God is to go toward death. To choose sin is to choose death. The only way to save us from our rightly deserved death is to have a substitute who takes our place and dies instead of us. God is just and fair. God does not let sin off. God’s Word says, “Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness.” (Heb. 9:22 NIV) Without the shedding of blood, our guilt remains on our own heads and we must receive the rightful punishment for our sins.

Throughout the Old Testament, God shows His people that He will save them through blood: the blood of a substitute who dies in their place. The entire Old Testament system of sacrifices is a picture of Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, the final bloody sacrifice for all sin of all time.

Jesus is our great High Priest. High priests for a thousand years sacrificed animals in the Tabernacle and Temple as they waited for the promised Messiah. Now, that promised Messiah, Jesus Christ, our High Priest, has sacrificed Himself and spilt His own blood on the altar of the cross, so we can live.

Holy Scripture has one purpose, one theme and that is the forgiveness of our sins. Therefore, everything in the Old Testament points toward Christ, especially toward these four days of Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday and Easter. And everything in the entire Bible, from Genesis to Revelation, points to Christ as He comes to the city of Jerusalem and what happens to Him there. And everything in Jerusalem centers on blood. For a thousand years before Jesus was born, hundreds of thousands of animals were killed and millions of gallons of blood were spilled on that Temple mount in Jerusalem – all in anticipation of this holy week, because “without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness.”

We sing a hymn during Lent and sometimes during Communion – a hymn that troubles me. Verse one goes like this: “Glory be to Jesus, Who in bitter pains, Poured for me the lifeblood from His sacred veins.” Verse one is okay, but it’s the last verse that bothers me: “Lift we then, our voices, Swell the mighty flood;
Louder still and louder, Praise the precious Blood.” This last verse bothers me because it is true. I don’t like to think about it. I don’t want a Jesus covered with sticky blood and sweat and the smell of death. I want a Jesus Who is happy and fun to be with. Recently, I saw a painting of Jesus on the cross and in this painting, Jesus is covered with flies. I don’t like that morbid reality. I don’t like death, especially when this Jesus’ death is my fault. I should be hanging on the cross instead of Jesus. It should be my blood dripping on the ground, not His. But this is love, that God the Son sheds His blood in my place and in your place for my sins and your sins. His blood sets us free from sin, from the devil and from eternal death.

Our logo at St. Luke is 1 Corinthians 1:23 – “We preach Christ crucified.” Without the death of Christ, we are doomed. Without the precious Blood of Jesus, we will be sacrificed on the altar of our own sins. Without the spilling of the Blood of God, our sins separate us from God. But Jesus is separated from His Father in our place. Jesus cries out on the cross: “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” Jesus suffered the separation from God and the torment of hell in our place. Thank God that Jesus’ suffering and death saves us. Jesus’ blood is the medicine that gives us eternal life, because “Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness.”

Thank God that you are alive now in the year 2010. You see and you hear what the prophets of old longed to see and hear. You know in person what they only understood at a distance. You participate here in what they only gained in heaven after their death, this feast at the Supper Table of Jesus, the Son of God.

Tonight, Jesus again says to you, “Take, eat; this is My Body. Take, drink; this is My Blood.” You receive the very real Body of the Lamb of God in the bread and the very real Blood of that same Lamb in the wine. “The blood of Jesus Christ purifies us from all sin.” (1 Jn. 1:7) This bread is not a symbol of Jesus’ Body. If so, it would do nothing for you. This wine is not a symbol of Jesus’ Blood. Symbols and representations cannot forgive sins. Instead, you are receiving the actual Body that died for you and the actual Blood that drained from Jesus’ veins. Thank God that this is not make-believe or feel-good, but this meal is really Jesus.

The sinless Son of God joins Himself to you in this meal. In His Body, your sinful self dies and in His Blood, you are cleansed. In this Holy Supper, Christ Jesus takes your sin into Himself and in His Body and Blood He gives you His sinlessness.

In Christ and through His blood, we live because He lives. After supper on this holy night, Jesus says: “By this, all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (Jn. 13:35) In Christ and through His blood, “we love, because He first loved us.” (1 Jn. 4:19) Amen.