Scarlet Thread – Remembering the Blood of the Lamb
Scarlet Thread – Remembering the Blood of the Lamb.
“Glory be to Jesus, Who in bitter pains, poured for me the life-blood, from His sacred veins.
Grace and life eternal, in that blood I find, blest be His compassion, infinitely kind.
Blest through endless ages, be the precious steam, which from endless torments, did the world redeem.
Lift ye then your voices, swell the mighty flood; louder still and louder, praise the precious blood.” (Friedrich Filitz).
Glory Be to Jesus – Christian Song with Lyrics (youtube.com)
The scarlet thread that is sewn into Holy Scripture from beginning to end is unmistakable. There is no doubt whatsoever that the Bible is blood-centric, that there is an overriding theme of blood wherever we look. We don’t need to be super-detectives to discover blood patterns in the Word. The Scripture seems practically preoccupied with blood, and one could be excused for observing that God seems to be out for blood. We find out why this is the case in Leviticus 17:11 and 13… “The life of all flesh is in its blood. The life is in the blood.” The Word of God seems preoccupied with blood only because God is preoccupied with life. God is out for blood only in the sense that He is out for Life. The Bible is blood-centric only because God is life-centric. In fact, the term “scarlet thread” is not strong enough. Instead, the Bible has a powerful crimson tsunami flowing through its pages from Genesis through Revelation, from before creation to the New Creation.
In this Bible study we will take a good look at the blood-stories in Scripture, from the divine sacrifice before the foundation of the world, to the animal sacrifice in the Garden of Eden; from the bloodshed in the first family, to the blood-themed covenant between God and Noah; from the Nile River, to the Passover in Egypt; from the bloody mess in the Tabernacle, to the Scarlet Worm that hinted at Jesus. Yes, there seem to be blood-splatters all over the floors and walls of Scripture. Through it all, the precious blood of Jesus is the centerpiece.
“For the tradition I received from the Lord and also handed on to you is that on the night He was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took some bread, and after He had given thanks, He broke it, and He said, ’This is My body, which is given for you; do this in remembrance of me.’ And in the same way, with the cup after supper, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Whenever you drink it, do this in remembrance of Me.’” (1 Corinthians 11:23-25).
This “new covenant” mentioned by Jesus certainly was intended to remind the disciples of the ancient blood covenant at Mt. Sinai, in which Moses sprinkled sacrificial blood on the people as they committed themselves to following Yahweh. (Exodus 24:8). There was nothing more solemn or serious than ratifying a covenant with God through blood, the essence of life. The splattering of blood on the people by Moses sealed God’s promised faithfulness to His Chosen People. And soon after this Last Supper the precious blood of Christ will ratify, will seal the new covenant with God.
To Remember: A biblical remembrance is much more than the mental activity of bringing something to mind, of recalling something from the past. To remember something in Scripture is an active experience, an embodied participation of whatever is being recalled. In the Bible, one has to demonstrate what is being remembered in order for it to be truly remembered. To remember is to participate in whatever is being remembered so that it won’t be forgotten. When we remember something, we are seeking to bring the full effects of a memory into the present. To remember is to join into the continuous presence of a past event, to tap into its power and significance. To remember something in Scripture means we are good as there, experiencing a memory, participating in it.
The Bible rarely allows us to keep something at merely the intellectual level. It is not enough to just think about something. There must be an embodiment of the thought to prove its existence. The mental thought is not considered real unless it is put into practice. Some examples include: To believe is not to limited to mentally agreeing to a list of doctrines, but instead to demonstrate an actual trust in God. Faith without works is dead. To know (“yada”) is experiential knowledge, a deep participation in whatever is known. To know the truth is to have a personal experience with that truth and to live in light of that truth. To love (“hesed”) requires a demonstration of that love through mercy, compassion, kindness. Love has to be proven through acts of love. A love that isn’t fleshed out doesn’t exist. To listen (“shema”) is to act on whatever is being heard. “Shema” means to hear-do, to listen-obey, take in-flesh out. One must give evidence that one understands. One has to prove that it didn’t just go in one ear and out the other. To remember follows that same pattern. Remembrance isn’t limited to the intellect, but is actively bringing the reality of something from the past into the present. In Scripture, it is never sufficient to merely think about something or keep it at the intellectual level.
Remembrance in the spirit of Passover: “Each person celebrating the Passover Seder is obligated to show himself as though he himself came out of Egypt. Every day of the year, we have to remember that we came out of Egypt, and that our relationship with God was forged through it. But once a year we have actually to come out of Egypt ourselves. To go through the process of slavery and redemption.” (Rabbi Gidron Weitzman). The Jewish idea of remembrance involves much more than recalling an event. It is the experience of reenacting the event, participating in the Passover event as told in Exodus 12 as if one were there in Egypt painting the doorposts of his house with the lamb’s blood. It is a retelling of the story, while also putting oneself into the story to experience its full meaning. The Seder involves personal involvement in the truth of the story in their own lives in the here and now. Celebrating Passover does not literally bring one back to Egypt, but it’s the next best thing, because it is a way of participating in the story and making it one’s own.
Remembrance in the spirit of Eucharist: “… Do this in remembrance of Me.” The sacrament of Eucharist is also known as Holy Communion, the Lord’s Supper, Breaking the Bread, the Table of the Lord. It is the Greek word for “thanksgiving,” containing the word for grace, “charis.” The bread and wine of this sacrament is considered spiritual food, necessary for our life and growth in the Christian faith. It can be described as a physical point of contact with spiritual reality, or material matter that is a channel of God’s grace to the believer. In this great mystery, the bread and wine are offered to God, and the Holy Spirit transforms those elements to the presence of Jesus, His flesh and blood. The outer, visible substance of the bread and wine are unchanged, but the inner reality, the “essence,” is transformed into the spiritual substance of the glorified Christ. Physical food is transformed into spiritual food. The Eucharist is a celebration instituted by Christ at His last Supper, and Christians have been instructed to “remember” His death in this way in the Church. Eucharist is a memorial to remember in the biblical sense, which is “to make present,” to literally participate in the memory that is being represented. To partake of the elements in this way requires faith in the words of Jesus and early Christian tradition, because the believer is unable to perceive the natural elements literally changing into spiritual matter. The mystery of the Eucharist defies the laws of nature and so cannot be fully understood. The bread and wine are the physical channels of God’s grace and blessing to us through the power of the Holy Spirit. “Truly, truly, I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day. For my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink, real food and real drink. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them. Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me. The one who eats this bread will live forever.” (John 6:53-58). What a wonderful mystery of mysteries… The life that the Father gives to the Son passes to us through the Eucharist! The mystery of the mutual indwelling… We have Christ in us, and we are in Christ. A Holy Communion.
Other Hints of the Eucharist in the Hebrew Bible. The Offering of Todah. In the Law of Moses there was a ritual thanks offering called the Todah. When someone wanted to show gratitude to God for a deliverance from a mortal danger, whether through a healing or a rescue of some sort, this person was instructed to initiate a todah ritual with the priests in the Tabernacle, consisting of a lamb, and bread and wine. The person was to deliver the lamb to the Tabernacle for the priest to make a sacrifice of thanksgiving, and then the person asks the priest to consecrate, to place a sacred blessing, on the bread and wine. The grateful worshipper then returned home with the blessed bread and wine and hosts a big celebration of thanksgiving with the family and friends. The Hebrew word Todah is equivalent to the Greek word eucharist, both words meaning thanksgiving. The early Christians thought the Last Supper was in fact a Todah reference that was completed in the sacrifice of Christ as the lamb. The Todah sacrifice points directly to the celebration of Holy Communion, the Old Covenant becoming the New. In fact, the earliest Eucharistic prayers were directly taken from the traditional Jewish prayers of Thanksgiving in the Todah sacrifice. So in many ways, one of the central sacraments of the Christian believers is a direct descendant of the greatest thanks offering in the Hebrew Bible. One final confirmation of the Todah, the Psalm during Jesus’ time that was recited during the Todah ritual was Psalm 22, which was the very Psalm recited by Jesus on the Cross.
The Lord’s Table in the Tabernacle. There were specific instructions given to Moses regarding a special Table in the sanctuary. Often called the Shewbread Table, it was the first holy object one would see upon entering the Holy Place. On the Table were placed twelve loaves of unleavened bread and golden goblets of wine. The bread represented Israel with its twelve tribes, and the wine would represent the blood of the Covenant between Yahweh and His Chosen People. The bread and wine were to be consumed by the priests, and celebrated as an important time of communion between the priests and Yahweh. The shewbread, or showbread, was also known as the Bread of Presence, or more literally the Bread of the Face. The Table was an ongoing sacred act of fellowship with the Lord, a time of thanksgiving when the bread and wine reminded the people of their dependence on God for their very survival. Once again, bread and wine are the centerpiece, and we see Jesus fulfilling the Law of Moses as the Bread of Life and the blood of the New Covenant. Jesus completes the Law with bread and wine, and so the disciples would not have been at all shocked to see the central use of bread and wine in their New Passover meal.
Are Both Ways of Remembrance Acceptable? In the spirit of the Passover, to celebrate and remember the Exodus story involves a reenactment, a personal participation in the event through the telling of the story and the recalling of the event and its importance. But one does not literally return to Egypt and escape the angel of death through the blood of the slaughtered lamb. But it’s the next best thing. In the spirit of the Eucharist, one believes that the participation of the event of the Lord’s Supper is a literal experience in the present. Perhaps Jesus has fulfilled the Scripture once again, this time by miraculously turning the symbolic Passover celebration into the literal fulfillment of that historical event in Hebrew history. Perhaps the Hebrew understanding of remembrance is fulfilled in the literal Christian act of remembrance.
“Christ our Passover Lamb has been slain for us. Therefore, let us keep the Feast!” (1 Cor. 5:7).
Now Behold The Lamb | Jesus Image Choir | Jesus ’20 with John Wilds (youtube.com)