Christ is our Passover, not our Easter Bunny!

This is the Eleventh post from Chapter 8 of Friends With God: God’s Friendship With Israel And The Church, in which we are exploring the relationship, similarities, and differences between the Old and New Covenants.

As we approach the Passover and Easter we need to appreciate the real meaning of the sacrifice of Christ, and celebrate it the way he intended us to, as revealed by him, and to not vainly follow the traditions of men. (Matt 15:9, Mark 7:7)

The Holy Days Of God And The New Covenant

As we have seen in previous posts in this series, when the New Covenant is mentioned in the Gospels, nothing is stated about it conflicting with the Old Covenant. Indeed, the New Covenant is instituted at the Passover, which is considered today by many Christians to be an exclusively Jewish feast. (Matt 26:18, Mark 14:14, Luke 22:8)

What we see in scripture however is not a removal, but an elevating and changing to the Passover, so that it becomes a feast that both Jewish and gentile Christians are able to keep together from a spiritual and physical perspective.

During the Passover Jesus said:

With desire I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer: For I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof, until it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God…
And he took bread, and gave thanks, and broke it, and gave unto them, saying,
This is my body which is given for you: this do in remembrance of me.
Likewise also the cup after supper, saying,
This cup is the new testament (covenant) in my blood, which is shed for you.
(Luke 22:15-20)

Not only was this New Covenant initiated at Passover, but Christ will eat a Passover when it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God. We therefore see that the Passover is not done away with, as it will be kept when Jesus returns to establish the Kingdom of God on Earth.

This concurs with Zechariah 14:17-19, which also talks of the Feast of Tabernacles being kept at that time when Christ establishes the Kingdom of God on Earth. Not only will these festivals be able to be kept by all nations, but they will actually be enforced by God upon them! :

And it shall be, that whoso will not come up of all the families of the earth unto Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, even upon them shall be no rain. And if the family of Egypt go not up, and come not, that have no rain; there shall be the plague, wherewith the Lord will smite the heathen that come not up to keep the feast of tabernacles. This shall be the punishment of Egypt, and the punishment of all nations that come not up to keep the feast of tabernacles. (Zec 14:16-19)

When the Kingdom of God is throughout the entire world, then all people will show reverence to God by keeping his festivals.

The Symbols Of The New Covenant Within The Old Covenant Passover

The Apostles, being Jews, were in the Old Covenant. If there was a conflict with its terms in relation to the New Covenant, then at this Passover would have been a good time for Jesus to tell them. But nothing is said about doing away with the Old Covenant, here or anywhere else in scripture.

When Jesus said to the Apostles this cup is the New Covenant in my blood, he did not say, “and everything in the Old Covenant is obviously now done away with”. Instead, Jesus told the Apostles “this do in remembrance of me”: meaning to keep the Passover each year, in order to remember his sacrifice at that time.

Jesus also added to the Passover the new symbols of the bread and wine. Yet, there is no mention here of any requirement for the other symbols of the Passover, such as eating the lamb, to be removed.

These new symbols provide a deeper understanding of how Christ is integral to the meaning of the Passover – Christ Himself being much more than the lamb alone symbolised. By including the bread in this meal we see the significance of what he had previously said:

I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. (John 6:51)

As is explained below, Christ is the entire Passover - all the symbols and all the actions surrounding the Passover- such as when God passed over Israel in Egypt, when they took the lamb four days before killing it, whey they did not break any bone, etc. All of these characteristics surrounding the Passover are represented in Christ.

We therefore cannot replace the Passover with any other festival, let alone the pagan festival of Easter, which celebrates the Anglo-Saxon goddess of fertility called Ēostre!

Jesus shows us the way, the truth and the life that we need to live - for us to gain freedom from sin and live a righteous life and so receive eternal life. (John 14:6)

Paul tells the gentile church at Corinth, just what the spiritual foundation of the first Passover was, and in doing so reveals that Christ was with Israel in the desert:

And, brothers, I do not want you to be ignorant that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea. And all were baptized to Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank of the spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ.
(1Cor 10:1-4)

While this is an amazing scripture that reveals that Christ was spiritually with Israel, and they spiritually ate and drank of him back then, it is even more significant to appreciate that Paul is talking to Christians in Corinth who are all uncircumcised gentiles, yet he calls them brothers and tells them all our Fathers were with Moses in Egypt.

The Spiritual Children Of Abraham

This gives even greater understanding to the fact that once we have the same faith of Abraham then we become Spiritual Israel and then we are then children of Abraham:

if you be Christ's, then you are Abraham's seed (children), and heirs according to the promise.
(Gal 3:29)

Those therefore who have the faith of Abraham, (as discussed in this previous post) be they Jew or gentile, not only inherit the promises but also the ancestry of those who also had the faith of Abraham, who all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank of the spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ.

We therefore who have faith in Christ (and live as he lived) have as our forbears those mentioned in the faith chapter of of Hebrews 11:

And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise: God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect. (Heb 11:39-40)

Christ In The Passover In Egypt

Let us come back to the Passover meal that Christ had with the Apostles. It was not something new to have bread and wine at the Passover, as these foods were always part of all meals in ancient times. It’s just that here, at the institution of the New Covenant, Christ reveals to the Apostles what the bread and wine represent at the Passover meal - his body and his blood.

As explained in this previous post, we need to eat Christ’s flesh and drink his blood, which is a very graphic way of saying that we need to follow his example in our lives.

The Israelites had been keeping the Passover since the time of Moses, including the bread and wine as part of the meal. Now Christ tells the Apostles that the bread and wine of this ceremony represent his body and blood in the New Covenant.

The Israelites were taking of the bread and wine, but could not have known what these two items were to symbolically represent in the future New Covenant with Christ.

The symbols of the Spiritual New Covenant were therefore part of the physical Old Covenant, just as circumcision of the heart was the purpose and intent of physical circumcision, as discussed in this previous post.

It was only those of physical Israel who loved God with their whole heart, mind and soul who would become Spiritual Israel, as mentioned in Hebrews 11.

In addition, when gentile Christians are told by Paul to keep the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread, there is no mention of eating the lamb. (1Cor 11:23-29) This is because all animal sacrifices were required to be offered at the Temple in Jerusalem, so anyone living outside of Jerusalem could not eat the Lamb. (Deut 12:5-28) Even though the lambs were slaughtered at the temple in Jerusalem, they were actually consumed in people’s homes.

Christian Jews living in Jerusalem, were able to eat the lamb sacrificed at the Temple. However, since the destruction of the temple in 70AD, they can no longer do that. Yet, the New Testament Passover is able to be kept by all Christians, be they Jews or gentiles, with the bread and wine, wherever they live, for these are not required to be offered at the temple. We are also told that Christ is our Passover, as discussed below. (1Cor 5:7-8)

These Holy Days in the New Testament are about a spiritual harvest, as spoken of by Jesus:

Lift up your eyes and look on the fields, for they are white to harvest already. And he who reaps receives wages and gathers fruit to life eternal, so that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together. (John 4:35-36)

This harvest is being coordinated by God the Father:

Then he (Jesus) said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the labourers are few; therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out labourers into his harvest.”
(Matt 9:35-38)

The plan of God for all mankind is outlined in events that have already occurred, and will occur in the future, on his Holy Days, as discussed in this previous post. These Days are an important element in their own right, of the testimony of God, as they record God’s direct intervention in history, and also provide a timeline for how future prophesied events will play out.

Keeping The Holy Days Away From Jerusalem

Paul also tells the gentiles at Corinth about how to keep the Passover that Christ kept:

After the same manner also he (Jesus) took the cup, when he had supped, saying, This cup is the new testament (covenant) in my blood: this do you, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me. (1Cor 11:25)

We need to understand the full context of this letter to the Corinthians, for much of it is addressing how Christians are to keep the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread.

When the Israelites came into the promised land, they were required to eat unleavened bread every year at this time, in order to remember their ancestors’ flight out of Egypt, when they had no time to let their bread rise. (Exodus 12:39)

As part of their remembering, they were told to remove all leavened bread, and products such as yeast used for leavening, out of their houses, before the Feast of Unleavened Bread began. Having done this house cleaning, they were then considered ‘unleavened’ and ready to eat the Passover lamb.

Paul, however, told his gentile Christians at Corinth to keep this festival with a new complementary meaning to being physically unleavened in their households:

Purge out therefore the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, (of unleavened bread) as you are unleavened. (they had cleaned their houses of leavening products) For even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us: Therefore let us keep the feast, (of Passover and Unleavened Bread) not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. (1Cor 5:7-8)

Because Christ is our Passover, rather than a physical lamb, these Christian gentiles were told to keep the feast, but not with old leaven- which could be construed as the way it was incorrectly kept by many in that day who were in the Israelite Covenant.

Also, instead of talking about leaven as being a reminder of when Israel left Egypt in a hurry, Paul uses a new analogy of leaven representing the sin of malice and wickedness. In doing this Paul is elevating the meaning of this festival to its spiritual intent.

As discussed in Chapter 4, we are to remove sin from our lives and in its place we are to inculcate the example of Christ’s sinless life, as exemplified by eating the unleavened bread that represents his body.

We are to also partake of the covenant agreement by drinking the wine, which represents his blood- which symbolically lives in us as we become living sacrifices as he was. (Rom 12:1-2)

Also, animal sacrifices were replaced in the New Covenant with doing the Will of God:

Then said he, “Lo, I come to do your will, O God”. He takes away the first (animal sacrifices), that he may establish the second (doing the will of God). (Heb 10:9)

God’s will is for us to become living sacrifices, being a light to the world such that we emulate the life of Christ in our lives today.

In this letter to the Corinthians, Paul is talking to gentiles, about how all gentiles can keep the Passover and Feast of Unleavened Bread. In Israel it was expressly forbidden for an uncircumcised man to keep the Passover. (Exo 12:48)

Interestingly, those gentiles who were uncircumcised and living in Israel could keep all the other festivals, but were forbidden to eat the Passover. Yet, here in Corinth, Paul is telling these uncircumcised gentiles specifically to keep the Passover: Therefore let us keep the feast.

In addition to this, Paul is telling these gentiles to keep this Holy Day of God in their own country. This is another major change, as God’s festivals, along with all animal sacrifices, were specifically required to be kept at the Temple in Jerusalem. (Deut 12:5-28, 16:5-16)

The Festivals of God were not even to be kept in any other part of Israel. Yet Paul encourages Jews and gentiles to keep these festivals in Corinth, a long way from Jerusalem.

Paul, as a Jew, would also have kept not only the Passover, but all of God’s festivals with these gentiles, for he stayed many years in Asia Minor without returning to Jerusalem. (Acts 18:11, 19:10, 20:31)

When he says “let us keep the feast” it’s therefore not just for the gentiles, but also for the Jews, including himself, or he would have said “you should keep the feast”. He encourages “us” to keep the feast in our own towns, rather than go to Jerusalem.

Christians are to take the bread and wine at Passover as symbols of the Body of Christ, and the New Covenant, respectively. (Luke 22:19-20)

Passover is a once-a-year festival, and the bread and wine are symbols of the body of Christ and the New Covenant, which he said were to be taken at Passover.

There is no need, nor requirement, to take the bread and wine more often than once a year, at the Passover. To do it more often would be of no value, and an example of vainly worshiping God and adding to the Word of God. (Matt 15:8-9)

The next post in this series will continue to examine the question of “What is new in the New Covenant?”.