Our text today as we return to the Old Testament and to this exciting portion of Scripture dealing with the release of the Israelites from their bondage in Egypt. The title of the message today is The Final Plague and the First Passover. Exodus chapter 12. You and I live in an age which does not take the God of the Bible very seriously. There are those who refuse to acknowledge God's existence, of course.
There are those who see the belief in a God as a human weakness, as a crutch upon which weak human beings must lean. Then there are others who don't take God very seriously and mock Him, blaspheme Him. An example of that perhaps would be the kind of film that has been talked about so much and recently in the news. There are those films that depict God as a jovial, cigar-smoking old man. And there are those that depict Him as this last one, as a confused, hot-blooded young Messiah.
Very little respect for the God of the Bible. Then there are those who redefine God, who seek to fit Him into their concept, their concept of what God should be like. To them, God is an idea to be explored and developed. God to them is the product of human thought and the evolution of that. Then there are still others who claim to believe and follow the biblical God, but they refuse to live in obedience to His demands of lordship in their lives.
These are those who want to have God in their lives as long as He keeps out of their way. I say again, we live in an age which does not take the God of the Bible very seriously. The failure to take God seriously brought the nation of Egypt in the 15th century B.C. to its knees. God sent nine plagues upon that nation because of the hard-heartedness of its leader, Pharaoh. One more is yet to come. What were these plagues that God sent?
On the one hand, they were expressions in the material, physical world of His judgment, God's judgment, upon the hardened heart of Pharaoh. On the other hand, they were also evidences of the impotence of Egypt's gods. For each plague was directly or indirectly an attack upon the Egyptian pantheon. And each one exposed that false system of belief upon which the Egyptians based their lives. We come now to the final plague, as well as the first Passover.
What our text today tells us is that we must take God seriously. Whether we be saint or sinner, lost or saved, we dare not trifle with the God of the Bible. Let's consider first the final plague. As we look at this, we are reminded that there is an end to the mercy and the patience of God. God's delay of judgment is often misinterpreted as His disinterest in sin. That is a fatal mistake, because God does take note of it. God is not lackadaisical about injustices.
He is not careless about the oppression in our world. He sees it all, and He sees the immorality, the lying, the stealing, the murder. He sees the covetousness, the materialism, the dishonoring of parents, the rebellion against His appointed authority. God knows the self-centeredness of our culture. He knows it all. He deals with sinners one by one as they fall into His hands at death. Furthermore, He brings an eventual and planned end to those nations and cultures which choose to forget Him.
God will not be mocked. As rich in mercy as He is, He is also angry with the wicked every day, and His wrath is coming upon every one of them to repay them for their evil. This truth is illustrated in the plagues that fell upon Egypt. Some of the plagues were preceded by warnings, such as this tenth plague.
Look in chapter 11, verse 4, where Moses said, Thus says the LORD, About midnight I am going out into the midst of Egypt, and all the firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die, From the firstborn of the Pharaoh who sits on his throne, Even to the firstborn of the slave-girl who is behind the millstones, All the firstborn of the cattle as well. Moreover, there shall be a great cry in the land of Egypt, Such as there has not been before, and such as shall never be again.
But against any of the sons of Israel a dog shall not even bark, Whether against man or beast. You may understand how the LORD makes a distinction between Egypt and Israel. And all these your servants will come down to me, And bow themselves before me, saying, Go out, you and all the people who follow you. And after that I will go out. And Moses went out from Pharaoh in hot anger. And now turn over a page as we look in chapter 12 and verse 29.
And now it came about at midnight that the LORD struck all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, From the firstborn of Pharaoh who sat on his throne, To the firstborn of the captive who was in the dungeon, And all the firstborn of cattle. And Pharaoh arose in the night, he and all his servants, and all the Egyptians. There was a great cry in Egypt, For there was no home where there was not someone dead. Egypt learned that night that you must take the God of the Bible seriously.
The last plague underscores that truth. Notice the details, the time was about midnight. Keep in mind that they were not watching Johnny Carson in those days. Normally they went to bed when the sun went to bed. And in that part of the world it goes to bed about the same time every night, early in the evening. But I can guarantee you that night there was not much sleep. There was wonder and fear and worry. Would this happen, which Moses had spoken? And certainly about midnight it did.
Now what was the action, what did happen? Well it tells us that the Lord struck the firstborn. We're not told how it happened, that is really unimportant. The fact is that this was the hand of the Lord. He sent his angel throughout the land of Egypt at midnight. And notice the extent of this plague. It was both selective and universal. It touched only the firstborn, it was selective. The secondborn, thirdborn and so on were fine. But the firstborn in every house was killed.
How many of you this morning are the firstborn in your family? Would you lift your hands? Those of us with our hands up now would be the ones dead that night in Egypt. But it was universal in the sense that throughout all of the land of Egypt, not an exception, throughout the Egyptians, the firstborn died that night. And the effect of it was great crying in the land.
You can only imagine the drama of this as household after household and hut after palace began to find and discover the firstborn was gone, was dead. The mourning and the crying that began to arise within the villages and the towns of Egypt as they realized the finality and the terror of this final plague of God upon their nation. And the result was rather dramatic as well and immediate. It was the glad release that very night of the Israelite slaves.
Verse 31 says, then he, Pharaoh, called for Moses and Aaron at night and said, rise up, get out from among my people, both you and the sons of Israel, and go, worship the Lord as you've said. Take both your flocks and your herds as you have said and go and bless me also. It's an interesting response, isn't it? And the Egyptians urged the people. This is not just Pharaoh. This is the populace. They urged the people to send them out of the land in haste for they said, we shall all be dead.
So the people took their dough before it was leavened with their kneading bowls, bound up on the clothes on their shoulders. Now the sons of Israel had done according to the word of Moses for they had requested from the Egyptians articles of silver and articles of gold and clothing. And the Lord had given the people favor in the sight of the Egyptians so that they let them have their request.
Thus they plundered the Egyptians just as had been predicted in Moses' life through Moses, but furthermore as had been predicted 400 years before. That night they left Egypt and they left with the wealth of Egypt. For God said to Abraham regarding his descendants who would be enslaved in Egypt for those 400 years, I will judge the nation whom they serve, Genesis 15, 14, and they will come out with many possessions. On that night they were paid for their generations of slavery in Egypt.
Please, please never doubt God's determination to do His will and to keep His word. We see that in this last plague upon the nation of Egypt. It is a warning to all of us that we cannot trifle with the God of the Bible. What He says He will do. But we have to ask again this question. On that night when the firstborn of Egypt died, what spared the Israelites judgment? Was it that they were better people? Was it that they were inherently more righteous than the Egyptians?
The answer to that is absolutely no. God by an act of His divine grace made a difference between the Egyptians and the Israelites. That is the only thing that spared them that night. God was able to make that difference because of the first Passover. That brings us to the second part of the message today. The first Passover. So that He could make a difference between the Israelites and the Egyptians with regard to their sin. God made provision for the sin of His people.
He provided a substitute death so that the firstborn of the Israelites would not have to die. It was a lamb or a young goat which provided by its death the blood of atonement. Because you see it is a law that is as true today as it was then and it will be true throughout the history of man that sin requires the death of the sinner. The holy God whom we worshiped earlier in this service is the same today as He was then. Because He is holy He cannot, He will not allow sin into His presence.
And He will strike out against sin not in meanness but because He is holy and judges sin. God that night provided so that He would not have to strike the children of Israel for their sin. He provided the Passover lamb and we know from the New Testament that Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of the Passover lamb. This lamb described in Exodus chapter 12 was a type, a prophetic type of Jesus Christ. He fulfills this picture that we see in Exodus chapter 12.
The apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians chapter 5, Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us and He is the only provision that God makes for the sin of humanity. Neither is salvation found in any other, says Peter, for there is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved. Just as that night in Egypt there was but one escape from certain death. So today there is but one escape from the judgment of God and that escape is God's Passover lamb, Jesus Christ.
I want you to notice with me here in the 12th chapter what God says regarding this lamb beginning in verse 3. Speak to all the congregation of Israel saying, on the 10th of this month they are each one to take a lamb for themselves according to their father's household, a lamb for each household. Now if the household is too small for a lamb, then he and his neighbor nearest to his house are to take one according to the number of persons in them.
According to what each man should eat you are to divide the lamb. Your lamb shall be an unblemished male a year old. You may take it from the sheep or from the goats and you shall keep it until the 14th day of the same month. Then the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel is to kill it at twilight.
Moreover they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two door posts and on the lintel of the houses in which they eat it and they shall eat the flesh that same night roasted with fire and they shall eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs. Notice first of all what God says regarding the selection of the lamb. It was to be a personal lamb. You will notice the progress. It begins in verse 3 with a lamb. It moves in verse 4 to the lamb and finally in verse 5 your lamb.
This lamb was to be a personal lamb selected by the head of each household and if the household was small they were to bring in another household nearby so that there might not be any of the lamb wasted that night when they ate the body after it had been properly cooked. It was a personal lamb. My friend, I want you to know that it is not enough to know that Jesus Christ is a Savior or that He is even the Savior of the world, but you must be able to say He is my Savior.
Secondly I want you to notice that it was a perfect lamb that was to be picked. An unblemished male. Everything about this animal was to be perfect. No spots, no imperfection at all, but absolutely perfect. So God's Passover lamb, the Lord Jesus Christ, though He was tempted in every way like we are, was without sin. He who knew no sin was made sin for us on the cross, but until that moment He was absolutely perfect in His life. He obeyed perfectly every aspect of the law of God in His life.
He was a prime lamb, a male, a year old, and so our Savior in the prime of His manhood was sacrificed. He was a proven lamb, for the lamb was to be taken out from the others and kept separate for four days. The purpose of that was to test the lamb, to make sure that there was nothing about it that would disqualify it to be that Passover lamb. To make sure it would not become sick in those four days.
So our Savior went through a period of testing in His life, especially in the time of His public ministry. He entered into that time with that temptation of Satan recorded for us, a temptation which then continued on throughout the next three years, but which was especially strong in those three that are recorded. He was tried and tested by the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Zealots.
He was put under pressure by every conceivable source, even His own disciples, and proven to be worthy to be the Lamb of God. After the Lamb was selected, it was to be sacrificed in the manner described in verses six and seven. The Lamb was of no use. It provided nothing unless its blood was shed. And so at the evening of the fourteenth day, a time which was probably between the sun's decline in the afternoon until its setting, during that period of time it was to be slain.
But notice that some of the blood was to be caught and then applied to the door post of the house in a certain manner. If you picture it in your mind, you see here that it symbolized a cross from the two sides of the door and on the top. And some commentators say the Lamb was slain right there at the base of the door where the blood was caught. And so it provided, as it were, the picture of the cross right there at that house, the sacrifice of the Lamb.
But then notice the sufficiency of the Lamb as well. Nothing else was required. They were not to be in a certain condition in the house. They were not to clean the house. They were not to whitewash it. All that was required to protect them from the judgment was the shed blood of that Lamb. And what a parallel that is today. We can add nothing to the completed work of the Lord Jesus Christ, who has once for all time sacrificed Himself for our sin. Nothing more can be sacrificed.
Nothing more need be sacrificed. We can add nothing to His work by our feeble efforts. He alone as the Lamb who was sacrificed is sufficient for us. And that Lamb on that first Passover night was then roasted with fire and was eaten by those within the house. And thus it provided not only for their protection but for their sufficiency as well during the night.
I want you to know that right now for those of us who have come to the Savior, to the cross and received Him, that Jesus Christ is all we need. He is sufficient for us throughout our lifetime, throughout our journey in this world. He is all that we need. He provided sustenance for the redeemed by His blood. You may notice with me the security of the Lamb.
Verses 12 and 13, God says this, I will go through the land of Egypt on that night and will strike down all the first born in the land of Egypt, both man and beast. And against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgment. I am Yahweh. And the blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live. And when I see the blood I will pass over you and no plague will befall you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.
Here I want you to see with me the perfect escape which the Lamb provided from the wrath of God. My friend Jesus Christ provides that for His own today. It is perfect, absolutely perfect deliverance for us from the wrath of God. The Lord Jesus said, Verily, verily, I say to you, he that hears my word and believes on him that sent me has everlasting life and shall not come into condemnation but has already passed from death to life. Isn't that a wonderful word?
For those of us who know Him, for those of us who have trusted God's Lamb, He says that we will not come into condemnation. That is His promise. But He says we have already passed from death to life. Perfect security the Lamb provided for the Israelites that night just as Jesus Christ provides perfect security for us today. The feast of Passover was then to be celebrated each year in the first month of the year among the Jews.
That generation onward, it was to provide a testimony to young children as they grew up of what God did for the people that night, how God had provided for them. And the evening of the Passover was to begin a second feast on the calendar of the Jews called the Feast of Unleavened Bread. For a whole week, a period of seven days, they were to eat no leaven.
On the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, they were to sweep out their houses to make sure not one bit of yeast or leaven would be in their house. Why? Because that represented to them corruption. It represented to them sin. And so God said for those seven days you will have no leaven in your houses, beginning with a holy convocation, concluded the same way.
It is that Passover meal that the Lord Jesus took with His disciples the night before He was crucified, from which He took the element of the unleavened bread and the wine. And He said, I want to give this a new meaning for you. This is my blood. This is my body, which is broken for you. Partake of this in remembrance of me. So every time you and I partake of the Lord's Supper, it is a tie for us back to the first Passover.
Now the Passover feast as the Jews celebrated it for those centuries from this time onward has been fulfilled. We no longer need to offer up a lamb, for the Lamb of God has once and for all been sacrificed for us. And we remember Him whenever we partake of the feast that we call the Lord's Supper. Observance of that feast is not an option on our part. Jesus commanded us to do it. If you and I habitually overlook the Lord's Supper, we are in sin. We cannot trifle with the God of the Bible.
And for you and for me to partake of that Supper carelessly, or not to partake of it out of carelessness, is to be living in disobedience to Jesus Christ and playing with the same God of the Bible who brought judgment upon Egypt on this night that we read about in Exodus 12. Only a fool fails to take God seriously. But the fact is that we live in a foolish age, don't we?
One of the psalmist foresaw a day like ours, probably because it was a day like his own, because man has not changed in the 3,000 years since these words were written. In pride, the wicked hotly pursue the afflicted. Let them be caught in the plots which they have devised. For the wicked boasts of his heart's desire, and the greedy man curses and spurns the Lord. The wicked, in the haughtiness of his countenance, does not seek God. All his thoughts are, there is no God.
His ways prosper at all times. Thy judgments are on high out of his sight. As for all his adversaries, he snorts at them. This is the wicked man now. He says to himself, I shall not be moved. Throughout all generations I shall not be an adversity. His mouth is full of curses and deceit and oppression. Under his tongue is mischief and wickedness. He sits in the lurking places in the villages. In the hiding places he kills the innocent. His eyes stealthily watch for the unfortunate.
He lurks in a hiding place as a lion in his lair. He lurks to catch the afflicted. He catches the afflicted when he draws him into his net. He crouches, he bows down on the unfortunate fall by his mighty ones. He says to himself, God has forgotten. He has hidden his face. He will never see it. Does that not describe my friend, the fool who plays with God, who says God doesn't know? His judgments are on high. They're not for me. Adversity will never come to me.
Let me tell you about the young corporate executive who was climbing the ladder of success. Everything that he did seemed to turn to gold. The decisions that he made in the corporation seemed always right and upward he went, even if he had to step on other people to make that step. The decisions that he made in the stock market always seemed to be timed just right.
He's the kind of guy that would have sold on October 18th last year and bought on the 19th when everything was flat and bottomed out. Everything that he did seemed to turn the right way. He had it all put together. One night in his penthouse, he looked out over the city in which he had great influence. He said to himself, what am I going to do? I have all of this money. I have all of these stocks. I am very secure in life. I know what I'm going to do. I'm going to begin my own business.
I'm going to make it rich in this town. I am going to begin building buildings and owning them myself. Everyone in this town will know who I am. That night, God said to him, you fool. This night, your soul is required of you. Every one of us had better take the God of the Bible seriously. What shall a prophet of man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul? Let's bow together.
My friend, either tonight or today as we speak here, and remember this night in ancient Israel, you are either under the condemnation of God because you are playing with the God of the Bible, or you have learned to take him seriously and you have received his only provision for sin, Jesus Christ. With our heads bowed and with the Spirit of God searching our hearts, I wonder if there is not a man, a woman, a young person in this auditorium this morning whom the Holy Spirit has convicted.
You have to admit that you have not taken the God of the Bible very seriously. Perhaps like the psalmist of old, the wicked that he described, you have felt that God has not seen. Somehow you are going to escape an accountability before him. Perhaps you have even said, there is no God. But in your heart you know there is, and he is a holy God. He will deal with you because of your sin. It may not be today or tomorrow, but deal with you he will. He surely will.
And you have only one escape, only one course of deliverance, and that is the way that God himself has provided for you. Will you repent of your playful attitude about God? Will you repent of your sin and trust Jesus Christ today? Would that be the attitude of your heart? If so, tell him right where you are seated. Pray to him quietly in your own heart. Ask his forgiveness. Tell him that you trust the death of Jesus Christ to be sufficient for your sin.
Ask God's Lamb, Jesus Christ, to save you, and he will. Even the wind and the sea obey him. He will come in and save you. If that is the attitude of your heart today, I would like to pray for you in closing. I would like to ask you to come forward in invitation, but the fact is we have no place to take you to pray with you. There is not an empty room. But that is not important. The important thing is your heart attitude.
I would like to see you at the door afterward, and you can just tell me what you have done and we can try to get together later. Since you cannot come forward in a public indication of your faith, would you lift your hand right now? God bless you. This is the first time. The life-changing time. Anyone else? I mean business with God today. Father, I thank you for this one who has lifted the hand. But there are still others who are playing with that decision.
I pray that you will continue to bear upon them the weight of the consequences of that attitude. May there be a genuine turning to you yet. Lord, those of us who have come to you through Jesus Christ, give thanks for the provision you have made for us. For we are all worthy of condemnation. And Lord, just as those ancient people were to celebrate the feast without leaven in their houses, so may we walk with you without leaven in our lives. May our lives be clean and pure as children of God.
May they reflect the kind of God you are. May the light shine forth from us as a witness to others and above everything else as a glory to you and honor to you, our Savior. We pray this morning that you will seal the challenge of this message to our hearts. And may all of us take you seriously, more seriously perhaps than ever before in our lives as we depart from here. In Jesus' name, amen.