IT’S FINALLY GO TIME for the Israelites!  But before leaving the cruel bondage of slavery to the Pharaoh; Instructions are given that must be followed.  It is a matter of life or death for each family.  The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob has given specific instructions to Moses and Aaron for His people, the Hebrew nation, that will secure their freedom from their former way of life of bondage and enslavement. 

These instructions are holy and significant; given by our Holy, Perfect God.  The guided, specific directions were given to save the lives of His people.  The commands for God’s people will indeed change everything in their lives!  God established a new calendar that will begin their “year” with this very event!  This event is commanded to be celebrated for generations to come with The Story of Redemption from Egyptian slavery that will be told to amazed, grateful listeners!

The Story of God’s Rescue of His People begins with an unblemished lamb taken from the herd, set apart, and made holy unto God—the holy Lamb of God.

Exodus 12

The Passover and the Festival of Unleavened Bread

12 The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in Egypt, ² “This month is to be for you the first month, the first month of your year. ³ Tell the whole community of Israel that on the tenth day of this month each man is to take a lamb for his family, one for each household. ⁴ If any household is too small for a whole lamb, they must share one with their nearest neighbor, having taken into account the number of people there are. You are to determine the amount of lamb needed in accordance with what each person will eat. ⁵ The animals you choose must be year-old males without defect, and you may take them from the sheep or the goats. ⁶ Take care of them until the fourteenth day of the month, when all the members of the community of Israel must slaughter them at twilight. ⁷ Then they are to take some of the blood and put it on the sides and tops of the doorframes of the houses where they eat the lambs. ⁸ That same night they are to eat the meat roasted over the fire, along with bitter herbs, and bread made without yeast. ⁹ Do not eat the meat raw or boiled in water, but roast it over a fire—with the head, legs and internal organs. ¹⁰ Do not leave any of it till morning; if some is left till morning, you must burn it. ¹¹ This is how you are to eat it: with your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand. Eat it in haste; it is the Lord’s Passover.

¹² “On that same night I will pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn of both people and animals, and I will bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt. I am the Lord. ¹³ The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are, and when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you when I strike Egypt.

¹⁴ “This is a day you are to commemorate; for the generations to come you shall celebrate it as a festival to the Lord—a lasting ordinance. ¹⁵ For seven days you are to eat bread made without yeast. On the first day remove the yeast from your houses, for whoever eats anything with yeast in it from the first day through the seventh must be cut off from Israel. ¹⁶ On the first day hold a sacred assembly, and another one on the seventh day. Do no work at all on these days, except to prepare food for everyone to eat; that is all you may do.

¹⁷ “Celebrate the Festival of Unleavened Bread, because it was on this very day that I brought your divisions out of Egypt. Celebrate this day as a lasting ordinance for the generations to come. ¹⁸ In the first month you are to eat bread made without yeast, from the evening of the fourteenth day until the evening of the twenty-first day. ¹⁹ For seven days no yeast is to be found in your houses. And anyone, whether foreigner or native-born, who eats anything with yeast in it must be cut off from the community of Israel. ²⁰ Eat nothing made with yeast. Wherever you live, you must eat unleavened bread.”

²¹ Then Moses summoned all the elders of Israel and said to them, “Go at once and select the animals for your families and slaughter the Passover lamb. ²² Take a bunch of hyssop, dip it into the blood in the basin and put some of the blood on the top and on both sides of the doorframe. None of you shall go out of the door of your house until morning. ²³ When the Lord goes through the land to strike down the Egyptians, he will see the blood on the top and sides of the doorframe and will pass over that doorway, and he will not permit the destroyer to enter your houses and strike you down.

²⁴ “Obey these instructions as a lasting ordinance for you and your descendants. ²⁵ When you enter the land that the Lord will give you as he promised, observe this ceremony. ²⁶ And when your children ask you, ‘What does this ceremony mean to you?’ ²⁷ then tell them, ‘It is the Passover sacrifice to the Lord, who passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt and spared our homes when he struck down the Egyptians.’” Then the people bowed down and worshiped. ²⁸ The Israelites did just what the Lord commanded Moses and Aaron.

²⁹ At midnight the Lord struck down all the firstborn in Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh, who sat on the throne, to the firstborn of the prisoner, who was in the dungeon, and the firstborn of all the livestock as well. ³⁰ Pharaoh and all his officials and all the Egyptians got up during the night, and there was loud wailing in Egypt, for there was not a house without someone dead.

The Exodus

³¹ During the night Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “Up! Leave my people, you and the Israelites! Go, worship the Lord as you have requested. ³² Take your flocks and herds, as you have said, and go. And also bless me.”

³³ The Egyptians urged the people to hurry and leave the country. “For otherwise,” they said, “we will all die!” ³⁴ So the people took their dough before the yeast was added, and carried it on their shoulders in kneading troughs wrapped in clothing. ³⁵ The Israelites did as Moses instructed and asked the Egyptians for articles of silver and gold and for clothing. ³⁶ The Lord had made the Egyptians favorably disposed toward the people, and they gave them what they asked for; so they plundered the Egyptians.

³⁷ The Israelites journeyed from Rameses to Sukkoth. There were about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides women and children. ³⁸ Many other people went up with them, and also large droves of livestock, both flocks and herds. ³⁹ With the dough the Israelites had brought from Egypt, they baked loaves of unleavened bread. The dough was without yeast because they had been driven out of Egypt and did not have time to prepare food for themselves.

⁴⁰ Now the length of time the Israelite people lived in Egypt was 430 years. ⁴¹ At the end of the 430 years, to the very day, all the Lord’s divisions left Egypt. ⁴² Because the Lord kept vigil that night to bring them out of Egypt, on this night all the Israelites are to keep vigil to honor the Lord for the generations to come.

Passover Restrictions

⁴³ The Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “These are the regulations for the Passover meal:

“No foreigner may eat it. ⁴⁴ Any slave you have bought may eat it after you have circumcised him, ⁴⁵ but a temporary resident or a hired worker may not eat it.

⁴⁶ “It must be eaten inside the house; take none of the meat outside the house. Do not break any of the bones. ⁴⁷ The whole community of Israel must celebrate it.

⁴⁸ “A foreigner residing among you who wants to celebrate the Lord’s Passover must have all the males in his household circumcised; then he may take part like one born in the land. No uncircumcised male may eat it. ⁴⁹ The same law applies both to the native-born and to the foreigner residing among you.”

⁵⁰ All the Israelites did just what the Lord had commanded Moses and Aaron. ⁵¹ And on that very day the Lord brought the Israelites out of Egypt by their divisions.

WHAT DO WE LEARN—HOW DO WE RESPOND?

When I see the blood, when I see the blood,
When I see the blood,
I will pass, I will pass over you…

This is the message: The blood of the unblemished Lamb of God saves us from death.

God protected the Israelites, not because they were better than the Egyptians, but because they were His people, the people of His Promise—namely Jesus, the Messiah, born from this generational line who will save the world!

God gives grace to his followers—whether through the blood of a lamb or the blood of the Lamb, Jesus—not based on merit but on his loving-kindness.

God redeemed His people by first releasing them from bondage and then bringing them out of oppression by others in power to a new way of life with Him who had all power to save them.  God redeems people today by breaking the chains of sin that entangles us and hold us down to a free life with him by believing in the Lamb of God, Jesus who bled and died to remove all our sins.

God reconciles us to Him.  Jesus removed all the barriers to come to God. By sacrificing His blood, He paid the price to redeem us.  He paid our sin debt in full by this act of God’s love.  No more lambs to kill to merely cover our sins because the Lamb of God, Jesus died and rose again to remove our sins!  Forever!  “Our sins remembered no more” by God!  We are redeemed, set free, once and for all, to love like He loves us!

God makes us right with Him because of Jesus, His Son.  God made him (Jesus) who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2Corinthians 5:19, 21).

Max Lucado writes of God’s message of redemption;

“The perfect record of Jesus was given to you, and your imperfect record was given to Christ. Jesus ‘suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God’ (1Peter 3:18). As a result, God’s holiness is honored, and his children are forgiven.

By his perfect life Jesus fulfilled the commands of the law. By his death he satisfied the demands of sin. Jesus suffered not like a sinner, but as a sinner. Why else would he cry, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me” (Matthew 27:46)?

God makes perfect then makes us holy. God does what we cannot do so we can be what we dare not dream, perfect before God. He justly justifies the unjust by His perfect Love, generous grace, and merciful kindness as a gift.

“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God.” Ephesians 2:8

Accept the gift of salvation with open arms, a seeking heart, a grateful mind, and a believing soul who is ready to be filled with Life eternal. 

Believe and be saved by the blood of the Lamb. 

Lord,

Our hearts swell with gratitude for the story of redemption which began with your Hebrew children in need of salvation from bondage, slaves to all that was not of you.  We are the same as slaves to sin.  You knew that.  So the Lamb of God was sent to save us and set us free!

Thank you, Jesus for the blood you shed, the excruciating pain you bore before death, the going to hell and back for us as the Victor over death, and then rising from death to Life in power—a power available to us for the asking!  God, You’re amazing!  You are indeed the wonderworking God, who made a way for us to reconnect with you!  Thank you, Father. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Holy Spirit to guiding us to Truth 24/7.

In Jesus Name, Amen

What needed to be paid was paid. What had to be done was done. Innocent blood was required. Innocent blood was offered, once and for all time.