Lesson 26 – The King’s Farewell and Betrayal
Read Matthew 26 – www.bible.com/bible/59/mat.26.esv

Jesus knew He had come to this world to die. Many hundreds of years before, as we see in Exodus and Leviticus, He had given the people of Israel a place and a way of worshiping Him that included the sacrifice of a lamb for a sin offering. Jesus had come to be the Lamb of God who would be the sacrifice for the sins of all people in the world.

So the plot to kill Jesus (as we read it in verses 1-5 of chapter 26) and the betrayal of Judas (in verses 14-16 and 47-50) did not catch God by surprise. And the anointing of Jesus by Mary, in verses 6-13, was timed by God to come at this very moment so it could be a picture to His disciples of His coming death.


Jesus now prepared to celebrate a very special holiday feast with His disciples. In Luke 22:16 we read His words to them – “I tell you I will not eat it [again] until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God.” He was asking His disciples to pay close attention to every item in this celebration because He would not join them again until every bit of this Passover was fulfilled, from its picture to its completion.

As Jesus took the wine that was part of this meal, He told His disciples this was His blood He was about to shed for them as He became the sacrifice for their sin – a sacrifice that would never need to be made ever again. In the many hundreds of years since the Passover was first celebrated (Exodus 12), the sacrifice of the lamb had been made every year. Now the last sacrifice, the one that would be able to cover sin forever, was about to be made.

Jesus took the bread and told His disciples this was His body, and it would be broken just as He broke the bread. With this Jesus brought about a new celebration for these disciples and for all who would believe in Him afterwards – including us, now almost 2000 years later. We call this the Lord’s Supper, or Communion. He asks us to celebrate it as a remembrance or a memorial of what He has done – what was about to happen to Him in the next chapter of Matthew.

*When you take part in Communion, do you remember Jesus’ sacrifice for your sins?
*Read the rest of this chapter – of all the things written here, what speaks to you about His suffering in your place?