I'm stunned and deeply saddened at the Old Covenant understanding of what is a thoroughly, entirely, and solely New Covenant celebration of the Passion and Resurrection of Jesus. My blog reading today has grieved me - even my favorite blog (post edit: I removed the name of this blog out of respect for its writer. She may not have realized...)
An Old Covenant understanding is the very opposite of what this Resurrection Thing is meant to communicate.
No, I am not talking about understanding the Jewish roots of Christianity - though it could be debated that the roots of Christianity are in Christ Alone - He was the plan from before the foundation of the world.
I am not talking about the thoroughly Jewish setting of the Gospel Narrative...I get all that. Been there, read the books, done the Seders, done the Halakhahs, got the T-shirt, and got me an "A" on the Hebraic Thinking Test. But all this talk of Old Covenant, as if it somehow makes the resurrection better than it is, all by itself? All the law-based jargon? Do we really have to be quite so Jewish to grasp our salvation?
No, we don't. And it could be...might be...I have at times personally observed it to be....dangerous. Yes, this whole Passover thing can be dangerous if not viewed through
radically New Covenant eyes. Read the words of the Apostle Paul, which are, incidentally, also the words of Christ. The whole Bible should be in red letters, because it is all the words of Jesus, and all about Jesus, the Word become flesh.
At worst, all the Jewish symbolism celebrated by supposedly New Covenant people keeps the lost from seeing the true Gospel (which is the Finished...
Finished!...work of Christ). At best, it is playing with shadows, delighting in symbol over substance. At worst, all this symbolism engenders an elitist spirituality - blatantly put forth as being sound doctrine. There is a sad example of this in one of the links on my favorite blog. The link she promotes takes you to a Jewish roots type of website, where the writer boldly asserts that keeping the law could be what makes us "chosen" in Christ!
Utter. Nonsense. I can't emphasize that enough. Not. True.
At best, all this Seder/Passover/Tabernacle/symbolism obscures the real and simple truth: Christ died for the sins of the world. (The Methodist church, next road over from me, has a replica of the tabernacle up in their yard. So I'm not just picking on this one lady, whose blog I normally adore, and promote here all the time. The tabernacle? In tarp and cotton and Tyvek? Puh-leeze. I'd rather my kid sit on a giant bunny's lap for a cute picture, or hunt for plastic eggs.)
All over blogland, as well meaning parents seek to teach their children the significance of Easter, the Resurrection is either trivialized on one side, or ritualized into Old Covenant oblivion on the other.
On the eve of this most New Covenant of New Covenant celebrations, may I point out that this thing, all along, has been all about Christ, and the Father's securing a bride for the Son? It all culminates
in a marriage supper, friends.
The Passover depicts the New Covenant, the New Covenant is not about the Passover. Yes, during Christ's celebration of the Passover, during that holy Seder, it is very possible, even probable, that the Son of God proposed marriage to His bride, down through the ages. When He said, "This cup is the blood of the New Covenant..." it would have been well known to a practicing Jew that that was a traditional marriage proposal.
Which made communion forevermore a New Covenant sacrament, where you and I get to say "Yes" again and again and again - YES to being the Bride. YES to having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing - because of the price our Groom paid to obtain us. He fulfilled the law on our behalf, so that the stain and spot of sin could be blotted out, the wrinkles of our failures smoothed by the pressing heat of His Great Love.
Once, for all time. His work is Finished, and if you look at that picture up there, you are looking at a small part of what it was all about. I know this, I think, deeper than I know my own name.
The most appropriate way in the universe to observe and keep and celebrate the Resurrection is to tomorrow be with The Bride, also known as your local church - not playing in the shadows at some Seder somewhere, earlier in the week. Not playing with symbols long been retired - but rather, go be with the Lamb's bride, celebrating the
substance of the Passover, and relishing the freedom from sin's dark stain, freedom from wrong's inherent wrinkles!
The Bride. No spot. No wrinkle. No "any such thing". Why? Because she stands In Christ Alone. Christ died to have her. His blood has (past tense) washed her clean. And don't you call unclean or irrelevant or "too much trouble to fool with" the very thing Christ gave the ultimate price to treasure and have.
The Passover is about the New Covenant. The New Covenant is not about the Passover.
