We have been exploring the Exodus Event, which started with the Passover meal. The Passover meal revolved around a lamb. The Passover lamb was to be without blemish, tested for five days, and was to provide innocent blood to deliver the firstborn sons of Israel. Each of these details of the Passover lamb found its ultimate fulfillment in Jesus Christ—the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.
3. WITHOUT BLEMISH (B.C.)
The Passover revolves around a lamb, and not just because the day is a feast. The lamb serves as both rescue and food. Because of the atoning function of the lamb, it was essential that the lamb would be a year-old male, without blemish. The matter of being without blemish is crucial here. The blemish could be temporary or permanent, superficial or a deformity, and could include the apparent inability to reproduce. (You must sacrifice not only this lamb, but all of the offspring that would have come from it.) Because the lamb is to substitute for a human life, any blemishes would weaken its effect. An innocent lamb substitutes for the life of a guilty human, and so it must be without blemish.
3. WITHOUT BLEMISH (B.C.)
Jesus also came as an unblemished Lamb, the perfect Lamb of God, slain from the foundation of the world. Just as the Passover lamb was to be unblemished, so it was crucial that Jesus be without sin or defect. Peter says that we were redeemed “with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.” (1 Peter 1:19) It is only because Jesus was without defect that He was able to make His church holy, as He is: Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her, “so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.” (Ephesians 5:27) If Jesus had not been perfect, then His atoning death would not have been efficacious.
4. FIVE DAYS (B.C.)
God gives an unusual directive with regard to the Passover lamb: Each household was to take a sheep or a goat, as long as it fit the requirements, and “keep it” from the tenth to the fourteenth day of the month. For most of a week, you observe him, witness his unblemished state, feed, water and care for him, and, I assume, grow close to him. The children might be likely to name him Fluffy, and note his unique characteristics. And then, Fluffy must be slaughtered. There is nothing casual about this sacrifice!
4. FIVE DAYS (A.D.)
Jesus entered the Holy City of Jerusalem on the Sunday before Passover—the tenth of the month! Then He taught in the Temple every day for the next five days, where Israel was able to observe Him, witness His unblemished state, care for Him, and grow close to Him. The children were singing His praises in the Temple area, and He showed His disciples the full extent of His love as He washed their feet. He was truly the spotless Lamb of God, and all who saw Him confirmed it.
5. INNOCENT BLOOD (B.C.)
The next detail that God tells Moses and Aaron is that the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel is to kill their lambs at twilight. They drain the blood, pour it into a basin, and then spread the blood on the doorposts and lintel of the houses in which they were to be eaten. (Note: This was the first and final time that this particular generation of Israel had a doorframe to paint, because they lived in tents for the next forty years!) The blood was the center of their deliverance, of course. Of all the other details, none is more important than the blood of a lamb covering the entryway to the house. God said, “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.”
5. INNOCENT BLOOD (A.D.)
They were to roast and eat all of the meat of the lamb that night, together with unleavened bread. Jesus revealed that blood and unleavened bread were to be the central elements of the new covenant, as well. Jesus reassigned the meaning and purpose of the cups of wine that were part of the Passover meal, in order to tie them directly to the blood that covered the door frames of houses. “And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, saying, "Drink of it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.” (Matthew 26:27-28) We have come to call this the Lord’s Supper, or Holy Communion, which Jesus commanded His followers to do in remembrance of Him. Without the blood, there would be no forgiveness, as the book of Hebrews tells us: “Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins.” (Hebrews 9:22)