Warm hellos to you dear brethren, co-workers, and spiritual family on the Coast of the Gulf of Mexico and scattered children of God, from our offices here in Spanish Fort.
I trust and hope this finds you all doing well, and that again your week has been blessed.
With so many staying in their homes, and life as we know it much different than what we are used to, I also have to reflect on things as well.
It feels strange, as normally in years past, I’d be writing to all from Cucuta, Colombia where my wife and I would have been with brethren for the Passover, the Night to Be Much Observed, and beginning of the Days of Unleavened Bread. We’d then have soon headed to Bogota to enable us to observe the continuing of the Days of Unleavened Bread with more brethren there, before heading back to our congregations in the United States.
We obviously with no doubt would not have been traveling this year due to restrictions in travel…
In eleven days, on Tuesday evening, we’ll participate in the celebration of the Passover service that will take place just after sunset. It will be a time for remembering, reflecting, and commemorating. As we read the Scriptures and we think back to the first observance of the Passover service by the Israelites in ancient Egypt, it will be inspiring and sobering exercise. What a powerful experience to have thousands of Israelites still enslaved by the Egyptians take time off from their forced work to prepare for this special ceremony!
The heads of households were instructed to select on the 10th day of the month Abib a yearling lamb (or kid) that was without blemish. They were to keep it penned up and evidently continue to examine it often to make sure it had no defects.
They were to prepare unleavened bread and a dish of bitter herbs to be used for a special meal the night of Abib 14. Then as sunset came that ended Abib 13 and began Abib 14, the heads of households began to sacrifice the lambs that had been penned up. The throat was cut, the jugular severed, and the blood that flowed out was collected in a container. For that evening each head of household functioned as a priest in performing this sacrifice. All over the land of Goshen thousands of lambs were killed. The collected blood was spattered on the doorways of their homes using a stiff piece of shrub called hyssop. They prepared the lamb for roasting, entered their homes and roasted the sacrificed lamb, and the whole family then ate that special meal during that night of Abib 14. I have to wonder what their emotions were as they participated in these rituals and then entered their homes? Certainly they included guarded anticipation. It had to be very sobering and rightly so!
The heads of households and the whole family acted in faith. They had faith that the blood of the slain lamb would protect their homes from the death of the firstborn. The Lord had told them, “For I will pass through the land of Egypt on that night, and will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt . . . Now the blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you are. And when I see the blood, I will pass over you; and the plague shall not be on you to destroy you . . .” (Ex 12:12-13).
As the Israelites were eating the roasted lamb, death fell on those in the houses not marked by the blood of a lamb. “And it came to pass at midnight that the LORD struck all the firstborn in the land of Egypt . . .” (Ex 12:29) The commotion that transpired that night throughout Egypt was incredible, as the Israelites remained in their homes as instructed. “And none of you shall go out of the door of his house until morning.” (Ex 12:22) Sounds a little like what some of us are going through now, does it not? Can you imagine the relief they felt and also the nervous expectation? They remained alive until morning. Would they perhaps face the wrath of Pharaoh the next morning or would they be freed? It was the Egyptian people who demanded they leave and pushed them out of the land. “And the Egyptians urged the people that they might send them out of the land in haste. For they said, “We shall all be dead.”” (Ex 12:33)
Friends, we too must act in faith and believe that we are delivered from death by the blood of the lamb. “For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us.” (1 Cor 5:7) “knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things . . but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. (1 Pet 1:18) We believe that we have been set free from the sentence of the second death and have been given the hope of eternal life. “But now having been set free from sin, and having become slaves of God, you have your fruit to holiness, and the end, everlasting life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Ro 6:22-23)
I trust you will have a faith-filled and awe-inspiring Passover celebration! May you finish this next few days prior in prayerful self-examination and looking to Christ for His example of how we should be living on a daily basis. Phil 2:5 must be our focus, and in spite of all we see in this world right now, not take our minds or thoughts off of God and His plan and promises!
Arms up friends! Our prayers and thoughts are with you daily. Please do pray for us as well.
