Exodus: Saved by the Blood

Have you ever had a jelly bean Cafe Mocha? It consists of four jelly beans: One chocolate pudding jelly bean, two cappuccino jelly beans and finished off with a cream soda jelly bean. And when you put all four beans in your mouth at once your taste buds go crazy and it's like you're actually drinking a big cup of mocha coffee. At least that's the idea. Those four little beans are giving you a small experience of something bigger and better.

It's a bit like that with Exodus chapter 12, because it encapsulates the story of Israel and the story of redemption that runs throughout the whole Bible. And absolutely central to this chapter (and this story) is sacrifice. The sacrifice of a lamb.

Nine plagues have already hit Egypt and the tenth would be deadly. An angel of death would sweep across the land killing the firstborn of every family. Only those who sacrificed a lamb and spread its blood on their doorposts would be saved.

In the years ahead Israel would offer many, many more sacrifices for the forgiveness of their sins. But this passage is not merely of historical interest. It bares very much upon our lives today, because it talks of Jesus.

At the very start of his ministry, John the Baptist introduced Jesus with the words: "Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!" (John 1:29) And it was at the time of the Passover in Jerusalem that Jesus was sacrificed on a cross and his blood was spilt. And so the worship song of Revelation can sing about Jesus: "Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain..." (Rev 5:12)

This is a story about a lamb and about Jesus. And central to this story is sacrifice. And so my three headings this evening are: A sacrifice that saves A sacrifice to remember A sacrifice worth sharing

1. A sacrifice that saves (12-13, 23)

Read with me again verses 12 and 13:

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. 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.

The Egyptians and Pharaoh had clearly sinned against God and His people - everyone knows that they were guilty. But what these verses make clear is that the Israelites also stood before God guilty. They needed saving.

The Bible doesn't say that there were Israelites who didn't follow these instructions. But if they hadn't, they would suffered precisely the same fate as the Egyptians. What saves the Israelites is not their ethnicity. The only thing that they are saved by is the blood on their doorframe. Verse 23 says:

"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."

The angel of death would indiscriminately kill the first-born son of any household which didn't sacrifice a lamb.

They were saved by the blood. Only by the blood and completely by the blood.

The passover lamb illustrates and reflects the death of Christ in a number of ways. The lamb was "without blemish". Jesus was perfect - he never sinned. The lamb was chosen from among the rest of the lambs. Jesus was perfect, but he was also a man like you and me. The Bible even says he was tempted just like us. The lamb was chosen on the tenth day of the month and it would live with the family for the next four days. Jesus lived on this earth and breathed this air. The God of creation, in amazing grace, lived like one of His creatures. The lamb was roasted with bitter herbs. The bitterness of these herbs was to remind the Israelites of the bitterness of slavery in Egypt. Whenever we think of the cross and the death of Christ, we also should do so with a tinge of bitterness, of sadness. Because it is our sin that held Him to that cross - the suffering we deserved. The blood was marked on the outside of the doorposts of each household. Jesus publicly spilt his blood upon the wood of the cross for all to see. The blood and the sacrifice saved the eldest boy of each household from death. The lamb's life was the substitute for another. Jesus died in our place. He atoned for our sin. So great was the love of Christ that he laid down his life for us. The lamb was roasted whole, every part of it and all of it had to be eaten. Christ gave himself in sacrifice in his entirety and in so doing offered complete salvation from all sin. Put yourself in the shoes of a 14 year-old Israelite boy all those years ago. You have two younger brothers and younger sister. You've spent all your life in Egypt and you don't like the Egyptians. They beat your dad, mistreat your mum and you're expected to work for them as a slave as well. But lately there have been some funny things going on. You've seen plague after plague hit the Egyptian people but the nutter Pharaoh just wont hold to his word and let you and the rest of the Israelites go. Things seem to be coming to a head.

Next thing you know there's this lamb causing havoc round the house. You and your younger siblings have great fun over the next four days playing with the lamb - he becomes a bit like a pet and you even give him a name.

Then, after four days of having this lamb around, at dusk, your dad takes the lamb in his arms and slits his throat with a knife. The blood is then drained into a big bowl. Your dad then grabs a branch, thrusts it into the bowl of blood and smears it all over of the outside of the front door frame of your house.

The dead lamb is taken and roasted over a fire. You, with your mum and dad and brothers and sister, then eat the lamb together. No one really says anything but finally you turn to your dad and say "Why did we have to do this?". Your father looks at you and simply replies: "It should have been you." At that moment you hear a cry in the distance. And then another. And another. The crying is more like wailing, the wailing of a mother who has lost her son. The terrible noise builds and builds until every Egyptian household in the whole of Egypt has experienced death. How would you feel if you were that Israelite boy? How grateful would you be for the death of that lamb?

We are all guilty of sin. If we had been in Egypt all those years ago, we would have needed a lamb for our household to survive. And as surely as that angel of death swept through Egypt, so each and every one of us will stand before God. And as that angel looked for the blood of the lamb, so God will look for the blood of his Son on us. Christ's death saves us and only Christ's death. Call on his name, plead for mercy and be eternally grateful, for he is faithful to save.

A sacrifice that saves, secondly, a sacrifice to remember.

2. A sacrifice to remember

As well as being an account of the first Exodus from Egypt, this chapter also serves as instructions of how Israel are to remember, or commemorate, the Exodus. Read with me verse 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.

The Passover was not merely to be an event in history but an annually repeated event. Every year, wherever they were, the Israelites were to take a year old lamb for each family, sacrifice it and put its blood on their door posts.

The chapter then goes onto to talk about the seven days that should follow the Passover celebration. These days are called The Feast of Unleavened Bread, which basically involved getting rid of all yeast from their food and even homes. The point of this was that when they had to leave Egypt following the first Passover, they didn't have time to let the their bread rise. And so to eat without yeast is to remember the sudden flee from Egypt and all that was there.

The fundamental point is that the Passover was to repeated as a 'lasting ordinance throughout all generations'. But why when the plagues had finished, their sons were no longer under threat from the angel of death and they were hundreds of miles from Egypt was it necessary to still be knocking off lambs and eating flat bread?

Why? They were to never forget where they came from and who had saved them.

I don't know if you're familiar with the Charles Dickens book Little Dorrit. (Hopefully the book bears some relation to the television adaptation and this will sound familiar.) It's the story about a girl called Amy Dorrit. Her mother has died and her father is in a debtor's prison. She is in complete poverty and with absolutely no prospects of ever leaving it. But, solely due to the kind and diligent work of a Mr Arthur Clennam it is discovered the Dorrit family are in fact entitled to a large estate. In his new found wealth Mr Dorrit leaves prison and rises up through the ranks of society. However, he becomes extremely proud and conceited, and eventually goes mad. in complete contrast, his daughter Amy maintains a remarkable level of humility. She never forgets that she was once very poor and who granted her, her freedom from poverty. She doesn't forget where she came from or who saved her.

After this sermon we are going to do Communion or the Lord's Supper. The Bible tells us that if we have believed and have trusted in the sacrifice that Christ made on the cross, that this is how we are to remember it.

It can be easy to downplay rituals and practices and say what really matters is spiritual and our hearts. And that may be true. But in his wisdom God has given us these rituals and practices because it helps us remember the spiritual and helps us to check our hearts. Just like the Passover was a reminder to the Israelites of the slavery they came from and how God saved them. So communion is a reminder that we were all once slaves to sin and how God saved us, through the cross.

But the Passover wasn't merely a reminder of a historical event. It also served as recognition that they served a God to whom they were continually indebted. God continued to save and keep Israel saved. It is the same for us.

As we come to take communion we we should not merely be saying "thank you for saving me all those years ago" or however long you have been a Christian. We should be saying "Thank you Lord that you have saved and continue to save me. Thank you that I can live each day in the death of Christ."

The lamb was a sacrifice that saved and a sacrifice to remember. Finally, it was a sacrifice worth sharing.

3. A sacrifice worth sharing

The Passover was a national event. Everyone celebrated together at the same time. It wasn't that individuals did the Passover at their own time, in their own place and in their own way. Everyone did it together.

Practically that happened by breaking the Passover down into families, which in itself served a vitally important function:

Read with me from verse 25.

When you enter the land that the LORD will give you as he promised, observe this ceremony. And when your children ask you, 'What does this ceremony mean to you?' 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.

Just as I'm sure at the first Passover children would have asked their parents what on earth was going on, so every time throughout the history of Israel, when the Passover was remembered children would have asked their parents 'why?'

The Passover was a vertical act of worship to God, but it also was a horizontal witness to those looking on. It was a witness to the surrounding nations but also an internal witness one each another and especially their children.

A little while ago, on a Sunday morning service, my son Ben hadn't settled in Scramblers and so I was sitting with him out in the foyer following the service via the TV. It was a communion service and so two people who were serving communion came out to the foyer for those sitting out there. Ben watched intently as I ate the bread and drank the wine. After the servers had gone he shuffled over and asked what I was doing. And so I told him that it was a special way for grown-ups to remember and think about Jesus. And the whole thing had visibly had quite an impact on him.

And of course this principle of witnessing to our children carries over beyond that of just the Passover and the Lord's Supper.

If you have children then you must carefully consider how you can practically witness to them the truths of the Bible. This means making the most of taking to them about the Jesus, but it also means setting good routines, habits, practices and even family traditions in place. Your children see every part of your life and so the words you speak to them will be next to meaningless if the rest of your life doesn't match up.

We have three young boys and try to work these things out in everyday life, but get wrong more often than not. I cannot hide what I'm really like from my children, and I have to regularly ask for their forgiveness. (Which in itself is an opportunity to model the gospel.) But I think it's helpful to be practical and these are some of things we have found helpful and are trying (in a very flawed way) to do.