Sunday, January 3, 2021

"The Table that the Lord Prepares..."

"The LORD is my Shepherd, I shall not want...
You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies." (Psalm 23:1, 5)

"I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep." (John 10:11)

"And [Jesus] took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, 'This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.' And likewise the cup after they had eaten, saying, 'This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood. But behold, the hand of him who betrays me is with me on the table. For the Son of Man goes as it has been determined, but woe to that man by whom he is betrayed!'" (Luke 22:19-22)

"So they took Jesus, and he went out, bearing his own cross, to the place called The Place of a Skull, which in Aramaic is called Golgotha. There they crucified him, and with him two others, one on either side, and Jesus between them." (John 19:16b-18)

"...and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies..." (Genesis 22:17b)

"I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades." (Revelation 1:18b)

"For you have delivered my soul from death,
my eyes from tears,
my feet from stumbling;
I will walk before the LORD
in the land of the living." (Psalm 116:8-9)

"Now this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom You have sent." (John 17:3)

The table that the Lord prepares for his people is set with the feast of his own flesh and blood, in the face of sin, death, and hell, the enemies whose gates he, as the Son of Man, has now taken as a man for the sake of mankind, so that his people might feed without fear and thus be delivered from the power of those enemies and walk before him "in the land of the living," which is his own eternal life -- which is the knowledge and experience of Himself.