Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

A Song of Ascents

The Exiles Restored

²¹ Then Moses summoned all the elders of Israel and told them, “Choose sheep for your families, and slaughter the Passover lamb. ²² Take a bundle of hyssop and dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and apply some of the blood in the basin to the lintel and the two doorposts. None of you is to go out of the doorway of his house until morning, ²³ because the Lord will pass through to strike down the Egyptians, and when he sees the blood on the lintel and the two doorposts, the Lord will pass over the doorway, and won’t allow the destroyer to enter your houses to strike you down. ²⁴ You are to observe this event as a perpetual ordinance for you and your children forever. ²⁵ When you enter the land that the Lord will give you, just as he promised, you are to observe this ritual. ²⁶ And when your children say to you, ‘What does this ritual mean?’^{[a] 27} you are to say, ‘It is the Passover sacrifice to the Lord, who passed over the houses of the Israelis in Egypt when he struck down the Egyptians but spared our houses.’” Then the people bowed down and worshipped.

The Jewish Council Plans to Kill Jesus^(A)

⁴⁵ Many of the Jews who had come with Mary and who had observed what Jesus did believed in him. ⁴⁶ Some of them, however, went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. ⁴⁷ So the high priests and the Pharisees assembled the Council^[a] and said, “What are we going to do? This man is performing many signs. ⁴⁸ If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and destroy both our Temple^[b] and our nation.”

⁴⁹ But one of them, Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, told them, “You don’t know anything! ⁵⁰ You don’t realize that it is better for you^[c] to have one man die for the people than to have the whole nation destroyed.” ⁵¹ Now he did not say this on his own initiative. As high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus would die for the nation, ⁵² and not only for the nation, but that he would also gather into one the children of God who were scattered abroad. ⁵³ So from that day on they resolved to put him to death. ⁵⁴ As a result, Jesus no longer walked openly among the Jews.^[d] Instead, he went from there^[e] to a town called Ephraim in the region near the wilderness. There he remained with his disciples.

⁵⁵ Now the Jewish Passover was approaching, and before the Passover many people from the countryside went up to Jerusalem to purify themselves. ⁵⁶ They kept looking for Jesus and saying to one another as they stood in the Temple, “What do you think? Surely he won’t come to the festival, will he?” ⁵⁷ Now the high priests and the Pharisees had given orders that whoever knew where he was should tell them so that they could arrest him.