Pathway to Victory

Speaker 1

Hey, podcast listeners, thanks for streaming today's podcast from Pathway to Victory.

Pathway to Victory is a nonprofit ministry featuring the Bible teaching of Dr. Robert Jeffress. Our mission is to pierce the darkness with the light of God's word through the most effective media available, like this podcast.

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Now here's today's podcast from Pathway to Victory.

Speaker 2

Hi, this is Robert Jeffress, and I'm.

Speaker 3

Glad to study God's Word with you every day.

Speaker 2

This Bible teaching program on today's edition of Pathway to Victory.

Speaker 3

The bread represents the fact that Jesus the Son was willing to give up the perks and privileges of heaven to take on bodily form to offer himself as a sacrifice for our sins.

And so Jesus, holding the bread, said, "This is my body, which is given for you."

Speaker 4

Welcome to Pathway to Victory with author and pastor, Dr. Robert Jeffress.

For 1,300 years, the feast of Unleavened Bread was the most significant feast in the Jewish tradition. It was an annual reminder of the time when God proved himself faithful and led the Israelites out of slavery.

Today, on Pathway to Victory, Dr. Robert Jeffress shares how Jesus gave the Passover meal a whole new meaning.

Now, here's our Bible teacher to introduce today's message. Dr. Jeffress.

Speaker 2

Thanks, David, and welcome again to Pathway to Victory. With Easter Sunday coming, we decided to devote this entire week to the power of the cross. Look, our entire Christian faith is founded on the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The empty tomb defines our Christian faith and sets us apart from every other religion.

Well, behind the scenes at Pathway to Victory, our creative team helped me prepare an exclusive coffee table book that celebrates the power of the cross. With colorful images from the Holy Land, the Power of the Cross tells the story of seven days in the life of Jesus, from his triumphal entry into Jerusalem to his glorious resurrection on Easter morning. And when you give a generous gift to support the ministry of Pathway to Victory, I'll make sure you receive a copy of this book called the Power of the Cross.

During this season that celebrates the crux of our Christian faith, we're inviting you to become one of our valued Pathway partners. When you sign up to become a monthly giver, you're actually becoming a missionary of sorts who carries the Pathway to Victory far and wide. Right now, we're looking to add 52 missionaries to our family. Would you be willing to step forward as a Pathway partner? All the details are at ptv.org.

I'm going to share more details with you later in today's program, but right now, let's get started with our new study for today. Quoting the familiar words of Jesus, I titled today's message "In Remembrance of Me."

Speaker 3

In his book *The God Delusion*, Oxford scientist and atheist Richard Dawkins explained the reason that he has rejected Christianity and believes it's merely a myth. Dawkins writes, "I don't see Jesus coming down and dying on a cross as worthy of that grandeur. If there is a God, it's going to be a whole lot bigger and a whole lot more incomprehensible than anything any theologian or religion has ever proposed." Of course, Richard Dawkins is actually making the case for Christianity. If Christianity were simply a manufactured myth, it would be a lot more grandiose than God coming in human form, dying on a wooden cross in some remote part of the earth. Wouldn't you come up with a better story than that? But the fact is, that is the Gospel. And Paul says, although that gospel is foolishness to those who are perishing, it's the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes.

And it's that simple message of the Gospel that Jesus articulates both in his words and illustrates through the ritual we're going to look at today in Luke chapter 22. If you have your Bibles, I want you to turn to Luke 22. Look at verse one. Now, the feast of unleavened bread, which is called the Passover, was approaching. Before the Passover could occur, there is a bit of business that had to take place, and that is the betrayal of Jesus Christ. You see the seeds for that betrayal that preceded the Passover taking place in these first six verses. Look at verse two of Luke 22. "And the chief priests and the scribes were seeking how they might put him to death, for they were afraid of the people." The public opinion had not yet shifted against Jesus, where they could have arrested Jesus in broad daylight and crucified him. So they were looking for a way to secretly arrest Jesus and do away with him. They were sitting there thinking, how can we do this? When on that Wednesday, opportunity came knocking at their door. And that opportunity was named Judas.

Look at verse three. "And Satan entered into Judas, who was called Iscariot, belonging to the number of the 12. And he went away and discussed with the chief priests and officers how he might betray him to them. And they were glad and agreed to give him money. And he consented and began seeking a good opportunity to betray him to them, apart from the multitude." That's what they wanted, a way to betray Jesus, apart from the crowd so that they wouldn't suffer their wrath. And so he sold him out for 30 pieces of silver. Now all of this in verses one to six are setting the stage for the Passover meal.

Let's look, beginning in verse seven, with the observance that Jesus celebrated of the Passover. "Then came the first day of unleavened bread on which the Passover lamb had to be sacrificed." We're now at Thursday. And Jesus sent Peter and John saying, "Go and prepare the Passover for us so that we may eat it." And they said to him, "Where do you want us to prepare it?" Jesus says in verse 10, "Go look for a man who will be carrying a pitcher of water on his head. Follow him to wherever he is going and ask him for a room." Of course, all of this was prearranged by God. And so verse 12 tells us that Peter and John found that owner and they took them to a large upper room. Verse 12 says, "where they would prepare the Passover."

Now notice Jesus sent Peter and John to make these arrangements secretly. He didn't ask all of the apostles to go, just Peter and John. Why is that? Because he wanted to keep the location secret from Judas. Had Judas known where they were going to meet, he could have prearranged with the Jewish authorities and the Roman authorities to capture Jesus. You say, "Well, why would that be a big deal?" Jesus knew he was going to die anyway. Jesus wasn't afraid of dying. He didn't want to die prematurely because he had some important business to take care of before his arrest, his trials, and his crucifixion. And the important business was the Passover meal. As you will see in a moment, Jesus was going to use that meal. He was going to transform its meaning to a brand new meaning. So it was very important to keep this information away from Judas until the last moment.

Look at verse 13. "And so they departed and they found everything just as he had told them. And they prepared the Passover." Now let's look at the partaking of the meal itself. Let me say a word about the significance of this entire Passover meal. Sometimes we call it the Last Supper. For 1300 years, this meal had pointed back to Israel's physical deliverance from Egypt. But from this point on, Jesus would transform the meaning of this meal to point to the spiritual deliverance from sin he would offer us through his death on the cross.

Look at verse 14. "When the hour had come, Jesus reclined at the table and the apostles with him." He reclined at the table. It was normal in a meal like this to have a low setting table, and around the table in a horseshoe shape were couches. We find from John 13 and other accounts that at the head of that horseshoe shape were two people. The apostle John was to the right of Jesus in the place of honor, and Judas was in the second place of honor on the left as well.

Look at verse 15, what Jesus said. "And he said to them, I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you." Literally in Greek, "I have desired, with a great desire to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. For I say to you, I shall never again eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God." Now, that evening, Jesus observed the traditional Passover meal. We call it the Seder. Some of you have eaten a Jewish Seder Passover meal. It's a very complicated meal. Now remember, Luke was written to the Gentiles. So Luke doesn't go into a detailed explanation of the entire Seder meal. Instead, he focuses on two parts of that meal.

Jesus takes two elements from this meal and attaches a brand new meaning to them. The whole Passover meal was built around four cups of wine, or Welch's grape juice, if you're a Baptist. But it was built around these four cups of wine. And let me show you what they were. First of all, the first cup would be blessed by the Father, the head of the family, followed by herbs dipped in sauce. This is what Jesus does in verse 17. Then the second cup came after an explanation of the Father of the meaning of the Passover. It also came after the singing of the Hallel Psalms, the praise psalms, usually Psalm 113 and 114. Then the third cup follows the blessing and the breaking of the unleavened bread and the meal of the lamb. The final cup follows the singing of an additional Hallel Psalm, probably Psalms 115 to 118.

Now, what we call the Lord's Supper, where Jesus singles out two of these elements to attach a new meaning to them, occurred between the second and the third cup. That's where this takes place. Look at verse 19, where Jesus takes the bread after drinking the second cup. "And when he had taken some bread and given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, 'This is my body which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.'" Now this bread Jesus took was unleavened. In the Old Testament, leaven represented sin. Since this bread ultimately would represent the body of Jesus Christ, it had to be without leaven, without sin. The fact that God's Son came in bodily form is foundational to the Christian faith.

In fact, I want you to hold your place here and turn over to Hebrews 10:5-7. "Therefore, when he, talking about the Messiah, comes into the world, he says, 'Sacrifice and offering, Thou hast not desired, but a body Thou hast prepared for me. In whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin, Thou hast not taken pleasure in those. Then I said, behold, I have come in the scroll of the book. It is written of me to do Thy will, O God.'" The sacrifice had to come in human form. The bread represents the fact that Jesus the Son was willing to give up the privileges of heaven to take on bodily form to offer himself as a sacrifice for our sins.

And so Jesus, holding the bread, said, "This is my body which is given for you." And then notice, after eating the bread before the third cup, verse 20, he says, "And in the same way Jesus took the cup after they had eaten, saying, 'This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood.'" The cup represents the new covenant, the new agreement, the New Testament, if you will. That means the agreement that God has made with man. The Old Testament, the old agreement, was based on works. The Old Testament was very simple. God said, "Here are my rules. Obey them and you'll find favor with me. Disobey them and you'll be judged by me." The only problem was nobody was capable of keeping those endless regulations.

And so built within the old covenant was a system of sacrifices that you could offer to atone for, to cover for your shortcomings. But those sacrifices were very limited in their efficacy. Look at verses 1 to 4 of Hebrews 10. I had you turn there a moment ago. Look at verses 1 to 4 to find out the limitations of the Old Testament sacrifices. The writer says, "For the law, since it has only been a shadow of good things to come, and not the very form of things, can never by the same sacrifices, year by year, which they offer continually make perfect those who draw near. Otherwise would they not have ceased to be offered, because the worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have had the consciousness of sins? But in those sacrifices there is a reminder of sin year by year. For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins."

Why did God have the Israelites engage in these endless sacrifices? To make them long for that future, once-for-all sacrifice that would forever remove the stain of their sin. And that sacrifice would be the sacrifice of Jesus, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world. And that's why Jesus said, "This cup now represents the new covenant, the new agreement, not based on your works, but based on my grace, demonstrated by my blood that has been shed for you."

Remember again in the Exodus, the Old Testament, that night in Egypt when God said, "I'm going to pass over not just the Egyptian houses, but your house too, in judgment. But if you will take the blood of that innocent lamb and put it on the doorpost of your house, when I see the blood, I will pass over you in judgment." When God looks at your heart and he sees that you have trusted in the blood of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, the Bible says that he will pass over you in judgment. There is therefore now no condemnation awaiting those who belong to Christ Jesus. Jesus, the Lamb of God, is the only way any of us can escape God's judgment. That is the picture in this Passover meal. "This is my body, this is my blood which is given for you."

You know, it is so easy to get lost in this chapter in the chronology of Jesus' life and in the details of the Seder meal that we forget the real purpose of this entire passage. And so for the last couple of minutes that we have, I want to point us to the real purpose of the Passover meal that's found in two words repeated twice in this passage. Go back to verse 19. "And when he had taken some bread and given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, 'This is my body which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.'" I want you to underline those words "for you." "Do this in remembrance of me." And in the same way he took the cup after they had eaten, saying, "This cup which is poured out, there it is again, underline it 'for you' is the new covenant in my blood."

Those words "for you" are a translation of the Greek preposition *uper* (H U, P E R). That preposition *uper* can mean "for the benefit of," but it can also mean "in the place of." "This is my body which is given in the place of your body. This is my blood which has been given in the place of your blood." That is one of the most foundational doctrines of Christianity: the substitutionary atonement of Jesus Christ. For us, Jesus was the sin substitute. You know, from the opening pages of the book of Genesis, God started teaching mankind that truth, that what we needed was a substitute for our sin. And of course, all of it pointed to Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, who would take away the sin of the world.

And so when Jesus said, "This is my body, which is for you," he was saying, "I am sacrificing my body in the place of your body. I am spilling my blood in the place of your blood to provide that covering for sin." You know, reclining around that table that last night at that Passover meal, every one of the apostles needed to hear that message. But there were two people who desperately needed to hear that message: two men who within just a few hours would sin a terrible sin against Jesus. Two men who would betray the Lord Jesus. They needed to hear that message of forgiveness. One of those men we know well, his name was Judas. He betrayed the Lord for 30 pieces of silver. But there was another man there who would also betray the Lord. His name was Peter. Within a few hours, Peter would leave that upper room, and in the courtyard of Caiaphas, he would deny even knowing the Lord. Not once, twice, but three times. His sin was just as heinous, just as grievous as that of Judas.

In fact, Jesus anticipated the failure of Peter. Look in verses 31 to 32. That night around the table, Jesus said to Peter, "Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat." He would say today to put you through the grinder. That's what Satan wants to do. "But I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail you. And when once you have turned again, you might strengthen your brothers." He was saying, "Peter, I'm praying that you don't fail this test, but you're going to fail. And my prayer for you is that once you have failed me, you would turn back to me and become a courageous leader." And that's exactly what happened, as we'll see next time. Peter denied the Lord three different times, but he turned and found God's forgiveness. And within seven weeks, he was transformed into not just the leader of the apostles, but to the greatest evangelist the world has ever known.

Two men failed God that night. Peter failed and turned toward God and received his forgiveness. Judas failed God and turned away and rejected that forgiveness. What Jesus said to both of those men is, "This is my body, this is my blood which is being offered for you." And what Jesus said that night 2,000 years ago, he's saying to you right now: "My body, my blood is being offered. Not for somebody else. It's being offered for you. It doesn't matter what you've done. I'm ready to forgive you if you will turn to me." You say, "Pastor, that just couldn't be true. You don't know what I've done." You're right, I don't know what you've done. But I know what others have done. God forgave Moses, who was guilty of murder. God forgave David, who was guilty of murder and adultery. God forgave Peter, who denied him three times. And God would have forgiven Judas had he turned and received that forgiveness. And God is willing to forgive you as well. "This is my body, this is my blood which is given for you."

Speaker 2

Someone is listening to me at this very moment who's ready to take this first step of faith, follow his prompting and say yes to his call. God is standing before you with open arms and he's ready to forgive. There's no better time to make this life-changing decision. The most important Christian holiday is coming this weekend.

So let me ask you this question, and this question applies to anyone who's listening right now. Have you ever stopped to think about the critical significance of Easter Sunday? The credibility of our Christian faith rises or falls on that miracle of resurrection on Easter. The death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ are not mythological moments. Easter Sunday changed everything forever.

And because this is true, I decided to craft a travel journal for you that traces the final footsteps of Jesus during the Holy Week. My book is called the Power of the Cross. This is a keepsake that you'll enjoy for many years to come. When you give a generous gift to support the ministry of Pathway to Victory, I'll see that a copy of the Power of the Cross is sent to your home right away.

As I mentioned earlier, we're praying that God would lead 50 new supporters to become Pathway Partners. So maybe your generous gift today will be your first as a Pathway Partner. Whatever the case, when you give a gift today, I'm going to say thanks by sending you my coffee table book filled with photographs of Israel called the Power of the Cross.

Speaker 4

David, thanks Dr. Jeffress. You can become a pathway partner when you follow the easy steps to sign up online at PT and when you give your first monthly gift or when you give a one-time gift to support Pathway to Victory.

We'll say thanks by sending you the Power of the Cross, a beautifully illustrated coffee table book based on the teaching of Dr. Robert Jeffress. Simply give us a call at 866-999-2965 or visit online@ptv.org, and when you give $75 or more, we'll also send you live from Israel eight powerful messages by Dr. Jeffress from the Holy Land. These messages were preached on location in Israel, and you'll receive them on both DVD, video, and MP3 format audio disc.

Again, call 866-999-2965 or go to ptv.org. If you'd prefer to send your donation by mail, write to P.O. Box 222-236-09, Dallas, Texas 75222. That's P.O. Box 223609, Dallas, Texas 75222.

I'm David J. Mullins. Few things are more painful than being betrayed or abandoned by someone we love. And Jesus knew the pain of betrayal and abandonment better than anyone. Hear a moving message called the Longest Night Wednesday on Pathway to Pathway to.

Speaker 1

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