Christ our Passover has been sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep the feast. Those words opened our service tonight. They’re words that were spoken this morning at our Communion service. But what does it mean? What’s the Passover, and how is Christ our Passover?
On these Sunday nights leading up to Easter, we’re going to dig into the Old Testament. We’re going to see how the cross of Jesus fulfils some of the Old Testament promises and prophecies. And tonight we begin with the Passover. So what is it all about?
In our (very) long reading, we heard of all the instructions for the very first Passover meal. Now, I don’t know whether in your house you have certain days for certain meals. Maybe Monday night is pasta night; or Friday night is a chippy tea. For this first Passover, there was only one dish on the menu, in every Israelite home. Roasted lamb, bitter herbs, and bread made without yeast. What’s for dinner tonight? It was going to be lamb, by divine decree.
As we’ve landed into the middle of a Bible book, we need to get our bearings. We’re in Exodus, the 2nd book of the Bible, and watching as the story continues. You see, Genesis, the first book, is all about beginnings - the creation, the fall, the flood, and then the story of Abraham and his family line. By the end of Genesis there are 75 (or 70) Israelites in the land of Egypt (brought there by Joseph and his amazing technicolour dreamcoat).
When Exodus begins, there are a whole lot more Israelites - so many in fact, that Pharaoh is afraid of them. He begins to enslave them, tries to kill off their babies, but one of those babies is rescued from the Nile by Pharaoh’s daughter. That baby, now grown up, is called by the LORD (capital letters, covenant name of God) to lead his people out of slavery and into the promised land. But when Moses went to the new Pharaoh, and asked him to ‘let my people go’, Pharaoh said no. Then no. Then no. Time and time again.
The LORD sent a series of plagues on Egypt, to demonstrate his power (and also to ridicule the Egyptian small g gods), but Pharaoh just kept hardening his heart. We heard them in Psalm 78 - the water turned to blood, frogs, gnats, flies, plague on livestock, boils, hail, locusts, and darkness. But still Pharaoh said no.
And so the LORD prepared to send his last plague. A plague even worse than the previous nine combined. The plague to end all plagues - the death of the firstborn. God said that there would be a death in every house, that the firstborn would die. Then Pharaoh and the Egyptians would know that the LORD is God. Then the Israelites would be saved and rescued.
Death was coming to every house on the same night. But for the Israelites, there was a way for the death of their firstborn to be avoided. It involved the Passover Lamb. And we find the details in chapter 12.
The man was to choose a lamb for his household - a year-old male without defect, big enough to feed his family. Over several days they were to care for it, look after it, until the fourteenth day of the month. At twilight, just as evening is coming in, the lamb was to be slaughtered. Before they cook the meal, though, the blood of the lamb had to be painted on the sides and top of the door frame of the house.
They even have cooking instructions - roasted over the fire (not raw or cooked in water). And they have table instructions - with your coat on, cloak tucked into your belt, sandals on feet, staff in hand, ready to move. This isn’t going to be a leisurely meal to take all night and chat into the morning. This is a meal eaten quickly, in haste, waiting to move out.
So how did the Passover work? Well, we’re told in verses 12-13. Let’s focus in on these verses. ‘On that same night I will pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn - both men and animals - and I will bring judgement on all the gods of Egypt. I am the LORD. The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are; and when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you when I strike Egypt.’
We get the same idea over in verse 23: ‘When the LORD goes through the land to strike down the Egyptians, he will see the blood on the top and sides of the door-frame and will pass over that doorway, and he will not permit the destroyer to enter your houses and strike you down.’
So here we get the idea of the Passover. The Lord will ‘pass over’ the Israelite houses. Why? Because of the blood on the door-frame. You see, the blood is the sign that a death has occurred in this house. And so the firstborn inside is safe, sheltered by the blood. The Egyptian homes didn’t have the blood on the door frame, and so the destroyer visited death in those homes.
Now, this is easy for me to imagine, because I’m the firstborn in our family. But imagine that you’re the firstborn in your house. You’d want to make sure that your dad did it all according to the Lord’s instructions, wouldn’t you? That your dad had killed the lamb. That he hadn’t forgotten to paint the blood on the door-frame. You see, for the firstborn, it’s either that lamb that dies tonight, or else it’s you. But you’ll be safe, so long as it has died in your place.
The Passover Lamb is a substitutional sacrifice. We’re familiar with the idea of substitutes in football. My own football career didn’t last very long. I was picked as a substitute for our school team for an away match against Rathfriland High School. It was a cold, rainy day, and for the whole match, I stood on the sidelines. I never got the chance to grace the pitch. So I gave up football shortly after that. But the idea of a substitute is that they take your place. You’re injured, or you can’t play, then someone else takes your place.
For the firstborn, the Passover lamb is their substitute. It dies instead of the firstborn. It takes his place. It dies, and allows the firstborn to live. And that’s exactly what happened. When midnight struck, the Lord struck down all the firstborn in Egypt (29). Every house in Egypt mourned, from Pharaoh to the dungeon.
That same night, Pharaoh gave the order for the Israelites to leave, to get out, to exit (hence exodus). That’s why the meal was eaten in haste. Over a million people were suddenly on the move, free from their slavery, saved by the Passover lamb.
It’s when we put ourselves in the sandals of the firstborn that we appreciate the blessing of the Passover lamb. It dies to let us live. It dies in our place as our substitute.
I wonder can you begin to see how Christ might be our Passover? One of the aspects of the Lord Jesus is that he came to be our Passover Lamb, the one who dies on our behalf, in our place. We see glimpses of this all the way through the gospels, little hints of what is to come. So, John the Baptist points at Jesus and says ‘Look, the Lamb of God!’ (Jn 1:36). Or, at the time of the Transfiguration, Luke tells us that when Moses and Elijah appear with Jesus, ‘They spoke about his departure (Greek: exodus), which he was about to bring to fulfilment at Jerusalem.’ (Lk 9:31).
The Passover became one of the three great festivals, which all the Israelites were to celebrate each year in Jerusalem. On their way, they would sing the songs of ascents (Ps 120-134) which we’re studying in the Fellowship. The Passover ritual remained the same every year. The same menu, with the same questions and answers and the same remembering of the Lord’s Passover.
The same, that is, until one particular Passover. It started as normal, but then Jesus departed from the well known script. Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to his disciples saying, ‘Take it; this is my body.’ Then he took the cup, gave thanks and offered it to them, and they all drank from it. ‘This is my blood of the (new) covenant, which is poured out for many.’
The bread and wine are the body and blood of Jesus - our Passover Lamb. In changing the Passover liturgy, Jesus is saying that he is the ultimate Passover Lamb. That the Old Testament Passover points to him and his sacrifice for us.
Jesus is our Passover lamb. He died in our place, for our sins, as our substitute. We can find shelter under his blood. We are freed by his blood - freed from the slavery of sin. We just need to trust in him.
We are safe under his blood, knowing that he has died for us. Are you trusting him tonight for your salvation?
Christ our Passover has been sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep the Feast!
This sermon was preached in St Matthew's Church, Richhill on Sunday evening 4th March 2018.
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