Kleinig, John W. “The Blood of Jesus: sermon on Matthew 26:27-28.” Lutheran Theological Review 14 (2001-02): 84-88.
Blood! We are both fascinated and horrified by blood. Blood is a wonderful, powerful substance that nourishes our bodies and keeps them alive. It carries oxygen and nutrients to the cells; then it removes the wastes and toxins from each part of the body. It protects us from infection by its antibodies and fights disease in our bodies. And so we value blood highly. Yet we are also rather squeamish about blood. We avoid the sight of it and are afraid of contact with it, because we feel that it somehow stains us and makes us unclean. We even use “bloody” as a swear-word, as if blood made things repulsive and disgusting…