Lavender & Lace

The story of Jesus begins in the book of Exodus.

Genesis ends with all of Israel going down into Egypt and having favor because of a man named Joseph. Joseph had a position of authority and favor so Israel settled there and prospered for about 400 years. And as Israel became more and more numerous the Pharaoh of that time, who didn’t know Joseph, became threatened by this and issued a decree to oppress the people, enslaved them, and eventually decides to murder them.

Then Pharaoh gave this order to all his people: “Every Hebrew boy that is born you must throw into the Nile, but let every girl live.” Exodus 1:22

So this begins the process of Gods rescue for his people out of Egypt. He calls a very reluctant guy names Moses who is called to deliver this message to Pharaoh;

“Then say to Pharaoh, ‘This is what the Lord says: Israel is my firstborn son, and I told you, “Let my son go, so he may worship me.” But you refused to let him go; so I will kill your firstborn son.’ Exodus 4:22

There are ten very famous plagues that are directed against the gods of Egypt, to show Gods superiority over them. They also represented opportunities for Pharaoh to repent and release the people.

“The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in 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. Then they are to take some of the blood and put it on the sides and tops of the doorframes 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 in your hand. Eat it in haste; it is the Lord’s Passover.” Exodus 12:1

After nine attempts Pharaoh has still not released the people and now God is going to claim life for life. But now, Israel has to participate. A lamb is to be sacrificed, and since its blood represents its life, the people are commanded to take it and smear it on the door posts of their homes. Which is such an odd thing for those who are new to the Bible…

“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 houses and strike you down.” Exodus 12:23

If you did not put blood on your doorframe, even as an Israelite, your first born would be struck down. It didn’t matter what your origin was, what mattered was whether or not you put the blood on your doorframe.

The noun, Passover, which is what we use to describe this festival is different from the verb, To Passover. The verb here is used as this image of a mother hen guarding her chicks. Hovering over them and shielding them from some outward threat. So the image of Passover is of a “destroyer” who is unleashed in Egypt who will indiscriminately take the first born son of every household…unless you have this blood. God is not just coming down and skipping over houses like we think he is, he is in essence, shielding or protecting his people from death.

This is important because Passover is not an atoning ritual it’s a protective ritual.

Which makes it interesting that Jesus chooses Passover rather than The Day of Atonement to describe his work in the world.

In the Old Testament when you talked about “salvation” Passover was the prominent vocabulary and image. It was the most important story Israel would tell, they would (and still do) celebrate it every year, this was the defining picture of salvation.

God protected them from death.

The first time we meet Jesus in the book of John it’s through a guy nicknamed “The Baptizer”. And he proclaims upon seeing Jesus from afar; “Behold, the lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world!”

If you have your Jewish ears on you would immediately recognize this imagery.

Passover imagery dominated the gospels.

And within the Passover ritual a lamb would need to be examined for blemish or defect. Pilot examines Jesus and three times announced his innocence.

“It was the day of Preparation of the Passover; it was about noon.” John 19:14

The Day of Preparation was the day before the celebration of Passover where the lambs would be slaughtered because there were so many that needed to be killed to supply every household in Jerusalem. So Jesus is handed over the be crucified at the same moment that the Passover lambs are beginning to be slaughtered.

“Now it was the day of Preparation, and the next day was to be a special Sabbath. Because the Jewish leaders did not want the bodies left on the crosses during the Sabbath, they asked Pilate to have the legs broken and the bodies taken down. The soldiers therefore came and broke the legs of the first man who had been crucified with Jesus, and then those of the other. But when they came to Jesus and found that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. Instead, one of the soldiers pierced Jesus’ side with a spear, bringing a sudden flow of blood and water. The man who saw it has given testimony, and his testimony is true. He knows that he tells the truth, and he testifies so that you also may believe.” John 19:31

Crucifixion was one of the most horrific things you could do to somebody. The way that you died was slow and agonizing suffocation. As the nails pieced through the bones of your wrists and heels you would have to lift yourself up, bone rubbing against metal, to take a breath. And one of the ways to speed up the dying process would be the break the legs of the crucified individual so that they could no longer lift themselves up to breath.

“These things happened so that the scripture would be fulfilled:“Not one of his bones will be broken,” John 19: 36

So what did Israel have to do to avoid the 10th plague?

1. Select a year old lamb without defect
2. Examine it
3. Slaughter and roast over fire
4. Paint the doorposts with the blood
5. Eat the lamb
6. Do not break any of its bones
7. Stay in the house till morning

When we read the gospels with all these incidental details, very often we’re not realizing that what we are reading is the author shouting that Jesus very deliberately chose Passover to explain his mission and death.

When we go back to what salvation meant in the old Exodus and look at what salvation means in the new Exodus we get the same sorts of images.

Salvation means deliverance out of slavery.

What would you say you are enslaved to? The powers? Sin? The destroyer?

The book of Genesis begins with the idea of death. The first thing the serpent says to Eve was, “you will not die”. But what happens when sin enters the world? There is death.

Jesus death protects us from death.

And I think it’s interesting to notice that during the Passover, is the lamb being punished? No. It’s being sacrificed. A life for a life.

There is this conception that many of us have where God is an angry God and that he has to be appeased by sacrifice. And so many of us have this hangover when it comes to sacrifice language or atonement language and we think that what Jesus did was protect us from God. But in Passover terms, God is protecting us from wrath.

The destroyer is unleashed and then God comes down to protect like a mother hen, hovering over her chicks.

The cross is not what God inflicts in order to forgive. The cross is what God in Jesus endures as he forgives. The cross is not where Jesus changes God but where Jesus reveals God.

On Good Friday Jesus does not save us from God, Jesus reveals God as Savior!

Jesus was saving the world-and he was saving it the only way the world could be saved.

For sin and death to be defeated he had to drink that cup. All of this plays out in the arena of love. Love alone provides the motive for the Passover drama.

“While they were eating, Jesus took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Take and eat; this is my body.”

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.” Matthew 26:26

The blood of the covenant is what Moses talk about in Exodus.

So Jesus is saving us from a different Pharaoh. He saving us into a different kind of life that a meal turns out to celebrate. Using the exact same language Moses used to describe a meal that was the foundation of the covenant in the Old Testament.

When Jesus chooses the manner in which he will die it’s not random. And Passover is the place that best explains what Jesus is doing as he’s dying. He’s not just rescuing us from something, he’s rescuing us for something. He’s not saving us from God, he’s saving us for God.

And there is a destroyer. Absolutely. There is wrath. This present age will be destroyed. And I want you to picture the people of God as a nest where Christ himself hovers over it protecting us from the destroyer that is floating around in our culture.

For those of us who take shelter in Christ, not only as those liberated people but as protected people, as this present age destroys itself-we are not included in that destruction.

And we’re saved into a reality that we celebrate with a covenant meal; the wine and the bread.

And just as the ancient Israelites had to participate for themselves-they couldn’t just depend on their neighbors doorway, they had to cover their own- they also had to trust that it worked.

Can you imagine being locked in your house and hearing from however far away, screaming and wailing as Egypt begins to wake up to this devastation. You can’t see the blood on your doorframe but you’re literally just trusting that you did it right and that it worked.

That’s a really interesting picture that the New Testament invites us into. That your righteousness or sinlessness, none of it adds anything. All you can do is trust.

And to me this is great news because I have lived most of my life trying to demonstrate that I really loved God. When in actuality, the whole point was that God loved me so much that he came and he died. And that shift has really taught me a lot about what grace turns out to be like.

More on that later…