Kingsport Sovereign Grace Church,
located at 905 Yadkin Street in Kingsport, Tennessee, would
like to invite you to listen to a message of sovereign grace
by their pastor, Gabe Stoniker. And now, Pastor Gabe Stoniker. If you have a Bible there with
you, I would like to encourage you to open your Bible with me
to Acts chapter 12, and let's read some scripture together. I would like for us to look at
one particular word today, one particular word. This word is
mentioned only one time in the scripture. It's only in God's
word one time. And I know that doesn't seem
like much, but even though a word is mentioned only one time, if
God put it in the canon of his scripture, even only one time,
It bears an eternal weight of importance. This is a very important
word. So we are about to look at something
that carries eternal weight and I want to strongly stress that
we pay close attention to what the scripture has to say about
it. I pray that the Lord will reveal to us what this word means,
what it truly means, specifically what it means for us. I pray
the Lord will open our eyes to see this today. All right, this
one word is in verse four of Acts chapter 12, but let's begin
reading in verse one. It says, Now about that time
Herod the king stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the
church. And he killed James the brother
of John with the sword. And because he saw it pleased
the Jews, he proceeded further to take Peter also. Then were
the days of unleavened bread. And when he had apprehended him,
he put him in prison, and delivered him to four quaternions of soldiers
to keep him, intending after," and here's our word, Easter. "...intending after Easter to
bring him forth to the people." They were going to put Peter
on trial intending to sentence him to death. But they put him
in prison to hold him for a while because they didn't want to do
it on Easter. They didn't want to do it on
Easter. Easter was a day or verse 3 says days. It says then were
the days of unleavened bread. Easter was a feast ordinance
that the Jews kept every year. And the reason they did it is
because God told them to. If you look with me at Leviticus
chapter 23, back in the Old Testament, Leviticus 23 verse 4, it says,
These are the feasts of the Lord, even holy convocations, which
you shall proclaim in their seasons. In the 14th day of the first
month at even is the Lord's Passover. The Lord's Passover. That's what
the word Easter means. That's what the word Easter translates
to. It's in the scripture only one
time but that word translates Passover. Every time you see
Passover it means Easter. Easter means Passover. Verse
six, it says, and on the 15th day of the same month is the
feast of unleavened bread. That's what we just read in Acts
chapter 12. Then were the days of unleavened
bread, the feast of the Lord's Passover, Easter, Easter. God told Israel, he told the
Jews to keep this feast every year for a remembrance. a reminder of the Lord's Passover. That's what Easter is, a reminder
of the Lord's Passover. Over in Exodus 12, if you turn
with me to Exodus 12, verse 14, it says, And this day shall be
unto you for a memorial, and you shall keep it a feast to
the Lord throughout your generations, You shall keep it a feast by
an ordinance forever. Verse 17 says, And you shall
observe the feast of unleavened bread, for in this selfsame day
have I brought your armies out of the land of Egypt. Therefore
shall you observe this day in your generations by an ordinance
forever. God said, Every year I want you
to observe this feast to remind you of my Passover. Every year
observe this feast to remind you of my Easter. And he said in verse 26, it shall
come to pass when your children shall say unto you, what mean
ye by this service? Why are you doing this? Why are
you observing this Easter? Why are you, what does this mean?
Why are you observing Easter? He said, when your children shall
say unto you, what mean ye by this service, that you shall
say it is the sacrifice of the Lord's Passover, who passed over
the houses of the children of Israel in Egypt. When he smoked the Egyptians
and delivered our houses, and the people bowed the head and
worshiped. So every year thereafter, he
said, I want you to observe this so that generation after generation
after generation will remember my Passover. They'll remember
my Easter. And every year thereafter, Israel,
according to God's commandment, observed the Feast of the Passover.
Our Lord Himself even observed the Feast of the Passover. If
you look with me at Luke chapter 2, it says in Luke 2 verse 21,
this tells us that it's speaking of our Lord Himself. It says,
And when eight days were accomplished for the circumcising of the child,
His name was called Jesus, which was so named of the angel before
he was conceived in the womb, speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And verse 40 right here says, the child grew and waxed strong
in spirit, filled with wisdom, and the grace of God was upon
him. Now his parents went to Jerusalem
every year at the feast of the Passover, every year. Our Lord went with his parents
to the feast. Verse 42, and when he was 12
years old, they went up to Jerusalem after the custom of the feast. He went every year and he did
this all the way up into his adulthood. Even through the three
and a half years of his ministry, our Lord observed this feast
of the Passover. Look with me at Luke 22. It says in verse seven, Then
came the day of unleavened bread, when the Passover must be killed.
And he sent Peter and John, saying, Go and prepare us the Passover,
that we may eat. And they said unto him, Where
wilt thou that we prepare? And he said unto them, behold,
when you are entered into the city, there shall a man meet
you bearing a pitcher of water, follow him into the house where
he entereth in. And you shall say unto the good
man of the house, the master saith unto thee, where is the
guest chamber where I shall eat the Passover with my disciples? And he shall show you a large
upper room furnished, there make ready. And they went and found
as he had said unto them, and they made ready the Passover. And when the hour was come, he
sat down and the 12 apostles with him." So our Lord observed
the Passover. All right, now I'd like to go
right into the point of this message. I want us to get to
the heart of this message. All right, this is the spiritual
point of this entire message. I want to ask two questions,
and the first one is this. What is the actual Passover? What is the actual Passover? Or we could say, what was the
actual Passover? It was not a feast. It was not
a feast. That is very important for us
to understand. It was not a feasting day. It was not a celebration of an
annual ordinance feast. The feast was the remembrance. That's what it was. It was the
remembrance of the Passover. What was the actual Passover?
The second question is, what was the significance of it? What was the significance of
the Passover concerning God's people? Two important questions. What did it mean for them? What
did it do for them? The answer to that begins right
here, right here in Luke 22. It says in verse 15, He said
unto them, With desire I have desired to eat this Passover
with you. With desire I have desired to
eat this Passover with you. What is he saying in that? What
does he mean with desire I have desired to eat this Passover
with you? And what does he mean when he
goes on to say before I suffer? before I suffer." Over in John
18, our Lord is on trial before Pilate and it says in John 18
verse 38, Pilate said unto him, what is truth? And when he had
said this, he went out again unto the Jews and said unto them,
I find in him no fault at all. No fault, none. But you have
a custom that I should release unto you one at the Passover."
Now think about this. Why did the Jews have a custom
that one should be released at the Passover? Why did they have
this custom every year that one should be released and another
should die? Why? Why did they have that? What brought that on? I'll tell
you that that has everything to do with the Passover. That
is the heart of Easter. That is what Easter is all about.
John 19, verse 13, it says, When Pilate therefore heard that saying,
he brought Jesus forth and sat down in the judgment seat in
a place that is called the pavement, but in the Hebrew, Gabbatha. And it was the preparation of
the Passover. In about the sixth hour, and
he saith unto the Jews, he said, behold your king, behold your
king. Oh, do we understand the significance
of that? Do we really understand what
the Passover is pointing us to? For certain clarity, I could
just say it right now, but I'd rather us read it in the Word.
For certain clarity, let's read it in 1 Corinthians 5. Over in 1 Corinthians 5, verse
7 says, Purge out therefore the old leaven, that you may be a
new lump, even as you are unleavened. You have been unleavened. in what this Feast of Unleavened
Bread represents, speaking to God's people. Verse seven says,
for even Christ our Passover, Christ our Passover is sacrificed
for us. Christ is our Passover. Christ is our Passover. John
the Baptist was the one that God chose to declare to the world
who Christ was and why he came and what he was going to accomplish
in his coming. John the Baptist. John pointed
to the Lord Jesus Christ and he cried, Behold the Lamb of
God which taketh away the sin of the world. Behold God's Lamb,
which will redeem God's people from all their sin. All the sin
of all the people that God the Father chose to save throughout
the whole world. Doesn't matter whether Jew, Gentile,
bond, free, male, female. A people out of every nation,
kindred, tribe, and tongue on this earth. Everyone. Now how
did he do that? As God's Passover lamb, how did
Christ save his people from certain death because of their sin? How did he do that? We can see
the answer to that in the actual event of the Passover. We're gonna read what took place
in the actual Passover and what God said concerning it. And as we read this, let's remember
that the Lamb in this Passover is our Lord Jesus Christ. This
points us to Christ and what he did for us to be our Passover. If you'll look with me at Exodus
12 one more time, back in Exodus chapter 12, God said that he
was going to slay the firstborn male in every house. But he said
through this lamb that would be provided for his people, every
house would be spared under the blood of the lamb. And it says
in verse 1, Exodus 12 verse 1, the Lord spake unto Moses and
Aaron in the land of Egypt saying, This month shall be unto you
the beginning of months. It shall be the first month of
the year to you. Speak ye unto all the congregation
of Israel, saying, In the tenth day of this month they shall
take to them every man a lamb." Every man, every woman, every
boy, every girl, every soul needs a lamb. Every soul needs this
lamb. He went on to say, according
to the house of their fathers, a lamb for a house. Every house. Verse four, and 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. Every
man according to his eating shall make your count for the lamb.
Verse five says, your lamb shall be without blemish. Listen right
here as he describes the character and the nature of our Lord Jesus
Christ. He said, your lamb shall be without
blemish. And that's Christ. We just read
where Pilate said, I find no fault in him. None, no blemish. Your lamb shall be without blemish,
a male of the first year. Christ is the first begotten
son of the father, our elder brother. In every house, the
oldest brother died. Well, Christ is our elder brother.
And verse five goes on to say, you shall take it out from the
sheep or from the goats, and you shall keep it up until the
14th day of the same month. And the whole assembly of the
congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening. And they
shall take of the blood and strike it on the two side posts and
on the upper door post of the house wherein they shall eat
it. Your lamb must be slain." Must
be slain. Your lamb's blood. Here's the only hope of being
spared. God said, I'm coming through and I'm going to smite
every house. And here's your only hope. You must have a lamb. It didn't matter what the people
in that house had done or not done. Their works did not play
one role in this. God said, you must have a lamb
and that lamb must be slain. And you must take the blood of
that lamb and put it on the post of the door of your house. It
must cover the door of your house. Now, this physical body right
here is our earthly house. This is our house. We come into
this body and we go out of this body. When we're born, our soul
comes into this body. And when we physically die, our
soul goes out of this body. This is the door of our house.
And God said our only hope of being spared death because of
our sin is We must be covered in the blood of the lamb. We
must be covered in it. Verse seven says, they shall
take of the blood and strike it on the two side posts and
on the upper door post of the house wherein they shall eat
it. And they shall eat of the flesh in that night, roast with
fire. They must lay hold of that lamb. and they must consume, they must
take in, they must ingest, they must become one with that lamb. He said he did not say just kill
the lamb and stand there and look at it, he said lay hold
of it, become one with it. He said the lamb must be roast
with fire. Your lamb must suffer the fire
of God's wrath. Verse 80 said, they shall eat
of the flesh and that night roast with fire and unleavened bread. Leaven represents sin. Leaven
is what puffs up. If you put that in bread, that's
what puffs the bread up. It represents pride. It represents
man's works, man's self-righteous works. And God said, man is not
going to take any part in this. Christ is the sacrifice lamb.
Christ is the heavenly bread. He is that unleavened bread that
was broken. And it was all because of the
bitter herbs of the sin of His people that He endured this.
That sin that was given to Him, pressed inside of Him. Verse
8 says, They shall eat of the flesh, and that night roast with
fire an unleavened bread, and with bitter herbs they shall
eat of it. Eat not of it raw, Your lamb
must endure the fire. It keeps saying that. If your
lamb does not endure the fire, there's no salvation. And the same is true concerning
Christ our Lamb. If He did not endure the fire
of God's wrath for us, there's no salvation. We must endure
it ourselves. Verse 9 says, Eat not of it raw,
nor sodden at all with water. This work that He accomplished,
don't water it down. Don't water it down, don't diminish
it. He goes on to say, but roast with fire his head with his legs
and with the pertinence thereof. That means the head and the body
together. Christ is our head, we are his
body. When he died, we died with him,
his people died with him. Verse 10, and you shall let nothing
of it remain until the morning. and that which remaineth of it
until the morning you shall burn with fire. None of it shall be
wasted. None of it shall see corruption.
Not one piece of his body, not one drop of his blood. Verse
11, and thus shall you eat it with your loins girded, your
shoes on your feet, your staff in your hand, and you shall eat
it in haste. It is the Lord's Passover. What that means is today is the
day. This is urgent. We need a lamb
and we need a lamb today. We need his blood right now.
Right now. This cannot be put off until
tomorrow. This cannot take second priority
to anything. This is the one thing needful.
This is life and death. This is the Lord's salvation.
Verse 12, he said, for I will pass through the land of Egypt
this night and will smite all the firstborn in the land of
Egypt, both man and beast, and against all the gods of Egypt,
I will execute judgment. I am the Lord. And the blood
shall be to you for a token upon the houses where you are. And
when I see the blood, he said, I will Easter you. I will pass
over you. I will pass over you and the
plague shall not be upon you to destroy you when I smite the
land of Egypt." He said, when I see the blood of the one that
will be sacrificed in your place, sacrificed for you, when I see
the blood that one has been sacrificed, one will be set free. The firstborn
that should have died, when I see that one has already died in
his place, he will be set free. When I see that one worthily
died, even though it was for one who unworthily lived, a sinner
like me, sinners like you. He said, when I see that blood,
I'll pass over. I'll pass over. I'll provide
a substitute for my people. I will provide an Easter substitute,
a Passover substitute, a bloody victim. That's what it was, a
bloody victim to die in the place of the one that I'm going to
set free. That lamb was Christ. That lamb was Christ. That Passover
was all because of Christ. He was lifted up on a post. And God said, when I see the
blood on the post, if that post is your post, if it's on your
house, if that cross was your cross, if you see him hanging
there in your sins, not just the sins of sinners, but your
sins, if that lamb was dying for you in your place as your
substitute, Then God said, when I see his blood on you, I'll
pass over you. I will not destroy you. Now I'll
tell you, that's an Easter. That is an Easter. That is a
glorious Passover. That's something to rejoice in.
That is something to rejoice in. And not only that, but this
along with it. Every physical Passover that
was slain from the time that God gave that to Moses until
the time that Christ came. Every Passover that died remained
dead. Every Passover lamb until the
very last Passover lamb was slain. They all died and remained dead
until that very last one that was slain rose from the grave. God said it was a perfect sacrifice. And because he arose, all of
his people will rise in him, rise with him. That is a glorious
Passover. That is the meaning of Easter. That is what we are to remember.
Till next week, may our Lord bless His word to our hearts.
You have been listening to a message by Gabe Stoniker, pastor of Kingsport
Sovereign Grace Church in Kingsport, Tennessee. If you would like
a copy of this message or to hear other messages of Sovereign
Grace, log on to our website at ksgctn.org. If you would like to come and
worship with us, our service times are Sunday morning Bible
study at 10 o'clock AM, worship at 1045 AM and 6 o'clock PM,
Wednesday evening at 730 PM, Please tune in next week for
another message of God's free and sovereign grace.