Seeking once again the Lord's
gracious help to grant me the words to speak to you this evening,
I'd like you to turn with me to the chapter that we read together,
Exodus chapter 12, and the text you'll find in verse 13. And the blood shall be to you
for a token upon the houses where you are, where ye are. And when
I see the blood, I will pass over you. and the plague shall
not be upon you to destroy you when I smite the land of Egypt. Those of you who were here with
us this morning will remember that we looked at the blood of
the Lord Jesus Christ and how throughout the scripture there
was no access to God except it be done through sacrifice, through
the shedding of blood. And we noticed over the last
Wednesday and this this morning, how that so many animals were
killed and so much blood was shed and yet none of them were
able to bring that perfect forgiveness of sin and that perfect access
to God. Yet there was one who came who
is the Lord Jesus Christ. Only he, his blood that was shed,
who was the perfect sacrifice and how he completed the whole
law of God and laid down his life upon the cross and how when
he died the curtain was torn from the top to the bottom where
signifying access has been made into the holy of holies and we
read in the book of Hebrews how he entered into heaven itself
with his own blood as our great high priest and presented himself
as the perfect offering, the perfect sacrifice who is able
to cleanse his people from their sins and through his perfect
sacrifice, those who are enabled to lay hold of Christ by faith,
his blood is able to be credited, his perfect righteousness, his
perfect sacrifice is able to be credited to their account,
wiping out their sin and granting them a positive righteousness
to be able to approach a holy God and to be found accepted
in Christ Jesus, accepted in the sight of a holy God through
the Lord Jesus Christ. And we looked at those verses
in 1 John that the blood of Jesus Christ, his son, cleanses us
from all sin. And I think we can almost combine
these two verses that says that the blood of Jesus Christ his
Son cleansed us from all sin and when I see the blood I will
pass over you and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy
you when I smite the land of of Egypt. We know that the book
of Corinthians tells us that Christ is our Passover lamb. He is the lamb of God and who
God sent into this world to be that substitute for sinners and
in the book of Exodus this account of the Passover we're enabled
to see something of what the Lord Jesus Christ accomplishes
for his people as the judgment falls upon the land of Egypt,
upon all those who are outside of the blood and yet the angel
passes over those who he sees that the blood is upon their
doorposts. and as he passes over the land
of Egypt as he sees the blood he's able to realize or the blood
symbolizes to him or shows him that judgment has already taken
place, death has already come to this house therefore he passes
over and he goes to where he sees no blood and when he sees
no blood judgment falls upon that house the death of the firstborn
of that house whether man or beast and the scripture tells
us great was the cry as the angel of death passed over and there
was not a house in Egypt or part of the Egyptians where death
had not come. And you can imagine the great
cry that went up, the great sadness that was there as the angel passed
over. And so as we look at this account
It is something that is quite remarkable really that this account
and all that was going to take place was already known by God
many years before. The children of Israel were captives
in a foreign land. And we know that Abraham had
been told that his family, his descendants, would be as the
stars of the sky and of the sand of the sea. And we looked at
recently how he was granted that one son, that Isaac with that
promise, that promised son, and how through Isaac, that promise
that was given to him, that he would be the one in which the
promise would flow through. But he was also told something
about his descendants. He was told that they would be
strangers in a foreign land. In Genesis 15 and verse 13. When Abraham was in a dream,
in a deep sleep, the Lord spoke to him and he said unto Abraham
or Abraham know for a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger
in a land that is not theirs and they shall serve them and
they shall afflict them for 400 years and also that nation whom
they serve will I judge and afterwards shall they come out with a great
substance and thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace and thou
shalt be buried in a good old age. And so this is of a great
comfort to the Lord's people as we read the Old Testament
and we see everything that takes place and that all of these things
are ordered in God's plan. that as the people of God when
we look at our lives and we seemingly think that they're out of control
all things are going wrong and it's as though no one is at the
helm of the ship we can come to the word of God and we can
read that God is in control of everything and we can see that
Abraham was told by God that this is exactly what is going
to take place. Your family, your seed are going
to be a stranger in a land that is not theirs and they shall
serve them and they shall afflict them for 400 years. And how that is brought about
is beyond our comprehension, you could never work it out,
you could never plan how God was going to bring about his
purposes for the children of Abraham and how Joseph was raised
up to be the favored child and how he was given those dreams
that his brethren would bow down to him and in the purposes of
God all of those things were being used by God although not
a good idea to boast to your brothers that they're going to
bow down to yet used by God. Their envy was risen up, they
became jealous of him So much so they wanted to kill him and
in the end he was sold to the Ishmaelites. And Joseph was used
as the means to preserve Jacob and his family and the land of
Egypt and then as Jacob and the family move into Egypt there
they prosper. and the children of Israel multiplied
and multiplied and multiplied and you could never have pre-planned
or pre-thought of this is how God is going to work out his
will and to bring about the promise that he gave to Abraham. It's easy for us. flick through
the scriptures, turn a few pages and we can read exactly what
has taken place. But the actual working out of
it all is a marvel of planning. Even using the sins of his brothers
to bring about that purpose of him being sold into Egypt to
become number two in the whole of the land of Egypt. It is beyond
our understanding but our God the true and the living God.
He knows the future. He plans the future. He orchestrates
the future in the lives of his people to bring about his own
purposes. 400 years, he says to him, they're
going to be slaves. Abraham had no idea how that
was going to take place yet he believed the word of God and
we see as the children of Israel grow in the land of Egypt and
as the different pharaohs come about and they did not remember
all that Joseph had done they began to be afraid of the children
of Israel and they began to beat them and to persecute them and
to make work hard for them in the end they cried unto God God
comes down as it were to save them and he raises up Moses to
be their leader to bring them out of Egypt. Moses was kept safe under the
providence of God in the courts of Pharaoh and then at the appointed
time he was called to return. But even in that There is something
that God says to Moses that he is to say to Pharaoh that shows
us that God knew exactly what he was going to do. There were
10 plagues and all of those plagues were pre-planned by God to knock
down every single god in the land of Egypt. And God knew that the very last
thing that was going to take place was that he was going to
slay the firstborn of the people of Egypt. Exodus 4. After God had, or the angel of
the Lord had spoken to him, to Moses and given him the commission
to go, He says in verse 22, And thou shalt say unto Pharaoh,
Thus saith the Lord, Israel is my son, even my firstborn. And I say unto thee, Let my son
go, that he may serve me. And if thou refuse to let him
go, behold, I will slay thy son, even thy firstborn. That was
the message that God gave to Moses, Israel is my son and if
you don't listen to what I'm going to say then I'm going to
slay your firstborn son. And we know that the heart of
Pharaoh was hard towards the message of the Lord and he rejected
the messages of God and he suffered. as a consequence of his hardness
of heart. Not only he suffered but his
nation suffered and the land of Israel which was the land
of Egypt which was once a superpower would never ever ever be the
same again after the children of Israel left the land of Egypt. in the last plague. God, as we
looked at with Abraham, how he was used to prophetically act
out something that was going to take place. So here, this
last plague was a prophetic acting out of the coming and the sacrifice
of the Lord Jesus Christ. They were going to escape death. by a substitute. The commands of God were to be
followed exactly. He gave Moses specific details
of how the children of Israel were to escape the judgment of
God. And the only way that they were
to escape was to listen to the specific instructions that the
Lord gave to Moses. they were at the right time to
find a lamb or a goat. Your lamb shall be without blemish.
The male of the first year he shall take it out from the sheep
or from the goats. Then they were to kill the lamb
they were to keep it until the 14th day of the same month and
then they were to kill it in the evening and they were to
take of the blood and strike it upon the two side posts and
the upper door posts of the house wherein they shall eat it and
there was a specific instructions as to how they were to kill and
cook the animal and how they were to themselves be dressed
and how they were to be prepared to get up at any moment and to
leave. They were to eat it with haste
for it is the Lord's Passover and that what they were acting
out was something that was going to be continued on until the
coming of the Lord Jesus Christ and even today the Jews will
remember the Passover. It was to be a continued reminder
of God's judgment upon the people of Egypt and God's preserving
hand by a substitute for the people of Egypt. They were to
be followed exactly. They were to take the blood and
to put it upon the doorposts and that is obedience. To listen
to the Word of God and to obey the Word of God is obedience. It is an act of faith. And so as they listened to what
God spoke through the prophet Moses, as they obeyed the word
that was spoken, as they acted out what God had spoken, and
as they put the blood upon the doorposts, they were saved. They were saved. The only way
in which judgment would pass over was if they acted in obedience
to the word of God and applied the blood to the doorposts. In chapter 12 from verses 5 to 7 it tells us there
that the lamb was to be without blemish from the sheep or the
goats. and there to take the blood and
strike it upon the two side posts and the upper door posts of the
houses wherein they were to eat it. And when, the text says,
and when I see the blood, I will pass over. And so that was the
only way of escape. As the angel moved over at midnight,
and as the Lord smote the firstborn of the land of Egypt, only if
he saw the blood Would that family or that household escape any
judgment? There was no other way. And the only difference we could
say between the Egyptians and the Israelites was blood on the
doorposts. Verse 23, for the Lord will pass
through to smite the Egyptians and when he seeth the blood upon
the lintel and upon the two side posts, the Lord will pass over
the door and will not suffer the destroyer to come in unto
your houses to smite you. And so what the angel was looking
for or the destroyer was looking for was blood. blood upon the
doorposts and when he saw that blood then he would pass over
that house and so if even if an Israelite did not act in obedience
to the word of God and did not place the blood upon the doorposts
then death would come to his house. The only difference was
the only thing that separated the two nations was the blood
on the doorposts The substitute, the lamb that had been slain
already. What was the judgment? Death
to the firstborn. What must die? The firstborn
lamb or the firstborn goat was to be the substitute and his
blood was to be placed on the doorposts so it could be seen
and then the angel would pass over. Matthew chapter 25. We have the parable
that the Lord Jesus told of the wise and the foolish virgins. Outwardly they look the same.
the Bible says five of them were wise and five of them were foolish. Five took extra oil in their
lamps and five as they waited for the coming of the bridegroom
their oil ran out and at midnight there was a cry made behold the
bridegroom cometh go you out to meet him. Then all those virgins
arose and trimmed their lamps, and the foolish said unto the
wise, Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out. But the
wise answered, saying, Not so, lest there be not enough for
us and you. But go ye rather to them that
sell, and buy for yourselves. And while they went to buy, the
bridegroom came, and they that were ready went in with him to
the marriage, and the door was shut. Afterwards also the other
virgins saying, Lord, Lord, open to us. But he answered and said,
Verily I say unto you, I know you not. Watch therefore, for
you know neither the day nor the hour when the Son of Man
cometh. Now look at these two groups
of people, these two virgins, five wise, five were foolish. What was the difference? some
the five had oil in their lamps and five did not. There's some discussion as to
what the oil means whether it is grace or whether it is the
holy spirit but if we boil down the whole matter it must be blood. You see you cannot have grace
without the blood of Christ. You cannot have the Holy Spirit
without the blood of Christ. And so whether it is grace or
whether it is the Spirit what does matter is that some of those
women, five of them did not have the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ
applied to their heart. The Holy Spirit will not dwell
in the heart of someone who does not have the blood of Christ
applied to it. The Holy Spirit only indwells
in the lives of a believer. Someone who is born again of
the Spirit of God. Someone whose sins have been
cleansed by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. If there is
no blood, then there is no grace. And if there's no blood of Christ,
then there is no Spirit of Christ. The angel looked for blood. And when I see the blood, he
says, I will pass over you. But if there is no blood, then
judgment fell upon that household and judgment fell upon these
five women. They were shut out of the marriage
supper of the lamb because they looked OK on the outside, but
there was no blood applied to their hearts. Therefore there
was no grace. Therefore there was no spirit.
And so when the time came they were found guilty and shut out
from the marriage supper of the Lord Jesus Christ. The blood
of the Lord Jesus Christ, we looked at, cleanses us from all
sin. The blood of the Lord Jesus Christ
causes judgment to pass over because judgment has already
fallen upon the Lord Jesus Christ. He has paid in full the debt
of his people. when I see the blood I will pass
over you and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you
when I smite the land of Egypt and so as Christ our Passover
lamb died upon the cross places his blood over the hearts of
his people when I see the blood I will pass over you. wise and the foolish virgins
or the foolish learnt as we can learn a serious lesson from them. It doesn't matter what we look
like on the outside. We may be able to deceive people,
we may be able to put on a good show on a Sunday and show ourselves
as good Christians but what truly matters is that what has taken
place in the heart, what mattered on that day when the angel flew
over was that blood was seen upon the doorposts, that the
substitute had already died and that the blood had been placed.
Do we have that blood applied to our hearts? Is Christ our
substitute? When the angel of judgment flies
over, where would we be? Will it be like these foolish
virgins? Look to the part. But when it
came down to it, when it was all boiled down to the matter,
there was no blood. There was no Christ. There was
no spirit. There was no grace. Lord, Lord, open to us. But he
answered and said, Truly, I say unto you, I don't know you. And the door, it was shut. The Scripture tells us that,
as we said in Corinthians, Christ is the Passover Lamb. And as
John the Baptist sees the Lord Jesus Christ, he says, the Lamb
of God, which takes away the sin of the world. The Gospel
according to John, in verse 29, as he looks at the Lord Jesus
Christ, The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him and saith,
Behold the Lamb of God which takes away the sin of the world. And as we look at the details
that were described regarding the Passover lamb, Your lamb
shall be without blemish, a male of the first year. He shall take
it out of the sheep and the goats. Truly Christ is the true Lamb
of God, the spotless Son of God, who was without sin. Neither was guile found in his
mouth. He is the Lamb of God that came
to take away the sin of the world. And verse 36, he repeats it. and looking upon Jesus as he
walks saith behold the Lamb of God. In the gospel according
to Luke chapter 13 the Lord Jesus speaks
about the coming judgment day. As the angel flew over the land
of Egypt as an act of judgment over the land of Egypt for their
hardness of heart, so will Christ come again in judgment. Verse 23. Then said one unto him, Lord,
are there few that be saved? And he says unto them, strive
to enter in at the straight gate. For many, I say unto you, will
seek to enter in and shall not be able. Then once the master
of the house is risen up and has shut the door and he began
to stand without and to knock at the door saying, Lord, Lord,
open to us and he shall answer and say unto you, I know you
not from whence you are. Then shall ye begin to say, Lord,
we have eaten and drunk in thy presence and thou hast taught
in our streets. But he shall say, I tell you, I know you not
from whence you are. Depart from me, all ye workers
of iniquity, and there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth
when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets
in the kingdom of God and you yourselves thrust out. weeping and gnashing of teeth
and as the angel of judgment the angel of the destroying angel
flew over the the land of Egypt and that death came in judgment
to those who were outside of the blood there was that cry
that went up and surely this shows us something of of what
that great day of judgment will be like. There will be those
who are sheltering under the blood of Christ and that will
be preserved but there will be those who are outside of that
blood like those who are outside and as the destroyer flew over
there was that cry that went up and Pharaoh rose up in the
night and his servants and all the Egyptians and there was a
great cry in Egypt for there was not a house where there was
not one dead. Surely this shows us something
of what it will be like on that great day. Depart from me for
I never knew you workers of Onyxia to be cast into the lake of fire
and there will be that weeping and that gnashing of teeth for
those who have rejected the Lord Jesus Christ, who have rejected
the only way of salvation, who are outside of the sheltering
underneath the blood. Jesus also speaks to us in Matthew
25 again under verse 31 when the Son of Man shall come
in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he
sit upon the throne of his glory. And before him shall be gathered
all nations, and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd
divided his sheep from the goats. And he shall set the sheep on
the right hand, and the goats on the left. Verse 41, then he
shall say also unto them on the left hand, depart from me ye
cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his
angels. And verse 46, and they shall
go away into everlasting punishment but the righteous unto eternal
life. And what is the difference between
these two groups of people, the left hand and the right hand,
the wise and the foolish virgins, the Israelites and the Egyptians? There's only one difference.
It's blood. Those who are found sheltering
under the precious blood of Christ will find safety. only because
judgment has already fallen upon that substitute, their Saviour,
the Lord Jesus Christ, as the Lamb of God that takes away the
sin of the world. It is only that that will preserve
a people for eternal life, to be with Christ in heaven for
all eternity. When I see the blood I will pass
over you. I will not destroy you when I
smite the land of Egypt. When I see the blood on that
great day of judgment, I will move you over to the right hand
and not to the left. When I see the blood, I will
receive you unto myself and I will not cast you away from myself
into hellfire for all eternity. And so as the scripture speaks
to us of the importance of that blood sacrifice, they point to
that perfect sacrifice, which we will look at over the next
few weeks as we approach Easter, that perfect sacrifice. The Lord
Jesus Christ, God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten
Son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish but
have everlasting life. And the blood of the Lord Jesus
Christ, his Son, cleanses us from all sin. If we confess our
sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to
cleanse us from all unrighteousness. And when I see the blood, I will
pass over you. I will not smite you. May we
be granted today, this evening hour, faith like the people of
Israel to believe the word of the Lord and to act upon it they
believed God Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him
for righteousness your lamb shall be without blemish a male of
the first year you shall take it out of the sheep and from
the goats you shall take the blood and strike it upon the
two side posts and the upper door post of the house where
they are in and when I see the blood I will pass over.' They
had to obey what God said. No obedience, judgment would
fall and it's the same today. No obedience to the gospel, then
judgment will fall upon us. because we are outside of Christ.
Today, if you hear his voice, harden not your hearts and when
I see the blood, I will pass over you. May that blood then
tonight be applied by faith to our hearts that our sins, which
are so many, may be cancelled away and that Christ's perfect
righteousness may be credited to our account and our sins,
which are so many, shall be cast behind the back of God and he
will remember them no more forever than on that great day of judgment.
When Christ comes with all of his angels he will bring us to
himself instead of casting us away from himself and we will
be with him forever and ever only because of the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Nothing good in self we find yet everything Everything is
to be found in Christ Jesus and his perfect sacrifice for sinners,
his perfect life, his perfect death, his perfect resurrection
and there he sits today at the right hand of the Father interceding
for his people, waiting to come and collect his people for himself
where they will be forever with him, forever and ever. Amen. May the Lord help us to now as
we sing our final hymn from Gatsby 370 to the tune 870. Great God,
attend while Zion sings the joy that from thy presence springs
to spend one day with thee on earth exceeds a thousand days
of mirth. 370. sings the joy that from thy presence
springs, to spend one day with thee on earth, as we eat of the
afternoon days. with glory to. He is our soul's victor, and
we've lost the real good from our price. Glorious Virgin in the main,
and devils at Thy presence be, blest is the man who trusts Thee. Our Heavenly Father and Almighty
God, we thank Thee for the perfect sacrifice of Thy Son, the Lord
Jesus Christ, that the blood of the Lord Jesus is able to
cleanse us from all sin. We thank Thee that the vilest
sinner out of hell who lives to fill their need is welcome
at the throne of grace, the Saviour's blood, to plead. Do grant us
then Lord that felt need of a substitute to be only found in thy son the
Lord Jesus Christ. Do help us now as we part from
each other. Do bless us with journeying mercies
and enable us to meet together on Wednesday according to thy
will. Now may the grace of the Lord
Jesus Christ and the love of God the Father, with the fellowship
and the communion of the Holy Spirit, do rest and abide with
us each now and for evermore. Amen.