Thursday April 14 Maundy Thursday
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Psalm 102
A lament at the destruction of Jerusalem 600 years before Jesus. It ends with hope of God’s faithfulness. The imagery of desolation is appropriate as we approach the execution of Jesus tomorrow, being betrayed, abandoned, and in hours will be dead. Yet God will remain faithful.
Lamentations 2.10-18 What’s Lamentations about?
The horrors of the city being overrun and destroyed 600 years before Jesus were interpreted by the early Christians as an anticipation of the sorrows which would overtake Jesus.
Mark 14.12-25 What’s Mark about?
Jesus eats the Passover meal which is a re-enactment of the hurried meal eaten the night that God slew all the Egyptians’ first-born children so that the Israelites could escape from slavery in Egypt.
Mark is interpreting that Jesus, also a first-born, is about to be executed so that the human race can escape from death into new life. This is now our communion service.
Today’s collect:
O God,
your Son Jesus Christ
has left to us this meal of bread and wine
in which we share his body and his blood.
May we who celebrate this sign of his great love
show in our lives the fruits of his redemption;
through Jesus Christ our Lord,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever. Amen.
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