NUMBERS 9

5 And they kept the passover on the fourteenth day of the first month at even in the wilderness of Sinai: according to all that Yahweh commanded Moses, so did the children of Israel.

THE PASSOVER was a special sacrifice, a sacrifice of special deliverance. Its ordinances were unique, but it most closely resembled the Peace Offering. All of it except the blood and fat was eaten by the offerers themselves. Unlike the Peace Offering, none was given to the priests, for when it was first instituted there was no separate priestly class. It portrays Israel in its highest relationship to God as a holy people, a nation of priests.

The Passover lamb was given special attention and care. It was roasted whole, and no bones were broken -- especially pointing to Christ's offering. Bitter herbs were to be eaten with it, representing salvation through sorrow and suffering.

It was to be partaken of in active readiness for a journey with feet shod, loins girded, and staff in hand. Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us, and we too must keep the feast in a state of readiness for the journey, wherever it may lead -- recognizing that we have here no continuing city. Nothing of the present is permanent or important. We must keep ourselves lightly loaded and travel-girded, careful not to build ties and possessions in this present evil world.

The Passover must be accompanied, Paul says (1 Cor. 5:8), by

"The unleavened bread of SINCERITY and TRUTH"

Sincerity and Truth are powerful and beautiful words: powerful and beautiful qualities. Sincerity is purity from any pretense or hypocrisy or deception. Truth is freedom from any error or falsehood or mistake. These are divine qualities, not common to mankind. Very few will hold firmly and faithfully to sincerity and truth when a small degree of concealment or misrepresentation will save them loss, or get them gain. But such are no use to a holy God

"Thou desirest Truth in the inward parts" (Psa. 51:6).

Only those who in spiritual wisdom perceive the living beauty -- and dedicate their lives to the principles of Sincerity and Truth are acceptable into God's family. By nature, we are all creatures of error and subterfuge and deception. Lying and evasion for self-protection comes naturally right from childhood. Sincerity must be learned. We must be shown and perceive the beauty of the better, more excellent way. Pure, guileless sincerity is essential to holiness.

We must not look upon sacrifice as a "giving up" of something. It is a gaining and receiving; a joy and a privilege. It is the highest and most satisfying use to which we may put anything we have, including our ownselves and our lives. To a mature mind, there should be no particular pleasure in just possessing something. It is exceedingly juvenile to get pleasure merely in possession -- it is a shallow, silly, selfish, unhealthy pleasure, not worthy of the name of pleasure. The pleasure and satisfaction should come in the use to which anything is put, in the good that can be accomplished by means of it.

And the greatest mature satisfaction comes from putting all we have to the highest and best use. THIS IS SACRIFICE.

Christ, in perfect wisdom, put his whole life to the best possible use: he accomplished with it the utmost possible good. He reversed the whole trend of history from failure to success. He turned death into eternal life, and sorrow into eternal joy, for all who have the wisdom to lay hold upon what he accomplished for them.

Bro Growcott - Living sacrifice

11 The fourteenth day of the second month at even they shall keep it, and eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.

The first year was taken up with getting to Sinai, receiving the Law and building the Tabernacle.

The second year began with the setting up and dedication of the Tabernacle (Ex. 40: 17). Then on the first day of the first month they observed the first anniversary of the Passover. The second observance of the Passover on the 14th day of the second month was for those who were unclean and unable to keep it in the first month (Numbers 9:11).

Bro Growcott