Search
The marvelous picture of the man created in God’s image was soon marred. Man fell, and by the end of Genesis he was “in a coffin in Egypt” (50:26). Instead of enjoying the tree of life, he was dead and in the world.
How grateful we are for Exodus! Exodus means “departure,” and in this second book of the Bible we find the way to get out of the coffin and out of Egypt.
How was man to escape from his sorry plight? In Egypt he was under God’s condemnation and Pharaoh’s tyranny. He had disobeyed God, and he had been enslaved by the Egyptians. What would be the means of his deliverance?
To be released from God’s condemnation and to be strengthened to leave Egypt, we need the Passover. First Corinthians 5:7 says that “our Passover, Christ, also has been sacrificed.” The Passover was a feast in which the children of Israel ate roast lamb, unleavened bread, and bitter herbs. All three of these are a picture of Christ.
The lamb was first killed, and then its blood was put on the two doorposts and on the lintel of the houses in which it was to be eaten (Exo. 12:6-7). God said, “When I see the blood, I will pass over you” (v. 13). The Israelites were sheltered by entering the blood-sprinkled house. Today we too have a free entry into the shelter through the redeeming blood of Christ and are under the covering of His blood. How we praise the Lord for the blood, which releases us from God’s condemnation!
To be strengthened to leave Egypt the Israelites had to do more than sprinkle the blood over their door entrance. The house needed to be protected so that they could eat the lamb.
Notice the three parts of the lamb to be eaten: “Do not eat any of it raw or boiled at all with water, but roasted with fire — its head with its legs and with its inward parts” (v. 9). Too many Christians have an oversimplified Passover, consisting only of the blood. We surely appreciate the blood, which keeps us from God’s judgment when His smiting hand strikes Egypt. But once we have the blood, we must eat the lamb under this shelter. The Israelites were to “eat the flesh in that night, roasted with fire, and they shall eat it with unleavened bread with bitter herbs” (v. 8). Once they were full of this rich meal of lamb, unleavened bread, and bitter herbs, they would be energized to march out of Egypt. This nourishing meal strengthens us to walk out from under the tyranny of Satan.
The first part of the lamb mentioned for eating was the head. This signifies that we need to eat Christ as our wisdom. When we eat the wise Christ, we can see the way out of Satan’s maze. The world is a maze, deceiving us with its false hopes and allurements. We are trapped in it until we receive Christ and eat Him as the wise head. Then we can see the way to slip out of its clutches and be delivered from its temptations. To walk out of the world, we need the wisdom of Christ; He has to be our wise nourishment.
Eating the legs of the lamb is a reminder to us that we need to eat Christ in His walk on this earth. Eating the legs strengthens us to walk out of Egypt. Leaving Egypt required strong legs. The children of Israel did not pursue a direct route. They curved around before reaching the shores of the Red Sea. Then, when they looked behind, they found the Egyptians in hot pursuit. On either side of them were mountains. Any way of escape seemed completely cut off. How they needed the wisdom from eating the head of the lamb and the walking strength from eating its legs! This was the source of their strength for walking on dry land through the Red Sea, with its waters a wall to them on their right hand and on their left.
The last part of the lamb the children of Israel were told to eat was its inward parts. The inward parts of Christ are His emotion, mind, will, and heart. We need to learn to read the four Gospels with a view to eating Christ in His wisdom, walk, and inward parts.
By eating Him in this way, He will be to us not only wisdom and strength to escape the snare of the world but also the patience, the long-suffering, and the strong will to sustain us.
Lamb was not the only food eaten at the passover. Unleavened bread was one of the accompaniments. First Corinthians 5:8 says, “So then let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.” Eating Christ as the unleavened bread keeps away all the sinful things, making us also unleavened, with nothing about us unclean in the eyes of God.
“They shall eat it with unleavened bread with bitter herbs” (Exo. 12:8). This was the other accompaniment to the lamb, all together making a well-rounded meal. The effect of eating Christ as the bitter herbs is the bitter sense you have whenever you touch something sinful. If you go to a movie or criticize your mother-in-law or even think negatively about her, you will sense the bitter herbs working within you.
I believe that by now we are all clear that the way to get out of the coffin and out of Egypt is by eating. This is shown through the provision of the passover.
Even the manner of eating the passover shows how closely it was related to their imminent departure: “This is how you shall eat it: with your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and you shall eat it in haste. It is Jehovah’s passover” (v. 11). It was not a leisurely, relaxing meal. They were on the alert, one hand grasping their staff and the other the pieces of roast lamb to be eaten. Thus they partook of the passover, ready at a moment’s notice to make their exodus.
Once the children of Israel were out of Egypt and across the Red Sea, they praised the Lord by singing and even dancing: “Then Moses and the children of Israel sang this song to Jehovah and spoke, saying, I will sing to Jehovah, for He has triumphed gloriously...And Miriam the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took a tambourine in her hand; and all the women went out after her with tambourines and with dancing” (15:1, 20). How was this glorious triumph accomplished? By the blood there was a complete redemption, and by the eating of the lamb, the unleavened bread, and the bitter herbs there was a perfect exodus. Thus have we too been redeemed from God’s condemnation and released from Satan’s tyranny.
Hallelujah for what the eating accomplishes!
After the Israelites left Egypt, they were sustained in the wilderness for forty years. As the Jews many years later told the Lord, “Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, as it is written, ‘He gave them bread out of heaven to eat’” (John 6:31; cf. Exo. 16:4, 15).
Manna was their only food day after day. Not surprisingly, they soon wearied of such a monotonous diet. Their thoughts went back to Egypt, and they complained to Moses: “We remember the fish which we used to eat in Egypt for nothing, the cucumbers and the melons and the leeks and the onions and the garlic; but now our appetite has gone; there is nothing at all but this manna to look at” (Num. 11:5-6).
These varied foods that came out of the water or out of the soil of Egypt were enjoyed not only by the Israelites and the Egyptians. Even you may have wearied of a constant diet of messages week after week and turned to the foods that Egypt had to offer. Rather than hearing about Christ and the church in message after message, some have promoted more entertaining meetings. Guitar playing, special singing, joking, and emotional stirrings are like leeks, onions, and garlic from Egypt’s soil. You may have enjoyed those meetings, but you must admit that there was no manna.
Now we have come back to the manna. Do not think that Christ is boring! We must learn how to cook Him in appetizing ways.
“When the layer of dew lifted, there upon the surface of the wilderness were fine round flakes, fine as the frost on the earth” (Exo. 16:14). With Christ there is the freshness of the dew. He is also as refreshing as the frost. In warm climates we miss the refreshing air that comes with frost. Such is Christ to us.
Verse 31 says that the manna was “like coriander seed, white; and its taste was like wafers made with honey.” Numbers 11:7 adds, “Its appearance like the appearance of bdellium.” Appearance literally means “eye.” By eating Christ as the manna, you have eyes to see clearly. Consider how much light you have received since you came into the church and began receiving Christ as the manna. The eyes on the manna have given you a clear view. The bdellium mentioned here is a pearl of wood resin. It is transparent. If you have kept enjoying this manna, you have had a clear sky, with no opaqueness or blindness. But if you have found in the meetings a lack of direction, the aimlessness may have come from eating the onions, leeks, and garlic of Egypt; the effect of that diet is to blind you.
“The people went about and gathered it and ground it between two millstones or beat it in a mortar; then they boiled it in pots and made cakes of it; and its taste was like the taste of cakes baked in oil” (v. 8). There were different ways of preparing the manna. We all have to experience Christ and then learn to serve the saints delicious courses of Him. In this way we eat the rich supply of manna.
“The children of Israel ate the manna forty years, until they came to inhabitable land; they ate the manna until they came to the border of the land of Canaan” (Exo. 16:35). Manna was the food with which God supplied His people throughout their wilderness wanderings.
You probably remember the occasion when, because of their complaining, God sent quails for them to eat. In response to their cry, “Who shall give us meat to eat?” (Num. 11:4), “a wind went forth from Jehovah and brought quails from the sea and let them fall beside the camp, about a day’s journey on this side and a day’s journey on the other side, all around the camp, and about two cubits above the surface of the earth” (v. 31). The quails were eaten in rebellion and provoked God’s judgment: “While the meat was still between their teeth, before it was chewed, the anger of Jehovah was kindled against the people, and Jehovah struck the people with a very severe plague” (v. 33).
This incident has reminded me of these recent years in the recovery. After hearing so much about the need to have Christ wrought into us, some turned away from that, claiming that it was too hard to listen to, and encouraged the young people to be themselves rather than be transformed. To replace the manna with quails from the sea is rebellion. God’s ordination is that we eat manna day after day.
What occupied the children of Israel during those forty years? There was no industry. How did they spend their time when they were not traveling? They began their day before sunrise, gathering the manna. In addition to preparing and eating it, they first built the tabernacle and then carried it all during their journey.
Here is a clear picture of what we should eat, what we should be, and what we should do. Our diet is Christ. We should be those who eat Him. We should build up the church to be the dwelling place of God and then carry it as His testimony wherever we go.
The worldly-wise might have thought the Israelites were lazy and purposeless. Why did they not settle in one place and farm? Then they could grow onions, leeks, and garlic, instead of having only manna to eat. Why did they do nothing but build a tabernacle and then carry it around with them?
In our day we may be criticized for not going to the mission field, for not engaging in this or that Christian work, or for not caring about the gospel. Why is it that we keep meeting together and pay little attention to anything other than Christ and the church?
We do not want to follow the pattern set by Christianity. Rather, we would be like the Israelites of old, eating manna and caring for the tabernacle. If we have such a testimony, souls will be won. Lovers of the Lord Jesus will be attracted.
Young people, are you satisfied with such a life? Your living is to eat Christ. Your work is to build the church with Christ. Your testimony is to carry the church with Christ. This is God’s economy.
In the previous chapter on the tree of life, we pointed out that God’s intention from the beginning was to be taken into man as food. In this chapter we have traced man’s failure and the steps God took to recover man from death and the world. This triumphant exodus from condemnation and tyranny was brought about by the eating of the passover. Then for forty years in the wilderness God gave His people manna. By this nourishment the tabernacle was built and His testimony set up. The book of Exodus, then, again reminds us that God’s intention for man is to be his life, received in the form of food. When man thus partakes of Him, God’s habitation is built and His purpose realized.
