BEHOLD THE LAMB

BEHOLD THE LAMB Exodus 12:1 - 13 April 8,  2001 Given by: Pastor Rich Bersett [Index of Past Messages] Picture in your imagination for a moment a Jewish family petting their one-year-old lamb. It is a beautiful little lamb, white as snow. In fact, this lamb is flawless. It would win the blue ribbon at a state livestock exhibition. It is an absolutely adorable specimen of a lamb. Little Nathan pets it and talks sweetly to the lamb-he's named it Hosea. He run his little fingers through its white wool and wonders to himself what it would be like to be a lamb. The fleece is tight and thick, white as the snow up high in the mountains. He has grown fond of cuddly little Hosea, along with the rest of the family. And Hosea has become attached to everyone in the family during the past week. After all, he'd been near them for several days for intense observation. Hosea had been taken out of the flock and set apart by the family so they might carefully watch and examine him. Every day, father Caleb took the lamb out into the bright sun light and examined it in minute detail, looking for any signs of a blemish, or see if it had become lame, or had some unexpected imperfection. Each day the verdict was the same-Hosea was the finest lamb of the family's entire herd. The choosing of the right lamb was not to be a last minute, rushed decision. Hosea actually had to become part of the family for awhile. Predictably, there had developed a sense of family identity with the lamb. To give up this lamb would be to give up something very personal. It was no small matter to give up a new pet for a sacrifice, especially for the children-they'd grown quite attached. Caleb and his younger sister Ruth had already begun to think of Hosea as part of the family. And father Caleb-for him this lamb had become his pride and joy. Hosea was the very best of his flock. The Lord had spoken to Moses, their new trusted leader, and the animal had to be in its first year of life, not old and ready to die, but in the prime of life, full of vigor. It would have everything to live for. It had to be an animal that was extremely valuable. Late in the afternoon of the 14th day Nisan, Caleb calls his family together. "The time has come," he says. They walk outside into the garden, sorrowful but solemn. Little Nathan runs behind them. He tried hard to understand what "sacrifice" meant when his father explained the whole thing two days ago. One thing he did know-something is going to happen to his lamb on this day. Ruth is fighting back her tears, holding on to her mother's hand. Father takes a moment to teach the children, and to explain the reason this innocent lamb must die. God intended to make the blood of this precious lamb their protection (PESAH) that night. The children listened deeply as their father told of the terrible event that would occur that night. The angel of death would fly over the homes of all of Egypt where they lived. And when the angel flew over each house, the firstborn child of that house would die. This, explained Caleb, was the way God would finally convince the Pharaoh to let their people go from Egypt. It was that afternoon that Nathan first understood how important this night would be. After all, he was the firstborn. Father continued to explain that God had given their people a way of escape. They were to brush the blood of a year old male lamb without defect onto the doorframes of their houses. Then, when the angel of death came that night, he would see the blood. And the blood would be a sign to him that God was sparing the firstborn of that Israelite household. Father Caleb knelt down, looked at Nathan and said, "Son, you are so precious to your mother and me and little Ruth." Nathan saw tears in his father's eyes-something he so seldom saw. His father continued, "We love our special lamb, Hosea, too. But we love our son infinitely more. Jehovah God has every right to take your life, but He has decided to take the lamb instead. Do you understand, Nathan?" The boy nodded, and as he did, hot tears dribbled over his cheeks. He fell against his father's big shoulder and hugged him. Then he turned and hugged Hosea one last time. Nathan decided to play in the house with Ruth while father took the lamb's life and drained his blood into the bowl. But when his father asked him to bring him two branches of hyssop, he gladly obeyed and joined his father in the task of brushing the lamb's blood on the frame of their front door, Caleb on one side and father on the other. Then Caleb lifted his son up high so he could brush the life-saving blood on the top of the door frame as well. Nathan was glad he had helped with that job when he went to bed that night. He knew it gave him the peace he needed to sleep on such a fearful night. He fell asleep thanking God for his earthly father and for sparing his life through the blood of the lamb. The Lord knew it would come to this. He even let Moses and Aaron in on how desperate things would become when Pharaoh continued to resist His will. We have every reason to believe that God's perfect will would have been for Egypt to acknowledge Him right away and avoid the plagues-especially this last, drastic measure. But the proud pagan Pharaoh would not, could not acquiesce. All along, while the plagues struck Egypt, God had spared the Israelites. While He sent flies and hail and darkness all over Egypt, he would not let the pestilence touch the area where His chosen people lived. All of the Egyptians' livestock were decimated by the foot and mouth disease God sent, but the flocks of the Israelites were spared. And now, the ultimate persuasion-the death of all the firstborn of Egypt, but the Israelite children would be spared through their parents' obedience to an odd command. They were to apply the blood of a perfect lamb as He directed them, and they would be saved. You know, when God gives an "off-the-wall" command like this, you instantly know He's up to something big! • "Abraham, start walking-never mind where, I'll show you later, just go!" • "Abraham, remember how I promised you a son, and you didn't get Isaac until you were a hundred years old? I want you to take that child of promise and kill him as a sacrifice to me." • "Jacob, I want you to wrestle with my angel tonight-all night long. And, by the way, I'm changing your name to Israel." • "Joseph, I know I've got you in prison in a foreign land, but trust me-I'm not only going to get you out of prison, I will make you the vice-regent of this whole great nation. Then your family, who betrayed you and who think you're dead now, will come and live here in Egypt for 400 years. But I will make sure that your descendants get back to the Promised Land of Canaan. In fact, I'll have them carry your bones back with them so you can be buried there." As God is giving Moses the instructions for the night of the Passover event, don't you imagine Moses was thinking, "Blood on the doorframes-what in the world? An unblemished lamb-why?" Once again, God is thinking about the rest of His plan in the history of mankind. Now the exodus is THE signal event in the history of Israel. It is the greatest landmark for all faithful Jews yet today. Just as Moses told them to 4,000 years ago, orthodox Jews today are busy obeying the rules of Exodus 12:14-30. They ate only unleavened bread this past week as they prepared for the Passover celebration this weekend. God said they should do this as a "lasting ordinance". Every year sacrifice an unblemished one-year-old lamb, rehearse the events of the exodus. Tell your kids about it-don't let them ever forget what I did! Why all this fuss? Because as big as the exodus was, as important as the Passover event was, He was planning something even bigger. And the whole Passover-exodus experience was designed by Him to be the sneak preview! God was going to send a lamb, THE lamb, the perfect lamb, and His blood, applied to the hearts of believing, obedient people, will save them from eternal death, by paying the debt for their sins. God was illustrating what redemption is really all about-His Son dying for the sins of mankind, so they could be brought back into fellowship with Him! Don't you see? The whole thing was a set-up, a prediction, a prophetic picture, a shadow of what was to come, a forecast, a divine prognostication. Why were the chosen people of God sent into a foreign land for four centuries and then delivered so dramatically by the hand of God? Why didn't He just let them take Canaan while they were there with father Jacob? Because the Director of History was in His heavenly director's chair, setting the stage for what was coming! He wanted to teach mankind, especially those who trusted in Him, what redemption was all about. It was God bringing deliverance to His people by His own hand when they couldn't do it themselves. God responding to the cries of his people who were in desperate straits, bringing them a deliverer who would eventually conquer the enemy. And the enemy in this production was the Satan figure, played by the current superstar Pharaoh. God would bring them out of their bondage, and His plot would center on the ignominious, shockingly morbid means of applied lamb's blood. Folks, every minute part of the Passover prefigures Jesus. And every part of the meal that God told His people to commemorate the event prefigures Jesus. I hope you're planning to be there this Thursday night as we host a genuine Passover Seder meal downstairs. And I hope you will take advantage of studying in advance the very helpful notes Carol Seymour has pulled together for you. It will be as meaningful a Christian experience as you have ever had. Here's the point - Jesus is the Lamb. He is unblemished because He lived the perfect, sinless life. When John the Baptist saw him coming to the River Jordan, he pointed at him and said, "Behold, the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world!" For just a moment or two, I want us to BEHOLD THE LAMB. He was part of the family-God's own Son, inspected and found worthy by the heavenly Father. "You are my son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased." As the apostle John gazes into the eternal regions of heaven he writes this record (Revelation 5) - "Then I saw a Lamb, looking as if it had been slain, standing in the center of the throne…and when He had taken [the scroll], the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb…And they sang a new son: 'You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, because you were slain, and with your blood you purchased men for God'…in a loud voice [the many angels] sang: 'Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain…'" The entire exodus experience was really for you. That's right. All the record of the Old Testament was written down as an instruction for us on whom the end of the ages has come. Here is what God wants you to take away from the Exodus-Passover experience. He loves you, and He sent His Son to be your Passover lamb. He died that you could live. The Bible says that "He who had no sin became sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God" (2 Corinthians 5:21). On August 16, 1987, Northwest Airlines flight #225 crashed just after taking off from the Detroit airport, killing 155 people. One person survived-a four-year-old named Cecelia, from Tempe, AZ. News accounts say when rescuers found Cecelia they did not believe she had been on the plane. They first assumed she had been a passenger in one of the cars on the highway where the airliner crashed. But the flight register was checked and there was Cecelia's name. This little girl survived, it turns out, because, as the plane was falling, Cecelia's mother, Paula Chican, unbuckled her own seat belt, got down on her knees in front of her daughter, wrapped her arms and body around Cecelia, and then would not let her go. Her body served as a life-saving cushion for her daughter. The Lamb left heaven, lived perfectly, then, in His death, He covered us with the sacrifice of His own body to save us. Gordon MacDonald has been a highly admired preacher, author and Christian leader for most of the past 35 years of his life. He nearly lost it all, including his family when, 15 years ago, he fell into adultery. He subsequently repented, he and his wife got counseling, he submitted to spiritual oversight who directed him to voluntarily remove himself from Christian ministry for what turned out to be several years. He and his wife went through the very difficult task of full restoration, and he is now ministering on the east coast. He wrote an article a couple years ago, and in it he tells this fictionalized story of what might have happened at the River Jordan when Jesus was baptized. Would you allow me a couple of minutes of silliness? Let me give you a vision of what could have happened that day. It expresses, as I see it, the implications of what is going on here. We're standing around there, and we understand that big things like this have to be organized. We make a plan. One of us says, "When you decide to come and repent, folks, we want you to register. We'll get your name down on a mailing list, and we'll give you a nametag so that the baptizers can be more personal with you. Just step forward, and tell us your first name and your most awful sin." Up to this table steps Bob. "Name?" "Bob." "What's your most awful sin, Bob?" "I stole some money from my boss once." The person takes a marker and writes, BOB: EMBEZZLER. Next person: "Name?" "Mary." "Mary, what's your most awful sin?" "I slandered some people. I said things that weren't true. I just didn't like them. So the person writes, MARY: SLANDERER. "Name?" "George." "What's your most awful sin?" "I've been coveting my neighbor's Corvette." GEORGE: COVETER. "Name?" "Gordon. " "Gordon, your most awful sin?" Adultery. GORDON: ADULTERER. And the person writing, with some degree of gloating, slaps the name tag on the chest of each person. Then all these people, with their name tags and their most awful sins, line up by the river, waiting to be baptized in repentance. Up to the table comes Jesus. Jesus' most awful sin? Well, there aren't any. So Jesus starts walking down the line. He steps up to Bob and says, "Bob, give me your name tag," and he puts it on himself. "Mary, give me your name tag." He puts it on himself. "George, give me your name tag." It goes on himself. "Gordon, give me your name tag." Soon the Son of God is covered with name tags and awful sins. In my vision, I see Jesus going to the water to present himself to John. The Savior is baptized. At the risk of being trite, in my vision, the people who had the markers didn't buy indelible ink. When Jesus comes up, all of the ink has been washed away and is going down the river. And I recall the words, "As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us." That's what the Lamb of God has done for you. The only one who did not deserve to die for His sins (because He had none) died for all the others, who did deserve to die. Now, Jesus, the Lamb of God, will apply the blood of His sacrifice to your life, if you will let Him. And you do that by placing your faith in Him. If you will today believe that Jesus died for your sins, according to the scripture, that He was buried and rose again on the third day, according to the scripture, then you believe the gospel. When you do that, it is as though you have taken a hyssop branch, dipped into His blood and applied it to your life. Will you receive Him today?       [Back to Top]