Worthy to Keep the Passover

I don't know about you, but I'm having a hard time grasping the Passovers coming up. You know, you try to get prepared for the Passover, you think about it weeks ahead of time, and then all of a sudden here it's almost here. And it just sort of... it seems like this time of year, if we're not careful, all kinds of things come along to get our attention so that we're not paying attention to the fact that the Passover's coming up. Really the most solemn and most holy thing that we do throughout the year. First Passover, of course, you know, we always talk about that this time of year, and during the days of 11 Bread, that first Passover, where all these dramatic events took place, and God literally destroyed the greatest empire on the earth at the time. It was the superpower, and God destroyed that nation in order to free Israel from slavery they were in, because of promises that He had made to Abraham. And you know, you read through those things that's so dramatic and so amazing, and you think about the people going through that, and they're told that, you know, God's going to bring down this nation, and God's going to do this, and God's going to do that, and every time they're told by Moses and Aaron something's going to happen, it happens. And they watched the most incredible series of public miracles, just dramatic miracles affecting hundreds of thousands of people, and all throughout the scripture. I mean, Jesus might have healed somebody, and that was the most amazing thing, but you know, maybe a hundred people saw it.

Here, entire nation saw it, plus all the Israelites. And then, of course, you have the opening of the Red Sea.

Let me ask you a question, and we'll answer this later. What would happen if that night of the Passover, and all the Israelites are killing a lamb, they're preparing it because of a special ceremony they have to have, they're going to do, because God's going to kill all the firstborn of Egypt.

And what if you're an Egyptian, and you're a firstborn, and you've decided, you know what, this God of Israel is the most powerful God. He's the God over all the gods, and the Egyptian gods can't stand up to him. So I decided to worship him so I can be protected. So if that Egyptian man then took and killed a lamb, brought all his family inside, and kept the Passover that night, would he have been spared? Like the Israelites, because he was doing what they were doing, would he have been would have been spared? Well, we'll talk about that, and expand that out into a concept that we need to think about as participants in the New Covenant. Of course, we keep the Passover differently than they did, because it's, even though they're connected, one is part of the Abrahamic and Old Covenant, and the other is part of the New Covenant.

So let's go back to Exodus chapter 12 to look at that first Passover. And what happened after the Passover?

So this is right after the Passover, and God gives Moses and Aaron instructions on what they are to do when they get into the Promised Land. So the Israelites have been told, God has called you to leave this land and go into a Promised Land, that they didn't know how far it was. They would have had no idea the distance. I doubt if many of them even knew the Red Sea existed. I mean, because they lived their whole lives in the Nile Delta. So, you know, it's like, what is this Promised Land out there? Well, that's where God's taking us. I really think the few of them would have known about the Sinai, crossing that desert. So they're excited, and God's doing all these miracles. And then after the Passover, before they actually leave, he tells them this.

Verse 43, and the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, This is the ordinance of the Passover. No foreigner shall eat it. But every man's servant, who is bought for money, would he have circumcised him, that he may eat it. And a sojourner and a hired servant shall not eat it. That's just interesting. This is what was going to happen when you get into the land. I mean, they weren't, you know, the sojourner meant they were in their land and somebody came into the land and wasn't a natural-born Israelite. And they were rich enough to hire people. Okay, these were people that were still slaves. So when you get into the land, this is how you'll keep it. And no foreigner can keep it. No sojourner can keep it. Someone that just is passing through. Even if you hired somebody that wasn't an Israelite and he was living in the country, he can't keep it either. Then he goes down to verse 45, or I'm seeing 48. And when a stranger dwells with you and wants to keep the Passover, okay, so you get these foreigners, these strangers, these sojourners, these hired servants, he said, when they live among you and they wish to partake of the Passover to the Lord, keep it properly, let all his males be circumcised and let him then come near and keep it. And he shall be as a native of the land, for no uncircumcised person shall eat it. And one law shall be for the native born and for the stranger who dwells among you. So he says, now once you get into the land and someone comes into that land, and they're a sojourner, they're a, you know, they're a stranger there, they're not part of Israel, but they say, I wish to follow your God, I wish to make a covenant with your God, then they have to be circumcised. And we do know, when we go clear back to the Abrahamic covenant, that the side of the covenant between God and Abraham and his physical descendants under those two covenants was circumcision. And he says, now when you get into the land and someone comes in who's not an Israelite and they wish to worship me, then they are to be circumcised and they are to become part of the people. In fact, he said, remember, it's the same law for them as to you. In other words, they can't be second-class citizens. Anyone who came into their land when they got there, then that person, once they accepted the God of Israel, once they accepted the covenant, and this is what's real important and it's understanding what we're going to go through today, it all depends on a personal covenant between God and people, between God and individuals.

And so any Gentile that came into Israel, made the covenant with God, became a full participant in their covenant and he could keep the Passover. So they leave and God opens a Red Sea, and they travel for about a year all across the Sinai. And God has to do miracle after miracle.

I mean, he has to cause water to come out of where there is no water. He brings them quail to eat when they want meat. Every day they get up and without growing the food, food appears. Every single day, except the Sabbath, and they have to gather the food together.

Every day they get up and they look towards that tabernacle and there's a pillar of fire there at night and a pillar of smoke during the day. The very special presence of God that they saw before they came through the Red Sea. It's that very pillar that held back, the pillar of fire, that held back the Egyptian army while they got through. They had seen the work of God over and over again for an entire year. And so they get to the Promised Land.

Something interesting happens. Let's go to Joshua 5. Remember to partake of the Passover. He had to be a participant in the covenant and any of the women or the females the family was in the covenant once the male was circumcised. So the whole family was part of the covenant. So now we have verse 2. Here they are just getting ready. These same people that came out that had crossed the Son and gone through all those troubles, were attacked by different tribes, and just went through issue after issue with God. They're there. They're right there.

Ready to go in.

Verse 2. And at that time the Lord said to Joshua, make flint knives of yourself and circumcise the sons of Israel again the second time.

Well, let me back up a minute.

No, no, because let me back up a bit. They get there and they're not allowed to go in.

They get there and God won't let them go in. Not because He says you can't, it's because they refuse.

They refuse to go into the Promised Land after destroying Egypt, killing the firstborn, open the Red Sea, leading them visibly every day for a year. After all the things that had happened, they refused to go into the Promised Land because they remember they sent in the spies.

And ten of the spies came back and said, it's terrible. There's walled cities, there's armed soldiers. Some of them are so big they're giants. We can't go take that. We can't. We have to go back.

We have to go back to Egypt. Joshua and Caleb said, no, no, no. God will give us this. And they said, no, I won't. God can't give us this. This is too big for us. We have to go back. And so God said, you can't come in. But let's look here at this story now because they wonder for 40 years. Verse 2, and at that time, this is before now, they're at the second time.

Okay. This is the second time they're before the Promised Land. The Lord said to Joshua, make flint knives for yourselves and circumcise the sons of Israel again the second time.

So Joshua made flint knives for himself and circumcised the sons of Israel at the Hill of the Foreskins. And this is the reason why Joshua circumcised them. All the people who came out of Egypt, who were males, all the men of war, had died in the wilderness on the way after they had come out of Egypt. Understand all the people over the age of 20 who had come out of Egypt, except for Caleb and Joshua, all of them who had come out, who had been promised the Promised Land, who had been promised, God promised I will take you there. Every one of them died because God sent them back and said, you cannot go in. And so a group of them actually tried to go in and the Canaanites slaughtered them. They had no choice but to head back out into the Sinai to spend 40 years wandering around in the Sinai. And now you realize they're about to go into the Promised Land. They're about to go through their own kind of Red Sea because the Jordan River would have to be opened up for them to go through. So they're about to go through their own baptism, just like they had to go back be baptized in the Red Sea. They have to go through their own baptism, but they now must be circumcised. For all those years, no one born in that 40-year period had been circumcised. So God now is re-initiating the covenant with the new generation because the generation before had broken the covenant and he had let them die. He says in verse 5, He had given to us a land flowing with milk and honey. Now realize how incredibly sad this story is. All the people that had experienced the first Passover, all the people had been led through miracle after miracle to the Promised Land, and all the adults were told, you cannot come in. And they didn't. And now 40 years later, they're circumcised and the covenant is made again. This would, by the way, the answer to our hypothetical Egyptian friend. Slaying the lamb and being in that house at that night would not have saved him. He wasn't in a covenant with God. The Israelites were still keeping the command given to Abraham, and the Jews aren't quite sure whether this was a mass event that happened at Moses' time, although it doesn't say that's what happened, or if that's the one thing they had kept all those years. It's an identity as a people with circumcision. All we know is they were all circumcised when they came out.

They were in a covenant with God, and God was fulfilling his part of that covenant by taking them to the Promised Land. And now he makes that same covenant with the new generation before they go into the Promised Land. You and I are part of a covenant with God. God made a covenant with us. We didn't make it with him. We disagreed. He made a covenant with us. It's called the new covenant. We keep the Passover because the Passover is commanded of the new covenant. In fact, the old Passover is just telling us about the new Passover.

It's a type of the reality of the new Passover. You and I can only go to that Passover ceremony and take the bread and the wine if we have entered into a covenant with God, just like that's the only way they could do it then. And so we can't partake of the Passover if we're not baptized. Because baptism is the public sign that you have entered into a covenant with God. And he forgives you because of the Passover Lamb of Jesus Christ, and you are given his Spirit. So we're talking about our Passover covenant. And there are some lessons, what I just read, that actually apply to us.

Now, we'll get to those in a minute, but I want to talk about something that sometimes causes confusion. And it's because the Apostle Paul, in telling the Corinthian church, that they had to be careful not to keep the Passover in an unworthy manner. So let's look at that and see what he said. Obviously, ancient Israel did not keep the Passover in a worthy manner. They ended up where they weren't even allowed to go into the Promised Land.

So what does Paul mean by this? Let's go to 1 Corinthians 11. I've heard this explained a couple different ways, but one of the things we have to look at is what it cannot mean. What does it mean, but also what it does it cannot mean?

Verse 18. Now, he's really correcting the church of Corinth because it's a mess, and they are keeping the Passover in a very spiritually dysfunctional way. He says, for first of all, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you, and in part, I believe it. He said, I hear that the church just is fighting all the time and arguing over things, and people can't get along with each other.

There must also be factions among you that those who are approved may be recognized among you. Therefore, when you come together in one place, it is not to eat the Lord's Supper. So they were coming together to eat the Lord's Supper, a reference to the Seder meal that Jesus would have kept with his disciples. And it probably was very similar to a Jewish Seder meal, just from the little descriptions we have of it.

So he's keeping this meal, and he's saying, when you come together, and he's going to talk about the keeping of the bread and the wine, the Passover, he says, it's not to eat the meal. That's not what we do. He says, for in eating, each one takes his own Supper ahead of others. One is hungry, the other is drunk. Now, can you imagine coming to the Passover, you're having a great big meal. Some people are feasting, others don't have much, and they're going hungry, and some people brought enough wine that they're sitting and are getting drunk.

What? Do you not have houses to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the Church of God and shame those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you in this? I do not praise you. For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus in the same night in which he was betrayed, broke bread.

He says, so let's go back to what we're doing, and of course we're doing this on the same night that Jesus did this. And when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, take eat. This is my body which is broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me. In the same manner, he also took the cup after supper, saying, this cup is the new covenant in my blood.

Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death till he comes. So he said, you are supposed to come together and take this bread and this wine as a profession that you have entered into the new covenant.

And in the new covenant, we don't have to go slay a lamb because we already have a lamb that has been slain, which is Jesus Christ. So you don't have to have the meal, but we have to partake of the symbols of Jesus Christ. We have to partake of bread and wine, his body, and his blood. He was crucified and he died for us as a substitute penalty for our sins. That's all throughout the entire New Testament. So Paul is saying, this is what you do. And you do this, you proclaim the Lord's death till he comes. That's why this is a solemn occasion when we come together to keep the Passover. It's, you know, there's not a lot of laughing and joy and I mean there's joy in it, but there's not. It's not a party by any means because we're coming together to remember his death, to remember the terrible penalty, to remember how much he suffered and all that only had one reason and that is because God's justice, his righteousness, demands our deaths for our sins. But he also worked it out that, and Jesus of course said he would do this, he came and said this is why I'm here. He would pay that penalty for all of us at one time.

For all of us at one time he was going to pay that penalty. So we come together on that night to remember that and to celebrate that. Verse 27, Therefore whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. Now that's a terrible thing he says here, to be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. In other words, you are guilty and not forgiven. That sacrifice of Jesus Christ isn't being applied to you. So when you look at that in horror and say I don't want to be that, so I don't want to do it in an unworthy manner. Well, to do it in an unworthy manner means that you're not forgiven. You're still, you're guilty of the blood in the in the body of Jesus Christ. It not has been applied to you for forgiveness. Now this passage does cost especially that verse a lot of angst at times because people start to look at themselves before the Passover and they say, I'm still weak. I still have sins. I still have faults. I have some things I've struggled with for a long time. I have this, I have that, I have the other. And so therefore I am not worthy to take the Passover because of my weaknesses and my sins. Now Paul can't be saying that.

The reason why is is because that none of us would then be worthy to take the Passover. There's not one of us here that still doesn't have sin in us. So he can't be saying you have to be perfect and sinless to take the Passover. It's not possible well it only is in the mind of God to be possible that he looks at us and says, I cover your sins. And how does he do that? Through the blood of Jesus Christ. So you and I can't bring a sacrifice because we'd have to kill ourselves. The sacrifice has to be done for us.

The purpose of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ is to make us acutely aware that we have no worth in ourselves to make God forgive us. What in the world can we bring to God and say, here I am. I'm basically a nice guy. Oh, I got a few problems. I'm basically a nice guy. So let's just call it even, okay? See, we don't have any argument here. We come before God in total humility and say, I have no worth to give you. And God says, I do. I give my worth for you, and now you are worthy to come before me.

To keep the Passover in an unworthy manner is to not recognize the power of the life and death and resurrection of Jesus Christ for you.

So yes, we're to examine ourselves, and yes, we find sin.

But in an unworthy manner doesn't mean you come without sin. Well, actually we do when we go to God and repent of it. When you say, please forgive me, as I approach the Passover, I'm not there yet. Please forgive me. And God says, yes, that's why you need to take the Passover. That's why you need to come and take the Passover. Because you're now with other disciples who aren't perfect either. But they're all coming because we all come together because God gives us the value of Jesus Christ. And now we have worth. We have worth that comes from Him. And in that worth, we have a relationship with God.

It's something we can never do ourselves. So in verse 28, we're told, let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup. He didn't say, examine yourself. You know, look at all your past sins. Look at all the things you've done, and just don't even show up. That's not what he says. He says, look at yourself and realize your absolute need for God's forgiveness. Your absolute need for God's strength and help. Your absolute need for the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. And go ask for that and show up. Come partake of it because God has made a covenant with you.

God already made the covenant with you.

God already applied Jesus Christ's death to you.

And so he says, every year though, we need to be reminded. Every year we need to be brought back to the focal point. Every year. And when we do, we recognize the absolute humility we have to have because we are lost without God.

We're lost without the Passover. So the examiners ourselves isn't to convince ourselves not to go, it's to convince ourselves of the need to go. And a desire to go. And yes, go to God and say, I'm still a work in progress. Please forgive me and please help me.

Paul goes on, oh and by the way, people say, well, I at Passover, I still remember all my past sins. And your covenant with God, he's already forgiven you your past sins. So why would you bring those up? God doesn't think about him.

So you know, I just remember every Passover, I think about when I did this and I did this and I did this. Why? That's not the examination we're supposed to do. The examination we're supposed to do of our hearts and minds now in our relationship with God and in our relationship with sin and our relationship with forgiveness.

And a little bit we'll talk about, we'll read, what God actually expects us to discover in this examination. Besides the fact that we're still terribly flawed, there's something else we're supposed to discover in it. He says, verse 30, verse 29 says, for he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner, eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord's body. The problem is we're not understanding Christ, the work of Christ. He talked about the body and the blood already. We're not understanding Christ. We're not understanding his resurrection. We're not understanding what the covenant that's been made with us by God. And for this reason, many are weak and sick among you and many sleep. For if we would judge ourselves, we would not be judged. He said, if we learn in this process to look at ourselves and see where we are in this relationship with God, then we won't have to be judged by God. But when we are judged, verse 32, we are chastened by the Lord that we may not be condemned with the world. So when we do this, we may find that we have to go to God and ask for forgiveness. We may feel God may actually bring us to some kind of repentance during the time period. He almost does. If we do this right, we always come back to a real repentant attitude. And he says, good, then you won't have to be condemned. You continue the forgiveness process, this continual process of being washed, forgiven, changed.

So let's go back to Israel and Egypt and leaving Egypt and start to take these two stories we're looking at here and see how they fit together. This is actually going to be in the New Testament in Hebrews. Hebrews chapter 3.

So we don't want to take the Passover in an unworthy manner.

So we have to even look at what is an unworthy manner. And this has to do, understanding that, it has to do with that first generation of Israelites who came out of Egypt. Why were they not allowed into the Promised Land? I mean, that was just a type. That was a physical thing. But we are on a journey to a spiritual Promised Land. So the principle that is set in that Passover passage and what happened then in Joshua applies directly to us in a spiritual way. And here's how the writer of Hebrews puts this, because he encapsulates this. Verse 7, Hebrews 3, therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, and I quote here from Psalm 95, today, if you will hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion as in the day of the trial in the wilderness. Now, Hisaki reads in the church, and he says, we've got to be careful. We don't make the same mistake those Israelites did, because they failed the test and did not go into the physical Promised Land. We don't want to fail our test, because we won't go into the eternal spiritual Promised Land. Ours is a little bit more important than theirs was.

When your father's testimony and tried me, saw my works for 40 years, therefore, I was angry with that generation and said, they always go astray in their heart, and they have not known my ways. So I swore in my wrath, they shall not enter my rest.

He says, I just won't let them in.

All the place here. Let's go back and look at where God deals with that in Numbers. Go back to Numbers. We'll come back to Hebrews here. Numbers 14.

And verse 19. We're back now to when that first generation came out of Egypt, and they're at the border of the Promised Land. And they listen to the ten spies. They refuse to go in. Then when God tells, you know, Moses, okay, they can't go in. A bunch of them try to go in, and they get slaughtered by the Canaanites. Now, no matter what God said, they did the exact opposite.

And so he tells him to Moses, just step aside. I'm just going to kill them. I mean, this, no matter what I do, no matter how many miracles I do, no matter how much I protect them, no matter what, they don't believe me, and they do the exact opposite of what I tell them.

Verse 19, Moses says, part of the iniquity of this people, I pray, according to the greatness of your mercy, just as you have forgiven this people from Egypt, even till now, he says, you've forgiven them over and over and over and over again.

For a whole year, can't you forget? Please, please, don't just forgive him this time. And what God says is very interesting. He says, the Lord says, I have pardoned according to your word. Okay, I forgive them. I'm not going to, at this point, He's not going to give them eternal judgment. But there's still going to be a physical judgment. But truly, as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord, because all these men who have seen my glory, remember we talked about just a few minutes ago, all the things they saw? I mean, can you imagine coming out and, you know, hearing all the screaming and crying in Egypt as all those firstborns died? And you see all the people coming up and throwing their gold and silver edges. They just get out of our country. You watch the hail mixed with fire in the darkness. You've seen all those plagues. You watch the red sea over and you went through. You watched it close on the Egyptian army. For a whole year, you marched across that desert and nobody starved and nobody died of thirst.

He says, they saw my glory and the signs which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness and have put me to test now these 10 times and not heated my voice. You read through that story of that journey 10 times in 12 months. They literally told God, we don't believe you can do what you say you're going to do. We want to go back to Egypt. Let us go back. There was security there. There was better food. This manna, you know, it's okay, but every day and every day we're sick of this. Now, where's a good deli?

They just, over and over, we don't believe you're wise enough. We don't believe you're powerful enough. We don't believe you really know what you're doing. Maybe you've got us lost out here. Maybe we want meat, so we sent them quail.

We want this. We want that. Over and over and over, they rebelled and rebelled. He gave them the 10 commandments. They saw the fire. They heard the voice from top of the mountain. And what did they do? They tried to go back in Egypt by creating a golden calf. Over and over and over again, we keep thinking, wow, all these incredible miracles! And it never changed them. It never changed them. And after a whole year of that, he says these 10 times, I've had enough. They certainly, verse 23, shall not see the land of which I swore to their fathers, nor shall any of those who rejected me see it.

The reason they didn't go into the Promised Land wasn't just because they had some sin, but wasn't just because they weren't perfect. It was because for an entire year, everything they did was based on a total disbelief that God could do what He says.

They just didn't believe Him, and a belief that life was too hard on the journey to the Promised Land. Getting to the Promised Land was too hard of a journey. They preferred slavery in Egypt to walking in the hot sun.

You know, not being able to take a bath as often as they want. I mean, the Nile River was right there before. Compared to all that, this just wasn't worth it. This Promised Land, whatever it is, wherever it is, all we can see is sand. Wherever this Promised Land is, we're not really that interested. And it may not have been as sandy as you think. I mean, they found out through these maps they can take through, what is it that reads into the soil, but it reads deep into the soil and so forth. Throughout the Sinai, that one time, it was covered with a forest.

So it's more lush than it is now. But still, it was a wilderness. There wasn't a lot of people living here.

So they looked at that and said, we just want to go back. We want to go a whole year back, then maybe you'll open the Red Safe Horse again, and we can go back to where our heart is. That's where we want to be.

And he said, just go. I'm going to send you out to the desert now, wilderness, and part of it was desert. Send you out there until you all die. And then I'll take your children, make an agreement with them, a covenant with them, and then I'll let them come in.

Let's go back to Hebrews. So why is this story being told in Hebrews?

Because that's what verse 7 here of chapter 3 through 11 is David retelling that story.

Verse 12, here's the message to the church. Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief and departing from the living God, an evil heart that just won't accept God. It doesn't matter how many miracles. It doesn't matter how many times He visibly was there. It didn't matter what He did from the mountain. They just wouldn't believe Him.

But exhort one another daily while it's called today. Lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin, that deceitfulness of sin. See, this does have to have to do with sin. But it's not about struggling with sin, asking forgiveness of sin, overcoming sin. It's about being deceived by sin until you want the sin. You want to go back into Egypt. You want to go back into the slavery. You like the slavery better than the difficulty of the journey.

For we have become, verse 14, partakers of Christ. If we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end, while it says today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion. For who, having heard, rebelled? Indeed, was it not all who came out of Egypt led by Moses? Now with whom was He angry with for 40 years? Was it not those who sinned, whose corpses fell in the wilderness? And to whom did He swear that they would not enter into His rest?

But to those who did not obey. So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief. Their view of God was small. It didn't matter that, you know, the greatest God in Egypt was the sun, and God just covered up the sun. And they were in darkness. He defeated every Egyptian God. I don't know how many of you heard the webcast Bible study that David Rains did, not this last one, but the one before, because I'm having him do some of them. He went through all the gods and goddesses that the plagues on Egypt were showing that God could destroy all their gods and goddesses. Every one of them, every one of them, of course, was based on, oh, the frog god? No. What could I do with that? The sun god?

What could I do with that?

And still, no, that's a better life. That's a better life than this one.

We didn't know that it'd be so hard to get to the Promised Land.

And here he warns Christians about the same thing.

To take of the Passover in an unworthy manner, let's look at what these things Israel did and to look at it how we can do that spiritually. We don't trust in God to complete the work He started in us. They didn't trust that God would complete the work He started in them. Come on, I'm taking you out as my people, and I'm going to take you out and take you to a great place, and I'm going to protect you, and I'm going to give you the Promised Land. He couldn't complete that work. I mean, He must be... where's His GPS? All we do is wander around in this desert. I mean, where... God doesn't know what He's doing. How many times do we face life that way? We just don't trust that He's going to complete the work He started in us. We love slavery to sin more than love of Him and His promises. We love the slavery to sin. We have to be aware of that. All sin produces slavery, and we love it more than God.

They love their slavery after a while. They literally can deceive themselves that it was better than being free.

We don't trust in the worth of Christ's sacrifice, so we don't accept God's forgiveness. That's a big one around Passover time.

Is the sacrifice of Christ big enough? Is it worthy enough to cover your sins? In the moment we say no, we've just told Christ He's not big enough. His torture, His death, that might cover some people's sins, but not mine. And then we're lost.

Because if His blood doesn't cover our sins, we're lost. We have no chance of salvation. None. We can't bring any worth. Our worth comes from what He has done. And then four, we reject our spiritual journey because it's too difficult. Now we see God's way is harsh, restrictive, keeps us from having fun, keeps us from doing for what we want. So we just know this price we pay for not partying on Saturday nights is too much of a price to pay for the Promised Land. Because the Promised Land is out there someplace, but I'm not there yet. I'd rather just have fun now. So think of this. This, these are the attitudes. So we keep looking at specific things. And there are specific things that can keep us from keeping the Passover in an unworthy manner. But primarily those come from one of these attitudes. We don't trust in God to complete the work He started in us. We love slavery to sin more than His love and His promises. We don't trust in the worth of Christ's sacrifice, so we don't accept God's forgiveness. Or we reject our spiritual journey as too difficult, and we see God's way as harsh and restrictive. Those are the attitudes that pull us away to keep the Passover in an unworthy manner.

We say, well, yeah, I've been thinking about it, and I'm thinking about that business deal or that my friend the other day, or two weeks ago, and I sort of cheated him, you know, and I'm thinking about that, and that's unworthy. Yes, it is, but you can repent of that. Right? I was thinking about how I lost my temper with this person, and I said some really mean things to him, and that's unworthy. Yes, it is, but you can repent of that. These things take us away from repentance, in which case we can become unworthy. The only way we maintain worthiness is through God, because what do we bring to the table? It is through God that we receive worthiness.

So as we humbly and prayerfully examine ourselves, we have to be careful that deep inside we're still not yearning for Egypt, or deep inside we're not trusting in God that He's going to take care of us. I tell you what, let's not pretend trusting in God is not easy.

I mean, there's going to be times in everyone's life when trusting in God is going to be the hardest thing he ever did.

And there's times when the journey seems not worth it. And these are the things that draw us away from keeping the Passover in a worthy manner.

So let me ask you this. I mean, we looked at that Old Testament example. We've looked at what Paul said, and we've looked at what's written in Hebrews that sort of brings these things together.

What is it that God wants you to come away with after you examine yourself? I mean, I hope all of you, if you haven't already done it this week, you're going to take a day in fast. You should be praying. You should be looking at the Scripture. You should be asking God to help you to keep this Passover in a worthy manner.

So you do this, and you go to God, you pray, and you fast, and you prepare for the Passover. When Passover time comes, what is in your mind? What should be in your mind? Let's go to Ephesians 3.

This isn't read. In fact, I've never heard it read in terms of the Passover, and yet this is what is Paul admonishing the church in Ephesus, but it is where the Passover takes us.

At the end of the Passover, once we've gone and taken through that bread and that wine, we've washed feet, we've prayed together as brothers and sisters, what should we be going home with?

This is what you should take home from the Passover.

Paul says in verse 14 of Ephesians 3, For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from which the whole family in heaven and earth is named. You leave that Passover humble in praise of God, not wrapped up in yourself, but humble in praise of God and Christ Jesus, and glad to be part of the family he's creating, that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might through his Spirit and the inner man.

You go home strengthened inside of you because of the Passover.

You go home strengthened by the power of God because you recognize all the things he's done.

And you know that the promised land awaits.

And you know this journey is worth it, even though it doesn't feel like it sometimes. It just doesn't. But it is worth it, and you know it because of the Passover. You know it because of the price paid. That Christ, verse 17, might dwell in your hearts through faith, that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and the length and the depth and the height. None of us will ever comprehend all that, even afterward changed. We'll never know what God knows.

And he says, I want you to know as much as you can. I want you to experience as much as you can of who God is, and what his love is, and what the sacrifice of Christ means, and how this is God saying, I'm doing this for you. This isn't God saying, you probably shouldn't come to the Passover. You're pretty wicked. That's not what's going on here. God is saying, come, incomplete person, and let's continue the process of completing you. If he didn't do it every year, we'd probably just drift and drift. He makes us do it every year. He says, to know the love of Christ, which passes knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God when you were baptized. Because you can only do this if you're baptized. Only if you enter into that covenant and God's Spirit is in you.

God literally came in your mind. That the power of God, the mind of God, the love of God, emanated from him, and it's in all of us. It's the same Spirit of Father and Christ, and it's in all of us. And he says, Paul says, I want you to be full of it. Of course, Paul was. I doubt if any of us are even close to where Paul was. But he looks at the people there in Ephesus, and I want you to be just filled with God. That's what we need when we leave the Passover. We're not to go away saying, oh, I don't know how I'll survive to another Passover. No, we're to be filled with God. That's what the Passover is supposed to do.

He says, verse 20, Now to him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think. Now think about that. He said, God is able to do beyond what you can even think. God is able to do beyond what you can know. You know, that's frustrating to me sometimes. It's because if he can do all this, why doesn't he do it? I mean, why do we have to cross the Sinai? Why can't we just go there? You know, why can't you just ship us into the ... part the Red Sea and have a bunch of, you know, a herd of horses come up with saddles and everything. We just get on horses. Right. Why did we have to walk across here?

Why do the, you know, Amalekites have to come along? Why?

He said, because this is the journey. I have to prepare you for that.

They were, they could never get out of the slavery to Egypt. They never, they were, they died slaves in a desert. That's all they did. They died as slaves in a desert.

They never let go so that they could, like, you know, grab ahold of God.

He says, now to him was able to exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to him be glory in the church by Jesus Christ to all generations forever and ever. Amen. We're going to be observing the Passover in a few days.

And we need to study the scriptures, meditate upon the covenant that God has made with us, and that we ratified it baptism. And in baptism, Paul says the old person was crucified, and a new person is being born. He's being created.

And here we are. We've already passed through our Red Sea.

We're keeping our Passover on the journey.

It is a time of self-reflection, but it's not supposed to lead us to despair.

Now, in preparation, sometimes you feel sort of bad. Like, I mean, you can feel mad. You should sometimes. I should be farther along than I am. God says, we'll fix that. If you just submit, we'll fix that. So in this self-reflection is to draw us to God and draw us to Christ and lead us to the knowledge of His power. So that we're not like those slaves who never accepted the power of God when it was right in front of them every day. And they could not do it. They could not accept it. And then we're reminded to not turn our backs as those Israelites who stood on the threshold of the promised land and to believe and trust God. That God isn't going to throw us away. God's going to work with us. God's going to get us there. God is going to give us what He says He will. And if as long as we submit, as long as we don't build those attitudes that they had, He promises to complete the work He started in us.