had forfeited his life to divine justice. Precisely in this way has Christ been sacrificed for us : "he died, the just for the unjust ;" he was put to death not merely for our good, but in our stead : and in his sufferings we may behold a figurative representation of what we had merited by our transgressions.]
In this view he is called " our Passover" — [The paschal lamb was sacrificed in a peculiar manner, and on a most extraordinary occasion. God had determined to destroy the Egyptian first-born, but to spare his own people : He appointed the Jews to kill a lamb, to sprinkle its blood upon the door-posts, and to eat its flesh roasted with fire, taking also with it some bitter herbs ^ Upon their due obser- vation of this ordinance God promised to interpose for their deliverance, and not to suffer the destroyer to involve so much as one of them in the common ruin. Thus are we obnoxious to the wrath that is coming upon the ungodly world : but Jesus, that spotless Lamb, has, on the very same month, day, and hour, that the passover was first killed, and in the midst of most inconceivable agonies both of body and soul, yet without the breaking of a bone, been slain for us'' ; and we are by faith to sprinkle our hearts with his precious blood : we are also to feed upon his body and blood ; and, in so doing, are as sure of the divine protection as if we were already in heaven. Though " thousands should fall beside us, and ten thousand at our right hand, the sword of the avenger should not come nigh us."]
That we may rightly improve this glorious truth, let us consider, II. The exhortation grounded upon it —
While the occasion of Christ's death affords us ground for the deepest humiliation, the deliverance effected by it should ever be remembered with joy —
[The Jews were commanded to " keep " an annual " feast" in commemoration of their deliverance from the destroying angel'". And, as their feast was a memorial of the mercies they had received, so is ours to be, to the latest generations. Indeed our whole lives should be kept as a holy solemnity, because we are daily and hourly experiencing the saving virtue of the Redeemer's blood.]
The peculiar manner in which the Jews were to
a Exod. xii. 3—9. '• Exod. xii. 46. with John xix. 83, 36.
•^ Such a feast is the Lord's Supper to us : as they fed on the Paschal Lamb, so do we on tlie body and blood of Christ, represented to us in tho bread and wine.
1957. J CIlIilST (UK PASSOVER. 165
observe their passover, was a figurative representation of the manner in which ours also should be observed —
[The Jews were enjoined on pain of death to forbear the use of leaven, and to put it out of their houses for seven days'^ : and they were to eat the lamb with bitter herbs and unleavened bread. Thus is the leaven of sin to be purged out of our hearts with the greatest care ; and while we feed by faith on the spot- less Lamb of God, we must partake also of the bitter herbs of repentance and " the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth." As for the " old leaven " of Gentile uncleanness, or of Jewish pride and malignity, it must be wholly put away : the scrupulosity with which the Jews seaixhed and swept their houses to purge out all leaven, is an admirable pattern for our imitation. A sincere desire to know the will of God, a full and unreserved determination to do it, together with a corresponding meekness in our spirits, purity in our thoughts, sincerity in our words, and integrity in our actions — this, this is the Christian temper ; this is the frame in which our whole lives should be kept as a feast unto the Lord. Moreover as the Jews were to eat the passover in haste, with their shoes on their feet, and their loins girt, so must we be in a continual readiness to go towards the promised land.]