PASSOVER AND REDEMPTION
Tuesday – April 11, 2017
At sunset yesterday was the start of the Feast of the Lord known as Passover. These Feasts of the Lord (seven total) for us (the Church) are types and shadows of the wonderful things to come for all mankind. There are four spring Feasts of the Lord and they are Passover, Unleavened Bread, First Fruits, and Pentecost. Passover commemorates the day that innocent spotless lambs were sacrificed over all of Egypt, the final plague before Pharaoh released God’s people from captivity. Our innocent spotless lamb is no less than our Lord Jesus. The feast of unleavened bread is associated with Passover for the Israelites were instructed to remove all leaven from their homes (represents sin, homes our body the tabernacle of the Holy Spirit). The Feast of First Fruits was looking forward to the first harvest in the land of promise and Jesus the first Fruit of salvation.
You know the story of Passover. God had told Pharaoh that if he did not let the children of Israel go that the firstborn of man and beast would die. The children of Israel were instructed to kill a spotless lamb on the 14th of Nisan (day Jesus died on the Cross some fifteen hundred years later), consume and destroy the remainder of the lambs body (looking at Jesus baring our sin in His body), and take the innocent blood and apply it to the doorposts of their homes (shed blood of Jesus). If they did this as instructed the death angel would not enter their homes and neither the firstborn child or animal would die. Jesus is our Passover Lamb. This memorialization of Passover and the prophetic message of the coming messiah was celebrated from year to year and to this day.
The following Scripture passage from Leviticus chapter twenty-three is rather lengthy but worthwhile to read through and see the various aspects of our redemption.
Leviticus 23:4-10 (KJV)
4 These are the feasts of the LORD, even holy convocations, which ye shall proclaim in their seasons.
Notice that these feasts are the LORD’s. These feasts were an opportunity for God to be merciful to His people and portended a greater redemption to come. The word feast is the Hebrew word ‘moed’ which is an appointed time and by implication an appointed purpose. From the first Passover to the Crucifixion is 1400 to 1500 years and that is when the full implications of these feasts came into full view.
5 In the fourteenth day of the first month at even is the LORD’S passover.
At the evening (6 pm) of the fourteenth day of the first month of the Biblical year, the month of Nisan, the innocent spotless lamb was sacrificed to cleanse the people from sin. Fourteen is the Bible number of deliverance or salvation. This first Passover and subsequent Passover’s is when the Lord would cleanse the sins of the Old Testament saints for another year, when the lamb without blemish and certainly innocent of sin, was killed, sacrificed. Our deliverance, our salvation came by way of Jesus’ death spirit and body on the Cross of Calvary, same sequence as Adam (Adam died spiritually first and then physically).
6 And on the fifteenth day of the same month is the feast of unleavened bread unto the LORD: seven days ye must eat unleavened bread.
Leaven represents sin, and Jesus was free of all sin. He was the sinless Lamb of God. Just as the children of Israel had to remove all leaven from their homes so Jesus removed all of our sin. Remember that fifteen is the Bible number of God’s provision, in this case His provision for our sin. Seven is the Bible number of spiritual completion, we are complete in Him.
John 1:29 (KJV)
29 The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.
7 In the first day ye shall have an holy convocation: ye shall do no servile work therein.
8 But ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the LORD seven days: in the seventh day is an holy convocation: ye shall do no servile work therein.
9 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
10 Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be come into the land which I give unto you, and shall reap the harvest thereof, then ye shall bring a sheaf of the firstfruits of your harvest unto the priest:
Jesus is the first One resurrected from the spiritual and physical death. Jesus is the
Firstfruit of salvation. Therefore we can be sure that we also will be raised as He was from the spiritual dead to eternal life and the physical dead to an incorruptible state. Jesus was the first and now each of us in our order. Praise the Lord!
1 Corinthians 15:20-23 (KJV)
20 But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept.
21 For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.
22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.
23 But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming.
We sing the song, ‘Because He Lives’ and we rejoice in the Crucifixion, the victory obtained over hell and the grave, and the resurrection, it is His and it is ours because of The Blood Covenant.
Because He Lives
God sent His son, they called Him, Jesus;
He came to love, heal and forgive;
He lived and died to buy my pardon,
An empty grave is there to prove my Savior lives!
Chorus
Because He lives, I can face tomorrow,
Because He lives, all fear is gone;
Because I know He holds the future,
And life is worth the living,
Just because He lives!
(From the Bill Gaither Website, partial)
By: Dr. David Wood, Author, Bible Teacher, and Prophetic Voice
I have recently published two books. First was the book titled “Temptation – The Battle for our Thoughts”. Perhaps this book will shed new light on this topic of temptation in ways you have not imagined. Second is the book titled “And God Said – The Creator’s Provision”. This book illuminates the will of God from the beginning for them and for us. These books are available at Amazon Books.
