The focus of the story now changes. God is done with dealing with Pharaoh. The negotiations are over, and the final judgment has been announced. Now, God sends Moses to his people to prepare them for what is to come.

The Lord gives the people instructions for the coming days, and also for all the years to come. Not only would the people be saved and set free, but they would remember how that happened every year for centuries, in preparation for the coming of the perfect once and for all sacrifice of Jesus.

The lamb is a substitute sacrifice. It must be free from blemish and injury, just as Jesus was without sin. The blood was to be smeared on the doorframe, representing the whole house. It represented the life of a sinless, divinely chosen substitute, poured out for the forgiveness of their sins and to set them apart to the Lord.

God’s people would be saved when he saw the blood. The people’s role was to accept the sacrifice and to obediently accept and apply the power of the shed blood. God’s role was to save and redeem. The Israelites could rest because the blood of the lamb satisfies God.

Christians, too, can rest because the blood of Jesus satisfies God. 1 John 2:2 reminds us that “He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.” We do not strive for a salvation that we could never earn for ourselves. Rather we accept the atoning sacrifice of Jesus and, in joyful response, seek to understand and to follow his perfect plan for our lives.

In the words of Whittier’s beautiful hymn, “In simple trust like theirs who heard beside the Syrian sea, the gracious calling of the Lord, let us, like them, without a word rise up and follow thee … Drop thy still dews of quietness till all our strivings cease; take from our souls the strain and stress, and let our ordered lives confess the beauty of thy peace.”

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NEWBOLD COMMUNITY CHURCH