Apr 2009
Truly Deleavened?
26/04/09 16:56
During the seven day long feast that follows Passover, we are required to remain leaven free. God tells us that we must eat unleavened bread on each of those seven days and that leavened products are not to be seen in our homes. Seven is God’s number of completion, or perfection. The feast is seven days long, so the duration of that feast pictures a process that is taking place in our lives, or should be.
Exodus 12:18
18 “In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at evening, you shall eat unleavened bread, until the twenty-first day of the month at evening. 19 For seven days no leaven shall be found in your houses, since whoever eats what is leavened, that same person shall be cut off from the congregation of Israel, whether he is a stranger or a native of the land. 20 You shall eat nothing leavened; in all your dwellings you shall eat unleavened bread.”
Abstaining from leaven is so much more than just the physical removing of the leaven from our homes and of not partaking of leavened products during the feast. God always uses physical things to teach us the true spiritual lessons that He wants us to understand. Becoming deleavened, brings about some changes in our lives and our normal every day routines. Extra care and thought must go into our meals and our eating habits are changed. We also have to be on guard against allowing any leaven to enter our homes, or our bodies. For those seven days we have to be vigilant and watchful.
What about when the feast has ended? We are free to eat leavened products again and we can go right back to the way we were before the feast. We can go right back to living the same life we were before and we can go back to being the same person we were before the feast, but where is the lesson? What are we to take away from the feast?
God asks us to remove something during the feast...leaven. Leaven is just a representation of what God really wants us to do. The leaven represents sin and all of the things that are contrary to living God’s way that we need to remove from out of our lives. God wants those things removed completely! We are not only to remove those things out of our lives, but they are not to be found anywhere among us including our dwellings. We are to be completely free from those things that are contrary to God.
The leaven that was in our lives, needs to be replaced with something. Just as God fed Israel in the wilderness with manna, the bread from heaven, we need to feed on the bread of life. God sent His only Son, Jesus Christ, from heaven for us. He is the true bread of life, the bread that brings eternal life. It is not enough to just remove the leaven from our lives, we need to replace it with the true bread of life...we need to be leavened with that true bread that comes from God.
Until next time...
Exodus 12:18
18 “In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at evening, you shall eat unleavened bread, until the twenty-first day of the month at evening. 19 For seven days no leaven shall be found in your houses, since whoever eats what is leavened, that same person shall be cut off from the congregation of Israel, whether he is a stranger or a native of the land. 20 You shall eat nothing leavened; in all your dwellings you shall eat unleavened bread.”
Abstaining from leaven is so much more than just the physical removing of the leaven from our homes and of not partaking of leavened products during the feast. God always uses physical things to teach us the true spiritual lessons that He wants us to understand. Becoming deleavened, brings about some changes in our lives and our normal every day routines. Extra care and thought must go into our meals and our eating habits are changed. We also have to be on guard against allowing any leaven to enter our homes, or our bodies. For those seven days we have to be vigilant and watchful.
What about when the feast has ended? We are free to eat leavened products again and we can go right back to the way we were before the feast. We can go right back to living the same life we were before and we can go back to being the same person we were before the feast, but where is the lesson? What are we to take away from the feast?
God asks us to remove something during the feast...leaven. Leaven is just a representation of what God really wants us to do. The leaven represents sin and all of the things that are contrary to living God’s way that we need to remove from out of our lives. God wants those things removed completely! We are not only to remove those things out of our lives, but they are not to be found anywhere among us including our dwellings. We are to be completely free from those things that are contrary to God.
The leaven that was in our lives, needs to be replaced with something. Just as God fed Israel in the wilderness with manna, the bread from heaven, we need to feed on the bread of life. God sent His only Son, Jesus Christ, from heaven for us. He is the true bread of life, the bread that brings eternal life. It is not enough to just remove the leaven from our lives, we need to replace it with the true bread of life...we need to be leavened with that true bread that comes from God.
Until next time...
Our Passover...
04/04/09 09:25
Exodus 12:3,5
3 “Speak to all the congregation of Israel, saying: ‘On the tenth day of this month every man shall take for himself a lamb, according to the house of his father, a lamb for a household.’”
5 ‘Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year. You may take it from the sheep or from the goats.’
God gave specific instructions to Moses, to speak to Israel, for the preparation of the Passover. A lamb was to be set apart and it had to be perfect and without any imperfection. A male lamb that was to serve a very important role in what God was planning to free Israel from Egypt. At long last the Israelites were to be freed from their bondage, but if they did not follow God’s instructions exactly...they would die.
They had a decision before them, they could trust God and receive life and freedom, or they could choose to ignore God and His protection and receive death. The blood of the lambs that were killed, was to serve as a sign between Israel and God, so that God would pass over them when He struck the first born of Egypt. They had to remain in their houses, under the protection of the blood, to be spared the fate of the Egyptians.
Exodus 12:22-23
22 “And you shall take a bunch of hyssop, dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and strike the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood that is in the basin. And none of you shall go out of the door of his house until morning.”
23 “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 not allow the destroyer to come into your houses to strike you.”
By obeying God and accepting what He told them, by trusting in Him and following His instructions exactly, the children of Israel were spared a certain fate of death. The ONLY thing that differentiated them from the Egyptians, was the blood on their homes as a sign that they were God’s people.
God instructed Israel that this event was to be observed forever throughout their generations. It was to be an ordinance (an authoritative order; a decree ) to them forever. God wanted this event memorialized forever among His people. It was an important event and there will never be another Passover equal to that first Passover observed in Egypt.
Many years later, another lamb would be separated out and prepared for a special use and purpose. A lamb perfect and without blemish, a male...the Son of God! Jesus Christ was set apart and selected to serve as the Passover Lamb for all time. Jesus Christ was sacrificed and His blood was shed to provide a covering and a protection to those who would receive it, just as the blood that was on the dwelling places of the Israelites in Egypt.
John 1:29
29 The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”
We are all in bondage to this world, the bondage of sin. We are called to come out of this world. Jesus Christ provided the sacrifice and the blood that is necessary for us to be passed over and protected from the fate of death that living in bondage to this world leads to. We have to accept and come under the sacrifice of Christ, our Passover, to receive life.
When we come under the sacrifice of Christ, we are marked by His blood, just as the dwellings of the Israelites were marked by the Passover lambs that they slaughtered. The blood of Christ removes the penalty of death and provides protection from the destruction that God will send and brings us life.
As we prepare ourselves for the Passover, it is important that we contemplate what Christ did for us, what He provided for us, so that we may have life. He went to His death willingly, knowing that He could not fail, because the entire fate of mankind depended on what He had to do. Christ gave everything for us! Jesus Christ died, so that we may have life...
1 Corinthians 5:7
7 Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us.
Our Passover is Christ and in Christ. We are passed over, forgiven and spared the fate we have earned. Christ, the lamb of God, died on the Passover day. That Passover day was the most important and pivotal event in the history of this world! Just as that first Passover in Egypt, there will never be another Passover to compare to that Passover, when Christ gave himself for all of mankind.
Are you passed over?
Until next time...
3 “Speak to all the congregation of Israel, saying: ‘On the tenth day of this month every man shall take for himself a lamb, according to the house of his father, a lamb for a household.’”
5 ‘Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year. You may take it from the sheep or from the goats.’
God gave specific instructions to Moses, to speak to Israel, for the preparation of the Passover. A lamb was to be set apart and it had to be perfect and without any imperfection. A male lamb that was to serve a very important role in what God was planning to free Israel from Egypt. At long last the Israelites were to be freed from their bondage, but if they did not follow God’s instructions exactly...they would die.
They had a decision before them, they could trust God and receive life and freedom, or they could choose to ignore God and His protection and receive death. The blood of the lambs that were killed, was to serve as a sign between Israel and God, so that God would pass over them when He struck the first born of Egypt. They had to remain in their houses, under the protection of the blood, to be spared the fate of the Egyptians.
Exodus 12:22-23
22 “And you shall take a bunch of hyssop, dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and strike the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood that is in the basin. And none of you shall go out of the door of his house until morning.”
23 “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 not allow the destroyer to come into your houses to strike you.”
By obeying God and accepting what He told them, by trusting in Him and following His instructions exactly, the children of Israel were spared a certain fate of death. The ONLY thing that differentiated them from the Egyptians, was the blood on their homes as a sign that they were God’s people.
God instructed Israel that this event was to be observed forever throughout their generations. It was to be an ordinance (an authoritative order; a decree ) to them forever. God wanted this event memorialized forever among His people. It was an important event and there will never be another Passover equal to that first Passover observed in Egypt.
Many years later, another lamb would be separated out and prepared for a special use and purpose. A lamb perfect and without blemish, a male...the Son of God! Jesus Christ was set apart and selected to serve as the Passover Lamb for all time. Jesus Christ was sacrificed and His blood was shed to provide a covering and a protection to those who would receive it, just as the blood that was on the dwelling places of the Israelites in Egypt.
John 1:29
29 The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”
We are all in bondage to this world, the bondage of sin. We are called to come out of this world. Jesus Christ provided the sacrifice and the blood that is necessary for us to be passed over and protected from the fate of death that living in bondage to this world leads to. We have to accept and come under the sacrifice of Christ, our Passover, to receive life.
When we come under the sacrifice of Christ, we are marked by His blood, just as the dwellings of the Israelites were marked by the Passover lambs that they slaughtered. The blood of Christ removes the penalty of death and provides protection from the destruction that God will send and brings us life.
As we prepare ourselves for the Passover, it is important that we contemplate what Christ did for us, what He provided for us, so that we may have life. He went to His death willingly, knowing that He could not fail, because the entire fate of mankind depended on what He had to do. Christ gave everything for us! Jesus Christ died, so that we may have life...
1 Corinthians 5:7
7 Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us.
Our Passover is Christ and in Christ. We are passed over, forgiven and spared the fate we have earned. Christ, the lamb of God, died on the Passover day. That Passover day was the most important and pivotal event in the history of this world! Just as that first Passover in Egypt, there will never be another Passover to compare to that Passover, when Christ gave himself for all of mankind.
Are you passed over?
Until next time...