Passover

“This day shall be for you a memorial day…” (Exodus 12:14)

For the coaching profession, the last recruiting weekend in April is one that can almost be considered a “basketball holiday” because it has become an NCAA-compliant yearly gathering of talented basketball players, coaches of all levels, family members, and fans of the game. This year, the same weekend also marked the beginning of the Jewish holiday called Passover (April 22nd), which concluded over this past weekend (April 30th). Although we may not celebrate in the traditional Jewish manner, it is good to be reminded of what God has done for us, and what He continues to do to manifest His promises.

Passover comes from the Hebrew word “Pesach” which means, “to pass over; to exempt or to spare.” “Pesach” is also the name of the sacrificial lamb that was made in the Temple on the Passover holiday. When we look to the book of Exodus for the background story, we find the description of liberation by God to bring freedom to the Israelites from their 400-year bondage to the Egyptians.

God’s promises declared to Moses, God’s chosen leader, began in Chapter 6:

“I am the LORD.

1. I will BRING YOU OUT from under the burdens of Egypt.

2. I will DELIVER you from slavery to them.

3. I will REDEEM you.

4. I will TAKE YOU to be my people.

5. I will BE YOUR GOD.

6. I will BRING YOU into the land.

7. I will GIVE it to you for a possession.

I am the LORD.”

There is SO MUCH just in these seven promises (which will probably be left for another day to discuss), but today, we will address God’s humanly unimaginable, but Divinely omniscient and prophetic plan of deliverance, redemption, and possession for His people outlined in the above promises but executed later in Exodus.

Because of Pharaoh’s hardened heart towards letting God’s people go to be free to serve and worship Him, God’s “wonders [were] multiplied in the land of Egypt” through a series of plagues (Exodus 11:9). The final plague was one that would result in God’s judgment as He passed through Egypt to put to death the firstborn (man and beast) of those who were found not to be covered by the blood of a lamb that was marked on the door frames.

“Go and select lambs for yourselves…and kill the Passover (Pesach) lamb. Take a bunch of hyssop and dip the blood that is in the basin, and touch the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood that is in the basin.” (Exodus 12:21-22)

“When I see the blood, I will pass over you, and no plague will befall you to destroy you…” (Exodus 12:13)

Drawing our attention to the symbolism of this Passover event with Jesus’s crucifixion we see the following:

• A lamb: Jesus is the Sacrificial Lamb—“Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.”—John 1:29.

• Use of “Hyssop”: “Hyssop” is the Hebrew word “ezob” meaning “holy herb” which was a three to four foot long plant used to purify and consecrate holy places, as well as to be burned in the fire with the animal sacrifice; “Purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean; was me and I shall be whiter than snow.”—Psalms 51:7; Hyssop was used to lift the sponge of vinegar to Jesus’s lips at the Crucifixion—“A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant, and lifted it to Jesus’s lips.”—John 19:29. Hyssop directs our attention so salvation since it was used to place the blood on the door posts, to purify the sacrifice in the Old Testament, as well as pointed to Jesus right before He offered up His life for us.

• Sacrificial Blood: The lamb’s blood ultimately represented Jesus’s blood that was shed for us. “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.”—Matthew 26:28

• Salvation from God’s judgement: God “passed over” all who had followed the directions to mark their doorposts with the blood because they were “covered,” marked as set apart, and were saved from death; Jesus is the only door to salvation, and His blood saves us from death—eternal separation from God.

The parallels we can pull from scriptures leading up to the culmination of Jesus’s death for our sins are so profound, yet completely personal for each of us to grasp. All of the references in the Old Testament that point towards the salvation that was coming for us through the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus, including this Exodus liberation story, were done so that we can each truly understand the depth of God’s love for us and His desire for us to be free and full in Him.

The prayer of the revelation of God’s love for all of us this morning comes from Ephesians 3:16-20:

“I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.”

May you be filled with God’s love and a distinctly personal remembrance today about the salvation that we have through Jesus Christ.