How do the elements of the Passover Seder point to Christ?

The lamb was to be kept for four days before being sacrificed (v. 6). The four days speak of testing. Thus, the life of the Lord Jesus on earth was a time of proving Him perfectly qualified to be the acceptable sacrifice. The whole assembly was to kill the lamb in the evening. This reminds us that all believers are responsible for the death of Christ, for it was our sins that caused Him His suffering and death. Blood from the lamb was to be put on the two side posts of their doors and on the cross bar above the doors, on the outside (v. 7). Inside they were told to eat of the flesh of the lamb roasted with fire, together with unleavened bread and bitter herbs (v. 8). “Roasted with fire” speaks of the Lord Jesus being exposed to the direct heat of the unmitigated judgment of God in bearing our sins. The lamb was killed before it was roasted, but the Lord Jesus was roasted with the dreadful judgment of God before He died. Leaven is typical of sin, therefore the unleavened bread pictures sin being fully judged and put away by the cross. “Bitter herbs” indicate the response of our hearts in recognizing that it was our own sins for which He was sacrificed. Therefore the roasting speaks of Christ judged for us; the unleavened bread, of sin judged; and the bitter herbs, of self judged. How well for us to meditate on these in contemplating the cross of Christ!

The children of Israel were not to be indifferent after they had a sense of safety and peace, but were to be engaged with the lamb under whose blood they were sheltering. "They shall eat the flesh that night roast with fire and unleavened bread and with bitter herbs shall they eat it." So God would have those who have taken refuge under the blood, to be occupied with the "Lamb that was slain." The "lamb roast with fire" speaks of Christ when He was exposed to the unsparing judgment of a Holy God against sin; when He bore "our sins on His own body on the tree." "Unleavened bread" shows there must be purity. "Bitter herbs" suggest self judgment. Only certain parts of the lamb were to be eaten by the Israelites on that memorable night, "his head with his legs and with the purtenance thereof." It is our privilege to have communion with our Lord as to His mind, as no doubt this is what "the head" teaches us. It is only as we partake of "the head" we can be marked by "one mind"; it is also the only way to intelligence in Divine things. The "legs" suggest the walk of Christ. We have to feast on His pathway here; what wonderful lessons there are for us in that beautiful life! As we feast on it so shall we be able to "follow in His steps." The "purtenance" or inward parts; this is the affections of Christ opened up to us. As we are engaged with His love fully displayed at Calvary so shall we respond in praise and adoration. There will also shine forth love one to the other, and in this way men will know we are His disciples. As Israel partook of the lamb roast with fire they were to be ready to leave Egypt, having their loins girded, their shoes on their feet and staff in hand. So we who have been redeemed by blood, have peace through faith and enjoy communion with our Redeemer, are to be freed from all earthly ties ready to enter into our promised rest, there to join the whole redeemed company in singing the "new song" unto the "Lamb that was slain!"

We will now consider the mode of eating the lamb. "And they shall eat the flesh in that night, roast with fire, and with bitter herbs (or bitterness) shall they eat it. Eat not of it raw, nor sodden at all with water, but roast with fire; its head with its legs, and with the purtenance thereof." How entirely out of communion are the thoughts of men with the mind of God, in speaking of the death of Christ as merely that of a martyr, apart from any reference to its atoning worth. But "roast with fire" ought to destroy the dangerous dreams and delusions engendered by the false theorizings of men with regard to the sacrificial work of the Lord Jesus. This solemn expression tells of the manner in which God has dealt with the question of sin. Fire speaks of the holiness of God expressed in judgment. So in the lamb roast with fire, we see in type, the Lord Jesus, personally exempt from sin and its penalty yet as our sinless, unblemished Substitute exposed to the full, intense and searching action of the fire — the judgment of God expressed in wrath against sin. The Holy One "who knew no sin was made sin for us that we might become God's righteousness in Him" (2 Cor. 5:21). They were not to eat of it "raw nor boiled at all with water." Nothing was allowed to hinder the action of the fire. The Word of God, as typified in the water, which was His constant delight and whose life in its entirety as the wholly devoted and obedient Man was regulated by it, was not allowed to soften nor enfeeble the sense of divine wrath which pressed in upon His holy soul. Who can measure the depths of His suffering as He speaks of being laid in the dust of death and cries in the deep anguish of His spirit, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me? … Be not far from Me, for trouble is near; for there is none to help" (Ps. 22:1, 11).

"Eat not of it raw, nor sodden at all with water." Had it been eaten thus, there would have been no expression of the great truth which it was the divine purpose to shadow forth; namely, that our paschal Lamb was to endure, on the cross, the fire of Jehovah's righteous wrath — a truth of infinite preciousness to the soul. We are not merely under the eternal shelter of the blood of the Lamb, but we feed, by faith, upon the Person of the Lamb. Many of us come short here. We are apt to rest satisfied with being saved by what Christ has done for us, without cultivating holy communion with Himself. His loving heart could never be satisfied with this. He has brought us nigh to Himself, that we might enjoy Him, that we might feed on Him, and delight in Him. He presents Himself to us as the One who has endured, to the uttermost, the intense fire of the wrath of God, that He may, in this wondrous character, be the food of our ransomed souls.

As to the difficulties raised in Bishop Colenso's chaps. 20, 21, the small number of priests for their work, they are imaginary and prove great inattention to the facts in Scripture. Thus Aaron and his sons had no such duty in the Passover, as we find in the extraordinary temple celebration recorded in 2 Chr. 30:5. In Egypt it was essentially a family feast, and so probably in the wilderness: certainly not one word then ties it to the presence or action of the priests. Its family character appears in the New Testament also. The Israelites who were not circumcised in the wilderness could not have found work for Aaron and his sons; for that rite was the basis for all the rest, and yet it was certainly neglected there and then.

Hence the Passover is brought before us of which the New Testament makes great account — the type of Christ the Lamb of God sacrificed for us, with the striking accompaniment of leaven absolutely excluded. Leaven represents iniquity in its tendency to extend itself by assimilating what was exposed to its action This ordinance then means the disallowance and putting away of all evil that belongs to man in his fallen state. The flesh of the lamb was to be eaten not raw or sodden, but roast with fire, the strong and evident sign of fierce unsparing divine judgment. It must and ought to be so; for herein Christ's death met our sins and God's judgment. Thus and thus only was the Israelite to eat of the lamb, sanctified by and to this holy feast, eating of its roast flesh that night and leaving none till the morning, or, if aught remained, burning it with fire. It was a matter between God and the soul, outside the domain of sense and nature. It was apart from all common food. All the congregation of Israel might and must eat it, but no stranger — unless circumcised, no foreigner, no hired servant, but only he who was bought and circumcised; and when eaten, bitter herbs must accompany it — repentance on our part, the fruit of the truth applied to us by grace. "And thus then shall ye eat; with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and ye shall eat it in haste: it is Jehovah's passover."

"M.T.D." We quite agree with you in thinking that self-judgment finds its place in the antitype of the "bitter herbs" which were ever to accompany the passover. We do not consider it the only thing, but we do consider it one thing foreshadowed in these herbs, and, as you say, "a most needful thing in the present day," as it doubtless has ever been. We long to understand somewhat of those "bitter herbs." We are under the impression that they set forth those deep spiritual exercises which flow from an experimental entrance into the sufferings of Christ. Were these things better known, there would be less heartless levity, less cold formality, less sinful indifference in our celebration of the Lord's Supper. If we more fully entered into the profound mystery of the cross and passion of our Lord Jesus Christ; if we knew more of the fellowship of His sufferings; we should be a very different people indeed from what we are, and our meeting at the Lord's table would present a widely different aspect and tone.

"While outside the house the blood of atonement spoke to God, to whom it was addressed; inside He provided that which was to satisfy them, and enable them for that path with Him upon which they were now so shortly to go forth. The lamb is theirs to feed upon, and God is bent upon their enjoying this provision of His love. The lamb, too, must all of it be eaten. If the household were too little for the lamb (we read nothing of the lamb being too little for the house), then, says the Lord, let him and his neighbor next unto his house take it. God would have Christ apprehended by us. He would have our souls sustained, and He would have Christ honored. We are to eat--to appropriate to ourselves what Christ is; and what we appropriate becomes, in fact, part and parcel of ourselves. This laying hold of Christ by faith makes Christ to be sustenance indeed to us, and Himself to be reproduced in us.

On the fourteenth day between the evenings the lamb was slain, and its blood applied to the two side posts and the lintel, outside the house where they dwelt, and inside the house its flesh was to be eaten by the family. The blood marks on the door were the external witness that death had already taken place within. The eating of the flesh within the house typified the realization and appropriation of the death of the lamb by those who were sheltered by its blood.

The important type of the paschal lamb is happily so well known that I will only say here: Its distinctly typical meaning as denoting the atoning and vicarious death of our blessed Redeemer permeates the New Testament, and is definitively affirmed in John 1:29, 1 Peter 1:18, etc. It must be a dead lamb; the death of Christ alone atones. It must become so by a non-natural death as evidenced by the blood-shedding; that is, something penal and repellent — for sin is the cause of it. (Those whose false delicacy is shocked when we speak of the blood are not shocked at the sin that causes its flow — that is merely "moral obliquity ": but if we deny the substitutional death of the Lamb of God, we must tear such passages as this out of the Bible and then we only have a mutilated fragment of it left.) The Israelites take shelter under the blood and eat of the victim inside the house, identifying themselves with, appropriating and assimilating, the Substitute. (John 6) It is roast with fire; subjected to God's judgment. To be eaten with bitter herbs (the repentance of a contrite heart) and unleavened bread ("of sincerity and truth," 1 Cor. 5:7-8). It was to be no ordinary feast: they were to eat of it standing — with solemn reverence: with loins girt — the girdle of truth Eph. 6: with shoes — "shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace": a staff — the word of God — in their hands: in haste — a matter of urgency; the whole attitude betokening a journey away from Egypt — no thought of receiving Christ and remaining in the world. It commenced a new era and closed the old one; Nisan, the seventh month of the old year, becomes Abib the first of the new.

For us this sets forth that as a guilty sinner I take shelter under the Blood of Christ, our Passover. And then I feed upon the lamb roast with fire, and the unleavened bread, and this brings me into a suited condition for the journey by connecting the heart's affections with all that Christ passed through. Nothing could more strikingly prefigure the sufferings of Christ on the cross, under the judgment of God, than this expression, "the lamb roast with fire!" He passed through the fire of God's judgment. They were to eat it with unleavened bread — setting forth the unleavened perfection of Christ — and with bitter herbs.