The Cross And The World Series

"If the household be too little for the lamb, let him and his neighbor next unto his house take it according to the number of the souls" (Ex. 12:4).

The Paschal lamb was God’s special type of Jesus Christ, "the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world." The lamb selected for the Hebrew passover was kept apart until the fourth day so that all might have an opportunity of inspecting his perfect blamelessness; and then it was slain and its blood sprinkled upon the doorposts, and the flesh eaten by the household. So Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, was set apart and manifested to all the people for three and a half years, that all might see that He was "holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners." Then in the fourth year He too was slain for the sins of men, and His life became the Living Bread of all the household of faith.

Jesus, The Lamb of God

God’s most precious gift to us lost and sinful men was the Lamb of God. As we realize the curse of sin -- and each of us has sometimes felt the dreadfulness of a sense of guilt and condemnation -- and then look upon the sprinkled blood and hear God say, "When I see the blood, I will pass over you," we must feel that among all precious things there is nothing like "the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot" (1 Pet. 1:19). And as we realize our weakness and step out on our pilgrim path through the desert of life, it is even more precious to feed upon His very life and echo back His own gracious word, "My flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed" (John 6:55). The old redemption song may have lost its charm for an age of higher criticism and self-sufficient humanitarianism, but for us the sweetest note in earth and heaven shall ever be

Dear, dying Lamb, Thy precious blood

Shall never lose its power,

Till all the ransomed Church of God,

Be saved to sin no more.

It was one of the provisions of the Passover Law that no man could eat his passover alone. It was a fellowship and family sacrifice. Together the household sat down and looked up at the door post dripping with the sprinkled blood, with a sense of infinite safety, and then together partook of the flesh of the lamb. So the sacrifice of Jesus Christ can never be an object of selfishness or a monopoly of the few. Men can monopolize many earthly honors and treasures, but the blood of Jesus Christ belongs to all our sinful race.

No doubt the household suggests the family. From the beginning God has included the home circle in the covenant of redemption. He recognizes the tender and sacred ties that bind us to our loved ones, and the promise is to us and to our children, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and they house" (Acts 16:31). One of the sweetest joys we have is the joy of praying for the salvation of our homes and thanking God for children in the household of faith. And one of the saddest shadows that has rested upon our hearts has been to think of the blighted homes and lost lambs of the heathen world where the Gospel has never been known. If ever you have had to part at the graveside with a beloved child, saved perhaps from great sin in answer to your prayers through the precious blood of Jesus Christ, I am sure your heart has gone up to heaven with a thrill of joy and thankfulness even greater than for you own salvation, and you have blessed His holy name for the arms that could reach out where yours could not have reached and could rescue from the gulf of sin and hell and carry through suffering and death that life which was dearer than you own. Thank God for the Lamb that is sufficient for our households as well as ourselves.

But the household has a wider meaning. It takes in the whole household of faith and the whole family of God. The blood of Jesus Christ has redeemed His church and is the bond that binds it into a greater family. The apostle, speaking of the relation of the church to the redemption of Christ, uses this language: "The church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood" (Acts 20:28). And again we read, "Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing" (Eph. 5:25-27). In this sense the Lamb is for the whole household of faith, and we together share the redemption and a grateful song, "unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion forever and ever" (Rev. 1:6).