Our guest blogger today is Tonja Smith who leads our Single Moms Ministry at First Baptist. Thank you Tonja for blessing us with information about the Passover!

THE LORD’S PASSOVER

 

“These are the feasts of the Lord, holy convocations which you shall proclaim at their appointed times. On the fourteenth day of the first month at twilight is the Lord’s Passover.” Leviticus 23:4-5

 

Several years ago I began to study the Feasts of the Lord as outlined in Leviticus 23.  I cannot understate the change in my heart that came with learning about these Feasts. I read and studied realizing there was a lot to glean, but it wasn’t until I began to actually celebrate the Feasts that the dim picture began to clarify and become multi-dimensional. They are a key that opens up layers in the Scriptures. Every time I seek God’s face through His Feasts, He blesses me in ways that I don’t believe I could receive in any other way. The depth of what our Savior did for us, and will do for us, is so beautifully outlined in these Feasts.  When I started this journey, the Scriptures literally began to come off the pages of my Bible and transform my life. I became a doer of the Word and not merely a hearer, as outlined in James.

 

There are 7 Feasts of the Lord (Leviticus 23) and together they depict the entire redemptive career of Messiah. The spring feasts are Passover, Unleavened Bread, First Fruits, and Pentecost. These were all fulfilled completely and to the letter by Jesus when he came the first time.  The three remaining feasts occur in the fall and will be fulfilled when Jesus returns. They are all set to the backdrop of agricultural harvests, but symbolize the picture of human history through the ages.  Spring has come and we have been in the summer for 2000 years, but I personally believe we are nearing the end of summer and fall is near.

 

The Passover is the foundation for all the feasts, and it is directly linked to two more, the Feast of Unleavened Bread and the Feast of First Fruits, all of which fall within a 7 day span. To understand more fully the sacrifice made by Jesus, we can look at the original Passover of Exodus, the deliverance of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt. After over 400 years as slaves, the Lord delivers them through Moses, who is a “picture type” of the Messiah to come. Ten plagues come on Egypt, each one aimed at false gods they worshiped. The tenth plague was severe and God instructed the Israelites very specifically in Exodus 12 how to be protected and delivered from the plague. All the firstborn in Egypt would die, except for those that followed the specific instructions of the Lord as spelled out in Exodus 12. Here is how Jesus fulfilled the Passover:

 

“On the tenth of this month every man shall take for himself a lamb, according to the house of his father, a lamb for a household….your animal must be without defect….you are to keep it until the fourteenth day of the month, and then the entire assembly of the community of Israel will slaughter it at dusk. They are to take some of the blood and smear it on the two sides and top of the doorframe at the entrance of the house in which they eat it.” Ex 12:3,5,6,7

 

This was fulfilled by Jesus when He entered Jerusalem on the tenth day of the first month, to the cheers and praises of the people. “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” Mat 21:9 This is a quote of The Hillel, Psalms 113-118, which is recited at each Passover Feast, and this scene of the Triumphal Entry also fulfills Zech 9:9.  Hosanna in Hebrew is Hoshiana which means “save, please!”  For four days Jesus was in Jerusalem observed by all, questioned by the Pharisees and Sadducees, put on trial, inspected and found blameless – the lamb without defect. He was crucified and died at the precise time that the Passover lambs were being slaughtered in the Temple on the fourteenth day of the month.

 

“Pick out and take lambs for yourselves according to your families, and kill the Passover lamb. And you shall take a bunch of hyssop, dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and strike the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood that is in the basin. And none of you shall go out of the door of his house until morning. For the Lord will pass through to strike the Egyptians; and when He sees the blood on the lintel and on the two doorposts, the Lord will pass over the door and not allow the destroyer to come into your houses to strike you. And you shall observe this thing as an ordinance for you and your sons forever.” Ex 12:21-24

 

What happened in Egypt was an actual event that brought freedom from slavery for the Israelites.  It was a physical foreshadowing of what would later be an actual event when Jesus, the Passover lamb, would bring freedom to the world through the shedding of His blood. All who apply the blood of Jesus to the doorposts of their heart will be saved!

“BEHOLD THE LAMB WHO TAKES AWAY THE SIN OF THE WORLD!” John 1:29

 

The Last Supper with his disciples was a Passover Seder He celebrated with them, His family, where He showed them the significance of what He was about to do.  The bread would symbolize His body, unleavened (sinless), and broken for us. There were 4 cups of wine, each symbolizing something different, but He drank the cup of redemption which symbolized His blood shed for the New Covenant of freedom from sin.

 

The Passover has been celebrated by Jews and many Christians alike for over 3,000 years now. Spartanburg is blessed to have Beth Shiloh Messianic Synagogue where Rabbi Andy Meyerson leads Jewish Christians to worship our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I hope you will be able to join us for the Passover Seder this year for the entire community of Spartanburg. I invite you to join with us to celebrate all that Christ has done for us during the Easter Season. Don’t miss the blessing!

 

 

Tonja Smith

April 2014