The Passover, the Preparation, and the New Covenant (Mark 14.1-25)

Let’s admit it: looking at us from the outside, Christians are weird. No weirder than a lot of other religions, but still…weird. We do a lot of things that will look distinctly weird for someone who has no experience with Christianity.

But one of the strangest things we do as Christians is what we call “Communion”: when we take the bread and the cup, and eat and drink in remembrance of the body of Christ broken for us, and the blood of Christ shed for us.

We aren’t Catholics; we don’t believe that the bread literally becomes the body of Christ, or that the juice literally becomes the blood of Christ.

Even so: it’s a pretty weird thing to do week after week. It may even seem morbid and distasteful.

So why do we do it?

This text gives us the answer to that question, but it goes much further than simply explaining what the act of Communion means. It shows us where our hearts should be when we take it, and where our hearts should go because of having taken it together.

But before we get into it, let’s remember where we are.

Jesus has just spent all of chapter 13 telling his disciples about the end—where they are going, what will happen before his return. (I want to formally thank Joe for preaching these last two weeks; it’s a tough text, and he did a great job getting to the heart of it all.) We saw Jesus’s goal in this teaching at the very end of chapter 13, when he says, simply: “Stay awake.”

His disciples may have assumed that he was giving them a command for further down the road—but as we’ll see, it was a command for right now. Stay awake.

We’re going to have to take this text in several sections, because as usual, even in a simple narrative text, Mark has a lot in mind.

I. The Conspiracy (vv. 1–2, 10–11)

If you’ve grown up in church, you’ve probably had this experience—you go through the year like you always do, but at one or two points in the year, the atmosphere of spiritual devotion becomes a little thicker. It usually happens at Christmas, or at Easter. These are the two biggest Christian holidays, where we remember Christ’s birth and Christ’s death and resurrection. Churches always do something special for these days, as we will, and in the time leading up to them, you’ll find people reading their Bibles with a little more intensity, wanting to make a more concerted effort to think about God and meditate on what he’s done for us.

That’s what the feast of the Passover was like for the Jews.

We can’t get into all the details now, but this feast (which marked the beginning of the Feast of Unleavened Bread) was very elaborate. On the day of the Passover each family or group sacrificed a lamb in the temple and then roasted and ate it in the evening. The lamb was a reminder of Exodus 12: God is about to send judgment on Egypt, who had been holding the people of Israel in slavery. That night, he told them, an angel would pass through Egypt and kill all of the firstborn sons of every family.

But he gave Israel a way to protect themselves from this judgment. Each family was to sacrifice a lamb and put its blood on the doorposts of their homes, so that the angel would “pass over” their homes and not put their firstborn son to death.

Of course, God didn’t strictly need the sign; it’s not like the angel would have accidentally gone into the wrong houses. But through this sacrifice God commanded the Hebrews to perform, he was preparing for something much bigger, much further down the road.

At any rate, that event is what the people celebrated at Passover, and much like for us around Christmas and Easter, religious devotion intensified at this time of year. Which makes what we see in these first sections all the more surprising.

Let’s begin reading again at v. 1:

It was now two days before the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread. And the chief priests and the scribes were seeking how to arrest him by stealth and kill him, 2 for they said, “Not during the feast, lest there be an uproar from the people.”

It’s no surprise that the chief priests and scribes are out to get Jesus; they have been for a long time now. What is surprising is the transparency of their hypocrisy—they want to arrest him and kill Jesus, but not during the feast. Not because the feast is sacred, but because they knew the people wouldn’t like it during the feast. They want to avoid a riot, but not murder.

Now keeping that in mind, go down to v. 10—we see something similar here.

10 Then Judas Iscariot, who was one of the twelve, went to the chief priests in order to betray him to them. 11 And when they heard it, they were glad and promised to give him money. And he sought an opportunity to betray him.

Here we see a similar kind of hypocrisy, but this time coming from a painful source: Judas Iscariot, “one of the twelve”, seeks to betray Jesus in exchange for money. It’s evil, wearing the mask of intimacy. Mark doesn’t give us a lot of information about what motivated Judas to betray Jesus (we see a little more in the other gospels, especially in the gospel of John, but we never get a comprehensive view of his heart, as we do for, say, Peter).

Ultimately, it doesn’t really matter, because what Mark wants to show us is that evil is coming at Jesus from all quarters: from without and from within.

Now, we’ve often talked about how much Mark loves to structure his narrative like a sandwich, to highlight or contrast his point. We have the plotting of the religious leaders in v. 1-2, and then Judas joining their conspiracy in v. 10-11.

What comes in between—in the middle of the sandwich?

II. The Burial Preparation (vv. 3–9)

Remember the context of this chapter, the last thing Jesus said in chapter 13: Stay awake. One of the goals of the Passover—of all the feasts—was to help the people do this. To not forget what God has done. To remember that he is still active. To stay awake.

The religious leaders and Judas, plotting against Jesus, are beyond “asleep”—they’re as dead. But in between them, we see one person who is indeed awake.

V. 3:

3 And while he was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, as he was reclining at table, a woman came with an alabaster flask of ointment of pure nard, very costly, and she broke the flask and poured it over his head. 4 There were some who said to themselves indignantly, “Why was the ointment wasted like that? 5 For this ointment could have been sold for more than three hundred denarii and given to the poor.” And they scolded her.

Side note: We usually try not to refer to the other gospels when we’re in one, because each gospel writer has his own reasons for writing as he does. But for simplicity’s sake, I’m going to this time. The gospel of John, in chapter 12, identifies this woman as Mary, the sister of Martha and Lazarus, so I’m going to refer to her by name (instead of calling her “the woman who anointed Jesus”).

It’s two days before the Passover, so anticipation is high: every meal is full of meaning, and every mind and heart is (or should be) on God. So Jesus and his disciples are at Bethany, eating in the home of a friend, and Mary comes in and shocks everyone.

She breaks this alabaster flask of ointment and pours it over Jesus’s head.

This was shocking for a number of reasons. First of all, this wasn’t a normal thing to do with a guest. A servant would wash guests’ feet when they came to visit, but they wouldn’t pour ointment over their heads. This sort of thing was more likely to be seen in the tabernacle or the temple, when one could give herbs or perfumes as an offering before God.

And Mary wasn’t a servant anyway—she had been a close friend of Jesus for years.

Secondly, Mark tells us that this ointment was “very costly.” He’s understating it a bit—a flask of pure nard was worth almost a year’s wages for a laborer. It likely represented Mary’s entire life savings.

Not surprisingly, then, some of the disciples chastise her for it. “If you wanted to use the ointment well, you could have sold it and given the money to the poor.” I’ll admit this is the sort of thing I would have said; at first glance, it seems like poor stewardship of material wealth.

But what Jesus says is staggering. V. 6:

6 But Jesus said, “Leave her alone. Why do you trouble her? She has done a beautiful thing to me. 7 For you always have the poor with you, and whenever you want, you can do good for them. But you will not always have me. 8 She has done what she could; she has anointed my body beforehand for burial. 9 And truly, I say to you, wherever the gospel is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in memory of her.”

The most surprising thing about Jesus’s response, I think, is not that Jesus appreciated the gesture. It’s that it meant something more than a gesture of devotion (like the woman who anoints Jesus’s feet in Luke 7—despite similarities, this is not the same event). He says in v. 8, “She has done what she could; she has anointed my body beforehand for burial.” We may ask whether or not Mary understood exactly what she was doing (I personally think she did, because she knew Jesus well and had almost definitely heard him say he was going to Jerusalem to die), but in the end, it doesn’t matter—she and everyone else would understand later.

Burial anointing was a Jewish custom—when someone died, they’d wash the body, wrap it in linen, and then rub it with aromatic oils and spices. This wasn’t mainly to ward off decomposition, but rather to honor the person who has died (like an extravagant display of flowers at a funeral today, but much more meaningful).

When Jesus died—as we see later on, in chapter 15—the nature of his death was such that they didn’t have time to do all this. When Joseph of Arimathea took Jesus’s body, he simply wrapped him in the linen and laid him in the tomb. It wasn’t until after the Sabbath, on Sunday morning, that the women came back to the tomb with the spices, so that they could anoint Jesus’s body.

But what did they find when they got there?

They found an empty tomb.

As it turned out, the women didn’t have to anoint his body, not just because the body was no longer in the tomb, but because the anointing had already taken place.

In addition, nard oil—the kind that Mary poured on Jesus’s head—is a fixative oil: it clings to skin and hair for a very long time. A few drops could be smelled on skin or on clothes for several days. An entire jar poured over someone’s head—mingling into his hair, his beard, his clothes, and the skin of his neck and shoulders—could have lasted as long as a week, even after washing. A quick shake of the head would have brought the smell back.

This anointing happened two days before Jesus’s arrest. This means that while Jesus was being arrested, while he was being beaten and scourged, when the crown of thorns was placed on his head, when he was being nailed to the cross, mingled in with the odor of sweat and blood, it is quite likely that he smelled the perfume, and remembered his anointing.

It would have been a simple comfort in such a painful time, but not a meaningless one.

Mary’s anointing very likely stayed with Jesus until the end. But the most important thing to see here is that Mary understood something the others seemed to have missed. Mary understood what Jesus was worth to her. He was going to die, and although she surely didn’t understand the full meaning behind his death, she definitely recognized what his death was worth. It was worth everything she had, everything she was, poured out as an offering to him.

III. The New Covenant (vv. 12–25)

So Mark gives us this contrast between Mary’s costly gesture and the plotting of the religious leaders and Judas, and it’s unsettling; Mark has made sure that we know that moving forward, things are going to get very dark.

That is the feeling with which we arrive at the day of the Passover. V. 12:

12 And on the first day of Unleavened Bread, when they sacrificed the Passover lamb, his disciples said to him, “Where will you have us 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 carrying a jar of water will meet you. Follow him, 14 and wherever he enters, say to the master of the house, ‘The Teacher says, Where is my guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?’ 15 And he will show you a large upper room furnished and ready; there prepare for us.” 16 And the disciples set out and went to the city and found it just as he had told them, and they prepared the Passover.

This seems like a bit of unnecessary detail, but if you’ve been reading this gospel with us, you’ll understand why Mark’s telling us these things. It’s very similar to what we saw in chapter 11, before Jesus’s triumphal entry in Jerusalem. Jesus tells his disciples where to go and what to find and what to say, and everything happens exactly as he says.

The religious leaders are plotting to kill Jesus, Judas is looking for an opportunity to betray him… But none of that is happening outside of God’s sovereignty. Jesus’s impending death is not a bump in the road; it is the plan. It is why he has come. God’s purposes are not derailed by human evil—they are often advanced through it.

So the preparations are made; the lamb has been sacrificed and prepared, and finally it is time for the meal.

We’ve all had Christmas dinners, Easter dinners. After the stress and busyness of preparation, everyone can finally relax and sit down and enjoy the food, enjoy one another.

This was not that kind of meal.

V. 17:

17 And when it was evening, he came with the twelve. 18 And as they were reclining at table and eating, Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, one of you will betray me, one who is eating with me.” 19 They began to be sorrowful and to say to him one after another, “Is it I?” 20 He said to them, “It is one of the twelve, one who is dipping bread into the dish with me. 21 For the Son of Man goes as it is written of him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been better for that man if he had not been born.”

It’s hard to overstate the shock this must have been for the disciples, to everyone except Judas, who of course knew what he was doing. But it did make me wonder why Jesus wasn’t more specific. Why didn’t he say, “This guy here, Judas, is going to betray me”? Why did he leave the disciples in suspense, wondering who it might be?

I think it’s because, like he said before, he wanted them to stay awake—to be on their guard. If “one of the twelve, one who is dipping bread into the dish with me,” could betray him, how could they be sure any of them would remain faithful?

It’s a good question—and Jesus gives the answer in what we see next. V. 22:

22 And as they were eating, he took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to them, and said, “Take; this is my body.” 23 And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, and they all drank of it. 24 And he said to them, “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many.

How could any of the disciples be sure they would remain faithful? They couldn’t—not on their own.

But they were not alone. Through what Jesus was about to do, God was establishing a new covenant with his people.

God had previously established a covenant with his people, saying that they would be his people, and he would be their God, on one condition: the people had to obey the law he gave to Moses. In Exodus 24, that covenant was ratified through sacrifice: Moses took the blood of the animals sacrificed and sprinkled it over the people. The blood of the sacrifice was the sign that the covenant was adopted.

The problem with covenants, though, is that they’re easy to neglect. Every married couple takes vows before their wedding; but over the years, especially when conflict arises, it’s all too easy to find excuses for not respecting the vows we made the day of our wedding. Instead of responding in love and support, we respond with anger and aggression. And we feel we can do this because we know the other person, frankly, isn’t going anywhere: they’re stuck with us.

That is what had happened with the people of Israel: they had begun to take their covenant with God for granted. They had started to think more about their own lives and their own worries than God’s plan—the plan he had stated to Abraham. They had stopped fully trusting God, and started relying on their own ability to make themselves what they wanted to be.

Of course, this wasn’t a surprise for God. He had announced his plan from the very beginning, as early as Genesis 3, and throughout the history of his people. His plan was never that the people would manage to hold up their end of the bargain; he knew they couldn’t do that. God’s plan was always to fulfill the covenant for them, and to establish a new, irrevocable covenant with them.

To put it simply, when Jesus says, “This is my body,” and “This is my blood”, he is telling the disciples that he is going to be the sacrifice that no Passover lamb could ever be. This new covenant, ratified by Christ’s blood on the cross, isn’t like the old covenant; it is not conditional on our perfect obedience. It doesn’t need to be, because Christ obeyed perfectly for us, in our place. It is done. It is finished. It is permanent.

This is the first time disciples of Christ took part in this act, and it is an act the church has repeated ever since, and for the same reasons.

Every time we take the bread and the cup, we’re not doing it in order to get something we don’t already have; we’re not doing it in order to make ourselves right with God. We’re doing to remember and to remind one another that we already are right with God, and that that isn’t going to change.

Now, does this mean that Communion is only symbolic, that is only a memorial of what Christ did? I don’t think so. From the beginning, the church has believed that when God’s people take Communion together, they aren’t just remembering, but participating in what Christ did. It’s a means of grace that God gives us, to help fuel our faithfulness to him.

But here is where a lot of people get it wrong. They look at their lives, they look at their struggles, and they don’t feel worthy to participate in this moment. They see that there are areas of their lives in which they’re struggling with sin. They see that there are relationships they’ve damaged, people they’ve hurt, or people they’ve been hurt by, and they haven’t yet taken steps to repair those relationships—to forgive, or to ask for forgiveness.

And so they don’t feel worthy to take the bread and the cup.

So what do they do when the bread and the cup are passed out? They don’t take it. They think, “Maybe next time; maybe once I’ve got my life more in order, I’ll participate.”

That instinct isn’t entirely wrong. If there are areas of our lives in which we are living in disobedience, then Communion is a forceful reminder of the need to do that: to repent of our sin, to forgive, to ask for forgiveness, to stay awake!

But it is crucial to remember that when Jesus established this ritual with his disciples, their lives were not in order. A few hours later, they would all leave him; Peter would deny him; Judas would betray him. Jesus didn’t wait for Acts 2, when it seemed the disciples finally started to get their act together, to give them the bread and the cup.

He gave it to them when they were still imperfect, still sinful, still not entirely faithful.

And it makes total sense, because the whole point of the new covenant is that it doesn’t depend on our obedience, but on his.

So if your instinct is to look at the bread and cup and feel unworthy to take it, you’re right. You are unworthy—and so am I. But that is no reason to abstain. That, in fact, is precisely why you shouldn’t abstain. Your sin is not big enough to annul Christ’s sacrifice for us. If you’ve been saved by faith, it’s because of his obedience, not yours. And his obedience is always perfect, no matter how sinful you feel. So take the reminder of this moment to repent of your sin, to go and ask forgiveness if you need to, to reconcile with your brother or sister if you need to—and then take, and eat, and drink.

Because you are not the center of this moment. None of us are. Christ is the sacrifice we are remembering; it is through the faith that Christ gave us that we are saved; Christ’s obedience is what we bring before God, not our own. He is the center.

Now, Jesus says one more thing after giving the bread and the cup to his disciples—and it’s something that should give us hope. V. 25:

25 Truly, I say to you, I will not drink again of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.

Wine is a staple of every feast; this is something we understand well in France. Wine at a feast is synonymous with celebration.

And thank the Lord, it is the same in the kingdom of God.

Jesus says that he will not again drink wine “until that day”—what day?—“when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.”

This Passover feast would be the last feast Jesus would celebrate in his earthly life…but there is another feast coming. When Christ returns, and all things are made new—everything we talked about these past two weeks—there will be celebration.

Conclusion

Let’s take a step back now.

This text frames the sacrament of Communion in a really particular way. There is a context behind it. The context of the Passover, of course—but also, the context of Jesus’s anointing in Bethany.

When Jesus gave them the bread and the cup, it was just after the meal at which they ate the Passover lamb—this memorial to the sacrifice given in Egypt, that saved the Hebrews from judgment. And while they were eating this meal—while they were taking the bread and the cup—it is quite likely that they could still smell Mary’s perfume on Jesus, surrounding him, mixing in with the smells of the meat and the bread and the wine.

While we were studying this text in home group this week, someone asked a great question: “What must the first Communion have been like for the disciples, after Christ’s resurrection?” Because this time, at this particular meal, it was a) the only time they took it with Jesus physically present; and b) the only time they probably didn’t really understand what they were doing.

But after the resurrection, it would have been different. At every Communion after this one, they wouldn’t have smelled the nard—because Christ had risen and ascended into heaven. And they wouldn’t have had a Passover lamb, because now they knew that Jesus was the Passover lamb, sacrificed to free his people from judgment, once and for all.

At every other Communion after the resurrection, and ever since, the bread and the wine alone are enough to bring all of these things to mind.

Given this incredible context, we should see that Communion isn’t just a memorial—it’s a call to conscience, and a call to action. Every time we take the bread and the cup, one question should be in the front of our minds: What is Jesus’s death worth to us?

There are many ways to answer that question, many ways to respond to Christ’s sacrifice.

Many respond like the religious leaders, like Judas: in the face of Christ, there is revulsion and rejection.

Many respond like the disciples in this chapter—with bewilderment and confusion and doubt (“Is it me? Am I going to betray him? How can I be sure I’ll stay faithful?”).

But the only right way to respond, the only fitting way, is like Mary. Faced with the imminent death of her Lord, she gave the most costly thing she had. It was a material gift, yes, but it was representative of everything she had, everything she was.

The most costly thing all of us have to give is ourselves. Our lives. Our affections and desires. Not just everything we have, but everything we are.

The idea of giving Christ everything we are can be intimidating—but it needn’t be, because we know we’re not alone. We’re not working under our own power. We have received the new covenant of Christ’s blood, which guarantees that if we have faith in him, we will make it.

So as we take Communion now, let us ask ourselves: What is Jesus’s death—what is the New Covenant he established with his people—worth to us? What should I give him that I am still holding back? And why would I want to hold back? What am I holding on to that could ever be better than what I have received in the New Covenant?

What is he worth to us?