Exodus 12:14-51 – “Memorial Day”
Outline:
I.) Intro.
II.) Vs. 14-28 Rejoice, remember, reach
III.) Vs. 29-36 The blessing of obedience
IV.) Vs. 37-51 From worriers to warriors
Intro.
This week has been a week of stark contrasts. Not all of my weeks have so much emotion in them, but this one has. I’ve come to realize that I’m really not in control & as long as the Lord is, that’s a good thing! I received a phone call late at night on Monday requesting me to go visit a lady who has attended our church several times. As I went through the maze of getting into C.C.U, I was wondering what I was going to say to this lady that would lead her to make a decision for Christ. What happened was more glorious than I could have predicted & nothing to do with me. In fact, all God wanted to do was show me what He was capable of doing apart from any help from me. Why? Because He is in control. God brought me to C.C.U. to watch this dear lady become a believer in Jesus so that I could celebrate with her. Do you get this, dear saints? God does all the work & we respond to His work & then He invites us to a party to celebrate. Folks, because of Christ’s work as the Lamb of God, we are invited to a huge party & what God wants us to do is to begin to celebrate that truth now & invite others to the party!
II.) Vs. 14-28 Rejoice, remember, reach
Vs. 14 In verse 13, God had just announced the purpose of the Passover, “And when I see the blood, I will pass over you..” But just what would that mean to those of that generation & the ones that would follow? How did the events, which were a new beginning for the nation, to be expressed then & in the future? Well, I think that God wanted them to do three things: REJOICE, REMEMBER, & REACH OTHERS.
Rejoice:
I think holidays are great things, I mean who does not need a little R. & R.? But is that all they are meant to be? Have you ever stopped to consider what emotions some holidays meant to those who originally celebrated them? Folks, I think church can often become some sort of holiday that we have lost the emotional & spiritual meaning to. There are those liturgical churches that do these strange ceremonies in their services that to the outsider would mean nothing. Kind of like an old tune you know where you can only sing a few words of the chorus but have long since forgotten how the rest of it went. God does not want Israel to forget what Passover was all about, so for these next few chapters, He tells them what it was for & how they were to express themselves during it, but more than anything else He wants them to realize the joy of it.
Sixteen times in these verses the word “Lord” appears, so the first & foremost Passover & the ceremony that came about from this is about the Lord! So? Hey, our salvation, our life, our everything is about the Lord. What kind of memories come to your mind when you think about the day you came to Jesus? “Man, it was the worst day of my life & it’s been a bummer ever since!” No way! You start to get excited, perhaps even a little animated. So the Lord tells them that this day shall be a “memorial” to them.
Now I have to confess to you that this does not bring about animated feelings. You see, when I think of a “memorial,” I think of some monument & that does not bring up exciting feelings. “Where are you going on vacation?” “Ah, to some memorial park.” “How about you?” “Man, I’m going to an amusement park!” You see what I mean? The root of the word means “memento.” You know, one of those treasures that you purchase to remind you of the wonderful time that you had while on vacation. So God is giving them a “memento” of his freeing them from slavery. Then in the very next sentence, He tells them what that “memento” is: “you shall keep it as a FEAST to the Lord.”
The word “feast” here has two meanings:
1.) A victim or a sacrifice.
2.) A festival or a feast.
So what this suggests is that it was a time of great remembrance upon the sacrifice & because of that same sacrifice it was a time of great celebration. Folks, every time they took part in Passover, they would remember the sacrifice of the lamb & rejoice in the fact that God had provided the Lamb for their freedom. Hey, go back for a moment & look at verse 11 for a moment. It says that it was the “Lord’s Passover” & again in the 26th verse we are told that it is the “Passover sacrifice of the Lord.” So? Well, they were celebrating the Lord’s sacrifice. Do you get the picture? God has given you Himself & the day you received Him was a “memento” for you forever. You can forever go back to the day that you first received the Lord & at once be taken to the place of joy as well as understand the price paid for your joy. That is what communion is to be for us as well: a time when we regularly take stock of the cost of our salvation as well as rejoice in it!
Five times in these verses God reminds them the reason for the celebration: “It is a night of solemn observance to the LORD for bringing them out of the land of Egypt.” God does not just have some mindless celebration. No, God wants them to appreciate the meaning behind it. In fact, three times in these two chapters He tells them to explain to their children the meaning behind it (12:26). But how were they to celebrate?
1.) Vs. 15-20 By living sincerely:
Say what you will about this celebration, but one thing was for sure: they took it seriously. This is not your normal laid-back, come-whenever-you-want, the way-you-want party. No, there was a strict code given to us right here.
a.) Vs. 15,18-20 No leaven:
Leaven is yeast that comes in the flour water mix that actually causes the dough to spoil. When it spoils, it puffs up the mixture & gives it a flavor that most folks like (kind of sounds like pride). Now leaven in scripture has two similar ideas, neither of them good.
1.) It carries an idea of sin.
So that fits, we are not to come to our day of celebration with any unconfessed sin. In fact, we are to get rid of anything in our lives that does not please the Lord. So often people think of sin as what is good, not what is bad. You will see T.V. adds describing some dessert as “sinfully delightful.” The truth of the matter is that some things that may be temporarily pleasing to our appetites are misery in our lives.
2.) The second idea is that of hypocrisy
or pretending to be something that you are not. A person who hides behind a mask presenting an image of something that in reality, they are not.
So the Lord says here get rid of anything that would hinder you from the true celebration. Don’t come to the feast with any false stuff. Yes, it is come as you are & you are now Holy as He is Holy, so that is the way you should come. Look at how serious this was to the Lord: verse 15, to so continue on in that old former way was to find yourself out of the party, cut off from the celebration.
b.) Vs. 16 No work:
God tells them that they were not to work; instead, they were to recognize that they were called out. They were once slaves, now they were set free to serve the Lord. The only thing they were allowed to do was prepare to party with the Lord. Man, is God good or what? This is a “Holy calling out.” This reminds me that my salvation is not my work, it is His! I cannot earn His favor; I can only receive it! Heb. 4:10 reminds us of this truth: “For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works.” I’m through with striving in my flesh to be good enough, now I’m resting on His goodness.
What this says to me is that we are to live sincerely before the Lord, that is what pleases Him, that is how we honor Him. So the first thing we see about Passover was that it was a time of rejoicing.
Verse 17 alludes to another reason why we are to rejoice: it is the way in which the Lord now sees us, “for this same day I will bring your armies out of the land of Egypt.” Armies? What armies? Hey, don’t you just love how God addresses these Israelites. They were a bunch of worriers, now He calls them warriors. “That’s my man Dale, the lean mean fighting machine!” Are you kidding me? No, that is how the Lord sees them in the blood of the lamb. That frees me up to be me because it does not matter how you see me or even how I see myself, all that matters is what my Dad thinks of me.
Vs. 21-23 REMEMBRANCE
This brings me to the second thing that Passover was to be for them, a time of REMEMBRANCE.
Here the first thing I see is that God instructs Moses to take the elders of Israel first. So? Well, I don’t think that you can effectively lead people any place you are not willing to go yourself. God knew that the way to reach the multitudes was through the leaders, but what were they to remember?
a.) Vs. 21:
That their lives were at the cost of another’s & that it had to be personal. Do you see that? “Take lambs for yourselves…and kill the Passover lamb.” They were not any better than the rest of Israel, they too need to come to remembrance of the truth that they were sinners & that their sin made them guilty. Folks, you see our leaders here at Calvary? Well, they are just as in need of Jesus as you are, they have not nor will they ever get to a place where they don’t need the blood of Jesus to cover sins.
b.) Vs. 22:
Obedience to the Word of God was absolutely necessary for their salvation. They were not above the truth, they could not say to the rest of Israel, “do as I say, not as I do.” If they did, they would be as dead as the Egyptians. Folks, obedience to the word of the Lord is not an option. Hyssop is a plant that grows in small cracks in rocks with a strong scent. This little plant shows up time & again in scripture & always as an instrument in cleansing. It reminds me that of faith, small as it might be, if it is used to apply Christ’s blood to the door of my heart, I will be cleansed.
c.) Vs. 23:
Lastly, that it was only dependence upon the Lord that saved them. In Egypt, they thought that the god Osiris was the giver of life, but the elders knew that the Lord would not allow the destroyer to come in.
Vs. 24-28 REACHING out
The last thing God wanted them to know about the Passover was that it was to be a time of REACHING out to the next generation. And what about that? Well, notice again the words of verse 27, when the children ask, “What do you mean by this..”, they were to say, “It is a Passover sacrifice of the Lord.” Do you see that? It was not a sacrifice of the lamb but rather a sacrifice of the Lord. The responsibility was clearly laid upon that generation to reach their children & keeping the Passover was a means to share the truth of the work of God in their lives.
What was the result of this? Well, look at verse 27b “they bowed their heads & worshiped.” Hey folks, don’t just teach people the need to go to church, no teach them the need to worship the true & living God. And guess what? Verse 28 says that they went away & did so. In other words, obedience to the word of the Lord was connected to true worship. It was not what they said that indicated that they worshiped, no, it was what they did in response to the word of the Lord. I know so many people who think because they show in a building at a worship service that they are worshiping God, that’s not worshiping God; only obeying His word is that.
III.) Vs. 29-36 The blessing of obedience
Vs. 29-36 Now we are again told of the blessings of obedience & it is twofold:
a.) Vs. 29-32:
They did not get what they deserved. As Israel was worshiping, Egypt was weeping. Oh dear Christian, does that not break your heart? Death is the great equalizer, is it not? And Pharaoh, who had promised in 10:28 to kill Moses if he saw him again, is now in the middle of the night sending for him. What a change! Moses was the one who spoke of the Lord’s wishes in “Letting His people go,” now it is Pharaoh who tells Moses to take everything & everyone & go. The final words of Pharaoh are “bless me also.” Pharaoh is now asking for prayer from Moses. How different things could have been if Pharaoh would have just heeded the word of the Lord.
b.) Vs. 33-36:
Then you have the second blessing, that of getting what you don’t deserve. So they take again according to what the Lord had told them, plus the plunder they received from the Egyptians. Hey, God blesses because of Who He is, not because we deserve anything. Now if they had not done according to the Word of the Lord, well, there would have been no blessing, so they had a part to play as well.
IV.) Vs. 37-51 From worriers to warriors
Vs. 37- 41 As they take out on their journey, they travel some 20 miles from the supply city of Rameses to Succoth, which means shelters. You will again notice that a mixed multitude went up from Egypt, no doubt some of them were believers & others were those who escaped Egypt on the good graces of the Lord. It was no doubt some of these that were the complainers. Furthermore, we are told that they took no provisions. Why? Because the Lord was their provision. And in all of this, it was according to what God had said in the Bible.
I just love the fact that God calls these worriers warriors. As far as God was concerned, this rag-tag group was now His army; we too have been transformed by the blood of the lamb from slaves to warriors. And it’s all through His power.
The last point here is who is allowed to take part in the feast, & you will see that it is only those who are set apart in the Lord. That is what circumcision is all about: the cutting away of the old life representing a new life in Christ. You could hang out with the children of Israel if you weren’t circumcised, but you couldn’t participate in the feast! Why would anyone want to do that? So that is what we too can celebrate about our conversion, & may I just say that God wants to include you in the feast as well.