The Lord longed to share the passover meal with His disciples. He was less than 24 hours away from fulfilling His mission and, like anyone who can see the finish line, He must have had feelings of relief and excitement.

The passover meal commemorated the Jews’ deliverance from slavery in Egypt (Ex. 13:3-10). It also had a much deeper spiritual application that, as Jesus explains here, would be fulfilled through His death. The Jewish nation as a whole had missed any future prophetic meaning of the passover.

On the night of the original passover, the Lord passed through the land of Egypt and judged the land by slaying all the firstborn men and beasts. The Jews had to slay a spotless lamb, take its blood and apply it to the door posts of their homes. They were commanded to remain indoors, under the covering of this blood until morning. When the Lord passed through the land at midnight to execute His judgment, He passed over the homes that had the lamb’s blood on their doors and no one inside was hurt. This is a perfect picture of the redemption that Jesus provides for us.