The Exodus Way Part 6 - Where is the Lamb?

The Exodus Way Part 6 - Where is the Lamb? 

As we have already seen, the plagues aren't God losing His temper. They are God exposing false gods, handing people over to what they insist on trusting, and repeatedly inviting repentance. The story isn't just about one stubborn man. It's about an entire death-shaped system. An empire built on fear, power, and the lie that some lives matter less than others. Pharaoh embodies it, but the machine is bigger than him.

When we get to Exodus 12, we find God finishing His work to bring "judgment on all the gods of Egypt." The plagues pull the mask off a whole way of life. The Nile, the sun, livestock, even Pharaoh himself. Each one is exposed as impotent, empty, and ‘unable to save’. And then we arrive at Passover.

Modern ears find it stark. The death of the firstborn is grievous. It's meant to be. It forces us to face a sobering truth: evil, when welcomed in, does not stay small. Egypt had already ordered Hebrew sons to be killed and had chosen a world where that kind of violence was permitted. The night of Passover is a terrible moral symmetry in a world where death has been normalised because it is now Egypt’s firstborn who are the target and the Hebrew’s who are shielded.

But even here, something deeper is happening. We often picture "Passover" as God skipping certain houses. But the language hints at something richer. God does not merely avoid the marked homes. He stands over them. He shields. He covers. The blood is not a sign to keep God away. It is a sign of refuge. This house belongs to Yahweh. Outside that protection, people are handed over to the destroyer whose way of life they have chosen. Inside, they are covered over by mercy.

And Jesus uses this event as the key to explain what He came to do.

The Gospels spend extraordinary space on Jesus' final week because the cross is the centre of the story. At the Last Supper, Jesus doesn't give a lecture explaining His death. He gives a meal. Herbs for bitterness, because evil and suffering are real and God does not ask us to pretend otherwise. Bread for urgency, because salvation calls for a response. A step. A decision to seek shelter. Wine for promise, because God binds Himself to His people.

And the Lamb? In Matthew's account we hear about the dipping bowl for the herbs, the bread, and the cup, but the lamb is conspicuously absent. Not because there is no lamb, but because Jesus is the Lamb. In Exodus, God judges a death-world and makes a doorway through judgment by a lamb handed over in the people's place. In the Gospels, Jesus is handed over by Judas, by leaders, by Pilate, and ultimately He walks into the "hour of darkness" so that darkness can spend itself on Him. And because He is handed over, we can be covered.

Under Him there is protection. Safety. Deliverance. We don't talk as much about the blood of Jesus as Christians once did. But Scripture does. The blood of Jesus is not superstition. It is shorthand for the finished work of Christ. It means guilt is removed. It means accusation loses its voice. It means you belong to God. And it means the destroyer does not get the final word. Passover isn't a religious tradition to admire. It's a shelter to step into. A God

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Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:01

In this powerful sermon, we stayed in the Exodus story and we walked through some of its harder scenes, namely the plagues and the Passover. As we've already seen, the plagues aren't God losing his temper. They are God exposing false gods, handing people over to what they insist on trusting, and repeatedly inviting repentance. The story isn't about one stubborn man, it's about an entire death-shaped system. An empire built on fear, power, and the lie that some lives matter less than others. Pharaoh embodies it, but the machine is bigger than him. So when we get to Exodus 12, we find God finishing his work to bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt. The plagues pull mask off a whole way of life. The Nile, the sun, livestock, even Pharaoh himself. Each one is exposed as impotent, empty, and unable to save. And then we arrive at last. Now let's hear what Dean has to say.

SPEAKER_01 1:08

So as I say, we've been going through the book of Exodus and the stories. Last week we did the plagues, God exposing the false gods of Egypt, God handing them over again and again to these gods, inviting them to turn, to repent, to come back to him, rewarning them, but the signs escalating and the Pharaoh's heart hardening each time until he's hardened it to the point where he no longer wants to respond. He doesn't want to hear what God has to say. We highlighted that these aren't God losing his temper, they're God pulling off the mask of a whole way of life. The oppressive order of Pharaoh and Egypt, the false gods that undermine and coerce and plague the people. Now they've been exposed and God is handing them over. And then we come to this Passover story. I just want to start with Jesus because uh that's a good place to start in most times. But when we have Jesus, we Jesus was born and he lived and he taught and he loved and he proclaimed and he demonstrated the kingdom of God and he was arrested and he was tried and he was crucified and buried and rose again and then he ascended to heaven where he promised to come again. Did I miss anything? I think that's it. Very good. Just checking. So that's Jesus' life. Now we've got four Gospels, four accounts that talk about it. But if you read them, you'll notice that roughly half to a third of each of these Gospels focus on the last week of his life. Well, they talk about his life, that they really focus on his death. Which is odd, when you read any other biography, that isn't the pattern you find. But but for some reason it's his death that seems to capture them, that they want to record in the most detail. I want to know what Jesus wrote in the ground when the woman caught in adultery came to him. I want to know exactly how much fish and bread was left over. I want to know what it felt like to walk on water, but but those details aren't there. The detail that gets focused on and Jesus and his last week and all that takes place, it's his death that comes into focus. And when you ask, well, why is that? Interestingly, Jesus didn't say much about the why. He said he was going to die, and he said that would happen, and he gave brief, but if you gather together all the things Jesus has said about his death, it's only about a page worth sort of explaining it and the why behind it. But what he does do at the end of his life is he sits down with his disciples and he shares a meal with them. And in this meal, he is explaining his death in the clearest possible ways. It's something I love about Jesus. Whereas I would give a lecture to explain something, I would give a sermon and lots of words to explain something, Jesus gives us a meal. And that is the picture, that is the explanation, because then everyone can understand it. Not just the intellectuals, not just the clever people or the boring people who like to listen to long sermons. It's those who can gather around this table. They can discover something about what Jesus has done. And that meal that we call communion or the Lord's table, that meal is the Passover. And that's the meal that Jesus chooses for us to understand what has happened or what's going to happen when he goes to the cross. So that's what we're going to learn about. The Passover meal and the events that surround it. So we've had the plagues, we've had nine of the plagues, and we come now to the last one. I'm just going to read, it's not going to be on the screen, but I'm just going to read this part in Exodus chapter 11. It says, Now the Lord had said to Moses, I will bring one more plague on Pharaoh and onto Egypt. After that he will let you go from here. And when he does, he will drive you out completely. Tell the people that men and women alike are to ask their neighbours for articles of silver and gold. The Lord made the Egyptians favorably disposed towards the people, and Moses himself was highly regarded in Egypt by Pharaoh's officials and by the people. So Moses said, This is what the Lord says. About midnight I will go throughout 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's 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. All these officials of yours will come to me, bowing down before me, and saying, Go, you and all your people who follow you. After that I will leave. Then Moses, hot with anger, left Pharaoh. The Lord said, said to Moses, Pharaoh will refuse to listen to you, so that my wonders may be multiplied in Egypt. Moses and Aaron performed all these wonders before Pharaoh, but the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he would not let the Israelites go out of his country. We said last week that God for hardening Pharaoh's heart, he does that by offering him a chance to repent. And then Pharaoh Pharaoh turns and says, No, that the grace of God, the mercy of God is actually what hardens him in a way that doesn't make sense until you realize it in yourself. God is so good to us, and we take that goodness and we use it as a reason to stand away from him. Like the prodigal son. He goes to his father and says, Let me take half of your wealth and leave you. And the father says, Yes. And because he says yes, his heart is heart is hardened, and he goes away until he gets to a point where he finally turns back. Here, Pharaoh's heart is hardened in this plague that creates a bit of a somber mood, a sadness, the loss of life. Pharaoh finally impacted directly by all that's been going on. To modern ears, it's it's quite a stark thing. And the idea of the firstborn, even back then, it would have been stark. It was their future, it was their strength, it was a household. It symbolized tomorrow and all that was to come. Egypt always put their hope in their future and their prosperity and their ability to grow and culminate. But here, God is answering something. He's answering something, if you remember, happened earlier. Egypt had already touched the firstborn once before. Pharaoh had taken the Israelite firstborn sons and thrown them into the river, drowned them and killed them on sight. And here the story comes full circle. And Pharaoh is reaping the very thing that he has sowed, he and Egypt have sown. The thing that Pharaoh has put out into the world finally returns to him. But there are some parts in Exodus chapter 12 that explain what's going on and help us to understand and frame this in terms of what's happening and what's going to happen with Jesus. In Exodus chapter 12, we read this verse. It says, On that night, explaining to them about the Passover meal, he says, On that 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. Do you remember we said last week that's what the plagues are about? Not just flexing God's muscles, showing he's in control, but showing them that their gods are false gods, that they are a lie, that they they promise life, but they only bring death. They promise growth and they only bring destruction. They promise prosperity, but they only steal. They are an enemy that wants to steal from you and kill you and destroy you. And God here is going to finally bring judgment on all these powers, all these systems, all these patterns of behavior. Pharaoh is propped up. The story isn't just about one man. There's a whole order behind him, a whole machine bigger than him. People who stand by and support systems and religions and beliefs that prop up this ability to wield the power as he does, to take life like he does, to enslave people as he does. And this whole thing is propped up by ordinary people. There's a famous line that says, all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. And in Egypt we see that. In the world around us, we see that. Evil prospers because people stand by and do nothing. Propped up by either false gods or by false beliefs that just keep the peace and everything will be fine, that as long as we're comfortable and we're secure, it doesn't matter about others, as long as we have all that we need, we don't concern ourselves with other things. The point is, all these things, these gods, God's going to lay them all bare and say they are not the truth. And so the text here doesn't treat that night lightly. It's meant to be grievous, it's meant to be painful. It forces us to reckon with a world where evil is not just politely swept over, where we don't just cover it and push it to one side. Evil is finally confronted and judged, and we realise that it is so costly to undo evil. And so here, God is going to bring judgment on the gods, on the lie behind them and the liar that is the source of all these things. We just need to remember that as we go on. Now that's what God is going to do, but what I noticed this week was how God does it. And I don't think I'd ever really wrestled with this. Because we know that what God's going to do, he's going to pass through, and he tells his people, if you prepare this meal, we're going to look at the meal in a bit, and you paint your blood of the Lamb over your doorpost, then I will pass over your house. And then often when we've taught this to children, or perhaps ourselves, my understanding was that there was an angel of death that passed through and took lives. Anyone else get that? An angel of death that goes through Egypt. And the Bible's a wonderful antidote to things that we think we know, because the angel of death isn't mentioned in the verse. And you go, Yes, it is. Okay, go read your Bible. Because the angel of death isn't mentioned. Here's what it does say. It says, Moses summoned all the elders of Israel and said to them, Go at once and select the animals for your families and slaughter the Passover lamb. Take a bunch of hyssop, dip it into the blood in the basin, and put some on the blood of the top and both of the sides of the door frame. None of you shall go out of your door or of your house until morning. 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 house and strike you down. Now later on, that destroyer became, through different interpretations, we called it the angel of death. But then the title given to it is the destroyer or the destroying one. So what is God going to do? Well, God is going to initiate this. This is a judgment, this is God doing something, the firstborn will die. How is God going to do that? A destroyer is going to be allowed to go through Egypt to take these lives, and God is going to pass over the doorways of those who are protected. It is God who directs, but it is the destroyer who strikes down. Now that one of those things, I just stood back and went, who's the destroyer then? Because that does it. I just thought it sounds like an odd person for God to have in his employment. For God to have to be using. That doesn't sound, I don't find that anywhere else in the text, a destroyer. And when you start to look at this term destroyer, it is only used by one other person. We're told in Hebrews, by faith Moses kept the Passover and the application of blood so that the destroyer, there it is again, of the firstborn would not touch the firstborn of Israel. We then read in Revelation, there's this moment where it says there's a king over all the angels of the abyss, whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon and in Greek is Apollyon, that is destroyer. See, it's a bit like the serpent in the Garden of Eden. We all go, well, that's Satan. But we don't know that until Revelation. It's only Revelation that says this serpent of old, the serpent is the Satan, that one in the garden. We kind of get a hunch and a hint of it, but it's only confirmed. And I wonder if the same is happening here, that this destroyer, the evil one, the father of lies, the one who is a murderer from the beginning, is the one who is allowed, permitted, I don't know quite what the right language is, but is allowed to go and to take this life. And God is the one who protects his people from it. See, throughout the Bible, God judges. It's part of what he does. He is righteous and good, and sometimes he brings judgment. But over and over again, the language you hear is that God hands people over. So in Israel's time, so Israel's a nation, and when God judges them, he says, I'm gonna hand you over to these other nations. You're gonna be taken over and pulled out of your land and taken off. And what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna hand you over to a nation. Now, this nation isn't a good nation, it's an evil nation. They are doing wrong, but you've chosen their ways, you've chosen their practices, you've chosen their life, and so I will allow you to have it. And the result is they get what they want, and it ends up in destruction. And the same in Romans 1 it says this as well. Oops, sorry. In Romans 1 it says, God's judgment is revealed, his wrath is revealed, and that he gave them over to their sinful desires. The wages of sin is death, and God gives us over to the thing that we're asking for. And here in Egypt, Pharaoh and Egypt have chosen a way of life. They've chosen the kind of world that they want. They want a world where the firstborn of those they don't like die. They want a world where people are treated as property and enslaved and beaten to get their way. They've chosen a world where the powerful are in control and the weak are abused. They've chosen a world that is governed by patterns of behavior that are false and deceptive, where humans are sacrificed, where life is taken, where people are not treated as the image of God. They've chosen that world and God hands them over to that. And this plague is the final culmination of that. I will hand you over to that, and to the one who is behind it. As I say, the one who is called the evil one, the one who is called the father of lies, the one who is called the murderer from the beginning. But what God will do is the thing that Pharaoh never did. I will provide a way out, and I will pass over. Now I often thought that meant that God sort of there's a house, house, death, death, and I'll skip that one, death, death, skip that one, and God's passing over some of the houses. But the language of Passover doesn't mean God's skipping, it's the idea of hovering. That God will hover over a house, like a mother bird hovering over its nest, protecting it and guarding it. It's not that God is skipping the house, it's that death has been unleashed, death has been allowed, and God is gonna protect, he's gonna seal the languages of covering, of embracing, of keeping near, of putting his arms around it, that God is gonna do that. And the sign is the blood of a lamb painted on the doorpost. And so death is unleashed. Death is allowed to have its way, and it does apart from those who have brought themselves into the embrace, the shelter, the grace that God has extended. This is a slightly different understanding, and I didn't quite realize this of Passover. I thought God's striking down, and then he's skipping some and striking down others. But here we see it's the destroyer who will strike down. They're handed over, and God will protect those who call on him. He will embrace and they will be covered. There is a power of death in this world. And it's the thing we chose again and again from the very beginning. We chose death rather than life. We chose disconnection from God rather than connection to the source. And when we're handed over to it, we kind of go, Well, that's not what I wanted. No, no, no, it's not. But it's what you chose. Adam and Eve and the Gordon, but we didn't want death. We didn't want sin. We just wanted to be like God, I know, but in choosing that, you chose death. And humanity, through all history, we want this, we want this, and when we choose it and we get death, we go, well, that's not what I wanted. No. It's a deception. It's what we fall for again and again. And Egypt is just one example. That there is a death in this world. There is such a thing as evil. And we are caught up in it and we are surrounded by it and it oppresses us. But God here makes a way that we can be covered, that we can be protected, so that death won't touch us, that the evil one cannot touch us, that the destroyer cannot destroy us. And when we're brought into this, and so God gives this meal to remind them again and again, there is a way out. Pharaoh never offered you a way out. The world will never offer you a way out. It will simply take and take until there's nothing left to take. But God provides a way, a covering, a way that you will be protected, that the evil one will still be judged and exposed, and he'll be used for God's purposes, but he will ultimately be defeated. But you will be protected from it all. And so we have this meal. So this meal, I was going to get bits of it for us to try out, but I realized I needed to preach while doing it. And the first one, there's a bit of horseradish, and I thought, if I have that, I'm not going to be able to continue the rest of the service. So in this meal, this is this is what they would do. They would take these bitter herbs, this this um some um it's like salad type stuff, some leaves, lettuce, and or cabbage or something of that type, and you dip it in horseradish. Um sometimes they the modern times that they sort of use a sweet mixture, but originally it's something that would bring tears to the eye, something that would sting because it's the idea of the tears that Israel would have wept. They made their lives bitter with hard service, it says in Exodus. And it's that bitterness of these herbs that reminds them evil is real, suffering is real, pain is real. We aren't ignoring that, we are recognizing that, and so they eat this. The tears come to the eye, it stings because they are reminded of their story. This is what what we've come to address the bitterness of this world, the way the evil one destroys everything that is good, turns everything into darkness, tears down everything that God builds up. This is what we're reminded of that it's costly, that we were slaves, that we were in bondage, and that God came to set us free. And so normally there's a bowl, and people go around and they dip into the bowl and they eat some of it. Then there's the unleavened bread, the matza. It's eaten, it's unleavened because they couldn't use, they didn't have time to let it rise. This was something showing that God was urgent in this. I'm gonna deliver you, and it's one night, you're gonna be covered, and then you're gonna be set free. And so it symbolizes that God is wanting to take us out of something, to leave somewhere and go somewhere else. They had to eat on the move, they couldn't sit still. This demands action. It demands us to respond in some way, that that God can't keep us in slavery, he needs to get us out. We can't stay sat comfortable in our in our imprisonment, that God wants to take us somewhere, and so the bread is a symbol of that. God's people had to prepare it quickly and leave quickly to get out of the system of Pharaoh and the world that was crumbling around them. Then there's the wine, the four cups, as we looked at a few weeks ago in Exodus 6, reminding us of those promises. I will bring you out, I will deliver you, I will redeem you, I will take you to be my people. This promise of God, his covenant, I am your God, I love you because I love you. You're my children, and I love you. And so the wine is the symbol of that. And then there's the lamb, the lamb without blemish, a perfect lamb that is taken, that is killed, that is then taken, the blood is taken and posted as a sign that the Egypt is going to be handed over to death. And Israel could be handed over to death unless something else is handed over in their place. They can be handed over, or something else can be handed over. They can be handed over, or someone else can be handed over. And so the Lamb is that picture that death is going to be allowed to do. The wages of sin are death. And so he's come to collect. And that's what the Passover night is about. Death will collect. Your sins will pay out, guaranteed. Better than any bond, any any investment you've ever made, death, sin will pay out. And either you pay or someone else will pay. Either you die or something else dies. And here the picture given to them is a lamb and it's blood painted to cover them. And on that house there was a protection. On that house, God would pass over it and hover above it and seal it so that death could not touch it. The destroyer could not take life in that place. And it wasn't based on morality, wasn't based on good behavior, it wasn't even based on ethnicity. Some people say that later on it says a mixed multitude leave Egypt. That actually there were Egyptians who would have responded to this. Just like the other plagues, the Egyptians hear this and they respect Moses, and some of them respond, some of them don't, but some of them do, and they take advantage of this. But all those who call on his name are covered and protected. And here's what I love most: Jesus takes this and he chooses this to explain his death. He told his people, not, like I say, not a long lecture, not a theory, but a meal, a memory, a story. So that every time they ate it, they would be reminded that this is what God has done. What I'm gonna do is I'm just gonna read how Jesus went through this meal, and I want you to try and spot what's missing. Okay? It's a tricky thing to do, but I'm just gonna read through when Jesus sat with his disciples. In Matthew, it says, On the first day of the feast festival of unleavened bread, the disciples came to Jesus and asked, Where do you want us to make preparations for you to eat? Eat the Passover. So Passover's coming. He replied, Go to the city to a certain man and tell him, the teacher says, My appointed time is near. Now, the reason it says a certain man, people think is because this man doesn't want to be identified. He thinks it's too risky at the time this is written, that he's a Christian, he doesn't want to be caught out, so it's just a certain man. Don't put his name in there. He wants anon anonymity. Is that the right word? So anyway, he goes there. I'm going to celebrate the Passover with my disciples at your house. So the disciples did as Jesus had directed them and prepared the Passover. When evening came, Jesus was reclining at the table with the twelve, and they were eating. He said, Truly I tell you, one of you will betray me. They were sad and began to say to him to one another, Surely you don't mean me, Lord. Jesus replied, The one who has dipped his hand into the bowl with me will betray me. Dipped his hand. So there we've got the herbs, the bowls, the bitter herbs, and they've dipped in. And you might think, well, that well, that's obviously going to be Judah, Judas, that he's dipped in and no one else has. Actually, people think that everyone would have dipped in, and that's the idea. While Judas would betray Jesus, actually, all of them would betray Jesus. And Judas, in particular, obviously, we know what he does, but all of them would deny, all of them would betray, all of them would run away. They've all dipped in, and that's kind of the point. So they've all dipped in. The Son of Man will go just as it is written about him. But woe to that man who betrays the Son of Man. It would be better for him if he had not been born. Then Judas, the one who would betray him, said, Surely you don't mean me, Rabbi. Jesus answered, You have said so. While they were eating, Jesus took the bread. And when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying, Take and eat, this is my body. The bread, the symbol of God going to deliver, bring you out. A decision to be made, I'm going to bring you out. There's the bread. Then he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, Drink from it all of you. This is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. I tell you, I will not drink from this fruit of the vine from now on until the day when I drink it, new with you my father's kingdom. The cup, the covenant that God will do, God will redeem, God will set you free, God will take you as his own. And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives. What's missing? Where's the lamb? The Passover meal that's already been celebrated for a thousand years at this point, that's established in Exodus. We're told this is what you do. Herbs, bread, the wine, the lamb, this is what you do. And they've done it again and again and again and again, over and over and over and over. And this time, when we have it recorded for us, either Matthew forgot, or may I just suggest there might be another reason? Where is the lamb? Where is the lamb? The lamb is the one who's breaking the bread, saying, This is my body. The lamb is the one holding the cup, saying, This is the new covenant in my blood. The lamb isn't really missing, the lamb is being fulfilled. That Jesus is going to be the one who will be a covering for his people. His blood will be shed, but in that they will be protected from death. They will be protected from the destroyer. They'll be protected from the evil one. They'll be protected from his lies. They'll be protected from the one who is a murderer from the beginning. They'll be protected from all his power and all his influence. The prayer that we pray again, deliver us from the evil one, will be fulfilled because he will be the one to deliver us. And he will cover us in his death that we may be sheltered. So when you read through the gospel account, you find that Jesus talks in this language. He says, Every day I was with you in the temple courts, and you did not lay a hand on me. But this is your hour when darkness reigns. The destroyer has free reign now. He's been given free reign to do what he wants to do. Again it says, Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in our humanity. This is Jesus, so that by his death he may break the power of him who holds the power of death, that is the devil, and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death. What's going on at the cross? Jesus is breaking the power of him who holds the power of death, the destroyer, the one who destroys the firstborn, the one who takes life, he breaks his power and he frees us. So that not only are we freed from death, we're freed from the fear of death. That it has no hold over us. We are protected, we are covered. His blood keeps us. And no matter what the enemy throws at us, no matter what noise he makes, no matter what attacks he throws, we are covered. We are sheltered. God hovers above us, he seals us, and the blood of Jesus is the reminder that that is true. In John 12, it says, This is the hour where the prince of this world will be judged. The judgment of the one who rules this world. He's called the ruler of this world, this destroyer, and he will be judged. This is what's going on. And Jesus says, This is what the Passover is for Christ, our Passover Lamb. There it is. Where is the Lamb? It is Him. He has been sacrificed. And the cross becomes not just an accident, not just a tragedy, it becomes God's strategy. In the same way that He hands over Egypt to their choices, but protects those who calls on Him. This world is handed over, but there is a way to be redeemed. God covers and He protects, and He starts something new, a new creation in the midst of the old, something reborn. And when that tomb is emptied, life breaks out, and the whole world around is decaying and falling apart, just as Egypt decays and falls apart. The whole world has been judged and shown for what it is, but in it there is this spark of light that will grow and grow and grow until it takes over the entire earth. Passover is God confronting Pharaoh's death world. This world that he has been a part of and that he has partnered with the evil one to make. But in it, God is starting something new. Out of the old, he is bringing new life. And to the same way Israel are brought out to start a new life, the church become those who are brought out of this old world, a new creation in the midst of the old, proclaiming he has done it, he is the Passover Lamb. He's destroyed the power of death, that is the devil, and the fear of death is gone. Because he was handed over. The Gospels constantly use that to talk about Jesus. He was handed over by Judas, he was handed over by the chief priests, he was handed over by Pilate, he was handed over to be crucified, he was handed over to the power of death, to the power of suffering and evil. And it was allowed to have its way. And there were tears, like those herbs bring. It was tragedy and desperate. But in that we were brought out. In that, a covenant was made. In that a lamb, not just blood on a doorpost, but a blood that covers our entire life. Not just freedom from slavery, but freedom from participating in a whole world that will not last. And what the Passover meal whispered, the cross shouts. Jesus has done it. He is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. He is our Passover Lamb who covers us. And so that's Passover. Not just a nice religious tradition, but a rescue, a shelter, a God who stands between his people and the destroying powers of the world. A God who says over us, you will not have them. They are mine, and I will protect. At whatever cost, whatever it takes, I will protect. And on the cross we see just how great a cost that is. What God has to do is that we could be protected. And so he gives us this. Tonight we're going to share that meal together. If you want to come, it's the time to meditate and to receive that. But we come to this table again and again because Jesus knows when you're afraid, you forget this. When you suffer, you forget this. When you're under pressure, you forget this. That you are covered. And he builds this act of remembrance into our worship, into what we're meant to do. As often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, remember. Remember you weren't abandoned. Remember you weren't overlooked. Remember you are not handed over to darkness. And while the darkness may shout, while the enemy may roar, you are not handed over to him. You belong to God. You've been handed over to his grace. You are not handed over because Jesus was in your place. And we, because of that, we get to stand in the shelter. We come under his covering. We take refuge because God has provided refuge. And that night of death becomes the beginning of deliverance. Just as Jesus, the night of death, becomes the beginning of a new creation. And the destroyer, whatever it may be, and we can discuss that, whatever it may be, he does not get the final word. The Lamb does. The destroyer says you deserve to die. The destroyer says there is no hope. The destroyer takes and steals and kills and destroys. But the Lamb comes that we might have life. Here's the question that Passover presses into our hearts. Where are you standing? Today, just to reflect on where are you standing? Outside the house? Trying to manage a world that is decaying? Trying to manage yourself, carrying guilt yourself, trying to outrun death yourself? Or are you standing under the covering? Under the protection, under the blood that says, You are mine, and nothing can touch you. As I said, the virtue wasn't in those who lived in the house, it wasn't in their goodness or the morality or the record of what they'd done. It was that they trusted. They acted because they trusted God. And that's the gospel. God has not asked you to save yourself, He has made a way for you to be saved. He's not asked you to stand firm and protect yourself. He will protect you. We're going to come on to that a bit more next week. But it's through a lamb. And in that upper room, Jesus takes this story and says, This is what I'm about. I'm about providing you a refuge in the storm, a rescue out of slavery, a deliverance from the greatest power that no one has ever been able to defeat, the great enemy no one has been able to touch, death itself. I've come to defeat it. To finally crush the head of that serpent and to make you free. So if you've never done it, if you sort of hover around the edges of faith and you've admired Jesus from a distance, then today this invites you to come in. There is no protection standing at a distance and watching what's going on. There is when you come in under his covering. Not with any bravado, not with any great demonstration, but simply with trust. Even a simple prayer. Jesus, I bring myself under your protection. Jesus, I come into your shelter. Jesus, I want you to pass over me. Remember, that doesn't mean you skip over me. That's how we tend to think. I want you to be over me. Your blood to cover me, your forgiveness to save me, your grace to be mine. See, there are two places where people stand. Either, like Pharaoh, we either we say to God, your will be done. You want to save me, you can save me. Or what Pharaoh finds is that God says to us, Okay, your will be done. Pharaoh, you want a world of death, your will be done. You want the death of firstborn to be the way the world works, your will be done. Those are the two options. We say to God, your will be done, or he says to us, your will be done. This is what Passover is about. God has made a way. He's given a lamb. His name is Jesus. Let's just pause for a moment as we respond to this together. Father, this story, such an ancient story, a story retold and remembered again and again around the world. A story that is so familiar and yet still speaks anew to us. We thank you for it. We thank you for the drama of it. We thank you for the power of it. We thank you for what it shows us about you. But more than that, we thank you that because of Jesus, it is our story. We who are handed over to death, we who knew the wages of our sin and it was paying out. We who live in a world that is plagued by the powers that bring suffering and heartache and destruction. We who see the destroyer everywhere and his work. But we also who have been brought in, brought into a shelter, brought into a strong fortress, brought under your protection, so that by your blood we are covered. The accusations of the enemy can't get in. The attack of the enemies cannot get in. His power of destroying cannot get in. The death that he sows cannot get in. And we are sheltered by the Most High. The blood of the Lamb covers us. And so today, if it's just a reminder, God, bring us back under that shelter. Help us to know that we are covered, that we are safe with you. And for any who find themselves on the outside, Lord, maybe for the first time, seeing what it is that you want to do with them, the way you want to save them, the way you want to deliver them. Would you enable them, God, to take a step and to come under? That simple act of faith. Jesus, I love you. Protect me. Forgive me. Bring me near. May we know that power of protection, God. May we know the power of you who hovers over us, surrounds us, encamps around us, protect your people. We thank you, Lord. You who gave so much. You, the Lamb of God. We thank you that you have done this.

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We bless you, Lord. Our protector, our deliverer, our saviour, our Jesus. Oh man.

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We hope that you have enjoyed listening to Dean's thoughts today. If anything that he has said has challenged you or raised questions that you'd like answers to, please don't hesitate to contact us and ask for a chat. You can find our details on our website, which is leopc.co.uk, as well as on the information that we have posted for this podcast. Alternatively, if you live in our area, you are very welcome to join us on Sunday morning at 10 30 to hear things first hand. We'd love to see you there.