Thursday - Exodus 12 - The Passover

God was coming into Egypt for vengeance and wrath and judgment and destruction. He wasn't coming in mercy. He was there to put an end to the resistance of Pharaoh. He was there to establish his name as the God above all gods (Exodus 12:12). But, in His obliteration of the uncircumcised (in body and heart), He showed mercy and grace to His children. Through the establishing of the Passover celebration, God preserved the Hebrews alive.

Don't get so bogged down in the minutia that you miss the overall glory of the scene. Why hyssop?  Why roasted lamb rather than boiled? Why unleavened bread? Why bitter herbs? Why cook the head and the guts too (Exodus 12:9)? Why burn the leftovers?  Why eat fast?  Why eat with shoes on and with a walking stick in their hand? Why were they not to break any bone in the lamb? The list of questions could be continually expanded. Not that these things don't have meaning. They do. And in some cases it is obvious what that meaning was and is.

For today though, focus on the glory of the simple comparison of the Passover feast of the OT and the Lord's Supper (or Communion) of the NT. God told the Jews to strike the posts of the entry to their homes in three places with the blood of their lamb, and, He promised, "When I see the blood, I will pass over you, and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you" (Exodus 12:13).

"When I see the blood of the lamb applied, I will pass over you... I will not punish you with the wicked." That was the promise to the Israelites in Egypt, and that is the promise to the church today in this world. God's anger against this sinful world is indeed severe and constant (Psalm 7:11).  But, the crucial question is, "Are YOU washed in THE blood?" Since the beginning, the wages of sin has been death (Genesis 2:17 & Romans 6:23).  And, (by God's decree and by the demands of holy justice) “...without the shedding of blood there is no remission" (or forgiveness) of sin. Therefore, according to Matthew 26:28, Ephesians 1:7 & 2:13, Romans 3:25, Colossians 1:14 & 20, Hebrews 9:12, I John 1:7 and Revelation 1:5 & 7:14, God withholds condemnation from us ONLY IF He sees the blood of His Son applied by faith to our hearts.  There is power in HIS blood… if it’s applied.