Sermon: Passover, The Night That Explains the Cross – Ex 12 (3/29/26)
Introduction
Scripture
Turn in your Bibles to the Old Testament book of Exodus 12.
Easter Sermon Plan
May I begin by telling you a little about my upcoming Easter message...
I cannot wait for Easter at the Coliseum 2026!
I'm looking forward to over 2,000 people...
Hearing the gospel...
Celebrating the resurrection...
We are going to learn how news of the resurrection, properly understood, rekindles lost hope!
The road to Emmaus...
This is right after the resurrection...
Jesus is walking with two of his followers as they travel to the village of Emmaus...
These two men are unaware of the resurrection...
He hides his identity so that they do not recognize him...
These two men open up with their 'unknown' companion...
They share something of their disappointment...
Hope had cratered...
Luke 24.21 | But we were hoping that he was the one who was about to redeem Israel. Besides all this, it’s the third day since these things happened. (CSB)
Luke 24.21 | We had hoped he was the Messiah who had come to rescue Israel. This all happened three days ago. (NLT)
These men were disappointed in how life had turned out...
Jesus explains the resurrection...
Hope is rekindled...
Help me share with our community about how the resurrection can bring hope!
PRAYER...
Pray for people in our community whose hope has cratered...
Ceremonies...
Have you ever stopped and wondered why the Bible is filled with so many unusual ceremonies and traditions?
Some of them seem strange to us.
Some even make us a little uncomfortable.
Take baptism, for example.
A person stands in water… and is lowered under it… and brought back up.
If you step back and think about it, it is an unusual thing.
Why do we do that?
Or think about the Lord’s Supper.
Bread… representing a body.
A cup… representing blood.
Again, if you really think about it… it is not ordinary.
And when you go back into the Old Testament, it becomes even more striking.
There are ceremonies filled with sacrifice…
With blood and gore...
With very specific and sometimes puzzling instructions.
So the question is unavoidable:
What do all of these things mean?
Are they just religious traditions?
Or are they actually trying to tell us something?
The answer is clear:
These are not random.
These are not optional.
These are not unimportant.
They are deeply meaningful… and they are absolutely essential.
Every one of these ceremonies is teaching us something we desperately need to understand.
And today, I want to bring two of them into focus:
The central ceremony of the Old Testament…
And the central ceremony of the New Testament.
Because when you see how these two connect…
You don’t just learn something interesting.
You see the gospel more clearly.
And that has the power to change your life.
Passover
The key Old Testament ceremony was the Passover.
This is something still celebrated today by the Jewish people.
If you want to understand the gospel, you must understand this moment.
I want us to go back and look at how this ceremony began...
The setting...
Fifteen hundred years before the birth of Christ...
The Israelites, as a nation and a people, were enslaved in Egypt.
Life was hard.
The work was brutal.
The Egyptians were cruel and demanding.
But it was God's desire to free the Israelites from Egypt and to move them to the land he had promised their forefathers, the Promised Land.
So, God raised up a leader...
Moses
Moses stood before Pharaoh and demanded that he let God's people go.
Pharaoh refused, repeatedly.
So God poured out his wrath and sent plagues upon the Egyptians, repeatedly.
Many of you know those stories.
When we come to Exodus 12, God is about to send the final plague.
God is not negotiating with Pharaoh anymore.
No more warnings.
This will be such a terrible judgment, that Pharaoh will beg the Israelites to leave.
What is the final plague?
God will kill every firstborn male in the land!
No exceptions!
Imagine the weight of that moment...
Every home...
Every family...
Exodus 11.4–6
Exodus 11.4 | So Moses said, “This is what the Lord says: About midnight I will go throughout Egypt, (CSB)
Exodus 11.5 | and every firstborn male in the land of Egypt will die, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sits on his throne to the firstborn of the servant girl who is at the grindstones, as well as every firstborn of the livestock. (CSB)
Exodus 11.6 | Then there will be a great cry of anguish through all the land of Egypt such as never was before or ever will be again. (CSB)
One Way of Escape...
God provided one way of escape.
He said that if people would...
Believe him...
Trust him...
Obey him...
Then when the Lord passed through the land, he would pass over those who were his...
He did not allow the destroyer to touch the firstborn sons in the households where they had believed, trusted, and obeyed.
These instructions God gave to the Israelites have come to be called the Passover Feast.
This is a strange ceremony...
But the details are critically important...
Let's read Exodus 12.1–13 together.
Scripture
Exodus 12.1 | The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, (CSB)
Exodus 12.2 | “This month is to be the beginning of months for you; it is the first month of your year. (CSB)
God is resetting their calendar.
Israel already had a civil calendar (beginning in Tishri, the fall).
God does not adjust it...
He overlays a new one.
We will try to come back to this.
Historically: This becomes the month of Nisan in the Jewish calendar.
Exodus 12.3 | Tell the whole community of Israel that on the tenth day of this month they must each select an animal of the flock according to their fathers’ families, one animal per family. (CSB)
The most important word in verse three is EACH.
This was not national salvation.
Though they are doing this by household, there is an individual aspect to their trust and obedience.
Exodus 12.4 | If the household is too small for a whole animal, that person and the neighbor nearest his house are to select one based on the combined number of people; you should apportion the animal according to what each will eat. (CSB)
God makes provision for every situation.
Exodus 12.5 | You must have an unblemished animal, a year-old male; you may take it from either the sheep or the goats. (CSB)
The fact that it could be a goat surprises people.
We always say "Passover lamb," and the typology of Christ as Lamb is obviously the right line to follow, but the text allows a goat.
Unblemished means no defects...
Not the leftover...
Not the weak...
Not the damaged...
This anticipates Christ as the spotless sacrifice.
1 Peter 1.18 | For you know that you were redeemed from your empty way of life inherited from your ancestors, not with perishable things like silver or gold, (CSB)
1 Peter 1.19 | but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of an unblemished and spotless lamb. (CSB)
Exodus 12.6 | You are to keep it until the fourteenth day of this month; then the whole assembly of the community of Israel will slaughter the animals at twilight. (CSB)
They kept the lamb for four days after it had been selected.
They were watching it, testing it, to make sure it was truly unblemished.
Four days of inspection...
The Passover lamb was on probation.
Any blemish found during those four days would disqualify it.
It is interesting…
When you come to the Gospels, Jesus is publicly examined in the days leading up to his crucifixion.
Jesus spent those same four days being examined publicly.
This gets strange, I know...
Hang on, it will get more strange in the next few verses...
Everyone slaughters their lamb at the same time.
Probably just after sunset.
Twilight
The Hebrew is bên ha'arbayim, literally "between the two evenings."
There was rabbinic debate about what this meant.
The Pharisees understood it as the afternoon hours between the sun's decline and sunset, roughly 3:00 to 5:00 PM.
The Sadducees took it as the period between sunset and full dark.
The temple practice followed the Pharisaic reading...
Lambs were slaughtered beginning around 3:00 PM.
Jesus died at the ninth hour, 3:00 PM.
The timing is not coincidental.
Exodus 12.7 | They must take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses where they eat them. (CSB)
They put some of the blood on the front door...
This was not a private ceremony.
The doorposts are the vertical pieces and the lintel is the horizontal piece at the top of the door frame.
Why not put blood on the threshold?
That is why I wish we could have church for three hours every Sunday morning!
Hebrews 10.29 | How much worse punishment do you think one will deserve who has trampled on the Son of God, who has regarded as profane the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace? (CSB)
Verse 22 tells us they applied the blood with a small bushy plant called hyssop.
Exodus 12.22 | Take a cluster of hyssop, dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and brush the lintel and the two doorposts with some of the blood in the basin. None of you may go out the door of his house until morning. (CSB)
David spoke of hyssop in Psalm 51.7...
Psalm 51.7 | Purify me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.(CSB)
And when Jesus was on the cross, they gave him a sponge soaked in sour wine lifted up on the end of a branch of hyssop.
John 19.29 | A jar full of sour wine was sitting there; so they fixed a sponge full of sour wine on a hyssop branch and held it up to his mouth. (CSB)
Exodus 12.8 | They are to eat the meat that night; they should eat it, roasted over the fire along with unleavened bread and bitter herbs. (CSB)
Everything has meaning...
Fire was often associated with judgment...
The lamb passes through fire so the family does not.
Bitter herbs reminds them of slavery...
Unleavened bread stresses urgency...
Exodus 12.34 | So the people took their dough before it was leavened, with their kneading bowls wrapped up in their clothes on their shoulders. (CSB)
Exodus 12.9 | Do not eat any of it raw or cooked in boiling water, but only roasted over fire—its head as well as its legs and inner organs. (CSB)
The Lord is specific.
Sometimes I hear people say that we all have our own way of worshipping the Lord.
They are implying that God accepts all worship.
That is categorically untrue.
God is very specific throughout Scripture for how God's people are to worship him.
Exodus 12.10 | You must not leave any of it until morning; any part of it left until morning you must burn.(CSB)
Exodus 12.11 | Here is how you must eat it: You must be dressed for travel, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand. You are to eat it in a hurry; it is the Lord’s Passover. (CSB)
This is a departure meal...
Exodus 12.12 | I will pass through the land of Egypt on that night and strike every firstborn male in the land of Egypt, both people and animals. I am the Lord; I will execute judgments against all the gods of Egypt.(CSB)
I will pass through...
God Himself, not a delegate.
The destroying angel is referenced elsewhere.
Exodus 12.23 | When the Lord passes through to strike Egypt and sees the blood on the lintel and the two doorposts, he will pass over the door and not let the destroyer enter your houses to strike you. (CSB)
2 Samuel 24.16 | Then the angel extended his hand toward Jerusalem to destroy it, but the Lord relented concerning the destruction and said to the angel who was destroying the people, “Enough, withdraw your hand now!” The angel of the Lord was then at the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite. (CSB)
Here the Lord speaks in the first person.
This is personal.
This is divine judgment!
Not random...
Not accidental...
Why did God bring this judgment? It seems awfully harsh...
We will come back to that.
Exodus 12.13 | The blood on the houses where you are staying will be a distinguishing mark for you; when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No plague will be among you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt. (CSB)
This is one of the two most important verses in the entire Old Testament.
The other is Genesis 15.6...
Genesis 15.6 | Abram believed the Lord, and he credited it to him as righteousness. (CSB)
If you understand these two verses, you understand the heart of the gospel in the Old Testament.
You could build the entire message of salvation in the Old Testament on these two verses.
When I see the blood...
The most important five words in the passage...
God does not say...
When I see your obedience...
When I see your sincerity...
When I see your moral improvement...
He says, "When I see the blood."
The basis of salvation is the blood of the substitute, not the character of the sheltered.
The Passover and the Gospel
Imagine being there that night…
The waiting...
The silence…
The tension…
Every home waiting…
And the difference between life and death came down to one thing:
WAS THERE BLOOD ON THE DOOR POSTS?
So the question we have to ask is not just, “WHAT happened?”
But what does this MEAN?
Why would God command something like this?
This bloody act of sacrifice…
This strange ceremony repeated year after year…
Let me say it as plainly as I can…
Exodus 12 shows us how the Lord rescued the Israelites from bondage in Egypt…
And in that rescue, God is showing US how he rescues US…
From the bondage of sin…
And from his righteous judgment.
I want to show you three or four truths we learn from the Passover that connect it to the gospel...
I. Judgment is certain and universal.
The way people usually read Exodus 12...
There bad people and there are good people...
The Egyptians are the bad people...
The Israelites are the good people...
God is going to pour out his wrath on the bad and rescue the good...
I have even heard this chapter preached that way...
THAT IS NOT AN ACCURATE WAY TO SEE OR UNDERSTAND THIS PASSAGE!
Who are the bad people in this story?
Everyone is bad!
The Egyptians are bad...
Not only did they oppress the Israelites...
They worshipped pagan (false) gods...
Exodus 12.12 | I will pass through the land of Egypt on that night and strike every firstborn male in the land of Egypt, both people and animals. I am the Lord; I will execute judgments against all the gods of Egypt. (CSB)
The Israelites are bad...
They were not morally superior to the Egyptians.
The Israelites were guilty of idolatry.
Joshua 24.14 | “Therefore, fear the Lord and worship him in sincerity and truth. Get rid of the gods your ancestors worshiped beyond the Euphrates River and in Egypt, and worship the Lord. (CSB)
Ezekiel 20.7 | I also said to them, “Throw away, each of you, the abhorrent things that you prize, and do not defile yourselves with the idols of Egypt. I am the Lord your God.” (CSB)
Ezekiel 20.8 | “‘But they rebelled against me and were unwilling to listen to me. None of them threw away the abhorrent things that they prized, and they did not abandon the idols of Egypt. So I considered pouring out my wrath on them, exhausting my anger against them within the land of Egypt. (CSB)
There is no evidence to suggest that the Israelites were any more godly than the Egyptians.
The Israelites needed the blood as much as the Egyptians needed the blood!
God did not give the Egyptians one way of escape and the Israelites another...
Without the blood, the Israelites would have suffered the same judgment!
You might think that God said he was going to bring judgment on the Egyptians, but if you look closely, he says he will bring judgment on the people who live in Egypt.
Exodus 12.12 | I will pass through the land of Egypt on that night and strike every firstborn male in the land of Egypt, both people and animals. I am the Lord; I will execute judgments against all the gods of Egypt. (CSB)
Here is the point...
Many people SINCERELY BELIEVE that God will bless the good people and punish the bad people.
And when people think that, they always put themselves in the category of a good person.
The Bible says there are no good people.
All of us have sinned...
All of us have failed...
All of us have rebelled against the Lord...
Romans 3.10 | as it is written: There is no one righteous, not even one. (CSB)
Romans 3.11 | There is no one who understands; there is no one who seeks God. (CSB)
Romans 3.12 | All have turned away; all alike have become worthless. There is no one who does what is good, not even one. (CSB)
Romans 3.23 | For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God; (CSB)
And except for what this strange ceremony points to, we will all experience the wrath of the holy God.
Notice that on that night, when midnight came, there was no negotiation...
No...
No second chances...
No sliding scale...
No accommodations...
No "let me explains"...
There was only judgment and wrath... UNLESS THERE WAS BLOOD ON THE DOOR POSTS.
II. Salvation requires a spotless substitute.
This is the heart of the Passover lesson...
Let us look at this in three brief and plain sentences...
A. God provides the means of salvation.
God is the one who took the initiative and provided a way of rescue.
The Israelites did not invent the Passover and the Passover plan.
God is the one giving the instructions in Exodus 12.
The Israelites were helpless...
Broken...
Not even seeking a solution...
And God stepped in...
This came from the very mind of God...
We can only be rescued the way God says we can.
There are not multiple ways to be right with God.
God did not say...
As long as you are sincere...
As long as you are kind...
As long as you try hard...
As long as you are sorry for your sins...
As long as you are spiritual...
This came from the very heart of God...
God did not have to rescue the Israelites at all.
They did not deserve rescuing.
And neither do we!
The fact that God made a way says something about him.
John 3.16 | For God loved the world in this way: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. (CSB)
And what did God provide as the means of salvation?
Not good intentions…
Not moral effort…
A substitute.
And that brings us to the next two pictures…
B. A spotless lamb was required.
Why did the lamb have to be unblemished… spotless?
Because the life of that lamb was standing in the place of the people.
It was a substitute.
And the Israelites were not perfect.
They were sinners.
They deserved the judgment of God just like the Egyptians.
So if a substitute is going to stand in their place…
It cannot be flawed...
It cannot be defective...
God does not accept imperfect substitutes.
The sacrifice had to be spotless…
It had to be spotless because it was standing in the place of guilty people.
Think about it this way...
Imagine you owe the courts $1,000 but cannot pay...
You are about to be arrested and thrown into jail for your failure to pay...
So, I go down to the courthouse and to pay the $1,000...
But when I hand them the $1,000 I discover that I also owed $1,000...
The courts take my $1,000...
Does that settle your debt?
No!
It does not settle your debt because I had a debt too.
You need someone who does not owe the courts any money to go and give them $1,000!
They Israelites owed a debt because of their sins (blemishes)...
Only a perfect sacrifice would suffice!
And this is exactly what that picture is pointing to…
Our sin has stained us.
It has separated us from God.
It has placed us under his judgment.
And we need a substitute.
But here is the problem...
An imperfect person cannot save you.
If a sinner dies for you…
He is only dying for his own sin.
He has nothing left to offer for you.
So, there is nothing YOU can do to save YOU...
We needed a perfect substitute.
A spotless sacrifice.
And that is exactly who Jesus is.
2 Corinthians 5.21 | He made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (CSB)
Jesus had no sin of his own.
No blemish.
No defect.
Which means when he died…
He was not dying for himself.
He was dying for us.
Only a perfect life can stand in the place of a guilty one.
C. The lamb had to be slain
Many people struggle with the imagery of the Old Testament sacrifices.
Why?
Why all the blood?
Why all the death?
Why was that necessary?
And the answer is not random…
It goes to the very heart of sin and salvation.
The meaning of the blood
There is a verse in the New Testament that answers this clearly:
Hebrews 9.22 | Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. (CSB)
Why is that true?
Because of the nature of sin.
Sin separates us from a holy God.
And God is the source of life.
So the result of sin... is death.
Romans 6.23 | For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. (CSB)
Here is how the Old Testament says the same thing...
Ezekiel 18.4 | Look, every life belongs to me. The life of the father is like the life of the son—both belong to me. The person who sins is the one who will die. (CSB)
Ezekiel 18.4 | “Behold, all souls are Mine; the soul of the father as well as the soul of the son is Mine. The soul who sins will die. (NASB95)
Back to our illustration...
We are not talking about a $1000 penalty owed...
We are talking about death...
So every time an animal was sacrificed…
That blood was saying something:
SIN BRINGS DEATH.
And death requires a life to be given.
But even more than that…
That animal was not dying for its own sin...
It was dying in the place of the people.
Every sacrifice was a reminder:
“That should have been me.”
And all of this was pointing forward…
To the ultimate sacrifice.
Jesus is the true Passover Lamb.
The spotless one…
Who did not deserve death…
For you know that you were redeemed… with the precious blood of Christ, like that of an unblemished and spotless lamb.
1 Peter 1.18 | For you know that you were redeemed from your empty way of life inherited from your ancestors, not with perishable things like silver or gold, (CSB)
1 Peter 1.19 | but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of an unblemished and spotless lamb. (CSB)
When Jesus died…
His blood was not symbolic…
It was substitutionary.
He was not dying for his sin…
He was dying for ours.
Either your sin will be paid for by your death…
Or it will be paid for by the blood of a substitute.
III. The blood must be applied personally.
The strangest part of this ceremony to me is not that the lamb was slaughtered.
The strangest part is what they did with the blood.
Exodus 12.7 | They must take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses where they eat them. (CSB)
Honestly, that is shocking!
Why was it not enough just that the lamb was killed?
Because the death of the lamb had to be personally applied.
The blood in the basin was not enough.
It had to be put on the door.
That act was an act of faith...
Belief...
Trust...
Obedience...
Faith is not just mental assent or agreement, but a trust that leads to obedience.
Salvation was not universally applied to everyone.
Rescue only came to those who applied the blood.
You could have a dead lamb in your house…
You could have blood in a basin…
But if it was not on the door…
That house would face judgment.
The blood in the basin saves no one.
And this is exactly what we see in the gospel.
Jesus died for sinners.
His sacrifice is sufficient for the whole world.
1 John 2.2 | He himself is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours, but also for those of the whole world. (CSB)
John 3.16 | For God loved the world in this way: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. (CSB)
2 Corinthians 5.19 | That is, in Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and he has committed the message of reconciliation to us. (CSB)
1 Timothy 1.15 | This saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance: “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners”—and I am the worst of them. (CSB)
But the whole world is not saved.
Scripture
Matthew 7.13–14 | “Enter through the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the road broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who go through it. How narrow is the gate and difficult the road that leads to life, and few find it.” (CSB)
John 3.36 | “The one who believes in the Son has eternal life, but the one who rejects the Son will not see life; instead, the wrath of God remains on him.” (CSB)
Revelation 20.15 | “And anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.” (CSB)
Why?
Because what Christ has done...
Must be received...
Must be applied...
That is why there are so many appeals in Scripture for people to call on the Lord!
John 1.12 | But to all who did receive him, he gave them the right to be children of God, to those who believe in his name, (CSB)
On that night in Egypt...
There were only two kinds of houses...
Those with blood on the door...
Those without blood on the door...
That is still true today.
The question is not...
Do you know about the blood?
The question is...
Has the blood been applied to you?
IV. Salvation changes everything.
We do not have time to really dig in here, but let me get you started...
How did the Passover change things for the Israelites?
God restarted their calendar.
Exodus 12.2 | “This month is to be the beginning of months for you; it is the first month of your year. (CSB)
This was a new start...
Their life was now divided into:
Before redemption...
After redemption...
This was a new beginning.
God brought them out of Egypt.
God wants to bring us out...
From the bondage of sin...
From the sentence of death...
From the weight of guilt...
From the hopelessness of someone who does not have eternal life...
The same God who passed over houses marked by blood is the God who saves sinners today.
I want us to take a moment and just respond in prayer to the truths of the Passover...
INVITATION PRAYER
Conclusion
The Lord's Supper
A. The Lamb and the Bread
Scripture
Exodus 12.5 | You must have an unblemished animal, a year-old male; you may take it from either the sheep or the goats. (CSB)
Luke 22.19 | And he took bread, gave thanks, broke it, gave it to them, and said, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” (CSB)
In the Passover…
A spotless lamb was chosen.
Its life would stand in the place of the people.
And when Jesus gathered with his disciples…
During the Passover celebration and meal…
He took the bread and said,
“This is my body.”
In other words…
I AM THE LAMB.
The bread reminds us:
His body was given…
For us.
B. The Blood and the Cup
Scripture
Exodus 12.7 | They must take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses where they eat them. (CSB)
Exodus 12.13 | The blood on the houses where you are staying will be a distinguishing mark for you; when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No plague will be among you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt. (CSB)
Hebrews 9.22 | Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. (CSB)
In Egypt…
The blood marked the house.
And when God saw the blood…
Judgment passed over...
The blood was the difference between life and death...
And now Jesus takes the cup…
And he is saying:
My blood will do what that blood pointed to.
Not just cover a house… but cleanse a sinner.
Because without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness.
C. The Rescue and the New Life
Scripture
Exodus 12.31 | He (Pharaoh) summoned Moses and Aaron during the night and said, “Get out immediately from among my people, both you and the Israelites, and go, worship the Lord as you have said. (CSB)
Exodus 12.32 | Take even your flocks and your herds as you asked and leave, and also bless me.”(CSB)
1 Corinthians 11.26 | For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes. (CSB)
When the blood was applied the people were not just spared…
THEY WERE SET FREE!
Pharaoh said:
Go. Leave slavery behind.
And that is what salvation does.
It does not just forgive you, it brings you out.
Out of sin…
Out of bondage…
Into a new life with God.
And every time we take the Lord’s Supper…
We are doing two things:
We are looking back to the death of Christ for us.
And we are looking forward until he comes again.
PRAYER