Aah Passover what a miraculous moment-in-time for us, then and now. I will like to share some remembrances of Passover and what it’s meant so that we don’t think of this time frame as insignificant.
Passover was instituted for us back when the LORD GOD spoke to Moses and Aaron, I’m sure you recall this from watching the Ten Commandment starring Charlton Heston. But did you know that when it was told to Moses and Aaron that the beginning of months of a new year would be October, according to orthodox Jewish Hebrew studies? And it was on the 10th day of October that the Israeli men who were making their escape from Egypt with their households were told to get a lamb. Each lamb was to represent his household. That lamb had to be a perfect lamb no older than one year old and they were to take this lamb into their home to care for and bond with it. Now we have to imagine a dear innocent little lamb, so cute and cuddly that we get to keep for fourteen days. We know how we are with puppies, dogs, kittens and cats. Now during the night the entire village had to kill their lambs on the fourteenth night of October. And of its blood, they were to smear it above the door and along the sides and then eat that lamb. Now we have to imagine the emotional distraught everyone had to be in especially the children, after all, this had become their pet. After this emotional trauma, you are now informed that we are about to leave the place that you’ve known all your life to an unknown place. And it’s going to happen at a moment’s notice. So be ready, be fully dressed and make sure that blood is over your door and on its sides as instructed. This, my friends, is the LORD’s Passover. So the LORD GOD HIMself moved throughout all of Egypt killing all the first-born humans that were not protected by the blood of the lamb and the first born animals. This is why we should never take the Passover as trivial we should always keep it holy for it is a day of honor that is to be memorialized. We should teach the Passover from generation to generation, do we have to continue with the rituals and ordinances of the Passover any longer? No, because JESUS freed us from the curse of the law and rituals and ordinances are a part of that curse. And just because according to the orthodox Jewish calendar it should be celebrated in October and we celebrate it in April does not delegitimize the fact that we must respect the LORD’s Passover. We can find the entire Passover story in Exodus 12.
Again, why is the Passover so important to us today? Some may think that what transpired then was for then but what happened was then was also relevant for now. What transpired then was only a foreshadow of what JESUS did for us now.
CHRIST means the Anointed One and what you do with anointing is a smear, paint, and pour over. Passover literally means to pass over or to spare. For the Israelites, the LORD GOD passed over their houses because HE saw the blood of the lamb. For us, we have been spared from the punishment that we so rightfully deserved because of sin. But because the blood of JESUS has been poured on us and we are being washed in HIS blood all the LORD GOD sees when HE looks on us is the blood of the LAMB. Because JESUS the perfect LAMB of GOD was sacrificed for the sins of this world.
JESUS understands more than we realize the oppression of mankind. As a matter of fact, HE endured more oppression than we will ever endure. JESUS was loaded down with unreasonable burdens, HE was treated unjustly, harshly, rigorously, HE was compelled to stay up and endure torture through unfair trials, lies, persecutions, being made fun of, being spat on, being hit on, having had HIS beard plucked out, hair pulled, crown of thorns placed on HIS head, beaten until HIS flesh was ripped from HIS back, clothes taken off HIS body, walked through town naked, carried HIS own cross and nail to that cross while still being made fun of and given urine and dung to drink. And yet HE never said an evil word against anyone. Instead, HE asked the FATHER to forgive. Passover is a great part of our salvation history and is worth studying.
1 Corinthians 5:7; Is. 53:7; Jhn. 19:14
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