Holy Week is the week before Easter, from Palm Sunday to Holy Saturday, when Christians remember Jesus’ last days in Jerusalem: His entry on Palm Sunday, the Last Supper on Maundy Thursday and His crucifixion on Good Friday. It ends at Easter, when we celebrate His resurrection. In 2027, Holy Week begins March 21, and Easter is March 28.
The Gospels slow down for this week: about a third of their chapters (30 of 89) cover it and the resurrection that followed. Here is what happened each day, where to read it in the Bible, and why Christians call the day Jesus died “good.”
When is Holy Week in 2027?
- Palm Sunday: March 21
- Maundy Thursday: March 25
- Good Friday: March 26
- Holy Saturday: March 27
- Easter Sunday: March 28
Easter moves from year to year (see the questions below). Orthodox churches, which calculate it with the older Julian calendar, will celebrate Easter on May 2, 2027.
Palm Sunday: the King arrives
On Sunday, Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a young donkey while the city filled with pilgrims for Passover (Matthew 21:1–11; Mark 11:1–11; Luke 19:28–40; John 12:12–19). People spread their cloaks and branches on the road, and John says the crowd carried palm branches, which gave the day its name:
They took palm branches and went out to meet Him, shouting: “Hosanna!” “Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!” “Blessed is the King of Israel!”
John 12:13 (BSB)
“Hosanna” comes from a prayer in Psalm 118:25, “O LORD, save us, we pray.” Zechariah had foretold this scene: “See, your King comes to you, righteous and victorious, humble and riding on a donkey” (Zechariah 9:9). Many hoped for a king who would drive out Rome. Jesus came to save them from something deeper: sin and death. Our messages Matthew 21:1–17 (Palm Sunday 2025) and The Triumphal Entry of Jesus explore that day.
Monday to Wednesday: teaching in the temple
The next day, Jesus drove the buyers and sellers out of the temple courts (Mark 11:12–17). Over the following days He taught there daily, while the chief priests and scribes looked for a way to kill Him (Luke 19:47–48).
In Bethany, a woman poured a jar of expensive perfume on Jesus’ head. Jesus said that by doing this, “she has prepared My body for burial” (Matthew 26:12). Then Judas went to the chief priests and agreed to hand Jesus over for thirty pieces of silver (Matthew 26:14–16). Read more in Jesus Anointed at Bethany and Why Did Judas Betray Jesus?
What is Maundy Thursday?
Maundy Thursday, also called Holy Thursday, remembers the night before Jesus died. He ate the Passover meal with His disciples in an upper room (Luke 22:7–15), and that night He did three things Christians still remember:
- He washed their feet. Jesus took a towel and a basin and washed His disciples’ feet, then told them, “I have set you an example so that you should do as I have done for you” (John 13:15). Our message Jesus Washes Disciples’ Feet walks through that night.
- He gave the Lord’s Supper. Jesus broke bread and said, “This is My body, given for you; do this in remembrance of Me” (Luke 22:19). Whenever the church shares the bread and the cup, we “proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes” (1 Corinthians 11:26).
- He gave a new commandment. “A new commandment I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you also must love one another” (John 13:34).
The day’s English name probably comes from that command: “Maundy” is from mandatum, Latin for commandment, the first word of John 13:34 in the old Latin Bible.
After supper they sang a hymn and went out to the Mount of Olives (Mark 14:26). In the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus prayed in anguish, “Yet not what I will, but what You will” (Mark 14:36), while His closest friends fell asleep. Then Judas arrived with an armed crowd, and Jesus was arrested (Mark 14:43–46). Our message Jesus Prays in the Garden looks at that prayer.
What is Good Friday?
Good Friday is the day Jesus was crucified. Through the night He was questioned by the high priest and the Council (Mark 14:53–65). At dawn they handed Him over to Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor, who had Him flogged and sentenced to death (Mark 15:1–15).
Soldiers crucified Him at Golgotha at “the third hour,” about nine in the morning. From noon until three, darkness covered the land, and then Jesus cried out and died (Mark 15:22–37). In John’s Gospel, His last words are these:
When Jesus had received the sour wine, He said, “It is finished.” And bowing His head, He yielded up His spirit.
John 19:30 (BSB)
Before sundown, when the Sabbath began, Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus laid Jesus’ body in a new tomb cut into the rock (John 19:38–42; Mark 15:46).
Why is it called Good Friday?
No one knows for sure how the English name began. The most likely explanation is that “good” once carried the sense of holy; Spanish speakers still call the day Viernes Santo, Holy Friday. You may hear that the name came from “God’s Friday,” but there is little evidence for that.
The real reason the day is good is what Jesus did on it. On the cross He took the punishment our sins deserved, so that we could be forgiven and brought back to God:
For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God.
1 Peter 3:18 (BSB)
Isaiah saw it coming centuries before: “He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities” (Isaiah 53:5). The day looked like a defeat, but it was the greatest display of God’s love: “While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). Our 2026 Easter message, Set Free, shows how the cross cancels the debt we owe (Colossians 2:13–15).
Holy Saturday: the day of waiting
Saturday was the Sabbath. The women who had watched the burial prepared spices, then “rested on the Sabbath, according to the commandment” (Luke 23:56). The chief priests remembered that Jesus had said He would rise, so they had the stone sealed and a guard posted (Matthew 27:62–66). For the disciples it was a day of grief and fear. Scripture says little else about it, and many churches keep it as a quiet day of waiting.
Easter Sunday: He is risen
Very early on Sunday, the first day of the week, the women went to the tomb and found the stone rolled away (Matthew 28:1–8; Mark 16:1–8; Luke 24:1–12; John 20:1–18). An angel told them:
He is not here; He has risen, just as He said! Come, see the place where He lay.
Matthew 28:6 (BSB)
That same day Jesus appeared to Mary Magdalene, to two disciples walking to Emmaus and to His disciples behind locked doors (John 20:11–20; Luke 24:13–35). Over the next forty days He showed Himself alive “with many convincing proofs” (Acts 1:3).
Why do we celebrate Easter?
Easter is the center of the Christian faith. Paul passed on the gospel “as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures” (1 Corinthians 15:3–4). He added that everything depends on the resurrection: “And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins” (1 Corinthians 15:17). But it did happen:
But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.
1 Corinthians 15:20 (BSB)
Because Jesus rose, we know His death paid for our sins: He “was raised to life for our justification” (Romans 4:25). Because He rose, death is not the end for those who belong to Him; He is the first of a harvest still to come. And because He rose, He is alive today, and you can know Him. That is why Christians have gathered on Sunday, the day of the resurrection, since the days of the apostles (Acts 20:7).
If you have doubts, you’re in good company: some of Jesus’ own followers doubted too. Our message Embracing Doubt: The Journey to Resurrection Faith is a good place to start. We’re also preparing a Holy Week devotional for families, with a short reading for each day.
Questions about Holy Week
All four Gospels tell it. For the Last Supper, the cross and the empty tomb, read Matthew 26–28, Mark 14–16, Luke 22–24 or John 13–21; John 13–17 records Jesus’ last long talk with His disciples. Acts 1 describes His appearances and ascension, and 1 Corinthians 15 lists eyewitnesses of the risen Jesus, including “more than five hundred brothers at once” (1 Corinthians 15:6).
Easter follows the moon. Since the early centuries, Western churches have celebrated it on the first Sunday after the first full moon on or after March 21, the church’s fixed date for the start of spring. That keeps Easter near Passover, when Jesus died and rose, so it can fall anywhere from March 22 to April 25. Orthodox churches use the older Julian calendar, so their Easter is often later.
Mark says Jesus died on “Preparation Day (that is, the day before the Sabbath)” (Mark 15:42), and the women found the tomb empty early on Sunday, “the first day of the week” (Luke 24:1). In Jewish reckoning part of a day counted as a day, so Friday, Saturday and Sunday make “the third day” (1 Corinthians 15:4). Some Christians, reading Matthew 12:40, argue for a Wednesday or Thursday crucifixion.
Lent is the season of about forty days before Easter that many churches keep for prayer, fasting and repentance. It begins on Ash Wednesday, February 10 in 2027, and Holy Week is its final week. Neither season is commanded in Scripture. They are traditions many Christians find helpful, and the Bible leaves believers free to observe special days or not (Romans 14:5–6).
No one is certain. The English word goes back to an old name for the spring month when the feast fell; the eighth-century monk Bede linked that name to a goddess, but historians still debate it. Many languages instead use a name drawn from Passover, like Spanish Pascua, because “Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed” (1 Corinthians 5:7).
Clarity Church meets Sundays at 10am at Edinbrook Elementary in Brooklyn Park, and we’d love to celebrate Easter with you on March 28, 2027. Plan your visit — come as you are.