The Passover: July 2013
Table of Contents
The Passover
The Passover was first kept in Egypt and then celebrated in the wilderness and Canaan. In considering these three places the Passover was celebrated, let us notice some thoughts that we may apply to our remembrance of the Lord in death. In one sense, we keep this loving remembrance of Him in the world, of which Egypt is the type, and in so doing we eat, as it were, of the roast lamb; that is, we feed on Christ as the One whose precious blood sheltered us from the just judgment of God and who underwent the fire of His judgment.
We also keep it in the wilderness, for that is what the world has become to those who are redeemed to God. In the wilderness the Israelites also ate the manna, which prefigured Christ as the bread come down from heaven. Even so we sometimes combine in our remembrance of Him the thoughts of His coming down as the true Manna with thoughts of His death as the Lamb of God.
In another sense, we remember Him as the risen and glorified Christ who was once in death. Of this the children of Israel’s keeping the Passover in Canaan and eating the “old corn of the land” give us a picture. In doing this, we are, in spirit, in heavenly places, of which Canaan is a type.
Adapted from P. Wilson
Jehovah’s Passover
“the Beginning of Months”
The Passover was Israel’s fundamental institution. It marked the commencement of their history as a nation and as a people in special relationship with Jehovah. That night in Egypt was never to be forgotten by them.
The Passover chapter opens very suggestively. “Jehovah 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 unto you” (Ex. 12:1-2). The month in question was Abib, otherwise Nisan (Ex. 13:4), and corresponded to our March-April. It had hitherto been the seventh in order of reckoning; from the time of Israel’s deliverance from Egypt it was to be accounted the first. Redemption thus gave the people a new start with God. Even so is it now. When a man acknowledges himself a sinner in God’s sight and takes refuge under the blood of the Lamb, he begins life anew — a new point of departure, a new mode of being altogether.
“Every Man a Lamb”
Ten plagues in all fell upon Egypt; from nine of them the captive Israelites were markedly exempt. But when the angel of death must be sent through the land, Israel could be exempted no longer. However favored these people might be, in God’s sovereignty, they were sinners like all others (Ezek. 20:5-9). If, therefore, they were to be spared the last dread stroke, it must be on some righteous ground. This is why the lamb was necessary.
The instructions concerning the lamb were very comprehensive. “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, according to the house of their fathers, a lamb for an house” (Ex. 12:3). In thus insisting upon a lamb, Jehovah was thinking of Christ, and 1 Corinthians 5:7 puts this beyond all dispute: “Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us.” Accordingly, this story of Israel in Egypt has its voice for us, for nothing counts with God but Christ. “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). The Lamb is our sole hope.
“the Tenth Day”
While the Passover month was to be henceforward considered the first in the year, the lamb was not to be slain on the first day of that month. We read in Exodus 12:3, “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.” Ten days were to run their course before the death of the victim. The number “ten” represents the full measure of human responsibility. Thus we have ten commandments in Exodus 20, ten virgins in Matthew 25:1-13, and ten pounds in Luke 19:13. The ten days speak to us, therefore, of the ages of responsibility (or probation) which ran their course before God sent forth His beloved Son to be the Lamb of God, the One to take away the sin of the world. Men proved, during forty centuries, that under every variety of circumstances and conditions there was nothing but evil in their hearts. This terrible fact having been fully demonstrated, God sent forth His Son. “When we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly” (Rom. 5:6). God’s “due time” is set forth typically in “the tenth day” of Exodus 12.
The Fourteenth Day
The lamb was to be taken out from the sheep or from the goats on the tenth day of the month; nevertheless it was not to be slain on that day. “Ye shall keep it up until the fourteenth day of the same month: and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening” (Ex. 12:6). The victim was for three or four days under the immediate observation of those for whom its blood was to be shed. This finds its answer in the years of the public ministry of the Lord Jesus. When He emerged into public view, He was, as it were, “taken out” on the tenth day and “kept up” until the fourteenth. During His three and a half years of ministry, the Saviour lived in the fierce glare of hostile criticism, and His spotless life proclaimed His fitness to die for the sins of others. He was thus divinely competent to take up the sin question and settle it to the eternal satisfaction of God.
“Kill It”
Death is everywhere stamped upon our chapter, and especially upon the solemn words of verse 6, “The whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening.” The lamb must die; the blood of the innocent must be shed if the guilty were to be spared.
Death lies upon men everywhere as the fruit of sin. Because “the wages of sin is death” (Rom. 6:23), the righteousness of God demands that if any are to be spared this sentence, then death must fall upon another instead. A living lamb would not suffice in Israel; a living Christ could not suffice for us. Thousands of lambs were slain by Israelites that night, and yet in the mind of God there was but One. Christ is God’s first great thought, and to Him every sacrifice pointed. There is no salvation in any other.
“Take of the Blood”
In Exodus 12:7, for the first time in Scripture, we have blood mentioned in connection with man’s deliverance and blessing. In the Book of Genesis, blood is spoken of as evidence of human guilt, but now it comes before us as the means whereby God’s believing people were sheltered from destruction. From this point onward to the close of the Bible, the doctrine of atoning blood stands out in unmistakable characters. By blood, and by blood alone, can men be saved. These were the instructions given to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt: “They shall take of the blood, and strike it on the two side posts and on the upper doorpost of the houses wherein they shall eat it” (Ex. 12:7). Further on in the chapter we hear Moses addressing the elders of Israel thus: “Draw out and take you a lamb according to your families, and kill the Passover. And ye shall take a bunch of hyssop, and dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and strike the lintel and the two side posts with the blood that is in the basin; and none of you shall go out at the door of his house until the morning” (Ex. 12:21-22).
The meaning for us in this day is plain enough. Christ, the Lamb of God, has been slain; His precious blood has been shed, and all that God requires from the sinner who would escape His wrath to come is to accept these mighty facts in simple-hearted faith. On the righteous basis of the blood of Christ, every believer is brought to God, accepted and taken into favor in the risen One, and entitled to know it in the power of the Holy Spirit sent down from heaven.
“When I See the Blood”
The blood of the lamb was the divine requirement, and nothing else could be accepted in its stead. Here is Jehovah’s message to the people: “I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and will smite all the first-born 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 ye 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” (Ex. 12:12-13).
The blood was the confession on the part of those who sprinkled it that they were personally only worthy of death and that they sheltered themselves under the death of another. To God the blood witnessed that death had already entered the houses upon which it rested, and this justified Him in passing by such houses. Sin could only be expiated by blood. The blood of Christ has made it righteously possible for God not only to exempt from judgment the sinner who believes, but also to take such a one into His heart of love forever!
“Eat the Flesh”
The blood of the lamb having been sprinkled according to the ordinance of Jehovah, the flesh of the animal was to be cooked and eaten. So we read, “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 purtenance thereof” (Ex. 12:8-9). Eating has in Scripture the double force of appropriation and identification. In John 6:51-57 the Saviour insists upon the necessity of eating His flesh and drinking His blood in order to have and enjoy eternal life. Israel’s feeding upon the lamb in Egypt is thus typical of our appropriation today of the once-slain Christ.
But there is more than this. It was distinctly forbidden to boil the flesh, as also to eat of it raw. It must be “roast with fire.” Fire is the emblem in Scripture of the holiness of God in judgment. Feeding, as it were, upon the roast lamb, I enter in some measure into the awful judgment which fell upon Christ as my sin-bearer. The “bitter herbs” which accompanied the roast lamb are suggestive of the same principle. The realization that my sin is so serious in the sight of God that nothing could save me but the death of Christ is bitter indeed, though the knowledge of redemption yields exceeding joy.
“Ye shall let nothing of it remain until the morning; and that which remaineth of it until the morning ye shall burn with fire” (Ex. 12:10). In like manner, the work of Christ is not a progressive but a completed thing, definitely and eternally. So divinely efficacious is it that nothing further could ever be required.
The Stroke
Men’s threats are sometimes mere idle words, but not so the predicted judgments of God. The dread sentence took effect on the night of Israel’s Passover. “There was not a house where there was not one dead” (Ex. 12:30). There was no respect of persons, yet while desolation spread itself throughout the land of Egypt, the houses of the Israelites were absolutely unharmed. They could eat and drink in peace, with girded loins and staff in hand, prepared to march out of a scene which was not their home.
We are ourselves living in a solemn moment in the world’s history. The gospel day is ending, and the hour for God’s judgments to begin will shortly strike. Then the once-crucified Lord will come forth as the divinely-appointed Judge of those alive and the dead. Happy are those who, as guilty sinners, have fled to the Saviour for refuge, trusting solely in His precious atoning blood. Such are eternally secure.
“for a Memorial”
That night in Egypt was to be kept in perpetual remembrance by the people of Israel. “Ye shall keep it a feast by an ordinance forever” (Ex. 12:14). Year by year the Passover feast was to be observed in Israel, and in this way the goodness of God was to be kept alive in the minds of the people. The Lord’s supper comes to mind here. The Saviour was on the eve of death when He instituted it, and during the whole period of His absence, the Lord’s supper remains with the church as the memorial of her once-slain Lord and Saviour. As the children of the Israelites were to be carefully instructed as to the meaning of the Passover feast, let us in this day see to it that we are not only ourselves under the shelter of the blood of the Lamb, but that our children are also instructed in this divine security. The wrath of God against all ungodliness is a tremendous reality, from which nothing can screen either ourselves or our children but the Saviour’s blood.
Adapted from W. W. Fereday
The Passover in Four Passages
• Exodus 12:1-4
• Leviticus 23:44
• Numbers 28:16-25
• Deuteronomy 16:1-8
In each of these four passages we are given different important details about the Passover. In Exodus we learn the origin and how it was to be kept. In Leviticus we find that it is one of the offerings that God was pleased to call “My offerings.” In Numbers we are told what was to be offered when the people were in the promised land. And, finally, in Deuteronomy we are instructed where the Lord had chosen for the Passover to be kept.
The Passover is a memorial — a remembrance. It is a memorial of redemption. As the people of God, we are a redeemed people, “Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold ... but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot” (1 Peter 1:18-19). This feast was a memorial of that, and the way in which this first Passover was kept is the way in which God’s people today begin. They were in the land of Egypt where the sword of judgment was about to fall. Egypt is a well-known type of the world in power and independence of God; it was not dependent upon the God of heaven for rain. They watered their fields by foot — irrigation. It tells of man’s independence of God.
There they were, and here we are — in the world as to our actual bodily presence, but not of it. We are secure from the stroke that is about to fall. The Israelites also were secure from the stroke of judgment that was about to fall. Their security depended on being under the shelter of the blood of the lamb. There was just one thing that secured them from judgment, and it was not just the shed blood, but the sprinkled blood. God gave the shed blood, but they had to apply the blood. Christ has died for all, and the death of Christ is God’s provision for all. “Who gave Himself a ransom for all” (1 Tim. 2:6), but it is only those who avail themselves of the provision made who escape the stroke.
The memorial of the Passover is a picture given beforehand of Christ the Lamb, as the Lord’s supper is a memorial given afterward. “Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us” (1 Cor. 5:7). The Christian says, “I am sheltered from the judgment that is coming upon this world by the blood of Christ.”
The Christian is here in this world, secure by the blood of Christ from the judgment that is coming. The Lord’s own word is, “Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning; and ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their lord, when he will return from the wedding. ... Blessed are those servants, whom the lord when he cometh shall find watching” (Luke 12:35-37). That is a simple, happy picture of the Christian’s position.
Roast With Fire
There is another thing given us as to the Passover lamb which is equally solemn and precious: “They shall eat the flesh in that night, roast with fire” (vs. 8). What are we to learn from that? There is no redemption in a living Christ; our redemption was accomplished by the death, not the life, of Christ. “Nor sodden at all with water, but roast with fire.” How solemnly blessed that is! What is typified by that is this: It is Christ our Passover bearing the judgment of God without the least mitigation — nothing coming between. “Roast with fire” — no water — nothing coming between. It is the consuming fire of the judgment of God. The soul meditates upon Christ as his Redeemer and upon the way in which He is his Redeemer.
His Head, Legs and Purtenance
“His head with his legs, and with the purtenance [inwards] thereof.” That is all the intelligence, all the ways and all the affections. Intelligence is the head; ways are the legs; affections are the inwards. All has been tried by the judgment of God and found perfect! It is instructive too that the Israelite was not left to his own mind or judgment as to how to keep this Passover: “Thus shall ye eat it.” Christ under those conditions was before them, or is before us when the memorial of the Passover is before us.
“The blood shall be to you for a token.” When God passed through the land with drawn sword, He did not look inside the houses at all. He took no notice of what was going on inside. That had its place. What He looked at was the outside — the two side posts and the lintel — and if they were sprinkled with the blood of the lamb, He passed them by. He did “not suffer the destroyer to come in unto your houses to smite you.”
There is another thing about Exodus 12. Nothing was to be allowed to remain until the morning. If it were not eaten, it must be burned with fire. We find that all through Leviticus in different ways. After the set time, which was a little longer in connection with the peace offering or thanksgiving offering, it was not to be eaten, but burnt with fire. The peace offering was good for three days; the thanksgiving offering was not so long.
We are to learn a very solemn lesson from that space between the time when it was sacrificed and when that which was sacrificed could be accepted by God, really a sweet savor to Him, after which time to eat it was sin. Do not separate worship too far from the death of Christ, or it will lose its sweetness. Suppose we leave out the sacrifice of Christ in our praise, or it is too much separated from it. The hymns of praise should be connected with the sacrifice of Christ. We must keep the sense of our relationship in our souls founded upon the death of Christ and not separate our thanksgiving and praises from it, forgetting the ground of our relationship. The death of Christ is the ground of communion with God — peace with Him and communion with Him.
Leaven
As the saint is meditating upon the Lord as the One consumed under the fire of God’s judgment, he says, “It was for me.” That is the bitter herbs. The unleavened bread is separation from what is not agreeable to that truth. Leaven in Scripture is always evil. We read of the “leaven of the Pharisees which is hypocrisy.” We get leaven morally in 1 Corinthians 5, doctrinally in Galatians 5, and then another kind of leaven of Herod. That was a mixture of the world and religion. The Herods were neither Jew nor Gentile. They were Idumaean; they came from Esau.
Where
Deuteronomy 16 tells us where the Passover was to be kept. It was to be kept in the place in which God had been pleased to place His name. That was in Jerusalem. All their males after a certain age had to go to Jerusalem three times a year. The first time was the Passover; the second, Pentecost; and the third, the feast of tabernacles. They all come in this chapter.
Deuteronomy 12:10-15 presents a most important principle as to the “where” as well as the “how.” It may be difficult to find the place in these days where one’s soul can be sure the Lord has been pleased to place His name, because there are many influences and many places, but there is that portion in John’s Gospel: “If any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine.” The first necessary thing is, Do I really want to know where the Lord has been pleased to place His name in order to do His will?
God chose to place His name in Jerusalem. Jerusalem is not just the geographical center of the land. The tribe at the extreme north of the land was much farther from Jerusalem than those at the south of the land — not east and west, for that was comparatively short; the land of Palestine is a strip. Ephraim and Benjamin are right around the temple, but look up where Naphtali and Zebulon are! What a journey they have to make! But they have to make it; they cannot bring Jerusalem to their tribes. That is important. There is a cost for those at the extreme ends of the land to come, and God takes that into account. There might be a number of persons in a meeting, and for some of them it is quite easy to get there and for others it is very difficult. The Lord notes as each one comes, where he comes from, and what it cost him to get there.
Selected from W. Potter
Eating the Passover
“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 purtenance 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. And thus shall ye eat it; with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and ye shall eat it in haste: it is the Lord’s Passover” (Ex. 12:8-11).
In the observance of the Passover, God did not leave these people to do their own will, follow their own opinions, and live as they liked. He prescribed details for them in the memorial of the Passover. He set three things before them, all of which have a solemn voice of instruction to us.
Leaven
First, they were to put away all leaven out of their houses. Leaven in Scripture will always be found to represent what is evil. They were thus to separate themselves from all evil. They were to hold to nothing that was unsuitable to God. His word is, “Be ye holy; for I am holy.” So now, being purchased by the blood of Jesus, we are God’s to show forth the characteristics of Him who has called us out of darkness into His marvelous light. We are to depart from iniquity, to cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of flesh and spirit, and to perfect holiness in the fear of God. Whether we eat or drink or whatsoever we do, we are to do all for the glory of God.
The Lamb Roast With Fire
Second, they were to eat of the flesh of the lamb “roast with fire.” This was their happy occupation, and it vividly admonishes us as to the need of communion with Him who “loved us, and gave Himself for us.” Nothing can go right with us if communion is neglected. We are called unto the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. They might have remembered the sufferings, death and blood-shedding of the lamb, they might rejoice in their present safety, but they were to be occupied with and feed on the lamb that had been slain. Particular parts of the lamb were specially noticed as provided for them — ”his head with his legs, and with the purtenance thereof” (vs. 9). And we cannot fail to notice in these words of the Holy Spirit that it is our privilege to have communion with our blessed Lord as to His mind, as we understand “his head” teaches us. Thus should we be not ignorant, but understanding what the will of the Lord is. Intelligently entering into His counsels, purposes and thoughts, as revealed to us in the Word and by the Holy Spirit, is one of our highest present privileges. To be able to say, without fear of contradiction, that “we have the mind of Christ” and “know the things that are freely given to us of God,” because “the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God,” was what an apostle was accustomed unhesitatingly to pronounce as characterizing the saints of God. Oh the blessedness of thus having communion with the Lord as to His mind and will!
His Legs
By “his legs” we understand His walk. This also, by the Spirit and through the Word, is given for us to enter into; He has left us an example that we should follow His steps — walk as He walked. And I ask, Can any exercise exceed the blessedness of tracing the steps of the blessed Son of God while here? At one time we see Him in a solitary place or spending a whole night in prayer; at another, preaching early in the temple. Sometimes we behold Him disputing with doctors or in controversy with rationalistic Pharisees or infidel Sadducees. Again, He is found walking Jerusalem’s streets, exposed to the temptations of Satan or the hatred of wicked men; He is sitting down in a Pharisee’s house to meat or talking to a crowd of thousands, or sitting alone on Samaria’s well with an enquiring sinner. In public or in private, every step was obedience to the Father’s will; every word that escaped His holy lips the Father gave Him to say; every act was such a manifestation of the Father that He could say, “He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father.” Ah, this was true and perfect; all was fruit in due season. But to enter into it, enjoy it and gather comfort and strength from the believing contemplation of it is a privilege indeed!
The Inward Part
They were to feed on the “purtenance” also — the inward part. And so the affections of Christ are laid open to us in the precious Word of God, and the Spirit delights to take of the things of Christ and show unto us. We know that He did love indeed — that whom He loved when He was in the world, He loved them unto the end — that He loved the church and gave Himself for it. It was when we were enemies, ungodly sinners, that He so loved us as willingly to die for us. We know that His heart is so set upon us that He is always in spirit with us and will never leave nor forsake us — that the same loving heart, though now on the throne of God, is always and unceasingly occupied in ministering to us and caring for us. And so ardently does He long to have us in the glory with Him that He has not only promised to come again to receive us unto Himself, that where He is we may be also, but His heart still says, “Father, I will that they also, whom Thou hast given Me, be with Me where I am; that they may behold My glory” (John 17:24). It is thus entering into the affections of Christ and enjoying His love that our hearts are lifted up in adoring worship and rise superior to all the distressing circumstances which may cross our path. Let us not fail to see, then, that during this present time, before the coming of our Lord, it is our happy privilege to be occupied with the thoughts, the walk, and the love of that Lamb who is now in the midst of the throne, as it had been slain.
In Haste
Third, there is also another point of deep practical importance. They were to eat it in haste, not as those who were settling down in Egypt. On the contrary, they were to be ready to move at the Lord’s command. Their position was to be one of entire subjection to the will of God, ready to go at His bidding. We read, “Thus shall ye eat it; with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and ye shall eat it in haste: it is the Lord’s Passover” (vs. 11). They had to feed on the lamb with girded loins, staff in hand and shod feet. They were a distinct and practically separated people from the Egyptians, and they were to be in a position ready for whatever He pleased. True it is there was no singing in Egypt as there was afterwards on the other side of the Red Sea, nor was there fighting as when beyond Jordan, but there was conscious peace, shelter from judgment, separation from evil, feeding on the lamb, and the expectation of leaving Egypt forever and dwelling in the land flowing with milk and honey.
And how is it, dear fellow-Christians, with our souls? Are we peacefully enjoying the shelter of the blood and resting on the precious assurance of God’s unerring Word? And in the sweet comfort of this, is Christ everything to our hearts — our strength, our joy, our never-failing resource? Do we truly realize that because we are the redeemed of the Lord, we should be ready to go, to stay, to wait, to serve, to be wholly and unreservedly His? Oh the blessedness of this condition of soul — to be in the enjoyment of the thoughts, the love and the ways of Christ Himself! And though all our joys here are mixed with human elements of bitterness — bitter herbs — yet we must find Him to be the spring of joy, the strength of life and the true never-ending source of all that is pure and blissful. Thanks be unto God for “the precious blood of Christ”!
H. H. Snell, adapted
Christ, the Bread of Life
Christ may be considered as the food of the Christian in three ways: first, as a redeemed sinner; second, in connection with sitting in heavenly places in Christ; and third, as a pilgrim and stranger down here. But this last is merely accessory and not the proper portion of the Christian. The Lord said to Israel that He had come down to deliver them from Egypt and bring them into the land of Canaan. He did not say a word about the wilderness when He came to deliver them from Egypt, because His interference for them there was in the power of redemption and for the accomplishment of His promises. However, the wilderness experience was necessary, as well as redemption from Egypt and the entrance into Canaan, and Christ answers as our food to these three things. Two of them are permanent, for we are nourished by Christ in two ways permanently — in redemption and glory. The third way is as the manna which we have all along the road. It is in these three ways that Christ meets His people and nourishes them all the way. Two of them remain, as we have seen, but the third ceases when the circumstances connected with it have passed away. They did eat the Passover and the manna until they got into the land; then the manna ceased, but they continued to eat of the Passover.
The Passover
As to the Passover, they ate of the lamb when the wilderness had ceased and Egypt had been long left behind. When in Egypt, the blood was on the lintel and the doorposts, and the Israelite ate of the lamb inside the house. The thought they had while they were eating it was that God was going through the land as an avenging judge. The blood on the doorposts was to keep God out, which was a great thing to do, for if brought into God’s presence as a judge, He must punish sin.
Canaan
The state of the one that now eats of Christ is just according as he estimates the value of the cross, through fear of what sin actually merits. When we realize the full effect of the blood of the Lamb, we have gotten into Canaan and enjoy the peace of the land as a delivered people. We have crossed the Jordan (not only the Red Sea) and have passed through death and resurrection, not as merely knowing Christ dead and risen for us, as presented in the Red Sea, but as being dead with Him and entered into heavenly places with Him. Then the character of God is known as their God; that is, the accomplisher of all that which He purposed towards them. It is not keeping God out now — not looking at His pouring out wrath in judgment against sin, but enjoying His love. In Jesus, on the cross, there was perfect justice and perfect love. What devotedness to the Father, and what tender love to us! This is the way the saint who is in peace feeds on the cross. It is not as merely knowing that he is safe, for Israel’s keeping the Passover after they got into Canaan was very different from their keeping it in Egypt. In Canaan they were in peace, and they were able to glorify God in this way, in the remembrance of their redemption from Egypt.
In this type we see presented, not the sinner that feels he is safe, but the saint that can glorify God in his affections, his heart confidently flowing out to him, and feeding on Christ as the old corn of the land — the second Adam, the Lord from heaven. We see Christ now by faith at the right hand of God as the glorified man, not only as Son of God, but as Son of Man — as Stephen, when the heavens were opened to him, beheld Jesus at the right hand of God. We also see Him up there. We do not see Him as He is represented in the Revelation, seated on a white horse, coming forth out of heaven. He will indeed come forth and receive us up where He is, and we shall be like Him and be forever with Him. We shall feed on Him as the old corn of the land when we are there, and this is our proper portion now; manna is not our ultimate portion, though it is our provision by the way.
The Wilderness
Joshua sees the Lord as Captain of Jehovah’s host, and Israel feeds in the land before they fight. And our portion is to sit down in it before we fight, because God has given it to us. They do not eat the manna in Canaan, because it is for the wilderness. The manna is not Christ in the heavens; it is Christ down here. It is not our portion; our portion is the old corn of the land; that is, the whole thing, according to God’s counsels, is redemption and glory. But all our life is exercise down here, or sin (excepting that God does give us moments of joy), because while here there is nothing but what acts on the flesh or gives occasion for service to God. We may fail, and then Christ comes and feeds us with manna — that is, His sympathy with us down here — and shows how His grace is applied to all the circumstances of our daily life — and that is a happy thing. For most of our time, the far greater part of our life, we are occupied in these things, necessary and lawful things, no doubt, but not occupied with heavenly joy in Christ, and these things are apt to turn away the heart from the Lord, and hinder our joy. But if we would have our appetites feed on Him as the old corn of the land, we must have the habit of feeding on Him as the manna.
For instance, something may make me impatient during the day. Well, then, Christ is my patience, and thus He is the manna to sustain me in patience. He is the source of grace, not merely the example which I am to copy. He is more than this, for I am to draw strength from Him, to feed upon Him daily. We need Him, and it is impossible to enjoy Him as the Passover lamb, unless we are also feeding on Him as the manna.
We know that God delights in Christ, and He gives us a capacity to enjoy Him too. To have such affections is the highest possible privilege, but to enjoy Him, we must feed on Him every day. It is to know Christ come down to bring the needed grace and turn the dangerous circumstances with which we are surrounded to the occasion of our feeding on Himself as the manna to sustain us and strengthen us in our trial.
Adapted from
The Christian Friend
Remembrance of Deliverance
At the time of the celebration of the Passover in Numbers 9, it had been a year since their deliverance, and they were still in the wilderness. When the Passover is understood, the present power of deliverance is a very intelligible thing (Ex. 13:3). They had been in bondage, but they were out of Egypt and in the wilderness, though not yet in Canaan. They had memory of deliverance, with toil and exercise as the fruits, because they were in the wilderness. So we have the joy and peace of deliverance, but not yet rest. They were out of Egypt, but were still in trouble and trial. They felt it when they said, “Were there no graves in Egypt?” Herein is the exercise and often failure with us, but there is no failure on God’s part, because He brings us into the wilderness.
The Passover was to be kept as an offering to the Lord (vs. 7) in remembrance of and retaining full consciousness of their being the Lord’s delivered people. We have spiritually the principle of the thing in the Lord’s supper. There is deliverance in Christ, but trial and exercise as to the actual condition here. Unbelief may say, “We shall die in the wilderness,” but faith will always keep the Passover. It recognizes God’s deliverance, and this is blessing. Spiritually it is an offering to the Lord, and so by communion we have present joy — a privilege only to faith, for the deliverance has only brought us into the wilderness where we get trouble. We see grace and holiness brought together to meet defilement in verse 10, “If any man of you or of your posterity shall be unclean by reason of a dead body, or be in a journey afar off, yet he shall keep the Passover unto the Lord.” Defilement now has to do with death, because, by the energy of the Spirit of God in us, sin is known in its actual power as death. God brings in the remedy where the need is, the moment it was a question of being kept back from offering to the Lord. When there is the power of the Spirit working in our souls from day to day, there will be the constant detection of sin, for what is not of the Spirit is flesh and sin, and in its power is not merely defilement but death. They were delivered from Egypt, which was nothing but a place of defilement, and yet they were defiled so that they could not keep the Passover. Where there is any consciousness of sin, there cannot be worship. They could not come to God because they were defiled, for “holiness becometh Thine house forever.” When the Spirit is grieved, there cannot be worship to God; still they were not shut out from Israel, though there must be the humiliation that owns the defilement. We can never return to the power of worship without referring to past failure. There must be humbling and purging from the sin before we can really worship, and the Lord judges of cleanness according to the energy of the life of God.
Adapted from J. N. Darby
Keeping the Feast
“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” (1 Cor. 5:7-8).
In God’s ways, there is neither chance nor accident. Exactly forty years before the children of Israel encamped at Gilgal, they were slaves in Egypt. God had so arranged their journeys and the date of their entrance into the promised land that the first feast kept there was the remembrance of their deliverance. “The children of Israel encamped in Gilgal, and kept the Passover on the fourteenth day of the month at even in the plains of Jericho” (Josh. 5:10).
The Feast and the Memorial
The Passover and “the feast of the Passover” are distinct. One is the deliverance itself, which was wrought in Egypt, and the other is the memorial of the deliverance. There was but one Passover, while the feast of the Passover was annual. The Passover was once for all; the feast of it, as frequent as the years of freedom. Christ’s blood has been shed once and forever, and our redemption by His precious blood is complete, but the memorial, the feast of remembrance, is continuous.
In the Passover, Israel was occupied with their expected escape; in the feast, they were rejoicing in obtained freedom and meditating upon the means by which God had brought them out of bondage. The very attitude of the partakers of the Passover itself differed from that of those who partook of the feast. In the former case, they ate standing, with loins girded ready for departure, with shoes on their feet and staff in hand, and in haste; in the latter, they ate at leisure, reclining, with all outward indication of being at rest and of being blessed in fulfilled promises. They were in the land, their hopes were realized, and with joy they partook of their portion. The character given to the feast of the Passover was emphatically that of a redeemed people in the enjoyment of their rest. Such at least was the character of the feast, according to the custom of Israel in Canaan in later times, and we may well learn a lesson from this.
There was no destroying angel from whom protection was needed, and no sprinkling with blood of doorposts and lintel, for that work had been done once for all. There was no thought of being redeemed in the future or of redemption being a progressive work in accomplishment. Instead, there was the enjoyment of the blessing of being in the land of promise by virtue of an accomplished redemption. Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed for us; therefore let us keep the feast, and let us keep it as becomes those who are in the fullness of the blessing in Christ in the heavenly places.
In the Wilderness
Previous to keeping the feast in the plains of Jericho, Israel had kept it in the second year of their wilderness wanderings. “They kept the Passover on the fourteenth day of the first month at even in the wilderness of Sinai: according to all that the Lord commanded Moses, so did the children of Israel” (Num. 9:5). This was the only Passover mentioned in the wilderness; of none other is there any record. And, indeed, when we consider the constant unbelief of the people, we are not surprised, for of what moral value would a memorial of deliverance be if that deliverance were doubted? A deliverance from one form of death to another would be a mockery, but deliverance from Egypt in order that they should be slain in the wilderness was, according to Israel’s murmurings, that which Jehovah had wrought for His people.
We cannot remember that which to us is not known. We cannot remember Christ in His death for us unless we know that He died for us. If we are doubting that He died for us and questioning the benefits of His death, remembrance of Him and keeping the feast are impossible. Israel disbelieved God and said He could not bring them into Canaan. Had such been the case, the Passover in Egypt would have been ineffectual, for He brought them out of Egypt in order to bring them into Canaan, even as the song at the Red Sea witnessed: “Thou in Thy mercy hast led forth the people which Thou hast redeemed: Thou hast guided them in Thy strength unto Thy holy habitation” (Ex. 15:13). Hence with their unbelief upon them, Israel could not keep the feast, and they did not do so until in Canaan, where their unbelief was dispelled by being at home.
In Canaan
In the Passover kept in the wilderness and in the Passover kept in Canaan, we have a twofold witness to our joy in Christ, whose blood has redeemed us. We can say, “We are redeemed from wrath and shall reach glory,” or, “We are blessed with all spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.” God’s love is the source and the precious blood the foundation of our every good. Whichever way we regard ourselves, either as in the wilderness or as in the heavenly places, our feast is the love of Christ in dying for us. His death is, and always will be, the opening of our songs of praise.
H. F. Witherby
Appropriation - the Way of Enjoyment
When the Passover was instituted, there were two items that were to accompany the eating of the lamb — unleavened bread and bitter herbs. Leaven, as we know, is a figure of evil, and hence the unleavened bread shows that not only had their eyes been opened to their danger, but that, in type, there was also a turning from darkness to light, a real judgment of evil — a turning from the power of Satan unto God. In a word, light had entered their souls and also divine power to bring them out of darkness into God’s marvelous light. Thus there were also the bitter herbs, for the effect of divine testimony, when it reaches the conscience in the power of the Holy Spirit, is to produce bitterness, because the discovery thereby is made of the character of sin in the presence of a holy God. It is a supreme moment to the soul when it is brought consciously into the presence of God and where the revelation is made that the God against whom we had been sinning is love and that He has proved it in the death of His beloved Son. It is there, too, that we begin to apprehend that in order to enjoy the divine love which has been set forth in the death of Christ, His death must be appropriated.
Adapted from
The Christian Friend
Remembrance
“What mean ye by this service?”
A son or daughter asks;
A lamb is killed, some bread is baked,
A multitude of tasks!
It is the great remembrance
Of Egypt’s final night;
God’s special plan, minute detail ...
His ways of power and might.
They could forget so quickly,
The wilderness each day;
He asked them to observe it thus
In a most detailed way.
Centuries turn, a cross appears
Outside Jerusalem’s gate;
Where the true Lamb is sacrificed,
This time in cruel hate.
He gave Himself in love for me,
But on the night before
Ordained a meal of bread and wine,
Remembrance to restore.
How worthy is our Lamb,
Who gave His life upon the tree!
And now He’s made a plain request:
“This do, remember Me.”
And when our children ask us,
“Why is Lord’s Day set aside?”
Can we explain His love and ours?
His bought and waiting bride!
cph