This week was obviously the Feast of Unleavened bread for many of us here. It was started with a Passover that symbolizes our communion with Jesu Christ, the Night to be Much Observed and then the first Holy Day. Now we are almost through the entire week refraining from eating leavened products. This being the week that leavening symbolizes our sin. For me and my wife as well as many of you, we have been observing them for over 50 years. I remember when I was young how as soon as sunset came we ran to get our first leavened products as the lesson was over. As a kid it seemed like it lasted far longer than a week. Now as an adult it seems so short and then it’s over.

This time of year for us either way should have much more meaning than just going without but to remind ourselves of the more important things that life in Christ has to offer. Removing sin from our life is not merely about being good. It is about our God through his son extending his hand down to us to save us from death. Death being the consequence of our sinful life. Since the fall of Adam everyone but Jesus Christ who ever walked the Earth is a sinner. The penalty for being so is to die as was Adam and Eve eating from the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

Death is the enemy of God. It is the last enemy of His to be destroyed where we read in 1 Corinthians 15:26.

What is fascinating and humbling as the very enemy of God is what Christ met our saving with when he died for us. He was willing to go through that separation from his father for our sake. Unfortunately this world trivializes and even embraces death as a solution to meaningless problems. His death, the living God is the one thing that holds the highest action ever for all of mankind. He couldn’t die as being God, he had to make himself human to do so. He could have allowed us to die for our transgressions but chose a path that shows his great love for us. That he was willing to do anything to save us. To meet the enemy we deserve and be taken by it to pay the penalty we deserve is a sacrifice that nobody except Jesus was qualified to make. And he did it without shame and all the love he had for us in his heart.

By believing in him and living our lives accordingly we obtain the reward we could otherwise lose through our own sin.

1 Thessalonians 5:5-11

5 You are all children of the light and children of the day. We do not belong to the night or to the darkness. 6 So then, let us not be like others, who are asleep, but let us be awake and sober. 7 For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, get drunk at night. 8 But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet. 9 For God did not appoint us to suffer wrath but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. 10 He died for us so that, whether we are awake or asleep, we may live together with him. 11 Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.

Happy Sabbath and Holy days!

Your brother in Christ,

Steve Koenig