An Old Testament Walk Through Holy Week: Daily Devotions

Originally published in our April 2025 issue, below are daily devotions for Holy Week that explore how the events of Palm Sunday through Easter Sunday are prefigured in the Old Testament. Each devotion also features accompanying Scripture readings.

Daily Devotions

Palm Sunday: “Behold, Your King Will Come to You” — by Kevin Golden

Monday of Holy Week: “The Anointed Prophet, Priest and King” — by Andrew Steinmann

Tuesday of Holy Week: “Who Has Believed?” — by Andrew Steinmann

Wednesday of Holy Week: “Betrayed by a Friend” — by Andrew Steinmann

Maundy Thursday: “Taste and See That the Lord Is Good” — Geoffrey R. Boyle

Good Friday: “The Day of the Lord Has Come and Is Coming” — Brian T. German

Easter Sunday: “On Yahweh’s Mountain” — Brian L. Kachelmeier

How To Use These Devotions

“You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about Me,” Jesus told the Jews in Jerusalem. “If you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote of Me” (John 5:39, 46).

During these holy days of Lent, Holy Week and Easter, and the whole year round, we should not neglect the books of the Old Testament in our devotions. As Jesus tells us, the Old Testament — just like the New — is about Him. As Luther wrote, “All the Scriptures point to Christ alone” (AE 35:132).

We do not have to hunt for Jesus in the Old Testament like a literature student trying to pick up on tropes or themes in a novel, or like a historian trying to crack an ancient esoteric code. As Geoffrey Boyle writes in his Maundy Thursday devotion, when we flip to the Old Testament, we are looking at “real things that actually happened, real people who actually did what is recorded … historical events that reveal something more.” The God who shepherded His people in the Old Testament is the same God who sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to die and rise again, as recorded in the New Testament. The traces and reflections of Christ we see throughout Scripture should not surprise us, then — but they should make us marvel, bolstering our faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, who truly came to earth, died and rose again.

As you work through this devotions throughout Holy Week, we encourage you to be sure to read the accompanying Scripture readings included with each.