What is God’s purpose for the festival of Passover and the Days of Unleavened Bread? The Passover pictures Christ’s sacrifice for the PAST sins of the people. This is brought out in Romans 3:24-26: “… being justified (cleansed of sin) freely by His grace … Whom (Jesus) God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness because in His forbearance God has passed over (forgiven) the sins that are PAST.” Note it: when we ask for and receive initial forgiveness (justification) it is only for our PAST SINS. This is symbolized by the eating of the Passover meal which includes symbolically partaking of  Jesus’ blood and body through the wine and bread. That takes care of all of one’s PAST sins. But what about the future? We must continue to live in this sin-saturated world surrounded by temptations. Contrary to popular Catholic and Protestant belief, the Lord’s death, resurrection and current life as Mediator does not allow the justified one to continue to sin. This is where the seven Days of Unleavened Bread play their symbolic part in the life of one whose past sins have been erased by Jesus Christ.

Scripturally, leaven is symbolic of sin (1 Cor. 5:8), as is the case in the Passover observance. It is for this reason that God instructed the Israelites to remove all leaven from their dwellings and to eat unleavened bread prior to His bringing them out of Egypt–also symbolically called “sin” in Scripture. The Israelites’ leaving Egypt (sin) after having been cleansed (deleavenized) is symbolized in the seven leavenless days following the Passover meal. Having been cleansed by the partaking of bread and wine, the next seven days are for the total purifying of the person–the total and permanent removal of leaven (sin) from him/her. God’s number of completion is seven. These seven days symbolize the completion of the purifying process.

The symbolism involved in Passover observance is not completed by the partaking of the meal, bread and wine. This merely pictures one’s acceptance of Christ’s death for the remission of his/her PAST sins. It pictures the crucified–dead–Christ. Shall we leave Him hanging on the cross to repeatedly cleanse us as we repeatedly sin? Paul answers in Hebrews 6. Here he is telling the church that, having partaken of the grace of Jesus Christ, if they continued to sin it would be impossible to bring them back to the Lord because, with each sin they “… crucify the Son of God afresh (again) and put Him to an open shame.” Those who do this, he says in verse 8, will burn. Sin, we are told in 1 John 3:4, is the breaking of the Ten Commandments. We are commanded to obey them totally, including #4, which the church rejects, thereby breaking all ten. Partaking of the seven Days of Unleavened Bread following Passover pictures one’s total (completed) deliverance from sin. One then must obey God in order to make the cleansing permanent. To observe the Passover then fail to observe the Days of Unleavened Bread is to accept Christ’s blood which cleansed us from our PAST sins, then reject His offer of total and permanent cleansing. By continuing to sin we leave Him nailed to the cross where He is repeatedly crucified “afresh.” Both Catholics and Protestant, neither understanding nor believing God’s commands concerning the eradication of sin, believe that Jesus’ sacrifice gives them a license to sin and get away with it. Indeed, Satan has deceived the whole world (Rev. 12:9). Confessing that she cannot resist Satan’s temptations, the church world has seen fit to leave Jesus on the cross where He supposedly takes care of her inevitable sins by being crucified again and again–a most convenient, though deadly theory.

He is risen! He does not remain on the cross as the Counterfeit Church would have us believe. His resurrection enabled Him to send us the Holy Spirit to empower us to overcome Satan’s temptations to sin, thereby enabling us to qualify for entrance into the Kingdom of God at His return. It is only through the power He provides that we can live His Words: “Greater is he (the Holy Spirit) in me than he (Satan) that is in the world.” To inherit the kingdom we must use His Holy Spirit power to “… overcome (Satan) even as I (Jesus) overcame” (Rev. 3:21). Only those who do so, as He said, will sit with Him on His throne. To be continued. L.J.