AN OVERLOOKED DETAIL: Why is it significant that Jesus died at Passover?
- Luke 22:7-8.
ISRAEL'S PASSOVER: Enslaved people longing for freedom and to go home are freed by God’s decisive miracle through the Passover lamb.
- Exodus 12:1-14.
- Unpack Passover in general – focus here on the victory of getting out of Egypt.
IMPORTANT PASSOVER SPECIFICS:
1. They needed protection from the angel of death; the blood provided it.
- Exodus 12:3, 7.
- Matthew 26:28; Hebrews 2:14; Hebrews 10:4, 12.
- Unpack the importance of the blood.
2. The blood that protected them came from the body of a sacrificial lamb.
- Exodus 12:3-4.
- John 1:29, 36; 1 Corinthians 5:7; 1 Peter 1:18-19; Revelation 5:6; Revelation 6:1, 3, 5; Revelation 7:10, 17; Revelation 14:4, 10; Revelation 15:3; Revelation 19:9; Revelation 22:1, 3.
- Unpack the idea of the lamb.
PASSOVER AND THE LORD'S SUPPER: At His final meal, Jesus points His disciples to the body of the Lamb and the blood of the Lamb.
- Luke 22:15, 19-20.
- Revelation 2:11; Revelation 20:6, 14; Revelation 21:8.
- All that leads us back to the Lord’s Supper, which is where we started. In Luke 22, Jesus is gathering the disciples for the Last Supper. That passage starts with the v. 7 mention of the Passover, which initiated our exploration up to this point.
- Look at v. 15 with me. Jesus tells them that He has desired to eat this Passover meal with them.
- We know what happens at the Last Supper. Look at vv. 19-20. Jesus takes the bread and breaks it. Jesus takes the cup and shares its meaning.
- Again, we need to stop and think for a minute: this is happening at Passover. That is not accidental. All that is going on is deeply meaningful from a Passover perspective.
- Both parts of the Lord’s Supper point back to the Passover. But Christ is doing for us spiritually what the Passover did for Israel physically.
- The blood of Christ points us back to the blood on the doorposts.
- For Israel the blood of the lamb saved them from death.
- For us the blood of the Lamb saves us from the second death.
- The New Testament talks about the second death as being spiritual separation from God (Revelation 2:11; Revelation 20:6, 14; Revelation 21:8). The first death is our physical death, but the second death is our spiritual death. That is, our separation from God because of our sin.
- To put it symbolically, I put the blood of Christ on the doorposts of my heart and the angel of the second death passes by me. I am not separated from God because of the forgiveness that Jesus brings me.
- The body of the lamb at Israel’s Passover was eaten after being killed. They gathered as a family and ate it.
- We gather as a church family and partake of the body of the Lamb.
- Go back to “Israel’s Passover” earlier in the outline. Have them mark out “Israel’s” and insert “My.” Then unpack that statement again in light of Christ.
