She was the woman of the house, and she was to prepare unleavened bread as part of the Passover meal. She had done this every year for her household, but this time, things were different. She was doing it for a group of strangers. She kneaded the dough as she hummed an old hymn. She baked the bread and served it to the Teacher they called Jesus and his disciples. Little did she know, the tasteless bread she had just made would be the bread the Messiah would use as a symbol of His holy sacrifice. In the upper room of a nameless house, the disciples shared a most intimate moment with the Savior - one that would live on forever and would be shared with the whole world.
Your boasting is not good. Don’t you know that a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough? Get rid of the old yeast, so that you may be a new unleavened batch—as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old bread leavened with malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. - 1 Corinthians 5:6-8
The symbolism is clear - bread that has risen with yeast is reminiscent of sinful pride, but unleavened bread is humble, pure and simple. The bread, scored and pierced to keep it from rising reminds us of how Jesus, humble, pure and sinless, was broken and pierced as he gave His life as the ultimate sacrifice to cleanse us from sin.
And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again. - 2 Corinthians 5:15
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. - 2 Corinthians 5:17-21
Let that sink in! Jesus came to Earth - fully God and fully man - took on the sin of the world, died as our sacrificial Lamb, and resurrected, giving us freedom from sin, shame and brokenness. Put off the old, and put on the new. Allow Christ to transform you into a living vessel of His glory.
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