I did some exhaustive research again – I googled it – and found out that today is a holiday. Did you know that? It is. Today is National Ampersand Day. Don’t you just love National Ampersand Day? Does anybody know what time the parade is? I can never figure out what to give as a present for National Ampersand Day. I assume you have to give two things so you can say you are giving this & that.
For those that don’t know, the ampersand is the little Latin symbol for “and” (&). I don’t know why that symbol gets its own holiday. I don’t know who gets to declare these stupid holidays but I guess you just do it and hope it catches on. And if you celebrate National Ampersand Day, I hope you enjoy it and truly find meaning in it, because I really can’t.
Some holidays are more important than others. Some are more meaningful. Most major holidays are to remind us of important things that have happened in the past. Thanksgiving and Christmas come to mind pretty easily. This Wednesday is September 11 and is Patriot’s Day when we remember what happened in 2001 when nearly 3,000 people were killed in those attacks. It is important to remember those times and so we make them into holidays and that’s good.
Americans celebrate our independence from the British on July 4th. It is important to celebrate that. It’s a big deal. A lot of people died so we could have that independence and it would be disrespectful to forget them. But did you know there is another celebration of independence that most of us never celebrate? The Passover is a celebration of independence that has its roots in the book of Genesis when young Joseph was sold into slavery by his brothers. It’s a long story but Joseph was sent to Egypt. Then as an adult, he saved his family, who lived in Israel, from starving and had his whole family move to Egypt and that’s a great story.
But after some years went by, the Israelites became a problem for the Egyptians and they made the Israelites slaves and they were slaves for 400 years. But finally, God raised up Moses and instructed him to go to the pharaoh and tell them to let God’s people go. And do you remember what happened? Well, first, Pharaoh said, “Uh…no. Thanks though. Now go back to work.” But after God sent a bunch of plagues, Pharaoh started to waiver.
Pharaoh was tough but after nine plagues that included blood, frogs, flies, hail, locusts and all kinds of bad stuff, God knew He had Pharaoh on the ropes. He knew that with this next plague, Pharaoh would give in so He called Moses and Aaron together and told them…well, let’s just read what God told Moses and Aaron in Exodus chapter 12.
We have just started our series on seeing Jesus in the Old Testament. We saw last week that Jesus is the subject of the entire Bible. Some people might not see it but they just need to look a little closer. There is prophecy about Jesus all through the Old Testament. There are signs and pictures and types of the Messiah on nearly every page if you start to look for them. Today we are going to see a foreshadowing of Jesus in the Passover. When you look at it with Jesus-focused glasses, it will be obvious. So, let’s start with Exodus 12:1 and go through just verse 13. Exodus 12:1-13.
The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in Egypt, 2 “This month is to be for you the first month, the first month of your year. 3 Tell the whole community of Israel that on the tenth day of this month each man is to take a lamb for his family, one for each household. 4 If any household is too small for a whole lamb, they must share one with their nearest neighbor, having taken into account the number of people there are. You are to determine the amount of lamb needed in accordance with what each person will eat. 5 The animals you choose must be year-old males without defect, and you may take them from the sheep or the goats. 6 Take care of them until the fourteenth day of the month, when all the members of the community of Israel must slaughter them at twilight. 7 Then they are to take some of the blood and put it on the sides and tops of the doorframes of the houses where they eat the lambs. 8 That same night they are to eat the meat roasted over the fire, along with bitter herbs, and bread made without yeast. 9 Do not eat the meat raw or boiled in water but roast it over a fire—with the head, legs and internal organs. 10 Do not leave any of it till morning; if some is left till morning, you must burn it. 11 This is how you are to eat it: with your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand. Eat it in haste; it is the Lord’s Passover. 12 “On that same night I will pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn of both people and animals, and I will bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt. I am the Lord. 13 The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are, and when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you when I strike Egypt.
Can you imagine the response of the Israelites when Moses and Aaron told them what God had said to do? “We are supposed to take a what? And do what with it? And eat it how? That doesn’t make any sense.”
Has God ever told you to do something that didn’t make any sense? Teresa, I know God told you to marry Cody and that doesn’t make any sense but you just hold on. Maybe it will some day. 😊 Seriously, somebody tell me a time when God told you to do something that didn’t make sense but you did it anyway.
I don’t know why God chooses to do some things like He does, but this story is practically dripping with symbolism and it all points to Jesus Christ. This is such a perfect picture or foreshadowing of Jesus, starting with the lamb. Is there anything anymore helpless than a lamb? Is there anything any sweeter than a young lamb, besides my sweet Sara dog of course? I saw a video the other day where somebody had put some little lambs and goats in custom pajamas and let them run around. If you can look at that and not say, “Aw!” then something inside you is dead. They are cute and helpless and sweet…and the perfect symbolic animal of our Lord, Jesus Christ.
I’ll show you why. So, let’s figure that the exodus of the Hebrew people from Egypt happened about 1300 AD, give or take a century. Then in about 700 AD, Micah prophesied in Micah 5:2, “But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times." That’s an incredible prophecy fulfilled by Jesus 700 years after it was written.
Did you know that for centuries Passover lambs were raised in Bethlehem? In those very same shepherds’ fields outside Bethlehem, a special breed of sacrificial lamb was raised and nurtured to be brought to Jerusalem at Passover to be slaughtered to cover the people’s sins. How fitting that Mary’s Lamb, God’s perfect Lamb, the Lord Jesus, would be born there!
And He was born in a stable. How fitting that a sacrificial Lamb would be born in a stable. This Lamb was the final Passover lamb, the Lamb slain from the foundations of the world (Rev. 13:8), the one sacrificed to cover the sins of the world, past, present and future—forever. (Adrian Rogers)
Then, in Matthew 27, it says that as Jesus stood before Pilate, being accused of crimes He didn’t commit, Jesus did not answer. It says that He made no reply to any charge. He didn’t fight back. He didn’t argue. He didn’t cry and beg. He just allowed them to do what they wanted to do; what had been prophesied that they would do thousands of years before. Jesus just allowed Himself to be killed. What a picture of the Lord Jesus, the Lamb of Bethlehem Who said, "No man takes it (my life) from Me, but I lay it down..." (John 10:18).
Even today, God does not force Himself on anybody. Have you noticed that somebody can slander God, call Jesus all kinds of names and blaspheme the Holy Spirit and God just allows it? Oh, there are definitely consequences but, if that’s what you want to do, God allows it. If I were God and you took my name in vain…Boom! Fire from Heaven, plagues on your house and the bird of paradise is definitely flying up your nose! But God allows you to be disrespectful. He allows you to misuse His name and mock Him or even believe He doesn’t even exist.
He just waits patiently for you to try all the other ways first. Sometimes you have to hit rock bottom. Sometimes it takes years of doing it your way and finally when your life is as big of a mess as you can make it, you turn around…and there’s Jesus quietly waiting to be asked into your life.
I’m reminded of the old hymn Softly and Tenderly. Written in 1880, it says, “Softly and tenderly Jesus is calling, calling for you and for me; O for the wonderful love he has promised,
promised for you and for me! Though we have sinned, he has mercy and pardon,
pardon for you and for me.” Softly and tenderly, like a beautiful little lamb.
Now, can you imagine taking that perfect young lamb in from the rest of the herd; bringing it into your house and caring for it- making it a part of your family - for four days? Then the head of the house takes that lamb and sacrifices it and uses the blood to cover the entrance of the house. As an animal lover, that seems almost horrific. God specified that you are to use its blood and to eat its body and when you do, God will see that and pass over. Does that remind you of anything else; even something that we do today?
That’s why we take the Lord’s Supper or Communion. We drink the juice and eat the bread to remember and honor the blood and body of Jesus and how, because He died on the cross, that our sins are not counted against us and God’s wrath passes over us even today. In 1 Peter 1 it says, “For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. 20 He was chosen before the creation of the world but was revealed in these last times for your sake.”
In Revelation, John the apostle sees Jesus as “a Lamb, looking as if it had been slain” (Revelation 5:6). In 1 Corinthians 5:7 it says, “Get rid of the old yeast, (Yeast is symbolic of sin – get rid of the sin in your life) so that you may be a new unleavened batch-as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed.”
If you truly know Jesus, you will be hurt by your sin. It will pain you the more you know Him. Just like spending time with that little lamb before the first Passover would have hurt those people when they had to sacrifice him, your relationship with Jesus should make you want to never sin again, and when you do, it should pain you. God allows us to have free will but just know that it is your sin and my sin that put Jesus on the cross to suffer and die.
This passage of scripture is pregnant with symbolism and we will see more of it tonight when we meet again but right now, I have to tell you the good news about this story. Look again at verse 11. This is how you are to eat it: with your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand. Eat it in haste; it is the Lord’s Passover. Do you know why they were supposed to eat it like that? They would tuck in their cloak so they could be ready to run! It was almost time for God to pass over and when he did Pharaoh would tell them to get out and it was time to go. So, God is telling them to get your shoes on and get packed up. Don’t even sit down to eat it. It’s almost time. “Eat it in haste.”
How many of you remember the old Charles Atlas ads in the back of magazines and comic books back in the day? Do you remember? The little skinny, scrawny guy got sand kicked in his face by the big bully, so he went home and started lifting weights “the Charles Atlas way” and got all buff and went back to the beach and beat up the bully. Do you remember those hand-drawn ads?
Okay, keep that visual in the back of your mind as I read something. Now, remember, we have just seen the little lamb sacrificed and we have seen Jesus allowing them to kill Him and we have felt the pain of our sins. But hang on just a second. In fact, maybe you ought to be standing up as I read this. No kidding. Stand up for just a minute. Now, do you remember the sweet little lovable lamb that wouldn’t hurt a fly?
Well, let me set the scene for ya. First, from 2 Timothy 3, “But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. 2 For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3 unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips…” Sounds like today, doesn’t it? Well, the rapture could happen at any moment. Matthew 24 says, “But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone.” So, are you getting the picture? That sweet Lamb is in Heaven now just waiting and He doesn’t need Charles Atlas to make Him strong. And one day soon – are you ready? – one day soon, as it says in 1 Thessalonians 4, we will be caught up with Jesus in the air and He will rapture us to Heaven, and won’t that be a glorious day? Jesus said in Revelation 22, “Look, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to each person according to what they have done.” But that’s not the end of the story. Oh no! There is a Second Coming. At His first coming, He was a suffering servant and sacrificial Lamb. At the Second Coming, He is the conquering King!
Revelation 1:7 says, “Behold, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him, and all tribes of the earth will wail on account of him.” But then it says in Revelation 19, speaking of this, “I saw heaven standing open and there before me was a white horse, whose rider is called Faithful and True. With justice he judges and makes war. His eyes are like blazing fire, and on his head are many crowns. He has a name written on him that no one knows but he himself. He is dressed in a robe dipped in blood, and his name is the Word of God. The armies of heaven were following him, riding on white horses and dressed in fine linen, white and clean. (That’s us, by the way.) Out of his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations. ‘He will rule them with an iron scepter.’ He treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God Almighty. On his robe and on his thigh he has this name written: KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.”
There’s your sweet little lamb! Sit down if you can. Sit down if you dare but you might want to be ready because it could happen at any second. We are going to be looking at some Old Testament prophesies that Jesus fulfilled pretty soon but I will just tell you that there are no prophesies left that need to be fulfilled. Everything has happened. Everything is done. We are just the bride waiting for her Bridegroom and it could happen any time.
Are you ready? If He came right now (and I pray that He does) are you doing what you want Him to find you doing? Have you told the people in your life that need to be told? Is there any sin in your life that you are aware of that is unforgiven and unrepented of? Is there any barrier between you and God right now? In Psalm 139, King David said, “Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my concerns. 24See if there is any offensive way in me.” Let’s do that right now. If you have never asked God for forgiveness and accepted what Jesus did on the cross for you, today is the day of salvation. Allow God’s Holy Spirit to come into your life and change you. Do it right now as the music plays.
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