The Bread of Affection Transformed (Mark 14:21,22)

The first time bread is mentioned is in relation to the curse. What had brought about the curse? “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die” (Genesis 2:16,17). Man ate, the curse was spoken, but did death come “in that day”?

“By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust and to dust you shall return” (Genesis 3:19). This is the first time Bread is mentioned in the Bible. The rebellion had brought about eventual physical death, but on the day that the sin was born there was a spiritual death. Fellowship with God was broken and the sound of the Lord God walking in the cool of the day had caused the man and woman to hid. The Lord God drove them out of the garden, “lest he reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever” (Genesis 3:22).

Many years later the children of Israel were released from bondage in Egypt by the blood of a lamb. The physical bondage they experienced in Egypt is a picture of the spiritual bondage that is experienced because of sin.  Lord led them into a wilderness where they were not able to toil for bread. Instead they were provided with bread from heaven in the form of manna. This was memorialize by the Passover Feast. The Passover is a festival of freedom.

Passover begins when the host holds up a piece of unleavened bread and says, “This is the bread of affliction our ancestors ate in the land of Egypt. Let all who are hungry come and eat.”  A child, or the youngest present, then asks a series of questions about, “why this night is different from all others nights.” The evening is spent remembering and retelling the story of the Exodus while eating the unleaded bread, the bitter herbs of suffering, and drinking the wine of freedom.

“And as they were eating, he took bread, and blessed it, broke it, and gave it to them, and said, “Take; this is my body” (Mark 14:22). Fellowship with God was restored at the Passover table. Jesus took the bread of affection and changed it into a symbol of freedom. The curse was broken on the cross. The bread that was produced by the sweat of man’s brow was temporal and still death would come. The bread from heaven given by Christ was eternal and brought with it life. What could not be accomplished by the sweat of man’s brow was accomplished by the outstretched arms of Christ our savior.