(Ex. 11:4-7, 12:3, 5-7,12,13, 28-30).
IN these scriptures God is revealed in His characters of Judge and Saviour. The great questions of His judgment of sin, and the means of deliverance therefrom, are raised, and answered, by Jehovah Himself. He speaks to us here in infinite wisdom and mercy, laying down, for the blessing of a lost world, the way in which humanity can escape the judgment to which all are liable through sin.
Many voices have been heard during the course of time, suggesting means by which the creature can escape the penalty of guilt. Above them all is heard the voice of God announcing the only means. Before that voice, all other must be silent; before His way, every other must disappear.
Two peoples are brought before us here, Egyptians and Israelites. Differing as to nationality, they are alike as to nature and condition before God, ―all are sinners.
In chapters 11, Jehovah decrees judgment upon the Egyptians; in chapters 12, He proclaims the means whereby Israel may escape it (for righteousness demands that all found there deserving judgment shall be judged, unless righteous grounds are discovered for saving some).
And this is His command, that every family in Israel shall take a lamb, and, after keeping it for four days, shall slay it, and sprinkle its blood upon the outside of their habitations. The result of this is wonderful.
In verse 12, God announces His passage through Egypt as the executor of judgment; in verse 13, He says, “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.”
The sequel proves the truth of Jehovah’s words. Our readers will observe, in the scriptures which head this paper, that at midnight the house of every Egyptian was visited in judgment, while Israel dwelt in their houses in perfect security.
With the utmost clearness, then, the fact is demonstrated that what saved Israel from the judgment on that awful night was the blood of the lamb sprinkled on the doors of their houses. Nothing more than this―nothing less.
What lessons are we to learn from this? Scripture itself shall answer us.
The Holy Ghost, in the Epistle to the Romans, unfolds the gospel of God. From it two things (amongst others) are learned: ―First, that the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of man (1:18); secondly, the means devised by God whereby men may escape this wrath.
It is now no secret that God will judge men for their guilt. He will not wink at their misdeeds. His wrath against them is already revealed. He will be revealed presently as their Judge. In Romans 3, all mankind are shown to be the objects of that wrath, for all are proved to be unrighteous. There is none that doeth good, no, not one; there is none righteous, no, not one; every mouth is stopped, and all the world is brought in guilty before God (10:10, 12, 19).
But, as we have before remarked, the gospel reveals not only this wrath of God against sin, and that all being sinners are consequently the objects of it, but it reveals also the salvation of God and the ground of it. This is found in verse 24 and 25 of chapter 3― “Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood.”
What a striking correspondence with Exodus 11. and 12. There, three thousand three hundred years ago, God saved a people from His judgment through the sprinkled blood of the slain lamb. Here, in the gospel, we find that the sinner’s way of escape from the revealed wrath of God is through the blood of Christ, whom God Himself hath set forth to be a propitiation. Nothing but the lamb’s blood could shield the Israelite from the judgment of Egypt. Nothing but Christ’s precious blood can shield a sinner from that wrath which will presently overwhelm this lost world.
This is the truth of God. He Himself speaks here. He Himself has devised the means. All others will fail.
If my reader is unsaved, I urge him to give instant and earnest heed to this most solemn truth. As a sinner, he is the object of Divine wrath, that will most surely overtake him, and engulf him in eternal ruin, unless he is saved from it in God’s way, ―i.e., through faith in the blood of Christ.
It was a Most singular spectacle that presented itself in Egypt on the Passover night. On the outside of the house of every Israelitish family appeared the sprinkled blood. It was there for three reasons, ―1st Because of the threatened judgment; 2nd because Jehovah had commanded it; 3rd because all Israel were obedient. To the natural mind those blood marks signified nothing. To the eye of faith they meant everything; for the Judge had said, “When I see the blood, I will pass over you.”
At midnight the test came. Jehovah visited the doomed nation. Upon every house, unsprinkled with the blood, judgment was executed, while He passed by every house that bore the token. Why did Jehovah pass over Israel? Because the judgment had already been executed upon them in the person of their substitute―the slain lamb. The blood upon the lintel was the sign of this.
It mattered not that some amongst the Egyptians were moral and upright. God looked for the blood, and finding it not, executed His fatal decree. It mattered not that every firstborn of the Israelitish nation was a sinner. God saw outside the sprinkled blood, and then passed them by. The blood, or the absence of it, made all the difference, and guided the Lord in His acts that night. The time of judgment had come, and wherever the blood was not, the judgment was outpoured.
These are solemn realities, recorded in the book of God for the warning and instruction of sinners in this world now. God’s principles do not change; the ground on which He saves a sinner from judgment today, is the same as that on which He saved the sinner of Exodus 12.
Salvation by blood is no new doctrine; it is almost as old as time itself. Even our fallen first parents, ere they quitted Paradise, were clothed by Jehovah with garments (type of the righteousness of God) made from the skins of animals which He Himself had slain. And the first sinner who sought and found acceptance with God, did so through the blood of the firstlings of his flock (Gen. 4). Again, the Holy Ghost, when describing the infinite sacrifice of Jesus, and the results that flow therefrom, silences every questioning voice with the solemn statement, that “without the shedding of blood is no remission” (Heb. 9).
The truth is, man has brought God’s wrath upon himself, and the only way of deliverance from it is by a sinless and competent substitute bearing it for him. For such a substitute we go to Calvary’s awful tree, where Christ once suffered for sins; ― the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God. This offering suffices for all who avail themselves of it; for He whose blood flowed in atonement there, was a holy sinless man, and at the same time God over all, blessed forever.
It is very charming to observe that every Israelite obeyed Jehovah’s command, and sprinkled the blood. None raised a question either as to its necessity or efficacy. Faith and obedience marked them all; and this is the sinner’s way to blessing today. “Christ Jesus, whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood,”―that is, God Himself has provided the Lamb; the sinner is responsible to avail himself of the Lamb’s atoning death―to have faith in His blood.
It would not have availed an Israelite to have relied on his good works for salvation from judgment. Suppose one amongst them, having a good opinion of himself, and a poor opinion of the blood, had affixed to the outside of his front-door a statement of his character in something like the following terms: ― “I am a law-abiding subject of the king, a kind and affectionate husband and father; moral, upright, and respectable in all my dealings. I have done, or at least have endeavored to do, my duty to my Maker. I have considered the poor. Men hold me in high esteem on account of my rectitude and uprightness of conduct. On these grounds, I claim exemption from the general judgment.” Of what avail would this have been? Simply none. When the Judge reached the door, His eye would have scanned the record of human merit, and then He would have looked for the sheltering blood, and finding it not, would have entered the house of the self-righteous Israelite to execute the judgment He had threatened. God did not say, “When I find human righteousness I will pass over,” but “when I see the blood.”
READER, ARE YOU SHELTERED BENEATH THE BLOOD OF CHRIST?
This alone will avail you. You may be able to plead as much and more than our imaginary Israelite, but good works will never shield a creature from the threatened wrath of God. He has said, “By the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight” (Rom. 3:2020Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin. (Romans 3:20)). And you are thus shut up to the blood of Christ. Nothing less will shelter you from the coming judgment, ―nothing more is needed.
How simple is all this. God has not commanded His fallen creatures to provide a shelter from the coming tempest, but in wonderful mercy has Himself provided one, and then bids them take refuge beneath it. This shelter is the atoning, soul-saving, all-sufficient blood of His beloved Son.
Not one Egyptian availed himself of the lamb’s blood, and not one firstborn escaped the judgment; not one Israelite neglected the lamb’s blood, and not one Israelite was touched by the judgment. No sinner who refuses or neglects the refuge of Christ’s precious blood, will escape eternal damnation, ―the wrath revealed from heaven; no sinner who flees in faith to that blood, will be touched by that same wrath.
Social position makes no difference when God’s judgments are abroad. On this solemn night death entered the palace and the prison, and passed not by the cottage of the servant. All suffered alike, for all had sinned, and all were unsheltered by the blood. The blood was the test that night. It is the test today; it will be the test in a fast approaching day. In Revelation 5 a glorified host in heaven sing that new and never-ending song, the refrain of which is, “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, and has redeemed us to God by his blood.” In chapter 6 the scene is shifted, and we see trot a blood-sheltered host in heaven, but a blood-rejecting host on earth. These do not sing; no sound of joy escapes their lips; only a wail of utter despair, that forms itself into a vain prayer to deaf rocks and mountains to fall upon them, and hide them from the face of Him that sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day of His wrath is come, and who shall be able to stand?
Friend, this fast approaching judgment is no vain dream of fools, but the solemn awful truth of the living God, announced throughout His Book from Genesis to Revelation. But, clear as the noonday sun, shines forth the way―the only way―of escape from it. Before God’s eye, this moment, the blood of Christ appears in all its infinite, soul-atoning value. If you would escape the wrath, flee while there is time, and place yourself, by faith, beneath this perfect shelter.
W. H. S.