The lesson this morning will
be taken from Luke chapter 22. Luke 22 marks the beginning of
the suffering and death of the Lord Jesus Christ, our Passover
lamb. And I've heard and read many
names for this gathering of his disciples in the upper room.
But it's clear to me that it was to be the last Passover and
the first of the Lord's Supper. And what he's celebrating in
this supper, having eaten the lamb, what he celebrates here
is the fulfillment of the Passover forever. Our Lord is the fulfillment
of all the promises of God. Everything God promised to chosen
sinners, He promised through His Son. And His Son is the surety
of those promises. Let's read the account given
us by God, the Holy Ghost, and pray that He'll reveal its hidden
mysteries to us. Luke 22, verse 1. of unleavened bread drew nigh,
which is called the Passover. And the chief priests and scribes
sought how they might kill him. Now, this is interesting to me
that this is, we're talking about the Passover. The Passover was
drawn nigh and the lamb had to be killed. Who's going to kill
him? Here they are, they're talking
about right here. The chief priests and scribes sought how they might
kill him. For they feared the people. Then entered Satan into Judas,
surname Iscariot, being of the number of the twelve. And he
went his way and communed with the chief priests and captains
how he might betray him unto them. And they were glad and
covenanted. come to an agreement to give
him money. And he promised and sought opportunity
to betray him unto them in the absence of the multitude. He
wasn't to come out in front of everybody and do this, but to
do it so nobody saw it, because they feared the people. 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 be a man meet
you, bearing a pitcher of water. Follow him into the house where
he entereth in, and ye shall say unto the good men 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. That is, make
ready for this Passover. 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 twelve apostles
with him, and he said unto them with desire, I have desired to
eat the Passover with you before I suffer. For I say unto you,
I will not any more eat thereof until it be fulfilled in the
kingdom of God. And he took the cup and gave
thanks and said, take this and divide it among yourselves, for
I say unto you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until
the kingdom of God shall come. Now in order to understand the
language and import of these verses, we must first know something
about the ceremony to which our Lord is referring, the Passover. Passover. So if you would, turn
with me to Exodus chapter 12. This is where the Passover was
instituted. I want to spend the entire study
this morning talking about the Passover. He said the Passover
is nine. The first Passover is thousands
of years gone by. And then many thousands of times
they ate that Passover between then and this day where he's
talking about. But it was first instituted over
here and recorded in Exodus chapter 12. And the Passover was an act
of God to save his people from the destroyer which he commanded
to go through Egypt and slay the firstborn throughout the
land. A lot of people say it was the
Lord Himself who went through there, and you can read the Scriptures,
and the Lord indeed passed through that land and took the firstborn.
But whether He did it personally or through someone is of little
consequence. You were dead. You were dead. And whether He be the destroyer
or someone He sent, it's the same outcome. And it's set forth
here in Exodus 12 in detail exactly as it was given to Israel. And
there are seven things that I want you to see here in Exodus chapter
12. First of all, to participate
in the Passover required a lamb. You hear me? There is no Passover
apart from the lamb. God ain't going to pass over.
He's not going to pass over. He didn't pass over Egypt because
there was no blood on the doorpost and no lamb slain. He said in verse 3, Exodus 12
verse 3, In the tenth 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. There will be no safe passage,
no mercy, no escape apart from this Lamb. The Lamb will be prominent
from this day forward. In all their sacrifices, the
Lamb is going to be prominent. So much so that when the forerunner
of Christ saw Jesus coming down the way, what did he say? Behold
the Lamb. That was significant. The Lamb
was the sacrifice of the Passover. The Lamb was the sin offering.
And on and on you go. The Lamb was significant in the
worship of God. You couldn't worship God without
a Lamb. I'll never forget this woman
arguing with Brother Mahan. She was a Jew. She didn't like...
He said something about... He had brought a message titled,
The True Jew. And I don't remember the whole
discussion, but they went back and forth and back and forth.
And we did this and we did that. And, you know, I'm a true Jew. Don't tell me I'm not a true
Jew. I'm a true Jew. And he said, well, let's just
cut through the chapter. He said, you say that you worship God.
She said, I do. And he said, where's the lamb? Where is your lamb? You can't
worship God without a lamb. You can't do it. Where's the
lamb? And she had no answer. There
can be no Passover where there is no lamb. The Passover demands
a lamb. It requires a lamb. And then the second thing he
tells us about the Passover is that the lamb must be examined.
Exodus 12 verse 5. He said, your lamb shall be without
blemish, a male of the first year. You shall take it out from
among the sheep or from the goats, and you shall keep it up until
the 14th day of the same month. Four days. You'll pin up this
lamb, and you're going to watch it carefully, examine it, look
it over good for four days. What were they looking for? They
wanted to be sure it was sound. It had to be sound. It had to be without blemish. And we know that these things
are symbolic. They're patterns of things in
the heavens, shadows of good things to come. So how does this
examination apply to us? You have to examine the land.
So how does this examination apply to the believer? Well,
the same as it did to them. You examine the lamb. Huh? We examine the lamb. Religion
is big on examination of the preacher. If you're going to
be a pastor or a preacher in most modern day religious circles,
they're going to bring you in before a committee of elders
and they're going to question you inside out. They're going to examine the
preacher. Now, let me tell you something. It has its place.
It has its place. There are requirements. There's
requirements of attitude and conduct, and it has its place. But to examine a preacher, we're
told to examine the Lamb. Now, we know it. It is the preacher's
calling to set forth the Lamb. That's his message, isn't it?
Try the spirits, John said, whether they be of God. Every spirit
that confesseth that Jesus Christ has come into the flesh is of
God. That's the Lamb. Examine the Lamb. He preaches. It's not those bringing the lamb
who were pinned up. It was the lamb. It wasn't the
man bringing the lamb that was set up here and examined. It
was the lamb. And if you're looking for a flaw
in me, it won't take you four days. It'll just take you a matter
of minutes. You can find all kind of flaw
in me. But you won't find any flaws in the lamb I set before
you. He's perfect. He's without blemish. He's God come into the flesh
and He's perfect in every sense of the word. And I think I can
almost hear Israel the next day after that awful night singing,
worthy is the Lamb. And I know that's what they're
going to sing in glory. Worthy is the Lamb. So the Passover
requires the Lamb to be examined. Now, let me ask you something
else. Who's doing the offering for your sins? Who's providing
the lamb for your deliverance? Then know this. He will Himself
examine your examination. Huh? God said bring the lamb. God said examine the lamb. How
they going to examine him to his qualifications, not yours? It's God who tells us who the
Christ is. We examine Him by His qualifications. Isn't that right? We're not told
to just examine Christ in our natural thinking, but He tells
us how. It's not my examination of the
Lamb that makes it acceptable, but His. I must examine this land to his
qualifications, and if the land don't meet his approval, it won't
keep death away. What exactly are you looking
for? To see if there's a blemish. Peter said, we're redeemed with
the precious blood of Christ as of a lamb without blemish
and without spot. who verily was foreordained before
the foundation of the world what was manifest, set before you. Manifest in these last times
for you. And then Paul said this, O foolish
Galatians, who hath bewitched you that you should not obey
the truth before whose eyes Jesus Christ, now listen to this, hath
been evidently set before you. crucified among you. Christ has been set forth by
all the evidences provided by God. That's how we set Him forth. Everything required of God is
in the Lamb. And it's all set before men through
the preaching of Christ crucified. And Jesus Christ is the sum and
substance of all of our preaching. Preachers, in their preaching,
they paint a picture with words as clear as possible before the
people. All the glory and excellences
of His person, His incarnate birth, His sinless life, His
offices as Mediator, Savior, and so on, His perfections as
the God-man, His office as a substitute, the fullness of his grace, the
efficacy of his blood through faith in his blood, Paul said.
So the Passover was a lamb examined and found faultless. Here he
is. He sits before the highest officer
in the land, Pilate. Now listen to what he said. He
turns to the Jews. He examines him, doesn't he?
He questions him. He looks him over. And he turns
to the Jews and he said, You have brought this man unto me
as one that perverteth the people, and behold, I have examined him
before you, and have found no fault in this man touching these
things. That lamb's been examined. And Herod did the same thing
and said the same thing. Found no fault. Alright, here's
the third thing. The Lamb must die. Everything
concerning the future of Israel and the blessed promises of God
are hanging on the death of the Lamb. The Lamb slain sets before us
how God saves sinners. How is He going to deliver His
people out of Egypt? Egypt was cursed of God. Death
was pronounced. The day of their death, it was
on. It was imminent. And there was
but one hope, and that hope was in the blood of the lambs. Nothing
but the blood. That's what we're saying, isn't
it? Nothing but the blood. The life of the flesh, he said,
is in the blood. And I've given it to you upon
the altar. Paul talks about the free justification
of Christ over in Romans 3 and tells us it's through the redemption
that's in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth to be a propitiation
through faith in His blood to declare His righteousness for
the remission of sins. The Passover requires the death
of the lamb. And then fourthly, concerning
this Passover lamb, he must be roasted. It has to be roasted. Exodus
12, 8, and they shall eat the flesh in that night, roast with
fire and unleavened bread, and with bitter herbs shall they
eat it. God's lamb was not burnt to pieces. He was roasted. He was roasted. He was not sodden with water.
That is, why do you boil something? Huh? To make it edible. I don't
know if you've ever eaten squirrel, if you just throw it in the skillet
and fry it, but it's tough as shoe leather. But you boil it,
and it tenderizes it, don't it? Makes it easier to chew. Well,
he's not gonna make his savior easy for you to chew. He's gonna
roast him. Gonna roast him in the fire.
He's not gonna water him down. And that's what it means to be
sodden with water. He's not gonna have his land
watered down. Must be roasted in the fire and
nothing else so suits the appetite of believing sinners than Christ
crucified. The suffering Savior. But whether
men love it or not, it's a sweet savor to God. And that's what
he told me. He said, you put it on the altar,
you roast it on that altar, and it'll be a sweet savor to me. And then there's something else
that occurred to me as I thought about these things. Jesus of
Nazareth suffered no longer than was absolutely necessary to satisfy
God. I watch Yvonne sometimes when
she's cooking something and she'll go there and open that door and
she'll look in there and she'll poke it or whatever she's doing
and she'll say, it ain't done yet. When our Lord cried, it is finished,
the roast was done. Well, it was done. Perfectly. I don't mean by that that God
did not pour out the full fury of his wrath or that he let him
off easy because he was a son and because he was dying as a
substitute. What I mean is that he was subject
to the fire until God's justice and wrath and vengeance were
satisfied. That's what makes the savor. And it was to be roasted and
eaten with bitter herbs. These bitter herbs were symbolic
of the bitter afflictions of their bondage down in Egypt.
That's one of the things these bitter herbs symbolize. But also, it is to us as well
as to them in our repentance over our sins, which is the cause
of his death. In Zechariah 12.10, it says,
And they shall look on him whom they have pierced, and they shall
mourn for him as one mourneth for his only son, that is, for
his death, and for his suffering, and for their part in it. It's
a bitter thing to know that your sins put him on the cross. They'll mourn for their rejection
of him, for their hardness of heart and unbelief, and they
shall be in bitterness for him, as in bitterness for the firstborn. He's the firstborn among many
brethren, isn't he? He sure is. And those who eat the roasted
lamb, they eat him with bitter herbs, and they eat the lamb
with unleavened bread. What's this all about? He talks
about the feast of unleavened bread, which is called the Passover. They eat the lamb with unleavened
bread. It was symbolic of the sincerity and truth in those
who ate it. There was among the Corinthians
a man living in adultery with his stepmother. You remember
our study in the Corinthians. And the people as a body just
ignored it all together. They just pretended like it wasn't
going on. They just ignored it. And they
went right on with their worship and let these things go. And
Paul forced them to deal with it. But here's what he said. Purge out therefore the old leaven
that you may be a new lump, as you are unleavened. For even
Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep
the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice
and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity
and truth. Those who eat the lamb eat it
sincerely, and they eat it in truth. They eat it in truth. And then fifthly, and I'll be
brief on these last things. The Passover lamb was to be eaten,
all of it. Read it with the pertinence thereof,
with its insides, everything. You're going to eat the whole
lamb. I remember Thanksgiving when
I was a child, I was thinking about this passage. And I'd pick
what I wanted to eat on Thanksgiving. I wanted the dark meat. I didn't
want just any piece of turkey. I wanted dark meat. I wanted
a leg or a wing. I wanted that dark meat. Boy, it tastes so much better
than that white. And that's what I wanted. And I wanted the stuffing that
was in the burger. And I wanted that, because it
was so much better than that other that just went in the oven.
And then I wanted different things. And I'd pick and choose. You
don't pick and choose in the Passover, you eat the lamb, all
of it. All of it. The whole lamb must be eaten.
And God's lamb, he said, will be for a house. How do I know
where God's house is? That's where the lamb is. Is
that right? That's where the lamb is. You don't just drive down the
road. Oh man, now look at that. They
got a big congregation. The Lord's there. Is He? I tell you where His house is,
is where the Lamb is. That's where His house is. A Lamb for a house. Everyone
in it. All whose hope was tied to it.
All who were associated with it. The gospel lamb is set forth,
not to one at a time, but before the whole house assembled. Exodus
12, 4. If a household be too little
for the lamb, let him and his neighbor next unto his house
take it according to the number of souls, every man according
to his eating. Too little for what? You like I am, you read that
passage and it don't say nothing to you, and boy, what am I going
to do with this? What am I going to do with this?
How's a house too little for the Lamb? Too little for what? Well, it
says too little for the Lamb. How so? Too small for His purpose. God has a purpose. He's going
to carry it out. He has the means. He's ordained
all the means. And that's what he's picturing
here. It's too small to fulfill the type. It's too small to set forth the
lamb as he would have it set forth, eaten. Had to eat all
the lamb. Couldn't have any leftovers at
the end of the day. Well, three people ain't going
to eat a whole lamb, are they? And there's something about this
verse as it concerns the unity of the body of Christ as they
assemble together to eat the roasted lamb set before them. The lamb eaten is symbolic of
the lamb preached, received, and eaten by faith in God's house. Wherever he's pleased to qualify
the house. Is that right? He has his house,
he has his churches. Read Revelation. He's talking
to the seven churches of the nation. Not talking to the world,
talking to his churches. Let them hear what the Spirit
saith to whom? To the churches. The Passover lamb was to be eaten,
and it's to be eaten by those ready to go. Listen to this. They'll eat it. Here's what he says. Thus shall
you eat it with your loins girded, and your shoes on your feet,
and your staff in your hand. You shall eat it in haste. Don't put it off. Don't put it
off. You know, I just ain't hungry
for lamb today. I think I'll have pork chop. You better eat it in haste. It's
the Lord's Passover. And then lastly, the Lamb was
to be set forth not only in that first Passover, but as an ordinance
forever. That's what it says. Forever. Exodus 12, 25. And it
shall come to pass, when ye shall come to the land which the Lord
will give you according as he hath promised, ye shall keep
this service. And when your children shall
say unto you, What mean you by this? Then ye shall say, It is the
sacrifice of the Lord's Passover. And so it is this morning that
I'm telling the children of God what the Passover is and what
the Passover means. When they shall ask you, here's
what you're gonna say, what's this lamb all about? It's the
Lord's Passover. When I see the blood, he said,
I'll pass over you. And Christ fulfilled that. He
is the lamb, isn't he? He's the unleavened bread. He's
the wine. He's the whole bottle of wax,
isn't he? This whole Passover was fulfilled by him. And here's
what he tells them at the beginning of this passage, back in Luke.
And the Passover drew nigh. The real Passover drew nigh. It was about to be fulfilled. Oh, may the Lord give us some
understanding of these old ceremonies and what they mean.