Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2407
“The fourteenth day of the second month at even they shall keep it, and eat it with unlea vened bread and bitter herbs. They shall leave none of it unto the morning, nor break any bone of it: according to all the ordinances of the Passover they shall keep it.” Numbers 9:11,12.
IN great tenderness God permitted the Passover to be kept a second time, that those who had unavoidably been defiled at the first observance might not be shut out from the memorable and symbolical rite. But, although He altered the date of the Passover, He never changed the form of it—the Paschal feast was to be the same whenever it was celebrated and by whomever it was observed. Whether one family, or an Israelite who happened to be a stranger and visitor in the house, whoever it might be—kept the Passover—the same regulations were to be carefully followed. From this I gather, learning a lesson from the type, that, whatever may be the experiences through which we come to salvation, Christ is always the same and we must partake of Him in the same way. You who have been so defiled that you have, as it were, to eat of the second Passover, even at the 11th hour, long after others have been feeding on Christ—still there is the same Christ for you as there is for those who come at the right time—who seek the Lord early, and find Him while yet the dew of their youth is upon them.
There is none but Jesus for each one of us! There is no way for this man, peculiar to himself because of his righteous life, and no way for that person, peculiar to himself because of his ungodliness—but for the most moral and the most immoral there is the same Savior to be received by the same precious faith! Only by the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus are we delivered from wrath and only by feeding upon Christ can our spiritual life be sustained. There are not two gospels, but only one Gospel. There are not two Christ’s, but only one Christ! There are not two roads to Heaven but only one road to Heaven. Let us go together to the Cross, view the one great Sacrifice for sin and, by faith, find salvation in
Him!
The subject for us to consider at this time will be just this—if we do receive Christ, that reception is beautifully expressed and represented by feeding upon Him. So, first, we are to feed upon Jesus Christ. The Paschal lamb was to be eaten. Secondly, we are to receive Christ and feed upon Him as a whole Christ—“They shall leave none of it unto the morning, nor break any bone of it.” Then, thirdly, we are to receive Christ in union with others. It is a very blessed thing when our personal reception of Christ, our personal feeding upon Christ, is not a solitary act, but is done in company, as when, of old, a whole household drew near to feed upon the Paschal lamb.
I. First, then, WE ARE TO FEED UPON JESUS CHRIST.
The true reception of Christ is very beautifully expressed by our feeding upon Him. The point a sinner longs to know, when he is really awakened and his conscience is thoroughly awakened, is first, this—“How can I be saved? I know that Christ is a Savior, but how can I make Him my Savior? I understand that He has provided an Atonement by which sin can be put away—how can that Atonement put my sin away?”
When the Paschal lamb was killed in the household of the Israelite, first the blood was sprinkled on the lintel and two side posts by the man who was the head of the household. And as soon as it was sprinkled, its virtue operated at on-ce—that house was secure. Next, they must bring in this lamb which had been roasted with fire, they must gather around the table and all they had to do with it was to eat it. Now, eating is such a simple operation that I cannot explain it. I suppose that the best way of explaining how to eat would be by eating—and the best way of explaining how Christ is to be received is to receive Him! Yet, since I am seeking to help some poor troubled one, I must try, if I can, to explain what it was to eat the Paschal lamb and what it is to receive Christ. I say again, eating the Paschal lamb was a very simple process. Moses might have said to a Jew, “That lamb, roast with fire, is yours if you will eat it. There is no ceremony to be gone through, no incantation to be repeated, no genuflection to be performed. You stand at the table, you eat the lamb, and it is yours.”
Now, concerning feeding upon the Lord Jesus Christ, the first thing to be done is to receive Him by faith. Receiving is the first part of eating. You are hungry, bread is set before you. You put the bread into your mouth, you receive it and it becomes yours. So receive the Lord Jesus Christ—faith is the mouth by which He is to be received. Believe Him—believe what is testified concerning Him in the Word of God. Say to yourself, “This record is true, Jesus is the Son of God. He came into the world as Man, He lived a holy life. He died a sacrificial death—‘the Just for the unjust, to bring us to God.’ I believe all this. I accept it as true, as true to me, and I take it, not into my ears only as hearing it, but into my heart as believing it to be assuredly the Truth of God whereby, alone, souls can be saved.”