What is the paschal mystery?

The meaning of the word mystery is a secret. It may not be a secret now, but it means a thing that was a secret. Where there is anything that people cannot understand, they are apt to call it a mystery. But in Scripture it means a truth that God kept hidden, but that is hidden no longer — something which they did not know as men or as Jews, but that Christ was to teach them as Christians.

Its distinctly typical meaning as the atoning and substitutionary death of our blessed Redeemer runs all through the New Testament... It must be a dead lamb; the death of Christ alone atones... The Israelites take shelter under the blood and eat of the victim inside the house, identifying themselves with the Substitute, taking Him in and making Him their own.

The Lord must die as a true paschal lamb slain for us. Besides, He must die on the very day of the Passover, to surpass the sacrifice of the law, which commemorated the deliverance from Egypt, and which pictured beforehand a deliverance infinitely more precious; that is, deliverance from guilt before God, and from the dominion of sin.

A living lamb would not suffice in Israel; a living Christ could not suffice for us. His personal presence on earth was a priceless privilege and blessing for men, but atonement was not made by it. He had to die before He could be available as Saviour for the lost.

But our justification is inseparably bound up with His resurrection. He was delivered up to death for our offences. But if He had remained in the grave, where would be our comfort and assurance? How could we believe He had justified us if He were not living? But He "was raised for our justification"... His resurrection is proof that He has completely exhausted the judgment: sin put Him to death; righteousness raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory.

The type therefore gives some indication not only of the objective value of the blood of Christ, before the eye of God, meeting His claims so that the sinner is sheltered from judgment, but also of its inward effects in the one who is sheltered — the meaning of His death inwardly digested with the bitterness of repentance, as well as faith, and the leaven of malice and wickedness put away.

Turning to Luke's account, we learn what the other two Gospel writers do not make plain — how distinct the Lord's Supper was from the Passover meal, though both were shared by the disciples at the same table, and on the same night... At the Passover meal the Lord had His place as one with them; at the Supper He was, as it were, the host, giving out what He Himself had provided to those who were the guests.