A Lamb, The Lamb, Your Lamb

Q: What does the Bible say about the Passover lamb?

The Bible states that the Passover lamb signifies God's provision for salvation, representing Jesus Christ, the ultimate Lamb who takes away the sin of the world (Exodus 12:1-14). The Passover lamb, as described in Exodus 12, was central to God's plan for Israel's deliverance from Egypt. Each household was instructed to take a lamb without blemish, signifying the need for a perfect sacrifice to atone for sin. This event was not just a historical moment but prophetic, pointing to Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, who was without sin and whose sacrifice fulfills the law's requirements. The blood of the lamb protected the Israelites from judgment, illustrating how Christ's blood protects believers from divine wrath by fulfilling the demands of justice on our behalf.

Q: How do we know Jesus is the Lamb of God?

Jesus is known as the Lamb of God based on prophetic fulfillment and His role in atoning for sin as seen in scripture (John 1:29, Revelation 5:12). In the New Testament, particularly John 1:29, John the Baptist identifies Jesus as 'the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.' This declaration connects Jesus directly to the Passover lamb, fulfilling the Old Testament type and foreshadowing His sacrificial death. Throughout Scripture, lamb imagery conveys the need for a perfect sacrifice; thus Jesus's life, death, and resurrection fulfill these prophecy and typologies. Revelation 5:12 further emphasizes His worthiness as the sacrificial Lamb in heaven, affirming His role in redeeming His people and establishing God's kingdom.

Q: Why is the doctrine of substitutionary atonement important for Christians?

Substitutionary atonement is vital as it explains how Christ's sacrifice satisfies God's justice and allows believers to be reconciled to Him (Romans 3:26). The doctrine of substitutionary atonement is crucial for understanding the nature of salvation. It teaches that Jesus, as the sinless Lamb, took upon Himself the punishment for the sins of His people, fulfilling God's justice. Romans 3:26 states that God is both just and justifier, meaning He cannot overlook sin but must punish it. Christ's sacrificial death satisfies this requirement, allowing believers to be reconciled with God. This doctrine assures us that our faith rests on the completed work of Christ, granting us peace and security in our relationship with God amidst His righteous requirement for justice.

Q: What does it mean to have a personal relationship with Christ as the Lamb?

A personal relationship with Christ as the Lamb means acknowledging Him as your Savior and relying on His sacrifice for your salvation (Galatians 2:20). Having a personal relationship with Christ as the Lamb entails recognizing Him not just as a historical figure but as your own Savior who sacrifices Himself for your sins. This relationship changes your identity and your standing before God. Galatians 2:20 encapsulates this experience: 'I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless, I live; yet not I, but Christ lives in me.' This verse expresses the profound and personal nature of salvation, whereby believers receive spiritual life through faith in Christ's redemptive work. It emphasizes a daily reliance on His grace, where believers find strength and purpose through Him, rooted in love and gratitude for His sacrifice.

Well, again, I make no apology, but we're coming back to Exodus, and to Exodus chapter 12 again, Exodus chapter 12 again, and I want to look, I want to try to plumb more of the depths of the wonderful truth that is here in these words. You know, the gospel of God is rare. The gospel of God is rare. I'm not talking about counterfeit gospels. There are plenty of counterfeit gospels that sound like the real thing, but they're not when you look down onto them.

We read the other morning in Psalm 145 in verse 18, it said, the Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon him. It didn't stop there. He said, the Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon him in truth, in truth, in truth. What's he talking about? In truth. It's according to this book. And so much of what is preached as the gospel of Christ in the days in which we live and down history has not been in accordance with what God has revealed in this book. It hasn't. The true gospel of God is rare. It's what was said in the early chapters of Samuel. The word of God was precious. It meant it was rare. It was something that wasn't common. It's not preached. It isn't preached. It isn't believed in this way. It's regarded by the Gentiles as foolishness and by the religious folk as a stumbling block. It's not believed. And it isn't certainly not sought after.

Look, how many of us are there here this morning? How many with us out on the internet? and look at the great big wide world outside, pursuing its fleshly pursuits. But all of them, all of them are in eternal peril. They're not just, they haven't just made a life choice. They haven't just made a life choice.

Well, it's okay for you. I'm, I personally, I'm not a religious person, but if you want to do that, well, that's fine. Whatever makes you happy, but you know, I'll be your friend, but this isn't for me. No, you're in eternal peril. You are in eternal peril, for it's appointed to man to die once and then the judgment. It's unavoidable. Every single one of you have an appointment. Everyone listening here, out there on the internet, any who will listen in the future when this is listened to again and again and again. you're in eternal peril. It's the most important issue, this side of death, this side of eternity, is that question, which I refer to often, of Job.

How should a man be just with God? How are you going to stand before the judge of the universe, the God of the universe, in your sins, in your rebellion, in your unbelief against him? How are you going to stand? If God should mark iniquities, who shall stand?

None is the implication of that. but to know that your immortal soul, because you have a soul that isn't going to die, to know that your immortal soul rests on a solid rock, is anchored to a solid rock, and that solid rock is our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Word of God.

The Word of God just isn't words on the pages of this book. He is the Word of God. That's his name. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God. To know that your immortal soul rests not on some airy-fairy religious nonsense, but on the facts of redemption. On the facts that Christ has redeemed his people from the curse of the law. What is it that alone propitiates God's wrath against sin? What was that word you said? Propitiates. What do you mean? Propitiation is to turn away the just anger of God. What is it that calms the just anger of God? What is it that soothes the wrath of God against sin? What is it? The answer is this. The answer is the Lamb of God.

John the Baptist said to two of his disciples when he saw Jesus walking, he said, behold the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world. He didn't mean the sin of everybody in the world without exception. He meant the world of his people whom he had loved before time. Behold the Lamb of God.

That's how your sin is dealt with. That's how you can face judgment with confidence if you know the Lamb of God. What's the central theme of eternity? You know, we're told this in Revelation, as the veil is drawn aside and we're given glimpses from where we are in this sinful world through the words of this book, by the application of the Holy Spirit. The theme of eternity is this. Worthy is the Lamb. Worthy is the Lamb that was slain. So that's why I want to stay with Exodus chapter 12 today.

And I want to notice some things in these first 14 verses in the instructions for them concerning the Passover. Look at this, the Lord spake unto Moses, verse 1 of chapter 12. The Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, saying, verse two, this month shall be unto you the beginning of months. It shall be the first month of the year to you.

That's the sort of verse you would just skip lightly over as if it was just there for filling out words, you know. How can we fill a Bible with words? Well, you can either think very hard or you can just fill it with words that don't mean much. Oh no. Every word, every word has meaning.

This month shall be the beginning of months. It was the month Abib, Abib. It was also called, the same month was called in the Babylonian exile times, the month Nisan. It's about March, April. It's when we have Easter, because the Passover is the time that we have Easter. It's March or April, and it's the time when the Passover would take place. when the sacrificed lamb would be remembered, would be sacrificed, but the symbolism of it would speak to them.

It marked the beginning of a new era for Israel. You see, we'd had all the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and all the way down, Joseph, and all the way down, but this marked a new era for Israel. When Christ, the Lamb of God, When Christ, the Lamb of God, came into the world, the calendar changed then. It was a new era for the people of God. When Christ, the Lamb of God, came into the world, the calendar changed from Anno Mundi, which is the year of the world, to Anno Domini, the year of the Lord.

Think on this. Those of you, if anybody comes across this and you're of the sort that thinks, well, it's all right for people like us who've got this funny religious habit and we have to indulge this religious habit, but don't bother me with it. You pursue your religious interest if you want to, but don't disturb me with it. Think about this, think about this.

Though the gospel is widely despised as foolishness and as a stumbling block, now get a hold of this, nearly 100% of the world, including the Islamic world, measures its time from the birth of Christ. It's a fact. The legal systems of the Islamic world are all based on the same calendar that we use. The 100% of the world measures its time from the birth of the one that the majority of the world despises and rejects and wants nothing to do with. Isn't that staggering? Isn't that staggering? We're a little irrelevant sideline. No, we're not. You all measure your time by the one whom we worship this morning. Does it not indicate that there's something deeply, deeply profound here? The Holy Spirit of God has given us this book of Exodus by Moses to reveal eternal truth regarding God, regarding His Christ, regarding the gospel, regarding salvation from Satan's bondage, regarding the journey to the paradise of God.

Let's look at these instructions in these verses, verses 3 down to 13. Take a lamb. There, verse three. Speak to the congregation of Israel, saying, in the 10th day of this month, this month, Habib, in the 10th day of this month, they shall take to them every man a lamb, a lamb. You notice I've called this message a lamb. The lamb, your lamb. Very significant, very significant. Take each according to you a lamb.

God had told Pharaoh that Israel was his, God's, firstborn. In chapter four, we saw it last week, but I'll remind you of it. In chapter four of Exodus, In verse 22, Moses was to say to Pharaoh, thus saith the Lord, Israel is my son, even my firstborn. And I say unto you, 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. Let my firstborn go.

And he'd sent nine plagues of cursing on the idols of Egypt. Egypt, like the rest of the world of Satan, is an idolatrous world, worshipping things anything other than the one true God whom we should worship. They worshipped the river Nile, and he cursed it and turned it to the blood of death. They worshipped the frogs as sources of life, so he cursed them with a plague of frogs. They worshipped the flies, Beelzebub, and he cursed them with that. They worshipped their economy, and he cursed it with a disease on the cattle that destroyed their economy. He stripped their vegetation with locusts. He smothered them with lice from the dust of the ground that they had come from, and so on, up to the 10th, the 10th one.

Then on the 10th one, it says in verse five of chapter 11, the previous chapter, all the firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die. All the firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die. Why? For sin. For sin, for sin is the judgment, is the offense against God which causes his judgment. In the day that you eat thereof, he said to Adam and Eve, you shall surely die. The soul that sins, it shall die. It shall die, not just cease to exist, but it shall die a spiritual death of of separation from the eternal God. Sin is that vile outrage against the holy character of God for which death is the just penalty.

But a way was needed You see, God had said, I'll make a difference between the Egyptians and the Israelites. There shall not be any harm come to the Israelites. A way is needed for Israel's firstborn to be saved. How is Israel's firstborn going to be saved from the plague that would run through that land that night?

Answer, a lamb for a house. Take to them every man a lamb, according to the house of their fathers, a lamb for a house. There must have been thousands of one-year-old lambs, one-year-old lambs, yet lamb is always singular in this passage. There must have been thousands, think on it. There were hundreds of thousands of households came out of Egypt, Israel, at that time. So there must have been thousands of these one-year-old lambs of the sheep or of the goat.

And yet the word lamb is always singular. Take a lamb, take a lamb. Why? Because it's pointing to the one singular lamb. Behold the lamb of God. In verse five, look what it says. What's the lamb that you're going to take to be like? Sorry, where am I? Where am I? Yes. It's got to be, there we are, in verse five. Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year. It shall be in the prime of its youthful maturity. It's got to be examined. They were to take it on the 10th day of the month and keep it until the 14th day of the month.

The lambs were to be the substitute for the firstborn of the Israelites. But for each household, for each individual household, A lamb, which was the general thing. To every household, take you a lamb. A lamb became the lamb for that household. It became the lamb. Each household was to look on the lamb taken for them. Behold the Lamb of God, said John the Baptist. Each household was to look on the lamb taken for them. Behold the Lamb of God. He is the one viewed objectively that will take away sin from the world of God's people. Let me say that again. He is the one, the Lamb, viewed objectively that will take away sin from the world of his people.

This lamb for each household will die, and the sight of its blood will satisfy God's justice for sin, and the destroyer won't come in, won't be allowed to come in. In strict justice, God will not, as it says in verse 23 of chapter 12, Verse 23, he says this, the Lord will pass through to smite the Egyptians. And when he seeth the blood upon the lintel and on the two side posts, the Lord will pass over the door and will not suffer the destroyer. He won't allow the destroyer to come into your houses to smite you when he sees that blood. He won't allow it to come in. Do you see it? Do you experience it? You see, the household was to look objectively at the lamb that was to keep them from that destroying angel that night. But do you experience it? Do they individually experience it?

Is the lamb, of verse four, the lamb, is that become, in verse five, your lamb? Your lamb. You see, a lamb, the lamb, your lamb. Is it become your lamb? God sees the lamb. It's God's Passover. It's His. Look at verse 11. Thus you shall eat it with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet, your staff in your hand. You shall eat it in haste. It is the Lord's Passover.

Divine justice satisfied. Divine justice satisfied. But each guilty sinner must personally be sprinkled by the Lamb's blood, not literally, not literally. You, if you're his child, you must be personally sprinkled by that blood, not literally, but by faith, appropriating the effect of that blood of the Lamb.

As Jesus said to Nicodemus in John 3 verse 3, you must be born again. If you're not born again, you cannot see the kingdom of God. You cannot see anything to do with the eternal life of God. The Holy Spirit must give spiritual life to see it. That's the cause. And faith must apply it to the soul. That's the effect. Here's the believer's experience of God. Here is the believer's experience.

Galatians 2 and verse 20 says this, I am crucified. Paul wrote, I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live. Yet not I, but Christ lives in me. And the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of Jesus Christ, who loved me and gave himself for me. You see, That's somebody talking about the sprinkling of the blood. I live by the faith of Jesus Christ. My day-to-day walk is by the faith of Jesus Christ, knowing that he bore my sins in his own body on the tree, as Peter says.

He bare our sins. He bore the sins of his people. It's one thing to give mental assent to the objective fact that the blood of God's Lamb paid the sin debt of his people. Yes, I can see that in a theological college, I could say, what is it that pays the sin debt of the people of God? And I can write the correct answer objectively. It's the blood of the Lamb of God that has satisfied the justice of God, yes. But I must feel it in my soul for the cleansing effect of that blood for me, a personal application of that blood. Let me give you an illustration.

There's a well-known film that we've been watching down the years, probably for the last 50 or 60 years, and it's called The Railway Children. Yeah, you remember that one, the railway children? It's a lovely story and it's set in Yorkshire and there's a railway and what's happened is that the respectable father of this lovely family with an older sister and then a brother and a younger sister, the father's been falsely accused and he's been put in prison and so the family, the mum and the children, move away to this little place in Yorkshire next to the railway and it's the railway children.

They get all sorts of escapades but anyway, This is the point, this is the point. At the end of it, the oldest sister goes down to the station, not knowing what's going on. And there's clouds of steam as the locomotive comes in, clouds of steam, and a man gets off the train at the front of the train. and the steam's there, and she can't, and she looks, and she looks. And I'm not gonna say this without choking up and crying, because it's such an emotional moment in the film. But there she goes, she goes, daddy, my daddy, you see what I mean? That's what I'm saying. Is this yours? It's one thing to objectively look at the lamb, but is it my lamb? Is he my lamb? Is he my Christ? Is that the way it is?

When Thomas, the doubting disciple, came into that room and the risen Lord Jesus Christ showed him the nail prints and the mark in his side of the spear, he fell down at the feet of Jesus and he cried, my Lord and my God. That's what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying. Yeah?

A lamb, the lamb, my lamb, your lamb, my lamb. Personal, personal. Seeing and believing that, is a new era for Israel. It's a new era. It's the start of it. This will be the first of the months for you. If any man is in Christ, says Paul to the Corinthians, he is a new creature. It's a new era. All old things are passed away. All things are become new. You're a new creature in Christ. Right, let's go on. Let's go on. Verse six.

You shall keep it until the 14th day of the same month to make sure that it's without blemish and without spot, that it's perfect. And that so pictures the Lord Jesus Christ, who lived to the year of his adult strength and maturity, 30 years old, examined, and nobody could find anything to accuse him of sin.

And the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening. Kill it in the evening. This is my next point. Each household's lamb must be sacrificed. It must be sacrificed. Sacrificed. Verse 27. Look at verse 27 of this chapter. And 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. It's the Lord's Passover, the sacrifice of the Lord's Passover. The death and the lifeblood of a substitute, propitiated, turned away, soothed, calmed, paid for, propitiated the divine wrath of God against sin.

God is strictly just. God, he says in Exodus 34 verse 7, God can by no means clear the guilty. God can by no means sweep sin under the carpet as if it didn't exist. He can by no means clear the guilty. But where sin abounded, says Paul to the Romans, grace did much more abound. Where sin abounded, the grace of God much more abounded. But listen, listen, this is what so much religion misses. Where sin abounded, grace much more abounded, but not at the expense of God's righteousness. God didn't let grace abound and mercy come at the expense of righteousness.

How did he do it then? A lamb without blemish must die for the sins of the people. A lamb without blemish, perfect, must die for the sins of the people who has God says through Isaiah in the chapter 1 verse 6, he says, speaking of Israel, speaking of his people, speaking of people in their sin as they are, he says, from the sole of their foot to the top of their head, it's all putrefying sores. There is no soundness in it.

That's what we are. as the Apostle Peter says in 1 Peter 3.18, the just must die for the unjust. The just one, the just one must pay the penalty for the unjust. In the blood of the lamb, look what happens. In Psalm 85, in the blood of the lamb, look what happens.

It says there in verse 10, mercy and truth are met together. not the one at the expense of the other. Righteousness and peace have kissed each other. The righteousness of God is maintained, but the peace of God to those who are his sinful people, redeemed by the blood of that Lamb, have kissed each other. They're reconciled together. They've made peace together.

As we saw last week in 1 Corinthians 5, verses 7 and 8, we read that Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed for us. A sacrifice is a death to pay a penalty. Why was Christ killed for sin? Why was he who knew no sin killed? Because God made him the sin of his people. So God justly punished him. So God justly condemned him. Why? Why did God forsake him? My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why did God forsake him? For he was loaded with sin that God hates and cannot abide, and his justice must be satisfied on it by pouring out his wrath on it.

So that we read in Romans 8 and verse 32, he that spared not his son, he that spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all. How shall he not freely with him give us all things? In Hebrews 9 and verse 26, Christ once put away sin. How? By the sacrifice of himself. The sacrifice makes the payment. What was it that put away sin? The sacrifice of himself. The sacrifice of Christ himself for his people.

So it's our Passover. Christ, our Passover is sacrificed for us. but it's also, as we read in verse 11, it is the Lord's Passover. It's our Passover, it's the Lord's Passover. It is for the Lord, why? To satisfy his justice. The Passover, the dying of the lamb, does for God what his justice demands, it satisfies his justice. It not only does that, it magnifies his holiness, for our God is holy. And it vindicates his throne, his right to rule over all things. And it glorifies his holy character.

And it maintains this, that as Isaiah 45 verse 21 says, that he is a just God. and a saviour. A just God would punish sin, all sin. Ah, He has, therefore He can be the saviour of those whose sins He's punished in a substitute. As Romans 3, 26 echoes the same thing. He is, as God, He is just and justifier of those who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. And it's also, so it's for God, it's for God to satisfy his justice so that he can save without violating his justice, but it's also for his people. It's for us. Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed for us, the people of God. Why is it good for us?

It's pictured in the scapegoat that comes later in the books of Moses. But two goats were to be taken. One was the Lord's to be killed as a sacrifice for sin. The other was to have the sins of the people symbolically loaded on its head. That was the scapegoat. And that was the one that was to be set free. It was to be driven out into the wilderness by a fit man. Do you know there is a fit man that has driven our sins out into the wilderness, and that's our Lord Jesus Christ. That we might go free like that scapegoat. The word for Passover is the Hebrew word Pesach. Pesach. It means not just to pass by or to pass over, but to stand guard, to protect. That's what we saw in verse 23 of this chapter.

The Lord will pass over the door and will not allow, suffer the destroyer to come into your houses to smite you. The justice of God won't allow it. That's why it's good for the people of God. It's good for God because it satisfies his offended justice, but it's good for his people, for we see that he will not allow God is just. He cannot have sin punished in the lamb and then punished in you. That would violate his justice. It's to protect, to not allow.

He justly prevents the destroyer from coming in because the lamb has already died. Thus Jesus laments over Jerusalem. Look at this in Luke chapter 13 and verse 34. Jesus is by Jerusalem, and he says, "'O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, "'which killest the prophets "'and stonest them that are sent unto thee, "'how often would I have gathered thy children together "'as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings.'" That's Pesach, that's Passover, that's protect, that's God.

How much would I have done this? But you, in your stubborn sin, you would not, you would not. How do we apprehend it? How do we apprehend the truth of this? Just as Moses did. In Hebrews 11 and verse 28, it's through faith that Moses kept the Passover. Through faith, he kept the sprinkling of the blood, lest God destroy them for sin. Okay, well, we're running out of time, but let's go on.

The blood, the meal, the preparation for the journey, verses 7 to 11. the blood, the meal, and the preparation. Verse seven, they shall take of the blood and strike it on the two side posts and on the upper door post of the houses, wherein they shall eat it. And they shall eat the flesh in that night, roast with fire, and unleavened bread, and with bitter herbs they shall eat it. Eat not of it raw, nor sodden at all with water, but roast with fire, his head, with his legs, and with the pertinence thereof. And ye shall let nothing of it remain until the morning. and that which remaineth of it until the morning ye shall burn with fire.

What's he being told to do? Paint the blood round the house door. Four. Verse 13. The blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where you are. And when I see the blood, says God, I will pass over, I will pesach, I will protect you inside there. The plague shall not be upon you. I won't let the plague come upon you because the blood has already satisfied the justice of God. And this day shall be a memorial to you and you shall keep it a feast throughout your generations. You shall keep it as a memorial. of the thing which sends you on your way to eternal glory.

How is a man made just with God? How is Satan defeated? How is God's kingdom triumphant? The answer's given in Revelation 12 and verse 11, where we see a potted history of time. But there in verse 11 of Revelation 12, the people of God are triumphant in eternal glory, and it says, they overcame him. Who? Satan. They overcame Satan. How did they overcome Satan? By the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony. It was the blood of the Lamb that overcame Satan. Because who shall bring any charge against God's elect? Who shall condemn Romans 8, 33 and 34? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? Why? Christ has died. The Lamb of God has died. The Lamb of God has shed his blood to pay the price of the sin that God is furious with. And it's that blood that propitiates the wrath of God against sin.

Then they're told, Eat the flesh. Eat the flesh. Imbibe the flesh. Take it into you. Make it part of you. But it must be roasted. It must be roasted with fire. It must be eaten with unleavened bread. Leaven always speaks of sin and corruption. The bread that you eat it with must be unleavened bread.

And it must be with bitter herbs, speaking of the fire of God's justice against sin. freedom from the leaven of sin, with the remorse and the repentance of the bitter herbs, the remorse and repentance over sin, the death of the lamb, is become the meal, the food of life. The death of the lamb is become the food of life. Believers feed on Christ, for he said, I am the bread of life, which is come down from heaven. To Christ's true believing people, these are the words of eternal life, as Peter said to our Lord. This is the pearl of greatest price. This, in this world of possessions and experiences and things happening. This is the one thing above all others that his people must have and must possess.

What about you? What about you? What about you out there listening now? What about you listening to a recording of this in time to come? Is it of no relevance to you? The prophet Jeremiah asks that question in Lamentations, in Lamentations chapter 1 and verses 12 and 13. He says, Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by?

Behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow which is done unto me, wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger. For from above he sent fire into my bones, and it prevaileth against them. And he hath spread a net for my feet, and hath turned me back. He hath made me desolate and faint all the day. Do you see that? The yoke of my transgressions is bound by his hand. He was made sin, and he bore the punishment of God for those things. And when he hung on the cross, When he did hang on the cross, that was prophetical. That was hundreds of years before he died on the cross. It was prophetical. It was true.

But when he actually did hang on the cross 2,000 years ago, Mark records in his gospel, chapter 15, they that passed by Is it nothing to you, you that pass by? They that passed by railed on him, wagging their heads and saying, ah, thou that destroyest the temple and buildest it in three days, because Jesus had said, destroy this temple, meaning his body, and I'll raise it up in three days. They said to him, come on then, save yourself and come down from the cross, and then we'll believe you. And you know what Jesus said in response to that?

There they are, they're passing by. It's of no relevance to them. They're mocking him. They're pouring scorn on the gospel that he's preached to them. It's nothing to them that pass by. It's irrelevant to them that pass by. And what does Jesus say about them? Luke 23 verse 34 says this, then said Jesus, Father, forgive them. for they know not what they do. Father, forgive them for they know not what they, what? Forgive all of them for railing on him like that. How could he pray the Father to forgive? How could he pray the Father to forgive except on the grounds of his blood? Now listen carefully.

Shed for some of them that passed by. There was some in that crowd railing on him and wagging their heads. that he knew were amongst that multitude for whom he was dying. There was one on the cross next to him that, to start with, was just like the other thief, and yet he was one of the ones for whom Christ was dying. He could ask the father to forgive them because he knew he was paying their debt to divine justice. His blood was shed for some of them that passed by. This is my question to you out there, wondering whether this is of any relevance to you. Was his blood shed for you? Was it shed for you?

If it was, God will give you spiritual eyes and ears to see and to hear the truth of gospel grace. And in believing, you will find life. The scripture is rich throughout with promises. Listen to the words of Jesus recorded in John 5, 24. Verily, verily, truthfully, truthfully, you can rely on it. This is God come down from heaven saying this. Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me, listen, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from death unto life.

Is it nothing to you or ye that pass by? There's so much more to see here. Just very, very quickly, verse 11. 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. We could look at so much more here, but you've got to be ready to go. You people coming out of the darkness of this world and heading on that journey to eternal life, to the celestial city, get ready to go.

Gird up your loins. We read in Ephesians chapter six and in the spiritual armor, the armor that God gives to his people, that there's your loins girt with truth. Gird up your loins. It means take up the long robe and tie it up so that you can run, so that you can go. Well, in Ephesians it says, tie up your loins, be ready to go.

What with? Go with the word of truth. With your shoes on, with your feet shod with the gospel of peace. With your staff in your hand. What's the staff in your hand? It's our Lord Jesus Christ. It's the word of God in our hand. This is thy rod and thy staff. They comfort me on this journey. The pilgrim's journey. Where do we get to? I think we'll have to stop it there. But I'll read those verses that we read right at the start of the service. Romans 11, 33 to 36.

Because do you not have a sense of what Paul meant when he wrote this? O the depth of the riches, both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out! For who hath known the mind of the Lord? Or who hath been His counsellor? Or who hath first given to Him, and it shall be recompensed unto Him again? For of Him, and through Him, and to Him are all things, to whom be glory for ever. Amen.

A Lamb, The Lamb, Your Lamb

What does the Bible say about the Passover lamb?

How do we know Jesus is the Lamb of God?

Why is the doctrine of substitutionary atonement important for Christians?

What does it mean to have a personal relationship with Christ as the Lamb?

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A Lamb, The Lamb, Your Lamb

What does the Bible say about the Passover lamb?

How do we know Jesus is the Lamb of God?

Why is the doctrine of substitutionary atonement important for Christians?

What does it mean to have a personal relationship with Christ as the Lamb?

Sermon Transcript

About Allan Jellett

Comments

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