The Ransom Paid - 1 Peter 1:17-21

Welcome to Eat This Bread Drink This Cup

The communion meditation today is based on a passage of Scripture from the New Testament, 1 Peter 1:17-21. In this passage of Scripture, the Apostle Peter explains how Jesus was the ransom God paid in order to free us from our sins. When we remember Jesus by partaking of the bread and drinking from the cup, we remember His precious blood He shed for us on the cross. All Scripture quotations are from the New Living Translation (NLT) and are used with permission.

As you listen to the episode today, my hope is that you will be encouraged from the time spent meditating on what Jesus has done for you. You are a special person; the one Jesus died to save! 

Transcript

Welcome to Eat This Bread Drink This Cup. The title of my communion meditation today is "The Ransom Paid." I read from 1 Peter 1:17-21. All Scripture quotations are from the New Living Translation (NLT) and are used with permission.

17 And remember that the heavenly Father to whom you pray has no favorites. He will judge or reward you according to what you do. So you must live in reverent fear of him during your time here as “temporary residents.” 18 For you know that God paid a ransom to save you from the empty life you inherited from your ancestors. And it was not paid with mere gold or silver, which lose their value. 19 It was the precious blood of Christ, the sinless, spotless Lamb of God. 20 God chose him as your ransom long before the world began, but now in these last days he has been revealed for your sake.

21 Through Christ you have come to trust in God. And you have placed your faith and hope in God because he raised Christ from the dead and gave him great glory.

The noun, ransom, is found only four times in the New Living Translation, and we encounter two of them in the Scripture reading today. The other two are found in the gospels, Matthew and Mark, where the authors quote Jesus, “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many.” As Peter explains to his readers, in order for God to save humankind, a ransom had to be paid to rescue us from the empty life we inherited from our ancestors. This was God's plan before the world began, and He brought it to fruition by sending His Son, His ransom, Jesus. Later, we would see that being the ransom meant Jesus would offer His precious blood on the cross to save us. We are not surprised then that God would have expectations of how we should live since we are literally His own, His chosen ones! From this passage of Scripture, we learn what God did, but it does not explain why He did it. We certainly did not deserve His favor. Humankind was headed in the wrong direction, away from and not toward God, when we were redeemed by God. This tells us something about our God our Father. He was willing to take extraordinary measures to help His children! He was willing to offer His only Son as a ransom to save His children from death! Any parent in the audience today knows exactly what it means to make sacrifices for our children. To an impartial observer, our actions sometimes do not make sense except to understand that these actions are motivated by love. What other explanation could God offer except that He loves us and wants what is best for us! He wants to be with us! Today as we partake of the bread and drink from the cup, we remember His Son, His ransom, Jesus, and His precious blood that He offered for us on the cross. Let us pray.

Abba, Father. Today we bless and set aside this bread and the fruit of the vine in this cup to remember Your Son, Jesus. We know that the bread represents His body that was nailed to the cross, and the fruit of the vine represents His blood that He shed for us. As we pour out the wine from the cup, we are reminded of how Jesus poured out His own blood that our sins might be forgiven. Abba, Father, we are overwhelmed by Your love. It is a gift of inestimable worth that we do not deserve. We are speechless and can only respond by saying thank-you. What an affirmation of who we are that You would send Your only Son to die on a cross for us! As we partake of the bread and drink from the cup, we remember Jesus and what He did for us. In the name of Jesus, I pray. Amen.

Today, Jesus invites you to partake of His supper. I read from Matthew 26:26-28 (NLT).

26 As they were eating, Jesus took some bread and blessed it. Then he broke it in pieces and gave it to the disciples, saying, “Take this and eat it, for this is my body.” Let us partake of the bread.

27 And he took a cup of wine and gave thanks to God for it. He gave it to them and said, “Each of you drink from it, 28 for this is my blood, which confirms the covenant between God and his people. It is poured out as a sacrifice to forgive the sins of many." Let us partake of the cup.

And the assembly of believers said, "Amen!"

Until next time, from Numbers 6:24-26, "May the LORD bless you and protect you. May the LORD smile on you and be gracious to you. May the LORD show you his favor and give you his peace."

Artist's Note: If you have questions about the Lord's Supper, I invite you to visit my website, https://eatthisbreaddrinkthiscup.com, for a brief overview. The Eat This Bread Drink This Cup podcast is listed in most podcast directories, and I invite you to add my podcast to your favorites and be notified of new posts. There is a written transcript that accompanies each podcast, and you are free to use the transcript in accordance with US copyright law. My prayer is that you will benefit personally from this time with Jesus and encourage others to observe the Lord's Supper. In these trying times, we need to keep our eyes on Jesus!