Passover Prophecy: Matthew 26:1-5
“1) When Jesus had finished all these words, He said to His disciples, “2) You know that after two days the Passover is coming, and the Son of Man is to be handed over for crucifixion.” 3) Then the chief priests and the elders of the people were gathered together in the court of the high priest, named Caiaphas; 4) and they plotted together to seize Jesus by stealth and kill Him. 5) But they were saying, “Not during the festival, otherwise a riot might occur among the people.”” Matthew 26:1-5
When Jesus had completed His teaching about the end times, He warned His disciples one more time of His coming fate at the Passover. He was indeed the Passover Lamb for the ceremony. He fulfilled every criteria for the unblemished and innocent lamb.
He made it clear that the method of His death would be crucifixion. This may have given false hope to the disciples, because crucifixion was a Roman and not Jewish method of execution.
It was at that time the chief priests and elders of the people gather together at the court of Caiaphas; and they plotted together to seize Jesus by stealth and kill Him. This action qualified as premeditated murder.
They were using the backdrop of the Passover to kill Jesus. For some reason they failed to notice that their actions were fulfilling the prophetic symbolism of the Passover. They were about to sacrifice the Passover Lamb that takes away the sins of the world. (See John 1:29; 36) Just as the Passover Lamb in Exodus 12 ended the slavery of the Hebrew people to Egypt, so the death of Jesus on the cross was going to end the slavery of those who would believe in Him from sin and Satan.
According to Matthew 26:5, they did not want it to happen during the festival, lest they cause a riot among the people. It may be that they feared the crowd of pilgrims from His home region of Galilee who were in Jerusalem for the Passover. These represented the bulk of His most devoted followers.
But Divine Destiny was governing the events. A cosmic battle was unfolding of which they had no awareness and over which they had no control. The “time had come” for Jesus to pay for the sins of humanity. The seed of the woman was about to step on the head of the serpent in the most unexpected way. (Genesis 3:15)
Daily Bible Commentary By Terry Baxter: Cofounder of GoServ Global
