Wow. That was some two weeks…walking with Jesus through the Stations of the Cross and ending with Easter! I hope yours was a fitting celebration.

If you’re following our Pentateuch Reading Plan, and you’re on schedule, you read through Exodus 20 last week. Now the schedule has us reading Matthew’s gospel. (There aren’t enough chapters in Genesis – Deuteronomy to fill the 260 reading days, so we’ve interspersed some gospels.)

We’ve paused at Exodus 20 because Genesis 1 – Exodus 20 is an important, possibly essential, part of the Story, taking us from Creation to the Flood to dividing the nations at Babel, to choosing Abraham. The Story continues with the chosen people in Egypt, their miraculous deliverance, and the giving of the Law.

Back to our series on Moses. We left him and the Israelites wondering if God was going to do something even though he confirmed the promise. The ten plagues begin in Exodus chapter 7, but I want to skip to the last one since we’ve just gone through Passion Week.

Instructions for the Passover begin in Exodus 11, and in Exodus 12, we have the first reference to “the Passover lamb:”

Then Moses called all the elders of Israel and said to them, “Go and select lambs for yourselves according to your clans, and kill the Passover lamb. Take a bunch of hyssop and dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and touch the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood that is in the basin. None of you shall go out of the door of his house until the 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 will not allow the destroyer to enter your houses to strike you. (Exodus 12.21 – 23, ESV, emphasis mine)

It is no accident that Jesus was crucified on Passover:

The next day [John the Baptist] saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1.29, ESV)

For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. (1 Corinthians 5.7, ESV)

Indeed Herod and Pontius Pilate met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed. They did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen. (Acts 4.27, 28, NIV)