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The Passover Old And New
Contributed by Steve Keeler on May 9, 2010 (message contributor)
Summary: The story of the Passover in Exodus 12 provides a wonderful model of God's way of salvation as Achieved by Jesus on the cross of Calvary.
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The Passover both Old and New by Steve Keeler
Exodus 12:1-13
Now the LORD said to Moses and Aaron in the land of
Egypt, this month shall be the beginning of months for
you; it is to be the first month of the year to you. Speak
to all the congregation of Israel, saying, On the tenth of
this month they are each one to take a lamb for
themselves, according to their fathers' households, a
lamb for each household. Now if the household is too
small for a lamb, then he and his neighbor nearest to
his house are to take one according to the number of
persons in them; according to what each man should
eat, you are to divide the lamb.
Your lamb shall be an unblemished male a year old;
you may take it from the sheep or from the goats. You
shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same
month, then the whole assembly of the congregation of
Israel is to kill it at twilight. Moreover, they shall take
some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and
on the lintel of the houses in which they eat it.
They shall eat the flesh that same night, roasted with
fire, and they shall eat it with unleavened bread and
bitter herbs.
Do not eat any of it raw or boiled at all with water, but
rather roasted with fire, both its head and its legs along
with its entrails. And you shall not leave any of it over
until morning, but whatever is left of it until morning,
you shall burn with fire.
Now you shall eat it in this manner: with your loins
girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your
hand; and you shall eat it in haste it is the LORD'S
Passover. For I will go through the land of Egypt on
that night, and will strike down all the firstborn in the
land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the
gods of Egypt I will execute judgments I am the
LORD.
The blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where
you live; and when I see the blood I will pass over you,
and no plague will befall you to destroy you when I
strike the land of Egypt.
Children often will play with models, model cars, trains,
airplanes if you are a man and doll houses and little tea
sets if you are a woman. The point of a model is that it
provides a simplified and scaled-down version of the
real thing.
The story of the Passover in Exodus 12 is not only a
record of the miraculous deliverance of the Israelites
over 3,000 years ago, but it also provides a wonderful
model of God's way of salvation as achieved by Jesus
on the cross of Calvary.
It's a three dimensional model and those three
dimensions are what we are saved from, by, and to.
The first dimension:
We are saved from destruction.
Exodus 12:12, 'For I will go through the land of Egypt
on that night, and will strike down all the firstborn in the
land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the
gods of Egypt I will execute judgments I am the
LORD.'
This is the 10th and last plague that the Lord inflicted
on Pharaoh and his land. Time after time the Lord had
sent Moses to Pharaoh and told him, "Let my people
go." Time after time the Lord had asserted his
authority over Pharaoh and his gods. Time after time
Pharaoh had refused and hardened his heart.
God was finished trying to deal with Pharaoh. The time
had finally come for the end of all the warnings and for
God's judgement and wrath to begin.
Exodus12:29-30, 'Now it came about at midnight that
the LORD struck all the firstborn in the land of Egypt,
from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sat on his throne to
the firstborn of the captive who was in the dungeon,
and all the firstborn of cattle. Pharaoh arose in the
night, he and all his servants and all the Egyptians, and
there was a great cry in Egypt, for there was no home
where there was not someone dead.'
What an awful thing it must have been to awake to,
what a terrible price Egypt had to pay for willful
disobedience and disbelief. Something many people do
these days is believe that God's judgement is just for
the Old Testament. Please don't make that mistake.
Listen to Paul in Romans 5:9 as he speaks of being
saved from God's wrath through Christ. It says "Much
more then, having now been justified by His blood, we
shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him."