Roast Lamb
Exodus 12:27 It is the sacrifice of the LORD'S Passover, for he passed over the houses of the people of Israel in Egypt, when he struck the Egyptians but spared our houses. (ESV)
So here we are in Easter week casting our minds back to that Passover Festival when Jesus was betrayed and crucified. And the Passover, back then and still today, was celebrated with a meal. Roast lamb.
Most countries have a day set aside to commemorate the fallen in wars of the past, and those celebrations invariably involve rich symbolism. The same is true with Easter – coming as it does during the Passover Festival of the Jews – because that’s when Jesus was crucified.
One of the names given to Jesus in Scripture is “the Lamb of God”. The idea of the sacrificial lamb goes right back to the night, roughly a millennium and a half earlier, when God saved His people from slavery in Egypt through the last of ten plagues.
To convince Pharaoh to let His people go, He sent the angel of death across the land to kill every firstborn child and animal in the country, except in the homes of the Israelites who were commanded to take a lamb without blemish, kill it and paint some of its blood on the door frames of their homes so that the angel of death would pass over them and not kill their firstborn. That’s indeed what happened, and that’s what the Passover Festival remembers.
Exodus 12:27 It is the sacrifice of the LORD’S Passover, for he passed over the houses of the people of Israel in Egypt, when he struck the Egyptians but spared our houses. (ESV)
And that’s why Jesus is called the Lamb of God, because when we believe in Him, in the blood He shed on that Cross for us, death passes us over. Whoever believes in Him will not perish, but have eternal life.
Jesus, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.
That’s God’s Word. Fresh … for you … today.
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