For several days before Pesach (Passover), Jewish people throughout the world cleanse their homes of all leaven in anticipation of celebrating Sedar. No matter what the circumstances, wherever a Jewish family still has a roof over its head and a box of matzoth, there mother and children gather around the table where father directs the time-hallowed ritual.
The first two Feasts of the Lord, Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread, are combined today in the Passover and last seven days. Hence, the seven days observance in Jewry today (Lev. 23:4-6).
Since that memorable night in Egypt 3,500 years ago (see Ex. 12), Jewish people have been observing annually that deliverance. Beautifully touching are the instructions given to Israel through Moses: “And when thy son asketh thee in time to come, saying, What mean the testimonies, and the statutes, and the judgments, which the Lord our God hath commanded you? Then thou shalt say unto thy son, We were Pharaoh’s bondmen in Egypt; and the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand” (Deut. 6:20-23).
Thus it developed down through the centuries that the Jewish boy seated at the Passover table would go through the ritual which involved asking the father certain questions. The boy asks, “Why is this night different from all other nights?” Then follows the recital by the father of all the wonderful events that led up to the Passover deliverance from the Pharaohs. So there is kept alive, age after age, that racial cohesiveness which makes the Jewish people self-conscious and causes them to realize how, in many wonderful ways, God has accomplished His miraculous preservation.
That is the reason why Jewish people, even against hope, can press on, and know that all the Pharaohs, Hamans, Herods, and Hitlers together cannot wipe them out. If the nation of Israel can be wiped out, then God would be the greater loser, for His Word is at stake; He said they would never cease to exist as a nation. During those early days of Joseph’s sojourn in Egypt, it looked as though the nation was doomed to go out of existence because of the famine in the land. That small company, about seventy-five souls, was preserved by going down into Egypt; there they grew to 600,000 men, besides women and children.
In some places, perhaps even in Israel, it must seem that death is again stalking close to the Passover door. In such places I can imagine it is not safe to leave the door open–not even for Elijah! Rabbis of old taught that the Messiah was most likely to come on the night of Passover. A vacant chair is to be seen at the Sedar feast for Elijah, the herald of the Messiah (Mal. 4:5-6).
The Saturday before Passover is Metzora-Shabbath Hagadol, the Great Sabbath. It commemorates the procuring of the Passover Lamb. In that original Metzora of long ago in Egypt, and the subsequent slaying of the lamb, being commemorated now, we recall how God heard the cry of the Jewish people. He knew their sorrows; He came down to deliver them by means of the shed and applied blood of the Passover Lamb. The Lord God still hears our cry; He knows our sorrows and has come down to deliver us. In the true meaning of Passover, people today–Jews and Gentiles–can learn how they can enjoy an eternal Festival of Freedom in Christ, our Passover.
Now let us look carefully at the table Jewish people will gather around. There will be the shank bone of a sheep, unleavened bread, bitter herbs, wine, candles, an egg, salt water, greens, and grated apple. All agree that a bloodless shank bone of a sheep is a poor substitute for the prescribed Passover lamb. The bread must be unleavened for leaven is a type of evil. Bitter herbs look back to the bitter sufferings under the lash of Egyptian taskmasters. The wine speaks of sacrificial blood. The candles bring to our minds the Tabernacle worship in the wilderness. The egg is added because in it are the qualities of life, a type of resurrection. Salt water speaks of tears shed in Egypt. The grated apple, having the color of clay, recalls the clay with which bricks were made in that long ago.
Let us consider in more detail the unleavened bread, the three matzoth, for this also is the Feast of Unleavened Bread. The middle matzo is broken and half of it is hidden. The hidden half is brought forth and eaten by every member of the family at the end of the meal. It is called afikomen. Could these three matzoth be symbolic of the trinity of God? Here on the Sedar table this truth is clearly symbolized. The middle matzo, the one that is broken, pictures the Messiah. We read that at the Passover table with His disciples, He took bread, broke it, and divided it among them. He then said, “Take, eat: this is My body, which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of Me” (1 Cor. 11:24). The broken and hidden half of the matzo is typical of His death and burial. And the bringing forth of it at the end of the meal is symbolic of His resurrection.
Yet only three things were commanded by God for the Passover table. They were the lamb, the unleavened bread, and bitter herbs. That is all. The most important and most significant of the three that night in Egypt was the lamb. Surely without the Passover lamb there could be no Passover, but the lamb is conspicuous at the Sedar by its absence. There has not been a lamb at the Passover feast for 1,900 years. Why? The answer is found in the Word of God: “He [the Messiah] was led as a sheep to the slaughter; and like a lamb dumb before His shearer, so opened He not His mouth” (Isa. 53:7; Acts 8:26-40). “Even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us” (1 Cor. 5:7).
Christ was the fulfillment of the lamb slain in Egypt on that Passover night. Without the lamb, then, there could have been no Passover, no deliverance. Without the Lamb of God now, there can be no true Passover and no deliverance. Without the Lamb slain, there could be no blood sprinkled and without the sprinkling of the blood, God could not have passed over; He could not have stopped the destroyer from coming into the houses of those fathers in Egypt and claiming the firstborn in death. There had to be a lamb then, and there must be the Lamb now. There is no longer a lamb at the Passover feast because Jeshua Ha-mashiah, Jesus the Messiah, is the Lamb of God.
That night it all depended on the shed blood of the Passover lamb. Today it all depends on the shed blood of Christ. Then, if there was no blood, there was no redemption. Now, if there is no blood, there is no redemption. What a night that was, that night in Egypt! All that happened that night was typical of God’s passing over and sparing sinners, Jews and Gentiles alike, who are under the shed blood of the Lord Jesus.
So the scriptural reason–God’s reason–why there is no lamb at the Passover feast is that God provided His Son as the Lamb. The Passover table is both a memorial of deliverance out of Egypt and a prophecy of the coming of the Messiah. The place at the end of the table, with the empty chair, is a constant reminder of the Coming One.
The Jewish prophetic Scriptures teach that He is coming again as the “Hope of Israel” (Acts 28:20) and “the Desire of all nations” (Hag. 2:7). In His coming again to earth, He will deliver and save Israel as a nation, usher in their glorious future, and right all wrongs of the earth.
The only way those Jewish forefathers were delivered in Egypt 3,500 years ago was by believing and acting on the message from God. They believed it was either the death of the lamb or the death of their firstborn. They believed that the Lord would pass over and protect their homes from death if the lamb had been slain and the blood applied. They believed God, who said, “When I see the blood, I will pass [hover] over you.” As Jehovah protected the houses marked with the blood of the paschal lamb, so God protects those of us who believe that the shed blood of the Messiah is the only atoning blood today.
Either we accept God’s Lamb, “Christ our Passover sacrificed for us,” or we receive death, the wages of sin. It is an individual matter. Whether we are Jews or Gentiles, we must believe God’s message, and like those fathers in Egypt, act on it.
We therefore beseech every Jew to look away from days and observances and behold God’s Lamb, the only provision great enough to satisfy the heart and holy standards of God. And as on the original Passover night, Gentiles too may find safety in the place where the blood has been shed and applied: “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world” (Jn. 1:29).
Reprinted from Jewish Holy Days, published by Loizeaux, available from GFP.