some thoughts

Consider this command and its divinely inspired meaning:

[An the Lord continued,] …It is the Lord’s Passover. For I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and I will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the Lord. … This day shall be for you a memorial day, and you shall keep it as a feast to the Lord; throughout your generations, as a statute forever, you shall keep it as a feast. …for on this very day I brought your hosts out of the land of Egypt. Therefore you shall observe this day, throughout your generations, as a statute forever. [Then Moses instructed the people, saying,] …And when you come to the land that the Lord will give you, as he has promised, you shall keep this service. And when your children say to you, “What do you mean by this service?” you shall say, “It is the sacrifice of the Lord’s Passover, for he passed over the houses of the people of Israel in Egypt, when he struck the Egyptians but spared our houses.” And the people bowed their heads and worshiped. (selections from Exodus 12, ESV)

And so they did for 2,000 years. Then along came Jesus, the Christ. When he sat at table with his disciples, he continued his “you have heard that it was said,” teachings. He said, in effect, “You have heard that it has been said of old, do this in remembrance of what happened in Egypt. But I say unto you, do this in remembrance of me.”

On what authority could he make such a massive, sweeping “revision” of divine, special revelation? Let there be no question about that. Jesus Christ was (and is, and shall forever be) “very God, of very God,” manifest in the flesh. He could “update” divine revelation, because He is divine. Yet, in this case, he was not abolishing the connection to the Passover in Egypt, he was revealing its true meaning: he wasn’t (as so many Bible headings read,) “Instituting the Lord’s Supper,” he was explaining the 2,000 year old Passover. He didn’t say, “think about me too,” He was saying “this is about me; that was allegory–I am reality.” It was a foreshadowing picture of God’s ultimate and final “putting [of] enmity” between Satan and God’s people, played out in the pictures of Pharaoh (as Satan) and the Israelites (as His people)–all in fulfillment of God’s covenant promise made to Adam and his wife in the garden (Genesis 3:15). (Adam’s later naming of his wife ‘Eve,’ i.e., ‘life-giver,’ was a sort of ‘Amen’ to God’s promise: by naming her ‘mother of life’ - or, ‘mother of the one who will restore us to God, and bring us back into the blessed fellowship in the temple-garden’ - he was expressing his faith in the promises of God. And, by applying the name to his wife, he was bringing his family/house/kingdom with him in that confession (think of Joshua 24:15). [HT: Meredith Kline])

That garden-promise was the seed. It was cultivated and confirmed in and with Abraham. And the Egyptian Passover was the sapling of which Christ’s Passover was the full-grown oak tree. It was, in a sense, a large-scale, dramatic pre-commemoration story (played out on the world-stage), of the reality that was to occur in, with, and by the Promised Redeemer (on the cosmic-stage).

C. S. Lewis has correctly warned us about the dangers of “chronological snobbery,” that “new” doesn’t necessarily mean “improved.” But that doesn’t work in the interpretation of Scripture; in its case, new always means improved–or better: more fully revealed. We must understand the Old Covenant in light of the New: not vice versa (HT: Kim Riddlebarger). And Christ, through his Word and his work, have given us the means to do so correctly.

…just a few (rather disorganized) thoughts.