3Speak to all the congregation of Israel, saying, ‘On the tenth day of this month, they shall take to them every man a lamb, according to their fathers’ houses, a lamb for a household; 4and if the household is too little for a lamb, then he and his neighbor next to his house shall take one according to the number of the souls. You shall make your count for the lamb according to what everyone can eat. 5Your lamb shall be without defect, a male a year old. You shall take it from the sheep or from the goats. 6You shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same month; and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it at evening. 7They shall take some of the blood, and put it on the two door posts and on the lintel, on the houses in which they shall eat it. 8They shall eat the meat in that night, roasted with fire, with unleavened bread. They shall eat it with bitter herbs. 9Don’t eat it raw, nor boiled at all with water, but roasted with fire; with its head, its legs and its inner parts. 10You shall let nothing of it remain until the morning; but that which remains of it until the morning you shall burn with fire. 11This is how you shall eat it: with your belt on your waist, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and you shall eat it in haste: it is Yahweh’s Passover. 12For I will go through the land of Egypt in that night, and will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and animal. I will execute judgments against all the gods of Egypt. I am Yahweh. 13The blood shall be to you for a token on the houses where you are. When I see the blood, I will pass over you, and no plague will be on you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.
On every occasion that Moses and Aaron approached Pharaoh they asked for the release of God’s people and also gave warning of a plague that would follow should resistance continue. Despite the warning Pharaoh was unrelenting and kept the Israelites captive, thinking that he too was a god and considered himself equal to the Lord. His wickedness and cruel treatment of God’s people could not go unpunished. Plague after plague fell on the Egyptians, the Nile turned to blood, frogs, gnats and flies, overwhelmed the land, livestock died, people suffered boils, hail and darkness flooded Egypt. In defiance the Israelites were still held against their will and suffered more atrocities at the hands of the slave drivers. Moses and Aaron approach Pharaoh again warning of a terrible judgement that was about to happen. The Lord will pass over Egypt and the firstborn son from each house will die, but Pharaoh continued to resist. However, unlike Pharaoh when he killed the Israelite baby boys, God in his mercy also gave a means to escape this terrible plague.
The instructions to remain safe were simple, take and kill an unblemished lamb, use its meat to make a special meal and set the blood aside. It was to be painted onto the top and sides of the outside doorposts of each home, so that when the Lord passed over he would see the blood as a sign that the occupants were obedient to him and all inside would be saved. God’s foremost desire was that the people would all turn to him, and remain safe, but if rebellion continued, he could not leave the current situation unpunished. They all had a choice to make, take God’s offer of safety or remain against him. Sometimes, it is difficult to understand that God is a God of justice, however, at the same time he offers mercy and forgiveness to all that would ask. In Egypt when he saw the blood of the innocent lamb that was enough for him to show mercy. Do you know that God longs to show mercy to you today? He continues to offer a means of rescue, not through a lamb but through his own son. In the NT John says about Jesus, ‘Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!’ Jesus became our sacrificial lamb when he died for us, because of this when we ask for his forgiveness for what we have done wrong, we are forgiven completely and he makes everything right between us and God.