Christ, Our Passover Lamb

Christ, Our Passover Lamb

Each spring people from all over the country would go to Jerusalem to sacrifice a lamb for the Passover feast. The day Jesus made his triumphal entry into Jerusalem was the very day herds of Passover lambs were being driven into the city. Later that week Jesus told his disciples, “As you know, Passover begins in two days, and the Son of Man will be handed over to be crucified” (Matthew 26:2). Ever since John the Baptist identified Jesus as the “Lamb of God,” all of Jesus’ ministry had been driving toward this day, this celebration of Passover, when Christ, “our Passover Lamb” (1 Corinthians 5:7), would be sacrificed.

God had given very specific instructions about the celebration of Passover and the lamb that would be slain for the feast:

On the tenth day of this month each man is to take a lamb for his family. . . . The animals you choose must be year-old males without defect. . . . All the people of the community of Israel must slaughter them at twilight. . . . Eat the meat roasted over the fire, along with bitter herbs, and bread made without yeast. . . . Do not break any of the bones.” (Exodus 12:3, 5-6, 8, 46, NIV)

The Passover sacrifice was to be a lamb free from all defects. Peter wrote that Christ was “a lamb without blemish or defect” (1 Peter 1:19, NIV). The lamb was to be slain by “all the people of the community of Israel,” and though Jesus was condemned by Pilate, the Roman governor, it was the Jews who plotted and pleaded for his crucifixion. The paschal lamb was to be slain publicly. So Christ was put to death in the most public and ignominious way, crucified on a hill within sight of Jerusalem at the very time huge crowds were there to witness the scene.

No bones in the paschal lamb were to be broken. When the Roman soldiers came to break the bones of those crucified, they discovered that Jesus had already died, and so none of his bones were broken. The paschal lamb was to be roasted with fire. Christ, too, experienced the fire of God’s wrath—intense and consuming.

Jesus, my Passover Lamb, you were slain not only for sacrifice but also for food. And unless I eat of your flesh, I have no part of your life, no protection from the fires of judgment. So I will gladly feed on you.