Mark 14:12; Ex. 11:4-7; 12:1-7,13, What was Written about When Jesus Would be Crucified?

Jesus was crucified at Passover.  Not the Day of Atonement.  Not during the Feast of Tabernacles.  But Passover.  The rest of the NT calls attention to this fact.  John the Baptist referred to Jesus as the Lamb of God (John 1:29), a title of Christ that is found in the Passover.  Paul said, Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us (1 Cor. 5:7).  Peter’s words in 1 Pt. 1:17-19 are profound:

¹⁷ And if you call on the Father, who without partiality judges according to each one’s work, conduct yourselves throughout the time of your stay here in fear; ¹⁸ knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, ¹⁹ but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.

There are many things about the first Passover that connect with Jesus’ crucifixion.  Moses told the people of Israel what God had said to him: around midnight the LORD was going to kill the firstborn of all in the land of Egypt, but He would not kill the firstborn of the Israelites.  In this way, everyone would know that the LORD made a distinction between Egypt and Israel.  Moses said these words for Pharoah to hear (11:8), and yet he spoke in the hearing of the people of Israel (11:2). 

Exodus 12 contains the instructions for the first Passover, the one that set the stage for all the others, and the one that prophesies Christ.  For example, in 12:3 we see that, as Jesus often said, “whosoever will may come.”  The offer was to all the people of Israel.  Passover involved a male lamb, without blemish (12:5), fulfilled in Jesus.  In 12:6 we see that the lamb was chosen and spent 4 days with the family, becoming dear to them.  In the same way, Christ came to His own, and lived among them, and ministered among them, and then was put to death. 

The Israelites were to take blood from the sacrificial lamb and put it on the doorposts and over the top of the door.  Thus, the lamb provided “atonement.”  The word for “atonement” comes from Gen. 6:14 when Noah was told by the LORD to cover the ark with pitch so that it would not leak.  In the case of Passover, the blood provided a covering over the household so that, when the LORD went throughout Egypt He would “pass over” the homes of the Israelites that were covered with blood.  The Lord Jesus provides an eternal covering for us, as we see in Rom. 3:24-25:

being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, ²⁵ whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed.

There is more to say about this connection, which we will in the next post.