1 ver. 14. k ver. 8. with Deut. xvi. 1 — 4. l 1 Cor. v. 7, 8. m Exod. xiii. 2. with Numb. viii. 17. " 1 Cor. vi. 19, 20.
Exod. xii. 3 — 11. Speak ye unto all the congregation of Israel, saying, In the tenth day of this month they shall take to them every man a lamb, according to the house of their fathers, a lamb for an house : and if the household be too little for the lamb, let him and his neighbour next unto his house take it, according to the number of the souls : every man according to his eating shall make your count for the lamb. Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year : ye shall take it out from the sheep, or from the goats. And ye shall keep it up until the fourteenth day of the same month; and the ivhole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening. And they shall take of the blood, and strike it on the two side-posts, and on the upper door-post of the houses wherein they shall eat it. And they shall eat the flesh in that night, roast iv it h fire, and unleavened bread; and with bitter herbs they shall eat it. Eat not of it raw, nor sodden at all with water, but roast with fire; his head toith his legs, and with the purtenance thereof. And ye shall let nothing of it remain until the morning; and that which remaineth of it until the morning ye shall burn loithfire. And thus shall ye eat it; with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet, and your staff in your hand: and ye shall eat it in haste; it is the Lord's passover.
THE mercies promised to the Lord's people shall be fulfilled to them in due season. Their trials may be long continued, and may increase when the time of their termination is near at hand : but God will not forget his promises, or delay the execution of them beyond the proper time. He had foretold to Abraham that his posterity should be ill treated in Egypt to a certain period; but that they should then be brought out of it with great substance. The appointed period, foretold four hundred and thirty years before, was arrived, and yet the condition of the Israelites was as distressed as ever : but at its conclusion, " even on the self-same day" the promised deliverance was vouch- safed; and an ordinance was appointed to keep up the remembrance of it to all future generations.
From the words of our text we shall be led to notice, I. The ordinance itself —