Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Rules for the Seasons and for the special days

23 The Lord said to Moses, ² ‘Tell Israel's people about the special days when they must worship the Lord. They are holy days. The Israelites must come together and have a feast on these days.

³ There are six days when a person can work. The seventh day is the Sabbath day. A person must not do any work on that day. It is a day when people meet together for worship. You must not work in any place where you live. It is the Sabbath to the Lord, a day of rest.

Passover and bread without yeast

⁴ There are other special days. They are holy feasts. On these days you must tell the people how to obey the Lord's rules. ⁵ One special day is the 14th day of the first month. When the sun goes down, the Passover to the Lord begins. ⁶ The 15th day of the first month, the Feast of Flat Bread begins. It is a feast to the Lord. For seven days the people must eat bread that has no yeast in it. ⁷ On the first day the people must meet together and they must not work. ⁸ For seven days the people must give burnt offerings to the Lord. On the seventh day they must stop work and they must worship the Lord.’^[a]

Judas agrees to catch Jesus

22 The Passover festival when the Jews eat flat bread was coming soon.^[a]

² The leaders of the priests and the teachers of God's Law wanted to kill Jesus. They were talking together about how they could do this. It was difficult because they were afraid of the people.

³ Then Satan began to live inside Judas Iscariot. Judas was one of Jesus' 12 apostles. ⁴ He went to the leaders of the priests and he talked with them. The police that worked at the temple were also there. Judas told them how he could give Jesus to them secretly. ⁵ They were very happy and they promised to give him some money to do this. ⁶ So Judas said that he would do it. Then he waited for the right moment to help them to take hold of Jesus. He wanted to do it when the crowd was not there with Jesus.

Jesus eats his last meal with his apostles

⁷ The day came for Jewish people to eat the meal of flat bread which has no yeast in it. They had to kill a young sheep for the Passover meal on that day. ⁸ So Jesus said to Peter and John, ‘Go and prepare the Passover meal for us to eat. Then we can all come and eat it.’ ⁹ They asked him, ‘Where do you want us to prepare the meal?’

¹⁰ Jesus replied, ‘Listen. When you go into the city, a man will meet you. He will be carrying a jar of water. Follow him until he goes into a house. ¹¹ You must then say to the master of that house, “Our Teacher sends this message to you: ‘Where is the room for visitors? I will eat the Passover meal there with my disciples.’ ” ¹² The man will then show you a large room upstairs. It will have all that you need in it. Prepare the Passover meal there for us all.’

¹³ So Peter and John went into the city. They found everything that Jesus had told them about. So they prepared the Passover meal.