Christ the True and Better Passover Lamb

[0:00] Turn to Exodus 12, beginning in verse 29 through 32.

[0:19] ! That is the scripture I'm going to read this morning. If you don't have a Bible, there are Bibles in the pews for you to use. And if you don't own a Bible, please take that Bible home today as a gift from our church to you in our hopes that you'll continue to be reading God's Word.

[0:34] Exodus chapter 12, verse 29 through 32, if you would stand with me as we honor the reading of God's Word together. At midnight, the Lord struck down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sat on his throne, to the firstborn of the captive who was in the dungeon, and all the firstborn of the livestock. And Pharaoh rose up in the night, he and all his servants and all the Egyptians. And there was a great cry in Egypt, for there was not a house where someone was not dead. Then he summoned Moses and Aaron by night and said, Up, go out from among my people, both you and the people of Israel, and go serve the Lord as you have said. Take your flocks and your herds as you have said, and be gone. And bless me also.

[1:27] May God add a blessing to the reading of his Word. Would you please be seated? The nightmares that I have as an adult are much different from the nightmares that I had as a kid.

[1:41] Instead of waking up in a cold sweat from fleeing some bad guy or boogeyman, my dreams these days, my bad dreams these days, involve my having forgotten something really important.

[1:58] For example, I'll have dreams that I'm back in college, and it's the end of the last semester, but I forgot that I was enrolled in a class that I hadn't attended all semester long, or that I hadn't turned assignments in for all semester long.

[2:16] And to make matters worse, it's often a math class. There's another reoccurring bad dream that I have.

[2:26] Sometimes I'm ascending the steps to preach, and I realize that I've forgotten my sermons. Sometimes I've forgotten my Bible. Sometimes I've forgotten what text I was going to preach from.

[2:39] Sometimes I've forgotten all of those things at once. And I don't need someone like Joseph to interpret my bad dreams for me. I know that I have a fear of forgetting important things.

[2:53] Maybe you have similar nightmares to the ones I described. Maybe not. But one thing I think that is true for all of us is that we are forgetful.

[3:07] And so I'm sure that you, like me, you've surrounded yourself with calendars to aid your memory. I have a calendar on my computer.

[3:18] I have a calendar on my phone. I have a calendar on my watch. I have a calendar on my desk, in my office, in my home. On my desk, there's all kinds of sticky notes with reminders.

[3:31] And they're there to help me from forgetting. Yet despite all of those calendars and all of those reminders, I still forget stuff.

[3:44] But there are some things that are so important to me, I know that I'll never forget them. Like the day I married my wife.

[3:57] Like the day my children were born. I don't remember what I had for lunch last Wednesday. I don't really remember what I had for lunch yesterday. But I remember those special days because they were significant.

[4:13] They were life-changing days for me. And I can never forget them. So at this point in redemptive history, Egypt has forgotten.

[4:26] They've forgotten how God used Joseph, who we looked at his life last week and how it was a type of Christ. They forgot how God had used Joseph to bless them during those seven years of famine.

[4:39] And how otherwise their nation would have been ruined. People would have starved to death. But now centuries have passed. Joseph, if you remember, had originally made arrangements to settle his family of about 70 in the land of Goshen, which was located in the northeast section of the Egyptian delta.

[4:58] Great piece of land, especially for raising and feeding herds. But by the time Exodus begins, many years had passed.

[5:13] And Joseph's family of 70 had become a nation of about 2 million people. These were Joseph's people.

[5:25] The man God had used to bless Egypt. But by this time, the Egyptians had forgotten that part of their history.

[5:38] The Bible says that there is a new Pharaoh who did not know who Joseph was. And he feared Israel's large numbers.

[5:50] And so he acted to suppress those numbers by first enslaving them and then intensifying their labors before ultimately resulting to aborting their newborn sons, ripping them out of their homes, out of mother's arms, and throwing them into the Nile River.

[6:11] But God providentially delivered one of those sons. A son who would one day be used by God to deliver his people from their captivity.

[6:21] His name was Moses. And Moses was a very unlikely hero. And I'll tell you more about Moses next week. But for now, remember that Moses was adopted by Pharaoh's daughter.

[6:35] He grew up in Pharaoh's house. And Moses also had a short fuse. As we read in Exodus 2, 11 through 12, Later, when Pharaoh hears about what Moses has done, he seeks to kill Moses.

[7:09] So Moses goes on the run. He's a fugitive now. He's public enemy number one of Egypt. And he flees to the land of Midian, where he gets married. And he starts a family.

[7:20] And he works as a shepherd for his father-in-law. That's his arrangement. And that's his arrangement for a long time. But during that time, God's people continued to suffer in Egypt.

[7:36] And so they were crying out to God for help. And though we are forgetful, God isn't. We read in Exodus 2, 23 through 25, During those many days, the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery, and cried out for help.

[7:54] Their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God, and God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. God saw the people of Israel, and God knew.

[8:09] And so God calls out to Moses from the burning bush. He's going to send Moses back to Egypt to deliver his people from bondage. But at this point in Moses' life, he's 80 years old.

[8:25] And he comes up with a lot of excuses for why God should not put an 80-year-old man back into full-time employment, especially for a task such as the one that God had for him.

[8:36] A task which required him to speak publicly, which was something that Moses had a lot of insecurities about. But in the end, God will have his way.

[8:47] He had his way, and he would provide Moses with all that Moses needed to be able to do all the things that God intended for him to accomplish. And so here I just want to pause and say that you are never too old like Moses, and you are never too young like Mary, the mother of Jesus, for God to use you to accomplish extraordinary things.

[9:13] Our society, I believe, seeks to convince us that old people and young people are burdens. And may that lie never be something that God's people ever believe, because none of us ever retires from our service to the Lord, and none of us is too young to be used by him to do awesome things for his glory.

[9:39] So Moses goes, and he delivers God's message to Pharaoh, but Pharaoh doesn't budge. We read about that in Exodus 5, 1 through 2.

[9:52] Afterward, Moses and Aaron went and said to Pharaoh, Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, Let my people go, that they may hold a feast to me in the wilderness. But Pharaoh said, Who is the Lord, that I should obey his voice and let Israel go?

[10:10] I do not know the Lord, and moreover, I will not let Israel go. Thus began the confrontation between Pharaoh and Moses, and truly the confrontation between Pharaoh and God.

[10:27] Each time Pharaoh refused to obey God, judgment was brought upon him and his people.

[10:37] And that judgment came in the form of plagues. And after each plague, Pharaoh was given an opportunity by God to obey him and let God's people go.

[10:52] And each time, Pharaoh refused. And so by the time we get to chapter 12 of Exodus, Pharaoh and his people have experienced awful and awesome, the awful and awesome power of God.

[11:11] They had suffered, but Pharaoh's heart was hardened. He will not give in. He will not acknowledge that God is superior to his gods, and he would not acknowledge that God was superior to him.

[11:30] In Pharaoh's mind, he is the one who rules. He is the one who gives orders. And though he's personally suffered and his sinful pride has caused every other person who are part of Egypt to suffer, he will not allow another to reign in his mind or occupy the throne of his stone-cold heart.

[12:03] So God sends another plague, the tenth and final plague, one more deadly and one more costly than all the rest.

[12:17] Exodus 11, 4 through 6 says, So Moses said, Thus says the Lord, About midnight I will go out in the midst of Egypt, and every firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sits on his throne, even to the firstborn of the slave girl who is behind the hand mill, and all the firstborn of the cattle.

[12:43] There shall be a great cry throughout all the land of Egypt, such as there has never been, nor ever will be again. And so now we're caught up to the events that have preceded Exodus chapter 12 where we're at today in Exodus chapter 13.

[13:01] While Egypt had forgotten how God had blessed them through Joseph and how God had spared them, they had turned on God's people, they had enslaved them, but God is not a God who forgets.

[13:21] God remembers. He remembered his covenant. And in this final, decisive act whereby he will liberate his people, he provided a multi-sensory symbol of this event that they were to remember and that they were to celebrate for years and years to come.

[13:43] And that multi-sensory symbol and event is the Passover. And the Passover lamb whose blood was shed and then spread on the doorposts of their homes, sparing their lives, ending their slavery, and securing their freedom.

[14:05] And so here this morning, we see yet another type of Jesus Christ. And typology is a special kind of symbolism.

[14:17] A type in Scripture is a person or object in the Old Testament that foreshadows a person or object in the New Testament. And it is through typology that God reveals to us that all of the Bible, though written over long periods of time by many different authors, is truly one story about one person whose name is Jesus Christ.

[14:39] And this text reveals to us today the truth that Jesus Christ is our true and better Passover lamb.

[14:50] And that's something that God's people should never, ever forget. So the main idea for this morning's sermon is that God's people must never forget what God has done to save them through the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ.

[15:06] God's people must never forget what God has done to save them through the Lamb of God who is Jesus Christ. In the Scriptures that I'll be covering today, God gives instruction for the Passover.

[15:22] They're instructions that God desired his people to remember and celebrate because ultimately they pointed forward to the true and better Passover lamb that God himself would one day provide to liberate sinners from the kingdom of darkness and transfer them to the kingdom of his Son, Jesus Christ, who is the true and better Passover lamb.

[15:49] And so there's three remembrances here, three remembrances of what God has done to save his people that we must never forget. The first remembrance is God's unblemished substitute.

[16:01] substitute. We must never forget how God has provided an unblemished substitute. Now again, there's a lot of instructions in these verses, but I'm only going to highlight a few.

[16:13] And the first comes at the beginning of Exodus chapter 12 verses 1 through 3. The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, this month shall be for you the beginning of months.

[16:26] It shall be the first month of the year for you. Tell all the congregation of Israel that on the tenth day of this month every man shall take a lamb according to their father's houses, a lamb for a household.

[16:41] And so, you know, in a couple of days our nation will celebrate its independence. We celebrate Independence Day, a time for our country to commemorate what has been done to gain our freedoms and the freedoms that we presently enjoy.

[17:03] Yes, we do that by grilling food and blowing things up and blasting Lee Greenwoods. I'm proud to be an American, but truly it's a day for Americans to remember what was done to purchase our freedom.

[17:25] And also, I think, for us to think about where our country not only has been, but to contemplate where our country is going. And in these opening verses of Exodus 12, God is doing something similar but on a much greater scale.

[17:44] At the beginning of each year, the people of Israel were to remember the freedom that God had achieved for them by sacrificing a lamb at Passover.

[17:58] But not just any old lamb would do. God's instructions for that are in Exodus 12, 5 through 7. Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male, a year old.

[18:13] You may take it from the sheep or from the goats, and you shall keep it until the 14th day of this month when the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill their lambs at twilight.

[18:27] Then they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and the lentil of the houses in which they eat it. Now look at verse 13. The blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you are.

[18:44] And when I see the blood I will pass over you and no plague will befall you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.

[18:56] In what way was the blood a sign for them? What was that blood meant to signify? Well, that judgment had already fallen on that house.

[19:12] The unblemished lamb that was slain, consumed, and whose blood was applied to the doorposts of the Israelites' homes was a vivid demonstration that to be spared from God's righteous judgment, the blood of an unblemished sacrifice must be shed and applied.

[19:43] Though God had protected his people from the previous nine plagues, they now had to act in faith to appropriate the means by which the Lord would pass over them and think for a minute of how strange this command would have sounded to those who first heard it.

[20:10] Your firstborn sons will die unless you kill a lamb and paint your door with its blood.

[20:23] And you could hear that and you might think, well, how does that work? or why is that necessary? Well, this has been God's way from the very beginning and how he forgives and covers sin.

[20:45] After God proclaimed the consequences of sin's curse to Adam and to Eve and to Satan, and after promising to one day send a deliverer who would end it, Genesis 3 21 says, and the Lord made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them.

[21:07] So we see the first death recorded in the Bible was the death of an animal. It was sacrificed by God to clothe sinners and cover their shame.

[21:22] The author of Hebrews tells us in 9 22, Indeed, under the law, almost everything is purified with blood and without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins.

[21:37] This is God's way. You know, and there's a lot of things that you can live without, but blood is not one of those things. No other natural ingredient or man-made material can replace blood as the means of sustaining your life.

[22:01] Later in Hebrews, the author reflects on the faith of Moses and subsequently the rest of Israel during the Passover in Hebrews 11, 28. By faith, he, referring to Moses, kept the Passover and sprinkled the blood so that the destroyer of the firstborn might not touch them.

[22:21] And so we see it was through faith in God, trusting in the blood of the substitute to deliver them that saved them from destruction.

[22:36] All of this was pointing forward to the shedding of Jesus' blood on the cross.

[22:47] Remember when he began his public ministry, John the Baptist who prepared the way for him saw him coming from the distance and he said, behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

[23:05] John at that moment understood that those first Passover lambs and all other Passover lambs throughout Israel's histories whose blood had been shed in sacrifice foreshadowed the ultimate sacrifice that Jesus would come to make atonement for, for the sins of his people.

[23:33] John knew that Jesus had come in fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy, Isaiah 53, 7. Speaking of Jesus, he was oppressed and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth like a lamb that is led to the slaughter and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth.

[24:02] Jesus came to substitute his life, to shed his blood and save sinners from destruction.

[24:14] Romans 3, 23 through 25 says, for all, all of us have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and are justified by his grace as a gift for the redemption that is in Christ Jesus whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood to be received by faith.

[24:40] This was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. You see, righteousness is the lifeblood we need to be saved and to be put in right relationship with God.

[25:02] We all have sinned. We all have blemishes. We need the righteousness of a sinless substitute.

[25:14] God and when you are born again, when you are saved, when you repent of your sins and you acknowledge your need for a righteousness that you could never achieve on your own and you put your faith in the one who can, Jesus Christ.

[25:38] God says that his blood covers you. It clothes you. You are clothed in his grace, in his goodness, in his righteousness.

[25:56] And when God the Father sees you, he sees his son, he sees one who has been cleansed, purified, made right and righteous by the blood of his son.

[26:11] He passes over your sin. He forgives your trespasses and he sees Christ's righteousness as belonging to you.

[26:26] You are spared, you are forgiven, you are saved. And so I ask, whose righteousness are you trusting in today?

[26:38] And do you know where your righteousness comes from? Charles Spurgeon said, no one can put on the robes of Christ until he has first taken off his own.

[26:51] Have you done that? The way to eternal life is not paved with your good works or your being a morally upright person. It was paid in blood.

[27:05] Jesus lived sinlessly, died sacrificially, and rose victoriously, and it is by faith in him and who he is and what he's done that saves you.

[27:23] Jesus is the unblemished substitute who purchased our pardon. Morality is good. We need more of it in our world.

[27:36] Morality, it'll keep you out of jail, but only the blood of Jesus will keep you out of hell. And this is a truth that we must never forget.

[27:50] But it's a truth that tragically, I believe, many in the church who call themselves followers of Jesus have forgotten. I remember years ago I was a youth pastor and I was preparing to take my teens for our first big overnight multi-day trip.

[28:13] And I was taking them to an evangelism conference out of state, a conference that their previous youth pastor had taken them before, one that the kids were really looking forward to.

[28:25] And so I had a parent meeting to answer their questions. Here's this young man in his mid-twenties who is going to take my son or daughter across state lines overnight.

[28:37] And so I expected that I would receive a lot of questions about just am I responsible for what I'm asking their parents to entrust me with, the responsibility I'm asking them to entrust me with.

[28:51] But that's not the question that I got. Afterwards, I was cornered by a handful of parents who were familiar with this conference and they knew that at this conference there was a time where the students were encouraged to text or call one of their friends back home who was an unbeliever and set up some kind of a time to share the gospel with them.

[29:19] And so these parents told me there's going to be this time for that. And basically what they were asking me to do was to discourage their children in participating in that gospel sharing activity.

[29:36] And the reason why they asked me not to do that is because they were afraid of how awkward it would be for them because they knew the parents of the students who would be called or texted.

[29:49] And honestly, what was happening was they were ashamed of the gospel they claimed to believe and tragically teaching their children to do the same.

[30:04] chapter 12 ends with instruction that the Passover was not only to be celebrated yearly with a festival but that it was a time for parents to pass on to their children and the preceding generations so that they would not forget what God had done to save them.

[30:28] And so parents understand that it is your job God has given you the responsibility to disciple your children to pass on the good news of what he has done for you in the hopes that one day he will save them too.

[30:53] Remember God's unblemished substitute. Jesus Christ who is the one who saved you who substituted himself for you remember that but also remember this God's mercy and severity God's mercy and severity and so we're back at Exodus 12 29 through 32 at midnight the Lord struck down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sat on his throne to the firstborn of the captive who was in the dungeon and all the firstborn of the livestock and Pharaoh rose up in the night he and all his servants and all the Egyptians and there was a great cry in Egypt for there was not a house where someone was not dead then he summoned Moses and Aaron by night and said up go out from among my people both you and the people of

[31:54] Israel and go serve the Lord as you have said take your flocks and your herds all you have said and be gone and bless me also God is someone to be taken seriously and there are serious consequences for those who sin against him to this point God had demonstrated his mercifulness this is the tenth plague God could have done this at the very beginning this could have been the first plague as a matter of fact God didn't have to send any plagues at all he could have just wiped out the Egyptians all together especially when he saw them killing their babies but God is patient and he is merciful but eventually his patience runs out the

[32:59] Bible reminds us that those who have received knowledge of the truth of God but who go on sinning continually will be judged Hebrews 10 30 through 31 says for we know him who said vengeance is mine I will repay and again the Lord will judge his people it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God God gave Pharaoh ample warning and opportunity to obey him in fact all the way back in chapter four before any of these plagues had commenced God knew what would happen and he said to Moses there then you shall say to Pharaoh thus says the Lord Israel is my firstborn son and I say to you let my son go that he may serve me if you refuse to let him go behold

[34:04] I will kill your firstborn son God is merciful but let Pharaoh's life serve as a warning to those who think they will never be judged who believe that God's wrath is just a bunch of hog wash who take God's grace for granted who trust in themselves and their own understanding who think they can define truth and error right and wrong on their own who refuse to acknowledge God as the final authority on all things and who refuse to obey his commands they will meet the same end as Pharaoh did don't forget who God is

[35:05] God is holy God is other God is infinite omnipotent omniscient!

[35:16] omnipresent! He is not bound by time as we are he is eternal he is he always been he always will be he is sovereign ruler over all things he is the righteous judge whom we all will one day stand before and give an account for our lives he is fearsome and his judgment will fall on all who denied him the glory that he is due but God is merciful and in his grace he has provided his son as a substitute that by faith in him we will not be crushed by his righteous wrath which fell on instead on his only begotten son and over and over and over again

[36:16] God calls out to his people calls out to the unbeliever that they would turn to him and that they would be saved from that Joel 2 12 through 13 it says yet even now declares the Lord return to me with all your heart with fasting with weeping and with mourning and rend your hearts and not your garments return to the Lord your God for he is gracious and merciful slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and he relents over disaster do you know the lamb of God are you trusting in him for salvation have you received his mercy so rejoice!

[37:18] And never forget the lengths that he went to descended to to save you but if not you are here by God's design to hear this message and I pray that today is the day of salvation for you and that you turn to Christ in faith and be spared don't waste your life living like a little pharaoh do not take God lightly and so the third remembrance that we come to now is God's strong hand to deliver God's strong hand to deliver the time had come and Israel was ready to go they had been in Egypt for 430 years but again

[38:18] God had not forgotten them he kept his promise to deliver his people he kept his promise to Abraham in Genesis chapter 15 verse 14 as well that God would punish the nation that enslaved his people and that as he delivered them he would cause them to prosper that's what we see in Exodus 12 36 and the Lord had given the people favor in the sight of the Egyptians so that they let them have what they ask thus they plundered the Egyptians as they made their way out of the land God also promised he remembered his promise to Abraham that through his seed the nations would be blessed and in Exodus 12 38 we read a mixed multitude also went up with them the Israelites and very much livestock both flocks and herds so they were escaping together many here who were not physical descendants of

[39:19] Abraham were allowed to join Israel as they left Egypt they saw the signs that God had done and they believed and here we see the beginning of the fulfillment that God would one day save Gentiles this was a preview of an event still to come for us of an event we read about in Revelations chapter 7 9 through 10 after this I looked and behold a great multitude that no one could number from every nation from all tribes and peoples and languages standing before the throne and before the lamb clothed in white robes and palm branches in their hands and crying out with loud voices salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the lamb in exodus 13 14

[40:27] God again reminds his people to never forget what he has done for them by his strong hand and when in time to come your sons ask you what does this mean all these things that we're doing you're doing for the Passover what does this mean you shall say to him by a strong hand the Lord brought us out of Egypt from the house of slavery and so our main application for the sermon is to remember remember that true freedom is in Jesus Christ on the night before his death Jesus having fulfilled all of the old covenant announced a new covenant the sacrificial system that had foreshadowed the necessity of his coming was no longer needed it was no longer necessary and he inaugurated a new covenant at

[41:40] Passover and a meal that he ate with his disciples before going to the cross Luke 22 19 through 20 it says Jesus took bread and when he had given thanks he broke it and he gave them to it saying this is my body which is given for you do this in remembrance of me and likewise the cup after they had eaten saying this cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood what does all of this tell us what is God saying to us don't forget yes remember that true freedom is in Christ remember what it means to be free in Christ we were slaves to sin we deserved a visit from the angel of death but in

[42:48] Christ God has passed over us slaves of sin who through Christ have become sons and daughters of God Galatians 4 3 through 7 says in the same way when also when we were children were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world but when the fullness of time had come God sent forth his son born of a woman born under the law to redeem those who were under the law so that we might receive not just freedom but adoption as sons and because you are sons

[43:50] God has sent the spirit of his son into our hearts crying Abba Father so you no longer are a slave but a son and if a son then an heir through God wow isn't that amazing enemies in bondage to sin bound for hell God by his grace and by his mercy provided a substitute his only son

[44:51] God that by faith in him we are free we are saved we're adopted into his family and we are heirs of all there is to have in Christ and there is so very very much and as a result of that we have this relationship with God where we can go to him in prayer we don't have to set up an appointment or knock on his door excuse me uh mister sir may I have some of your time no he's our Abba he's our father he's our dad and we can come to him in our times of weakness and our times of understanding and our times when we need help and he'll lavish us with his grace that's good news and if you don't believe it

[45:53] I pray that today God has turned your heart to him and you do and if you do believe it what more could you want what more could you ask to know Jesus is to have everything one question of application why is it so important to God that we not forget who he is and what he's done to save us how can you remind yourself of this truth every day every day remind yourself of this truth let's pray Lord sometimes I think for some of us who you have you've been gracious to save us when we were young and we've heard these things taught to us through your word for years God may it never be a case that we read these things and it's just like watching a rerun of an old show that we've seen multiple times but that it would cause us to reflect and to rejoice and to serve you and to be more like you time and time again a story that never grows old a story that is always good to hear one that we would remind ourselves of every day who you are and what you've done to save us

[47:17] God you know each person in this room and you know those who have been covered by the blood of your son and those who have not and Lord I pray that your word today has spoken to them that your spirit is revealing to them that yes God you are a God who is merciful and you are a God who is patient but eventually your patience comes to an end and at that point there is only judgment and Lord I pray that they would turn to you the gracious savior and merciful father that you are and that they would be saved and spared and clothed and covered in the righteousness of your son God we thank you for a country where we have the freedom to do many things that other nations do not have the freedom to gather the freedom to worship Lord we thank you for that but more importantly we thank you for the freedom that we have in Jesus Christ the

[48:17] Lord of the nations who Lord one day will bring us all together around his throne and collectively we will sing all worthy and honor and praise to the Lamb thank you Lord for the reality of that day and we anticipate it soon coming until then Lord may we be found faithful in our service to you you're worthy in Jesus name we pray amen