Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Chapter 12

The Passover Ritual Prescribed.^{[a] 1} The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt: ^2 [b]This month will stand at the head of your calendar; you will reckon it the first month of the year.^{(A) 3} Tell the whole community of Israel: On the tenth of this month every family must procure for itself a lamb, one apiece for each household. ⁴ If a household is too small for a lamb, it along with its nearest neighbor will procure one, and apportion the lamb’s cost^[c] in proportion to the number of persons, according to what each household consumes.

⁵ Your lamb must be a year-old male and without blemish. You may take it from either the sheep or the goats. ⁶ You will keep it until the fourteenth day of this month, and then, with the whole community of Israel assembled, it will be slaughtered during the evening twilight. ⁷ They will take some of its blood and apply it to the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses in which they eat it. ⁸ They will consume its meat that same night, eating it roasted with unleavened bread and bitter herbs. ⁹ Do not eat any of it raw or even boiled in water, but roasted, with its head and shanks and inner organs. ¹⁰ You must not keep any of it beyond the morning; whatever is left over in the morning must be burned up.

¹¹ This is how you are to eat it: with your loins girt, sandals on your feet and your staff in hand, you will eat it in a hurry. It is the Lord’s Passover. ¹² For on this same night I will go through Egypt, striking down every firstborn in the land, human being and beast alike, and executing judgment on all the gods of Egypt—I, the Lord!^{(A) 13} But for you the blood will mark the houses where you are. Seeing the blood, I will pass over you; thereby, when I strike the land of Egypt, no destructive blow will come upon you.^(B)

¹⁴ This day will be a day of remembrance for you, which your future generations will celebrate with pilgrimage to the Lord; you will celebrate it as a statute forever.

Psalm 116^[a]

Thanksgiving to God Who Saves from Death

I

Tradition of the Institution. ^23 [a]For I received from the Lord what I also handed on to you,^(A) that the Lord Jesus, on the night he was handed over, took bread, ²⁴ and, after he had given thanks, broke it and said, “This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” ²⁵ In the same way also the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”^{(B) 26} For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until he comes.

III. The Book of Glory^[a]

Chapter 13

The Washing of the Disciples’ Feet.^{[b] 1} Before the feast of Passover,^[c] Jesus knew that his hour had come to pass from this world to the Father. He loved his own in the world and he loved them to the end.^{(A) 2} The devil had already induced^[d] Judas, son of Simon the Iscariot, to hand him over. So, during supper,^{(B) 3} fully aware that the Father had put everything into his power and that he had come from God and was returning to God,^{(C) 4} he rose from supper and took off his outer garments. He took a towel and tied it around his waist. ^5 [e]Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet^(D) and dry them with the towel around his waist. ⁶ He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Master, are you going to wash my feet?” ⁷ Jesus answered and said to him, “What I am doing, you do not understand now, but you will understand later.” ⁸ Peter said to him, “You will never wash my feet.” Jesus answered him, “Unless I wash you, you will have no inheritance with me.”^{(E) 9} Simon Peter said to him, “Master, then not only my feet, but my hands and head as well.” ¹⁰ Jesus said to him, “Whoever has bathed^[f] has no need except to have his feet washed, for he is clean all over; so you are clean, but not all.”^{(F) 11} For he knew who would betray him; for this reason, he said, “Not all of you are clean.”^(G)

¹² So when he had washed their feet [and] put his garments back on and reclined at table again, he said to them, “Do you realize what I have done for you? ¹³ You call me ‘teacher’ and ‘master,’ and rightly so, for indeed I am.^{(H) 14} If I, therefore, the master and teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash one another’s feet. ¹⁵ I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you should also do.^{(I) 16} Amen, amen, I say to you, no slave is greater than his master nor any messenger^[g] greater than the one who sent him.^{(J) 17} If you understand this, blessed are you if you do it.

The New Commandment. ^31 [a]When he had left, Jesus said,^[b] “Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him. ³² [If God is glorified in him,] God will also glorify him in himself, and he will glorify him at once.^{(A) 33} My children, I will be with you only a little while longer. You will look for me, and as I told the Jews, ‘Where I go you cannot come,’ so now I say it to you.^{(B) 34} I give you a new commandment:^[c] love one another. As I have loved you, so you also should love one another.^{(C) 35} This is how all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”