We continue our meditation on Jesus' Passover celebration meal with His disciples the night before His crucifixion. What happened during the first Passover? For the firstborn of Israel to be saved and for the nation to be freed from Egypt, the land of slavery, God required faith in the blood of the Passover lamb. Without faith, it is impossible to please Him (Hebrews 11:6). The Israelites took some hyssop plants and dipped them into a bowl of blood from the sacrificial lamb. The blood was placed at the doorstep, and the hyssop was dipped into it. The lintel and sides of the doorframe were then struck with blood, forming an image of a cross over the door. The Lord describes what happened in Isaiah 31:5:
Like birds hovering overhead, the LORD Almighty will shield Jerusalem; he will shield it and deliver it, he will 'pass over' it and will rescue it (Isaiah 31:5; emphasis added).
The context of the prophetic passage above is about protecting Jerusalem. The Lord describes Himself as watching over the city and shielding them from harm. Ceil and Moishe Rosen, in their book Christ in the Passover, say this about the Hebrew word translated into English as "pass over":
The verb "pass over" has a deeper meaning than stepping or leaping over something to avoid contact. It is not the common Hebrew verb, a-bhar, or ga-bhar, frequently used in that sense. The word used here is pasah, from which comes the noun pasha, translated as Passover. These words have no connection with any other Hebrew word, but they resemble the Egyptian word pesh, which means "to spread wings over" to protect.[1]
The picture depicts the Lord protecting His people from harm. It offers new insight into the passage about Jesus mourning over the city of Jerusalem. He said: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing” (Luke 13:34). The God we have come to know and love longs to bring us close to His heart. He desires to wrap His arms around us to protect us, just as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings. The blood of the substitute lamb brought the protection and presence of the Lord to those who believed God's Word:
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).
“God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble” (Psalm 46:1). As a destroying angel passed through the land, God's presence was over the household whose faith was in the blood of the substitute lamb. The blood demonstrated that they were under covenant with God, and the destroyer could not harm the household because of their obedience to the Lord's instructions. All the firstborn of those who ignored the message of salvation died. The Passover celebration meal was a festive meal that commemorated deliverance from slavery in Egypt, but it also prophetically pointed to what the Messiah would do to save His people from the bondage of sin.
The Passover symbolizes our Passover Lamb, who is the substitute in whom we place our faith. Pharaoh represents Satan, who kept us in cruel slavery through our sins. Egypt symbolizes our worldly system, and Moses foreshadowed our deliverer, Jesus. Jesus is our deliverer and sacrificial Lamb, who laid down His life to save us if we trust in His shed blood, applied to the door of our hearts. God desires to dwell at the center of our lives, in the home of our hearts, and to be with us for eternity. Paul the Apostle wrote, "For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed” (1 Corinthians 5:7). Keith Thomas.
Taken from the series on the Gospel of Luke, study 59. The Last Supper
[1] Ceil and Moishe Rosen, Christ in the Passover, Printed by Moody Press, Chicago, 1978. Page 22.