I have an article in the bulletin
this morning about religious holidays. And I know different
people have different, even believers have different views on these
things. It's on, it's what about religious holidays? And you know
how the world today, religious holidays, and the word holidays
means holy days. how the religious world, these
days are so important to people. In fact, and you know, even false
religion sometimes will joke about this, how the only time
you see people in church is on Easter or Christmas or something
like that. Even false religion jokes about
that. And we know that's, you know, as far as what they're
concerned, how they look at it, we've got to put that out of
our minds because we know the reality of such things. And even
believers approach these things. There's some believers who just
ignore these days. There's some believers who are
adamant that anybody who does anything to recognize or to mention
or these days that they're idolaters. You know, because a lot of the
traditions that revolve around religious holidays really have
their roots in idolatry. And they do. And we don't want
to be part of that. You know, we're told in the scripture to
avoid everything that would be an open act of idolatry. You
know, somebody said, well, we need to avoid everything that
has anything to do with idolatry. Well, now, let me tell you something,
folks. You can't do that. Change your calendar. Every month
of the year, every day of the week, is named for some idol. Did you know that? So understand
that. We're in the world, but we're
not of the world. But my point is, is on the last
paragraph of this article, to show that we as believers in
Christ, we don't worship days, and we don't celebrate the particular
day in any way, we worship and celebrate Christ every day. And we do that every day. And we don't engage in our minds
in the idolatrous thoughts and ideas of false religion on any
day. And for example, we do not celebrate
Easter. Now the word Easter is in, you
find it in our King James Version in Acts 12 and verse four, and
what it means is Passover. Now that's the reason I'm doing
this because we're going to be talking about the Passover. And
what I mean is if you choose today to celebrate the resurrection
of Christ, there's nothing wrong with that. Celebrate it tomorrow
too. Celebrate it the next day, every
day. And don't we as believers, we
celebrate the resurrection of Christ every day. And we should,
but either way, and most people, what I say with believers who
know how to put things in perspective, how you deal with these things
is a matter of liberty anyway. You can read Romans 14 all about
that, and we'll go on from there. No, we're not to be idolaters.
And so when we think of things like this, we're to think of
them aright. And so last week, when we're talking about the
Lord's Passover as a picture of Christ, his sacrifice, his
death, his burial, his resurrection, And we know that because this
is such a glorious, grand picture, vivid picture, in every aspect
of it, of the person and work of Christ, and the apostle Paul,
in 1 Corinthians 5 and verse 7, when he's instructing the
Corinthians on their behavior, he says, purge out there for
the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, as you are unleavened,
and unleavened there means pure, And that doesn't mean we're sinlessly
perfect in ourselves, it means in Christ. And here's the proof,
he says, for even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us. So Christ is our Passover. And
that's what this is all about back here in Exodus chapter 12
in the 10th plague that God was gonna send on Egypt to kill the
firstborn of Egypt. But he provided a way for his
chosen people to avoid his wrath. And it was the blood of a spotless
lamb. And they were to slay that lamb.
Look back at Exodus 12. Look at verse three and I'll
just read through these first verses and then we'll continue
on. He says, speak ye unto all the
congregation of Israel saying, in the 10th day of this month
they shall take to them every man a lamb according to the house
of their fathers, a lamb for a house. And of course we can
say about Christ there, Christ is enough for every one of his
people. He's all in all. Listen, every drop of blood that
he shed is a guarantee of the salvation of every one of God's
chosen people. And he says in verse four, 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.
In other words, this lamb had to be consumed, nothing to be
left. The whole Christ had to be consumed on the cross. And
so he says in verse five, your lamb shall be without blemish.
A male of the first year, spotless lamb, no sin. See, that's what
that pictures. The impeccable Christ who could
not and did not sin. He was made sin, he was made
a curse by a transference of sin and the word that covers
that in the scripture is the word imputation. Sin was imputed
to him, he's our surety, he took our debt and became our sin bearer,
our sin offering, surety, substitute and paid that debt with his life,
that's redemption. And he says, you shall take it
out from the goats or from the sheep. Christ was brought out
of man in his humanity, born of a woman, the seed of Abraham,
the seed of David. Verse six, you shall keep it
up until the 14th day of the month and the whole assembly
of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening.
And what we have there, a picture of the lamb in its youth, in
its strength, Christ in his youth, in the strength of his humanity. He was put down on the cross. Verse seven, they shall take
of the blood, strike it on the two side post and on the upper
door post of the house where they shall eat it. And that's
the door post on the sides and on the top. And that was an act
of God-given faith. That's a picture. of God-given
faith. We believe in the Lord Jesus
Christ. We plead his blood. We plead
his righteousness. Now go to verse eight. This is
where we left off. They shall eat the flesh in that
night, roast with fire. And that eating there, the eating
of the flesh, is again, is number one, roasted with fire shows
the manner of his death. He went under the fire of God's
wrath. for the sins of his people imputed
to him. And he suffered the full measure
of that wrath. I can't remember, I've used this
phrase in preaching quite a bit, and I can't remember what old
writer said it this way, but here's what Christ did on the
cross. He drank damnation dry. He drank the well of damnation,
the well of God's wrath dry for his people. There's therefore
now no condemnation. for we who are in Christ because
we cannot be condemned because of him and what he did. God will
not impute sin to us because he imputed to Christ. God has
imputed his righteousness. So he was roasted with fire and
he had to be eaten. That's another picture of our
faith in him over in the book of John. Let me see if I can
find it here. John chapter six. Christ spoke of this. He says
in verse 53 of John chapter six, then Jesus said unto them, verily,
verily, I say unto you, except you eat the flesh of the son
of man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Now he's
not talking about cannibalism there. He's not talking about
any transubstantiation that the Catholic church promotes. And
you know what that means. They say that when the wafer
that they give and the wine that they give, it actually turns
into the blood and the body of Christ. Nor any consubstantiation. It's simply a symbol of faith
in Christ. So, and he says in verse 54 of
John 6, whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal
life and I will raise him up at the last day. Verse 55, for
my flesh is meat indeed and my blood is drink indeed. He that
eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood dwelleth in me and I
in him. What's he talking about? He's
talking about believing in him, living up on him. He's the bread
of life, you see. And that's what we do. It's consuming
him spiritually by God-given faith, knowing that he is everything
to us. He's our foundation, he's our
life. And so we continually feed upon
him every day of our lives, believing in him, feeding upon his word. And so that's what that's speaking
of in verse eight here back in Exodus 12. They shall eat the
flesh that night, roast with fire, and unleavened bread, and
with bitter herbs they shall eat it. The unleavened bread,
there's a lot to say about the unleavened bread, and I've got
a whole lesson on that. In fact, there is a feast of
unleavened bread. But the first application is
this, and we're going to see that later on, that the Israelites
were to eat only unleavened bread every year during Passover as
a commemoration of the Exodus. They're being brought out of
Egyptian bondage. And so they left Egypt hastily. You know, this is the 10th plague,
this death of the firstborn. And so Moses and Aaron, they
came to Pharaoh and they told him, let my people go, and Pharaoh
wouldn't do it. And God hardened his heart, the
scripture says, and he hardened his own heart. And as time went
on, many of them gave up and said, well, we're never gonna
get out of here. Well, it come to this point, this 10th plague. And the number 10 in the Bible
is the number of judgment, the number of law. So Pharaoh in
Egypt is getting ready to suffer the judgment of God's word. And the way that God provided
for his people is the way of the blood of the lamb, the Passover. And of course, there's that picture.
If we're in Christ, washed in his blood and clothed in his
righteousness, then eternal damnation and death will not come to us.
But without him, that's all there is is death. And so what happens
here is they're to eat this lamb hastily, and they don't have
time to put leaven in the bread to let it grow. And that's spoken
of over in Deuteronomy chapter 16. It says, I've got this cited
in your lesson, Deuteronomy 16, three. It says, thou shall eat
no unleavened bread with it, And seven days shalt thou eat
unleavened bread therewith, even the bread of affliction, for
thou camest forth out of the land of Egypt in haste, that
thou mayest remember the day when thou camest forth out of
the land of Egypt all the days of thy life. Now later on we're
gonna see how in the Bible leaven is almost always a type of sin
and false doctrine. You remember over in Matthew
chapter 16 When Christ told the disciples, he said, beware of
the leaven of the scribes and the Pharisees. And they didn't
understand immediately what he was talking about. In fact, it
says they thought first he's talking about real bread. And
then later on, they understood that he's talking about their
doctrine, their false doctrine. And over in Galatians chapter
five in verse nine, when Paul was exposing the false teachers
who subtly brought in heresies, little heresies that were not
readily recognized. And that's where he made the
statement, a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump. In other words,
it just takes a little bit. I was reading an article this
morning by a Church of Christ preacher who writes in the paper.
And his article was that we must be in Christ. to be saved, and
he's right. And everything he said in that
article up to the last paragraph was true. I agree with it wholeheartedly. But then he got to the last paragraph,
and you know what he said? He said, now how can we be in
Christ? Baptism. And most people would
read that, and it'd go right over their head. No, that's a
little leaven, see? leavened the whole lump. It made
his whole message a false message, even though there was a lot of
truth there. And I remember an old preacher friend of ours used
to say this. He said, you know, there's a
lot of good food in a garbage can, but I'm not going down there
to get it. And rat poison is 99% good food. You know, all
kinds of analogies there. So we'll be talking about this
thing about leaven later on. Not next week, I'll be gone next
week, but maybe the week I come back. But anyway, look back here
at verse 10. Or verse nine, he says, well,
you eat it with bitter herbs. That's to show, I think, the
whole issue of our life here on Earth. that this is a bitter
existence in a lot of ways, and not just being negative. Now,
we have times of joy here, but they get fewer and fewer, but
compared to what the glory that's to come, this is a bitter existence. The things we go through, Paul
said in this life, are not to be compared with the glory that's
to come. And so we were to think that
way. But now look at verse nine. He says, eat not of it raw. The
lamb was to be cooked thoroughly. And that's showing how Christ
had to die. He didn't just get sick. He didn't
just swoon. He didn't just faint. He died. And he says, nor sod at all with
water, but roast with fire, his head, his legs, with all the
pertinence thereof, all the innards. In other words, not one part
is to be, Christ is to feel in his humanity the whole measure
of God's wrath. And it's not to be sued with
water or boiled in oil or anything like that. And so in verse nine
he says, eat not of it raw or sodden with water. Verse 10,
he says, 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. The whole Christ, again. Nothing of it was to remain.
And this is the whole Christ is to be received and fed upon
by faith. His glorious person, his finished
work, Everything about him, you can't say, well, I believe in
the person of Christ, but then I don't believe that he accomplished
salvation for everyone for him. No, you can't split it like that. Brother Shepard, Gary Shepard,
he wrote an article, I hope, I think I saved it to reprint,
where he talked about he's tired of this dichotomy. I've heard
preachers say this, and some of them I know what they mean,
but statements can be confusing. I heard a man say, we don't trust
in a work, we trust in a person, trust in Christ, not his work.
No, you can't separate Christ from his person and work. You
can't do that. Paul said this, he said, we preach
Christ, what's the next word? crucified. If Christ just came
to earth, even as God-man, a perfect man, but if he didn't die, where
would that leave us? It'd leave us without forgiveness.
It'd leave us without a righteousness. He had to die. So you can't separate
these things, you see. He had to, it all had to be accomplished
by him. And so look at verse 11. He said,
and thus shall you eat it with your loins girded, ready to leave. And of course, your shoes on
your feet, your staff in your hand, and eat it in haste. Well, what's that picture? This
world's not our home. We're not to settle into this
world as if it's going to last forever. We're not to hold on
to this world as if it will never end. This is one of the big things
that I have to do with the, what do they call it, the green people.
Now look, and understand what I'm saying. I think and I believe
that as creatures on this earth, God put us here, we ought to
be responsible people to keep things clean, I don't want to
drink dirty water and I don't want to breathe dirty air. Do
you? I don't want to do that. I don't want my children to drink
dirty water or to breathe dirty air. And I think we should take
care of the things that God, we ought to be good stewards
over the earth. But here's the point. This world
is not our home. It is not our salvation. And
it's going to burn up. That's the word of God. So I
do believe in global warming. It's gonna burn up. And somebody
said, well, the climate's changing. Duh. It changes every daggone day.
Yes, it's changing. Doesn't the Bible say that the
only thing that endures and lasts forever without change is the
word of the Lord? The grass faded, the flower faded
away, the grass withered. Sure, it's gonna change, but
here's man's problem. In his pride, he thinks he can
save it. You're wrong. You're not gonna
be able to save this world. Man's the, and somebody said,
well, we're the problem. Yeah, started with Adam. When sin came into the world.
Yes, we are the problem. But the only one who can solve
this problem is the Lord God. And look at verse 11, the last
line, it is the Lord's Passover. There's salvation. This is the
Lord's Passover. Who needs the Passover? The Lord
does. That's right. This is his work. Christ is the lamb slain from
the foundation of the world. And so this is the way it's always
been in the mind and power of God. And that's not changed. Christ's the same yesterday,
today, and forever. It pleased the Lord to bruise
him, to make his soul an offering for sin. Even though I believe that we
should be responsible, take care of our world and be clean and
all of that, we can't, like the Egyptians, we're to believe in
Christ and to rest in him, having our loins girded, our feet shod,
our staff in our hand, ready to go at any moment when the
Lord comes back or when he calls us home. Ready to go. And so, That's where the type
is, it's the Lord's Passover. And look at 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. Some people say that means the
princes of Egypt. And I believe that's probably
true. Even the noble, see, there's nobody gonna be spared here.
And he said, I will execute judgment, I the Lord. Somebody said, why
is God being so cruel here? Why is he being so mean? He's
not being cruel. He's not being mean. He's just
being God. And that's what that means. I
will execute judgment. He has to, that's who he is.
And you know what? In our salvation, he executed
judgment, he had to. But he executed that judgment
on Christ in our stead. And that's proven, look at verse
13. And the blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses
where you 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. When I see
the blood. All of this, the blood of Christ,
what is the blood of Christ? It's the righteousness that God
has given us that shields us from his wrath. Because again,
blessed is the man to whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity. Blessed
is the man to whom the Lord imputeth righteousness without works.
And that's what that blood's all about. That's what his death
is all about. Christ didn't die for anyone
who perishes under the wrath of God, just like the Egyptians. The blood wasn't shed for them.
There was no blood over their door or on the side. Christ's blood was shed for his
people. Now let me, and I've got this
in your lesson. Consider the case of God's people whom he
chose in Christ before the foundation of the world. Let me ask you
this question. When did God see the blood as to our salvation? When do you think? Well, if you
believe what God's word says, and I think we do, I believe
we do, the Bible speaks of a salvation that was given to his people
before the world began. And here's what my point, there
never has been a time that God did not see this blood. Even
before it was shed in time, God always had in view the blood
of his son. Back over in Genesis chapter
three, when man fell and tried to hide from God and put on fig
leaf aprons, what did God do? He stripped off those fig leaf
aprons, that represents man's works. which will not shield
you from the wrath of God. And he slew an animal, killed
an animal. He shed blood and made coats
of skin. Read about it in Genesis 3.21.
What's that a picture of? That's the blood. God saw it
even back then. But he saw it even before then.
Christ was made our surety. The surety of the covenant before
the foundation of the Lord, that means our sins were imputed to
Him. We weren't even born yet, but our sins were given to Him.
He was made responsible, accountable for the sins of His people. And
in time, He came and became our substitute and died on that cross. What God had purposed and saw
before time had to be accomplished in time. So God's always seen
that blood. That's how he saved the Old Testament
saints, by promise, before Christ even came. Because he had in
view that blood. And he said, when I see the blood,
I'll pass over you. Now, here's the next one. When
did we see the blood? I've heard preachers preach on
this and said, I heard a man say one time, he said, it's not
important that we see it, but it's important that God sees
it. Now listen, now you better be careful here. If God saw that
blood over my doorpost, spiritually speaking, it's inevitable that
I must see it too. So when did I see it? When the
Holy Spirit came and gave me eyes to see in the new birth. And I didn't see it before then.
Before then, I thought the blood of Christ was shed for everybody,
even those who perish under the wrath of God. That's not the
blood shed here. That's a false god. That's an
idol. But when God the Holy Spirit
came and gave me life in the new birth, gave me eyes to see,
ears to hear, a new heart, that's when I saw it. That's when I
saw the blood. That's when you saw the blood.
And that's when our song changed. I don't mean we go around humming
all the time or singing all the time. But here's our song, Revelation
5, 12. Worthy is the lamb that was slain
to receive power and riches and wisdom and strength and honor
and glory and blessing. Aren't you glad? I'm glad God
has always seen that blood. but I'm glad he calls me to see
it. That's what he does for his children. Well, one more verse,
verse 14. 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. The Lord
told Moses that this Passover feast was to be a continual memorial. In other words, it was never
to stop throughout their generations. And he says, keep it forever.
Now this forever here, Sometimes you'll read in the Old Testament
dealing with things like this, the word forever, and sometimes
you'll see the word perpetual, which means continual. This forever
here does not mean throughout eternity. If it did mean throughout
eternity, then we need to go home and put that blood on our
door. That's not what it means. It means as long as that old
covenant would be in force for the nation Israel. forever until
the time that God had appointed. And what was that time? When
the Messiah, the true Lamb of God, Christ, would come into
the world and do His work. And you remember what happened
when Christ said it's finished? That included all the Old Testament
types and pictures. They're done. They're gone now
because He fulfilled them. That covenant is over. We're
not gonna go out and slay lambs and stuff. We have Christ, our
Passover, who is the Lamb of God. And so that's finished,
and you remember what God did when Christ gave up the ghost. He tore the veil in the temple
in two, from top to bottom. So it's finished, but Christ
is our eternal Passover. Isn't that right? Okay, we'll
stop there.