As we continue into the month of Nisan on the Hebrew calendar, we note important days as we approach Passover. It is important for us to look back and look forward in order to grasp the fulness of God’s plan of redemption. According to Exodus 12: 2 we read God’s command concerning the sacrifice of the Passover Lamb. “This month shall be unto you the beginning of months: it shall be the first month of the year to you.” This command was given to Moses to the Hebrew nation Israel. Before we further examine the significance of Passover and the month of Nisan, we will go back to the origin of that nation.
God chose Abraham to father a nation that would birth the Messiah, God’s Son, into the world to become the Redeemer. The term “Hebrews” would be attached to that nation throughout the Bible. The word Hebrew Ivrim “Those who cross over.” The first call of Abraham was “Get out of your country…and to a land I will show you.” The first command was “Get out.” The rest, all the blessings, all the promises of the Promised Land, and the future, all rested on the words “Get out.” Getting out is a holy act. The word “holy” means separate—to set apart. Abraham had to leave his kindred and all those who were steeped into the worship of pagan gods. God calls us to come, to move, to follow, to pilgrim and to enter into blessing.
God heard the cry of the Hebrew people as they were enslaved by the Pharoah and his evil government and persecution and God miraculously delivered them from the tyranny through the miracles of the 10 plagues. In the final plague, God set forth in the first Passover His plan of redemption as it was a type of Christ our Redeemer. (1) The lamb had to be without blemish, and to test this it was kept for four days (Ex 12: 5-6). It was Palm Sunday the day that Jesus entered Jerusalem on a donkey that the Passover lambs were gathered for testing. So our Lord’s public life, under hostile scrutiny, was the testing which proved His holiness. It was Pilate who declared “I find no fault in this man.” (Luke 23: 4) (2) The lamb thus tested must be killed. (Luke 23: 46) (3) The blood must be applied to the doorposts as the picture of perfect protection from judgment. (Ex. 12: 13; I Peter 2: 21-24) (4) The lamb was to be eaten—a picture of Christ the Bread of Life. The believer in Christ is saved by the blood of “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” (Rev. 13:8) Redemption is appropriated by personal faith in Christ and is strengthened daily by feasting on the Word—the living Word, Christ, and the written Word, the Scriptures.
We read in Exodus 13: 21 that after God delivered the Hebrews out of the darkness of Egypt and the gods of Egypt, these words: “And the LORD went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud, to lead them in the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and night.” Moses said to the people: “Fear not, stand still and see the salvation of the LORD” as God miraculously makes the way of deliverance through the Red Sea. However, the true test of obedience would begin after they crossed over. In the wilderness, the people’s fear led to a failure to trust God. As a result they rebel against God’s plan for them to enter the land He promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Deut. 1: 7-8). God brought them out of slavery in Egypt, gave them the law at Mt Sinai, provided food, water and clothes and shoes that did not wear out. Despite the miracles and God’s Divine Presence with them, they refused to enter the promised land. In Deut. 1: 28-33 we read: “The people are stronger and taller than we; the cities are large and fortified up to heaven, they tell Moses, adding that “our hearts melt.” Even though Moses assures the people that God will fight for them just as He did in Egypt, they do not trust God to fulfill His promises. Fear leads to disobedience, unbelief and a lack of faith which leads to severe punishment. The people wandered in the wilderness for 40 years as a punishment for distrusting the Lord’s care when He first brought them to Canaan; Moses himself was denied entry into the Promised Land and was only allowed to view it from a mountain across the Jordan before he died (Numbers 27: 12).
It was the next generation of Israelites who stood on the banks of the Jordan, ready to enter Canaan at last. Only the Jordan River stood in their way now, and it was at flood stage (Joshua 3: 15). At God’s command, Joshua (the people’s new leader) instructed the priests bearing the Ark of the Covenant to stand in the water of the river. They obeyed, the Jordan immediately stopped flowing to make a way for the Hebrews to cross over on dry ground (Joshua 3: 5-17). This magnified the power of God, and His kindness to Israel. The Ark was a picture of Christ. This passage over Jordan, as an entrance to Canaan, after their long, weary wanderings in the wilderness, shadowed the believers passage through death to heaven, after he has finished his wanderings in this sinful world.
After the miraculous crossing of the Jordan River, Joshua had the people set up two memorials: twelve stones from the Jordan River were placed on dry ground, and twelve stones from the banks of the river were placed in the river where the priests had stood. Thus, the location of God’s demonstration of power on behalf of the Hebrews was marked for generations to come (Joshua 4: 1-9). It was after crossing the Jordan that the Israelites celebrated the second Passover on the 14th day of the first month of Nisan. They are the cross over people, those who left one land and entered another—those who end one life and began a new one.
Now, let’s look forward to the month of Nisan in which Messiah would bring redemption. It’s the month He entered Jerusalem, the month in which He died on the cross…and rose from death. Jesus was our perfect Passover Lamb who is without blemish. This is the week that Jesus would have entered Jerusalem 2000 years ago to complete His great work of atonement, which brought us out of bondage from sin. This was a supernatural deliverance, just as it was for the Hebrews when they came out of Egypt and when they crossed the Jordan into the Promised Land.
But the Hebrew aren’t the only Hebrews. The Word of God speaks of another people joined to Israel…the followers of Messiah. They are the Hebrews of Spirit. So, to be saved, we must be a spiritual Hebrew. In order to be a Hebrew, we have to cross over. As Paul writes, “So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile . . . for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise” (Galatians 3:26–29). We have to pass through a barrier, through Jesus, from darkness to light. As it is written, “unless a man is born again, he cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.” Jesus is the One who crossed over the ultimate barrier, from death to life. It is in Him that we receive power to cross over any barrier, to leave any darkness, and experience His victory over sin and death! Messiah’s coming is our Nisan, that which ends the darkness—to cross over into a new beginning and bear the fruit our life was created to bear. We must ask ourself: What barriers are hindering us and the will of God in our life? Then, by the power of Messiah, we must begin crossing our Jordan. What Promised Land has God called us to enter? What must we first leave? We must leave the old, and we will enter the new. We must cross the Red Sea out of our Egypt, and we will also cross the Jordan River into our Promised Land. “If so be that we have heard Him, and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus: That we put off concerning the former manner of life, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; and be renewed in the spirit of our mind; and that we put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.” (Ephesians 4: 21-24) We are cross over people through Jesus Christ who gave His life for us!