Preparing for the Passover

While the world is planning for their “Easter Week” vacations, the bible guides us in a different direction. It is time to prepare for the first appointment that God made with his people.

From the first day of the first biblical month (The 1^st day of the month of Nissan) we must be aware that the first feast of the Lord is coming. We must begin the new year the right way.

The two weeks before Passover are days of preparation. It is a time to clean the house. During the days before Passover, all leaven must be taken out of the house, because leaven should not be eaten during the week of the feast.

(Exodus 12:14-19) 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. (15) Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread. On the first day you shall remove leaven out of your houses, for if anyone eats what is leavened, from the first day until the seventh day, that person shall be cut off from Israel. (16) On the first day you shall hold a holy assembly, and on the seventh day a holy assembly. No work shall be done on those days. But what everyone needs to eat, that alone may be prepared by you. (17) And you shall observe the Feast of Unleavened Bread, 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. (18) In the first month, from the fourteenth day of the month at evening, you shall eat unleavened bread until the twenty-first day of the month at evening. (19) For seven days no leaven is to be found in your houses. If anyone eats what is leavened, that person will be cut off from the congregation of Israel, whether he is a sojourner or a native of the land.

This is not a commandment that was given only to the Israelites who physically left Egypt. The Bible indicates that it is a statute forever. It is a physical action that has a profound spiritual meaning. In these days we must examine our lives to see if there is still any “leaven” (symbol of sin) in our lives.

Paul exhorted us to cleanse ourselves during this time…

(1 Corinthians 5:7-8) Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you really are unleavened. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. (8) Let us therefore celebrate the festival, not with the old leaven, the leaven of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

This physical and spiritual cleansing is an excellent way to begin the year.

JESUS CLEANED THE TEMPLE

Jesus implemented this principle. Before the Passover, He cleansed the Temple.

(John 2:13-17) The Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. (14) In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers sitting there. (15) And making a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. (16) And he told those who sold the pigeons, “Take these things away; do not make my Father’s house a house of trade.” (17) His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.”

He again cleansed the Temple a few days before the day of Passover when He gave His life on the cross as the Lamb of God.

(Mark 11:15-17) And they came to Jerusalem. And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold and those who bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. (16) And he would not allow anyone to carry anything through the temple. (17) And he was teaching them and saying to them, “Is it not written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations’? But you have made it a den of robbers.” 

[See also Luke 19:45-46 and Matthew 21:12-13]

Therefore, let’s take this time to cleanse our temple in preparation for the feast of Passover.

(1 Corinthians 6:19-20) Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, (20) for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.