Passover Pastor Jerry Gillis – April 23, 2017
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Feast on Jesus (Part 1) – Passover Pastor Jerry Gillis – April 23, 2017 So, last week on Easter, many of you gathered around with family and friends and had a feast, and celebrated the Resurrection of Jesus from the grave. Some of you ate so much that you are quickly headed to the grave, and thus are even more grateful for the Resurrection. But this time frame and this feast is not something that is just common to Christians, to those of us who follow Jesus and we celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus during this time. We're not the first ones to have this time frame of celebrating a feast during that exact time. In fact, our Jewish brothers and sisters have been doing this for 3,500 years during this time frame, which is a season that we are going to focus on in just a minute. Now let me say this, kind of from the outset. Part of the reason that we're doing this series is because here at The Chapel we believe that the whole of Scripture actually points to Jesus. All of it. Even well before the time where Jesus was born in the flesh in Bethlehem, we believed that the Old Testament is pointing us to the Lord Jesus Christ. And so, what we're going to do in this series is we're going to take a look at the Old Testament feasts and we're going to see and meet Jesus in that. In other words, the idea is this. It's that we're going to set the table with the Old Testament feasts so that we have the opportunity to feast on Jesus. That this is what we're going to endeavor to do. And we're going to start out in this first week by focusing in on the central feast for all of Judaism and all of Israel, and that is the Feast of Passover. Now some of you remember the history, and if you don't, here's a quick shot on that. God raised up Moses in the midst of His people Israel while they were under the oppression of Egypt during that time, and had been for hundreds of years. And so God raised up Moses to deliver the people out, and he was going to lead them toward the Land of Promise, which would have been in fulfillment of exactly what God had promised to Abraham many, many centuries and many generations before this time, where He said to Abraham I'm going to take you in, your people are going to have your own country, you're only going to be in captivity for a certain number of years, around four hundred and then you're going to be out. And so this was in fulfillment of that, so God knew exactly what He was doing. Now He raised up Moses. And Moses didn't think that God knew what He was doing because Moses said, "You know God, I don't talk real good. I don't know that I'm going to be able to represent you really well in front of Pharaoh. But God gave him the power to be able to speak to Pharaoh. And He continued to say, through Moses to Pharaoh, "Let my people go!" But Pharaoh, as you know, was not overly inclined toward that end. He would say, okay we're going to let you go, but then he wouldn't. And so God responded to that, because Pharaoh had established in Egypt, kind of a hardened heart toward the God of everyone, the God of Israel. And of course, Egypt had their own gods. So God began to send the plagues to Egypt. And those plagues, by the way, when you look at them were consistent with the gods of Egypt and were demonstrating that God is God and that Egypt's gods are nothing. That's what you see when you start walking through these plagues. But finally, when you get to the last plague, you realize it's kind of the worst one. In just a moment, we're going to be reading in Exodus chapter 12 and that's where we're going to base out comments out of today. But prior to that, in Exodus chapter 11, we have the opportunity to seek kind of a demonstration of this very last plague that's being discussed. Here's what it says in Exodus 11. "So Moses said, "This is what the Lord says: (he's talking to Pharaoh). 'About midnight I will go through Egypt. Every firstborn son in Egypt will die, from the firstborn son of Pharaoh, who sits on the throne, to the firstborn son of the female slave, who is at her hand mill, and all the firstborn of the cattle as well. There will be loud wailing throughout Egypt - worse than there has ever been or ever will be again. But among the Israelites not a dog will bark at any person or animal.' Then you will know that the Lord makes a distinction between Egypt and Israel." So there's a significant plague that's coming, right, of the first ones that came, whether those were with locusts or boils or frogs or any of those kinds of things, now you've got this plague surrounding the death of the firstborn. And it seems extraordinarily harsh, but keep in mind that this is God honoring His covenant with Abraham. Remember with Abraham He said, "I will bless those who bless you and I will curse those who curse you". And this is God actually acting out the reality of the covenant with Abraham. Also, keep in mind that God is doing that equitably, because if you remember, you kind of read this and go wow, that seems like a harsh judgment, the firstborn of Egypt, all the firstborn males of Egypt are going to die. Well, keep in mind what Egypt did around the time of Moses. At his birth, there was instructions that the firstborn males that were born among the Israelites were killed. They were thrown into the Nile, to drown or to be eaten by crocodiles in the Nile. It was a gruesome, horrible kind of thing to even think about, right? And so God is equitably dealing with Egypt during this time, and tells them what He tells them. Well, as you know, Pharaoh is not going to be responsive to Moses' last plea to kind of repent and let the people go, so this is actually going to happen. This is going to go down. And so what we find in Exodus chapter 12 is we find God's instruction to His people through Moses about how that is going to transpire. What is going to happen in this night of great judgment. Notice what it says beginning in verse 1 of chapter 12: "The Lord said to Moses and Aaron is Egypt, 'this month is to be for you the first month, the first month of your year. 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. 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. The animals you choose must be year-old males without defect, and you may take them from the sheep or the goats. 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. Than they are to take some of the blood and put it on the sides and the tops of the door-frames of the houses where they eat the lambs. That same night they are to eat the meat roasted over the fire along with bitter herbs, and bread made without yeast. Do not eat the meat raw or boiled in water, but roast it over a fire - with the head, legs and internal organs. Do not leave any of it till morning; if some is left till morning, you must burn it. This is how you are to eat it: With your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on your feet and your staff n your hand. Eat it in haste; it is the Lord's Passover. 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." Now this is loaded with things that we could talk about, and for the sake of time there's no way for me to be able to unpack everything that's here, but let me summarize saying this, kind of just to caption all of this under one heading. Here's what I could say about what is about to transpire. That the lamb is God's centerpiece for the deliverance of His people. The lamb is God's centerpiece for the deliverance of His people. In fact, it's interesting that He chose the idea of a lamb, because Egypt, in their god named Amun, he was always shown with a lamb, by the way.