Title: The Passover Lamb (Easter in the O.T.)
Text: Exodus 12:1-20
Truth: The death of Christ is the fulfillment of the Passover sacrifice.
Aim: To clarify and celebrate that salvation is an act of God in Christ.
Life ?: What does the Passover tell us about Christ?
INTRODUCTION
I read about a church in Norway called “The Church of the Lamb.” It got its unusual name because at the pinnacle of the steeple of this old, wooden church is a beautiful carving of a single, solitary lamb. Many years ago when the church was being built, the story goes, a workman was laboring up at the very top of that steeple when he suddenly slipped and lost his balance. He fell a great distance to the street below. But at that very moment, going through the narrow streets of that little town was a flock of sheep, and he fell on the back of one of those sheep. The lamb broke his fall and he was hardly injured, but in the process the sheep was smashed and died. As a tribute to that one lamb, the workmen carved a lamb into the steeple of that church, and that is how it got its name “The Church of the Lamb.” (David Dykes)
The Passover is the story of another lamb that gave its life so someone could live. The word “Passover” means “to pass over; to spread the wings over, to spare; preserve; protecting.” It refers to a specific event in the history of Israel when God’s judgment passed over Israel and the Lord stood guard protecting those who trusted in Him. The death of Christ on the cross is the fulfillment of the Old Testament Passover sacrifice.
Nine times the Lord commanded Pharaoh and Egypt to free the Israelites from slavery so they could return to their homeland. Nine times God judged Egypt with plagues that directly challenged and humiliated Egypt’s gods. The one true God of the Hebrew slaves proved Himself more powerful than any of the false gods of Egypt. Still Pharaoh refused. This is the tenth and final judgment. It will be so devastating and terrorizing that the Egyptians will beg the Israelites to leave the land.
Moses gathered the leadership and told them how to prepare Israel for this coming judgment. They would kill a one-year-old male lamb. They would take a hyssop branch and apply the blood of that lamb to the doorposts and lentil. It would not be on the doorstep. They were not to trample on the blood but be under the blood.
All the family was to gather in the home. None were to leave the house that night. During the night God was to pass through the land with the angel of destruction. As He would come to a house with the blood applied, He would pass over it and order the angel not to enter it. In this way, God spared all who were under the blood from the judgment of God. The Passover is an Old Testament picture of the provision of salvation that Jesus Christ provides from the cross and the grave.
What does the Passover tell us about Christ?
I. CHRIST IS OUR SUBSTITUTE FOR SIN
A substitute was provided for the firstborn male of the family. Only the firstborn males were in danger. The firstborn in many cultures are considered special, and in Egypt, they were considered sacred. In Exodus 4:22 God called Israel his firstborn. Pharaoh had instituted a policy of drowning all the males of Israel in order to control Israel’s population. God returns Pharaoh’s judgment on his own family and nation.
The substitute for the firstborn male was a one-year-old lamb. They were instructed to examine the lamb for 14 days to see if it had any defects or diseases. Jesus’ life was examined to see if there was any sin in Him and even his enemies confessed they could find no fault in Him.
A one-year-old lamb, I’m told, has reached its peak of health and strength. It is not too weak nor has it begun to decline. Jesus wasn’t crucified as a developing teenager or a man of declining strength in his middle age years. He was at the full measure of his strength in his early thirties.
The lamb was to be slain at twilight. That represents the time when the first light of the stars appears. This would be from 3-6 p.m. We know Jesus was riveted to the cross at 9 a.m. and died at 3 p.m. At that time thousands of lambs began to be sacrificed for Passover. The Gospel writers were careful to give us the time of these events so we’d make the connection that our Passover Lamb was dying for us on the cross.
The lamb was to be eaten whole like shepherds in the fields who are traveling. They are not to eat the meat raw like the pagans who think that consuming the blood of the animal somehow mystically empowers them with the qualities of that animal. They are not to boil the lamb. That would require breaking bones and the meat would separate. No, they were to leave this lamb whole. It would be obvious to everyone in the house that the firstborn was spared because of this lamb’s substitution.
In the whole chapter the word lamb is always singular. Though thousands of lambs died that night, it pointed to a singular lamb that would die for the entire world. The lamb was the son’s substitute, but it prophesied of the day when the Son would be our substitute.
During the Battle of Britain, July to October of 1940, Winston Churchill once drove to the military headquarters. R.K. Parks, the commander, and Churchill sat in front of a radar screen. Suddenly, dots appeared on the screen representing the German bombers coming across the Channel. Their eyes were glued to what was about to take place in real life.
R.K. Parks sent up the first wave of young Royal Air Force pilots to engage the Germans. More dots appeared on the screen coming across the Channel and he ordered up a second wave, and then a third. He sent those young men up to battle over the skies without emotion. The Germans seemed to come endlessly.
Churchill turned to Parks and asked, “How many more do you have?” Parks ordered one more wave of fighter pilots up and said, “That’s the last one.” They sat transfixed before the screen but no more bombers came across the Channel.
Winston Churchill is now believed to have been an alcoholic, but in the sobriety of that moment, as he went outside to his car, his face wet with tears, he said, “Never have so many owed so much to so few.” It was an eloquent tribute to the brave RAF pilots of Great Britain, but Churchill was wrong. Two thousand years ago we come to the cross where the Lamb of God is crucified, never have so many owed so much to just One.
What does the Passover tell us about Christ?
II. CHRIST IS OUR SATISFACTORY SUBSTITUTE FOR SIN.
What we see in the Passover story is God acting as Judge and Savior simultaneously. He satisfies the requirement of His holiness to punish sin while simultaneously satisfying the requirement of mercy toward sinners. God does not act only in judgment on man’s sin when Jesus is crucified, and later shows His mercy when Jesus rises from the grave. That’s wrong. When God acts, justice and mercy are in harmony with one another.
How can He express His holiness in judgment and His love in pardon simultaneously? By providing an acceptable substitute. The substitute receives the judgment and the sinner receives the pardon.
God cannot die. Immortality is an essential characteristic of the nature of God. It is incorrect to say God died on the cross. So He became a man in order to do so. Hebrews 2:14 says, “Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil.” In a mysterious union that is understood through the trinity relationship of God the Father and God the Son, God both inflicted the penalty for man’s sin and paid for man’s sin in the God-Man Jesus Christ.
“Can you explain to me how that works, Ed?” No. It is a mystery beyond the thinking of finite human beings, but I can experience the grace and mercy of God’s act of substitution.
The one who should pay for sin is man, but he cannot for he is not perfect. Unless sin is paid for he cannot be saved. Man ought to pay for the sin but only God can forgive sin. What is required for this great dilemma is a perfect man. What is required is a forgiveness that is eternal. What we need is the God-Man.
On the cross man’s sin is paid for. On the cross God’s holiness is satisfied. On the cross man is pardoned of sin. On the cross God’s love and mercy is extended. There is nothing like this in any other of the world’s religions. Christ is our satisfactory substitute for sin.
Presidential pardons have been issued since George Washington pardoned the leaders of the Whiskey Rebellion. There have been some famous and controversial pardons in our history. Andrew Johnson pardoned Confederate soldiers following the Civil War. Jimmy Carter pardoned draft dodgers of the Vietnam War. Bill Clinton issued 395 pardons during his presidency. That’s comparable to other presidents in recent years. However, 140 of those pardons were issued on his final day in office. Maybe the most controversial was Gerald Ford’s preemptive pardon in 1974 of Richard Nixon for his actions in the Watergate scandal.
The word “pardon” finds its roots in Latin in which the word means to give wholeheartedly. All over the world pardons are given to accused people which results in their forgiveness and release from penalties. But the pardon is valid only if the president is in office at the time of the pardon. For the one being pardoned, it makes all the difference in the world who the person is that is forgiving them and if they have the authority. What’s true of the pardon of criminals is true for the pardon of sinners. The One who pardons our sins must have the authority and position to grant forgiveness.
We are aware of our guilt and the need for its removal. Every society has shown some level of understanding that something drastic has to be done about our guilt. Hundreds and hundreds of cultures down through the ages have seen the need for sacrifices or blood. A relative of mine told me Tuesday at my uncle’s funeral that he was working with people at a halfway house. He said, “I’m doing something good for my soul.” We all know something is not quite right. We need to do something to correct that.
We know a lamb is not an adequate satisfaction for a human being. What we need is a perfect man whose death had such eternal influence it would satisfy the immortal God for all of eternity. We need a God-Man. There is only one Being in the universe that occupies that place of authority. It is the God-Man, Jesus Christ.
What does the Passover tell us about Christ? CHRIST IS OUR SUBSTITUTE FOR SIN. CHRIST IS OUR SATISFACTORY SUBSTITUTE FOR SIN.
III. CHRIST IS OUR SATISFACTORY SUBSTITUTE FOR SIN THAT REQUIRES SELF-HUMBLING.
Of course, the great act of self-humbling is Christ coming to our world as a man and dying on our behalf. But what I want to speak to is the self-humbling of the Israelites to apply the blood of a lamb to the doors of their home. It is what saved them.
Judgment falls on the Egyptians but Israel is protected. Why? It wasn’t a racial judgment. In fact, later in the chapter Moses gives them specific actions to take so that non-Israelites can be included in the meal. Those actions of circumcision required self-humbling to be included in the family of God.
The reason Israel was spared judgment was not because they were more righteous than the Egyptians or more religious. The Egyptians were some of the most religious people who ever lived.
God provided one way to escape judgment. It was available to the Israelite and the Egyptian. God’s provision of a bloody sacrifice divided humanity into only two categories: judged or saved. It all depended on a person’s response to accepting God’s way of sacrifice. We know from Genesis 46:34 that the Egyptians despised sheep. It was highly offensive to the Egyptians to take the blood of a lamb, smear it on their doorway, and trust that this would spare the life of their first born. They refused to accept God’s only way of escape.
In the Holy Land one of the popular sights to visit is the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. The church is built over the reputed spot where Mary gave birth to Jesus. To get to the church you walk across a broad plaza and then you come to a very small entrance. In fact, it is so small that you have to duck down low to get inside. The entrance is deliberately made low because several centuries ago the local bigshots liked to ride their horse right into the sanctuary. The priests felt that was inappropriate so they lowered the entrance to force the great men to dismount before entering the church.
The same is true of salvation. If you want to go to heaven, you’ve got to get off your high horse. Until you humble yourself, you’ll never be saved.
Are you willing to admit you are a sinner and deserve judgment? Over and over people tell me the answer they’d give God if He were to ask them why He should let them into heaven. That answer is “because I’m a good person. If that would be your answer, let’s assume that only once every waking hour you broke God’s law. Only once/hour do you ever think a thought that you shouldn’t, or only once/hour do you say something you shouldn’t say, or only once/hour do you do something you shouldn’t or fail to do something that God wanted you to do. This would amount to sixteen violations of God’s commands/day. At the end of one week you’d have sinned against God over 100 times. That would total nearly 500 violations of God’s law at the end of the month and nearly 6,000 in one year! If you lived to seventy years of age, you would stand before holy God with around 400,000 sins against Him--and any one of those sins would be sufficient to bar your entrance into heaven and open the door to hell.
Please be honest with yourself for the next few moments. Think back over the past month or week or even 24-hours and tell me what does your conscience tell you? Would you be willing for us publish and distribute to every person here this morning the actual content of your thoughts over the past 24-hours? Would you be comfortable if we showed every minute of your life on the projector for just the past 24-hours? What if we played over the sound system every word that came from your mouth for just the past 24-hours? If you’d not want that to happen then, how do you expect to face the God who died on the cross for your sins if you’ve refused Him? Our only hope is to humble ourselves before the God of the Passover.
The first step of self-humbling is to repent. We must admit that we don’t have sufficient natural goodness to save ourselves or even contribute to our salvation. It is your sin and my sin that required the crucifixion of the Son of God. Is there no regret? Is there no horror over what sin has cost God and what it has cost you? Sin has warped and twisted the very image God intended us to be.
This is why true repentance involves a desire to do away with sin and live a changed life. Repentance is not just a desire for God to sweep our wrongs under the rug; it is the honest desire to live a life that is pleasing to God. To repent is self-humbling because it is turning to a new life of being God-centered instead of self-centered.
Secondly, the Israelites humbled themselves by placing their faith in the way God had provided. Faith is a deliberate act of self-surrender and submission to Jesus Christ as the only means of forgiveness of sin and acceptance into God’s presence. You give up believing you will be accepted into heaven based on your goodness and solely trust in Jesus’ saving work on the cross as the basis for reconciliation with God.
That is so offensive to us that we will delay the assurance of heaven and risk the certainty of hell before we will acknowledge and submit to Jesus Christ as our only hope of salvation. But for those Israelites who obeyed it meant that children and grandchildren still had their daddies and granddads who were the firstborn’s like me. It meant many women were not separated from their husband and parents didn’t lose their sons because they applied the blood to the doors of their home. But across town the Egyptian tears flowed and the cries rose as mothers and wives and sisters shook the lifeless bodies of their firstborn husband and brothers and sons who refused to apply the blood.
CONCLUSION
Last night I went to bed thinking, “How can I make this message be real to us?” I woke up after having a horrible, frightening dream. It was one of those dreams that you wake up in a cold sweat, and don’t want to go back to sleep for fear it will recur.
I was at Burger King with one of my grandchildren. I don’t even want to mention which one the dream was so awful. I was watching this grandchild play in the play area. A man came in that I knew and we got to visiting with one another. Suddenly, I sensed I had not seen my grandchild. I looked for him in the play area. I called his name. I crawled through the play tubes because sometimes those little boogers won’t answer you. He wasn’t there. I checked the men’s restroom and knocked on the women’s restroom. I searched in the dining area. He was nowhere to be found. Panic was rising in my heart. Finally, I stood in the middle of that dining room and shouted, “I can’t find my grandchild. Has anyone seen my grandchild?!” It is then that I woke up and my grandchild was still missing.
Christians, we live in a community that is very lost and on the broad way to hell. Somebody has to shout and get their attention that a Passover Lamb has been provided for the certain judgment is coming. They are never more open to hearing that message than Easter. Please raise your voice, invite your friends and family to come to Easter service so they might learn how to apply the blood of protection from the coming judgment.
To you who are without Christ, the great danger of this story was to delay. Pharaoh presumed he had lots of time but his firstborn son had just moments. Death is the great uncertain certainty. The biggest gamblers this Sunday are not at Riverwind casino; they are the undecided in church this Sunday morning. A person that loses $5,000 can in time and work replace the money, but the chance is nil that the lost can escape paying for their own sins once death comes.
What possible reason can you give for not accepting His satisfactory substitute for sin? You are already on the road to eternal hell, but in His amazing love God has set before you the way to heaven through Jesus Christ. You may find it by repenting of sin and placing your faith in Christ.
INVITATION
When John Wesley was five years old the parsonage his family lived in, his father was an Anglican priest, burned to the ground. Thanks to the prompt action by two of the villagers, the boy was carried out just seconds before the roof crashed down. Much later in life he was preaching on the very date that the fire happened and he remembered being snatched from the fire. He told it to the congregation and there was much rejoicing. He always viewed his salvation as the second time he was snatched from the fire.
This morning your need is to be snatched from the fire, or you need to be snatching people from the fire. Which is the one you most need to commit to this morning? Look what God has done to in order to provide you protection when He became our Passover lamb.
