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| Get ready to make a run for your liberation. |
It's message is clear: Get ready to leave Egypt's tyranny now. Don't wait or hesitate. Prepare your last supper--in your house, or the house of a neighbor--a meal of roast lamb, unleavened bread, and bitter herbs, and be ready to make a run for your freedom at midnight.
Some twelve centuries later Jesus announced another regime change, this time from oppression of an even greater magnitude. As a new Moses, he is leading a worldwide, heaven-based rule based on a non-violent, grace-offering, blood-outpouring love for all, fellow-citizens and hated foreigners alike. Under God's universal new covenant, the lost are to be redeemed, the oppressed are to be freed, former enemies are to be reconciled, and the poor and oppressed are to experience God's special favor.
In this new era, marked by Jesus choosing crucifixion instead of vengeance, he is both our Passover Lamb, ensuring our deliverance from all evil, and our heaven-sent Liberator. He leads the procession of all who lay down their arms and take up his cross, and who who are willing to demonstrate his dramatic regime-changing vision for heaven-based living, starting right here on earth. The very body and life blood representing his Passover presence become nourishment and empowerment for our massive worldwide exodus toward freedom and shalom.
That is the forever vision of Pesach, our "passing over" into new life.
We celebrated that vision in our house church today by partaking of the bread and cup of the Lord's Supper as a part of an actual evening meal celebrating our evacuation journey. Each of us had a generous portion of bread and a whole cup of grape juice as a sign of Christ's life-giving body and blood offered for the world's redemption and healing. An assortment of cheese and fresh fruit were an additional part of our Love Feast meal.
This was the order of service:
Theme: Liberated by Grace, Governed by Agape"
Opening choruses
Prayer and sharing time
Your will be done on earth, O Lord
Anticipating regime change
Psalm 149, Exodus 12:1-14
Come, we that love the Lord Hymnal 14
Maintaining love and order in the new regime
Matthew 18:15-20
Peace before us, peace behind us, peace the path for our feet,
Peace within us, peace over us, Let all around us be peace.
(Christ… Love… Grace… Praise… etc.)
Governed by Agape
Romans 13:8-14
I am the bread of life Hymnal 472
Let us break bread together
Be present at our table, Lord 457
Celebrating the Feast of Deliverance
Readings, partaking of bread and cup, followed by an agape meal
Sent forth by God's blessing Hymnal 478
Benediction
May the Lord give you bread for the journey to come
May God’s Spirit sustain you with light from above
May the good Lord bless and keep you
May his face shine upon you
Go in faith, go in hope, go in love.
Go in faith, go in hope, go in love.
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