12:1 The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, 2 “This month shall mark for you the beginning of months; it shall be the first month of the year for you. 3 Tell the whole congregation of Israel that on the tenth of this month they are to take a lamb for each family, a lamb for each household. 4 If a household is too small for a whole lamb, it shall join its closest neighbor in obtaining one; the lamb shall be divided in proportion to the number of people who eat of it. 5 Your lamb shall be without blemish, a year-old male; you may take it from the sheep or from the goats. 6 You shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month; then the whole assembled congregation of Israel shall slaughter it at twilight. 7 They shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses in which they eat it. 8 They shall eat the lamb that same night; they shall eat it roasted over the fire with unleavened bread and bitter herbs. 9 Do not eat any of it raw or boiled in water but roasted over the fire, with its head, legs, and inner organs. 10 You shall let none of it remain until the morning; anything that remains until the morning you shall burn with fire. 11 This is how you shall eat it: your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand, and you shall eat it hurriedly. It is the Passover of the Lord. 12 I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and I will strike down every firstborn in the land of Egypt, from human to animal, and on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the Lord. 13 The blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live: when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and no plague shall destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt. 14 “This day shall be a day of remembrance for you. You shall celebrate it as a festival to the Lord; throughout your generations you shall observe it as a perpetual ordinance. (Exodus 12:1-14 NRS)
Happy Wednesday! Friend, make it your best day ever by being the best person you can be! Love all people. Smile more. Give more! Prayers for this old man as he prepares to preach in the home office of First Gonzales this Sunday at 8:30 and 10:45! May God give me a word to share with all people.
It's that time of year for the Procrastinators of America to get their taxes done! And yes, dear Sainted Reverend Thom Elliott, my friend and brother in Christ Jesus, I think of you often, but more so as I get my information in order to file in time for the last possible day to send Uncle Sam what I render unto him. And that involves me printing the 2025 calendar month by month so I can look over how many medical-related trips I made to Gonzales, and Mission, Texas for health and dental trips. Oh, and I can't forget San Antonio for vision-related jaunts. And tis funny how the online calendar shows every detail but the printed version does not, so I have bring the printed calendar here so I can write in the details I need. And speaking of calendars, this passage has the God of the Universe resetting the calendar!
There's a moment in this passage where God does something that feels almost strange for the God of the universe to bother with: he stops to reset the calendar. "This month shall mark for you the beginning of months; it shall be the first month of the year for you." Before a single plague finishes, before a single Israelite takes a step toward freedom, God says, essentially, "mark this on your calendars — everything starts counting from here now." When God is about to do something enormous, he doesn't just act — he makes sure you remember when it happened. This wasn't going to be a footnote. It was going to be the new starting line for how an entire people measured time.
Then come the instructions, and they are wonderfully, almost comically specific. Every family is to take a lamb — one per household, unless your household's too small to finish it, in which case you team up with your nearest neighbor and figure out the math together based on how many people can actually eat it. The lamb has to be without defect, a year-old male, and you don't just grab it and slaughter it right away — you keep it, watch it, live with it for four days before the appointed time. There's something almost tender in that detail. This isn't an anonymous animal grabbed at the last minute; it's something the family has had underfoot, part of the household, before it becomes part of their salvation.
On the fourteenth day, at twilight, the whole assembled community slaughters their lambs. And then comes the part that changes everything: they're to take some of the blood and put it on the two doorframes and the top of the frame of the houses where they eat the lamb. Not sprinkle it inside for good luck. Not paint it somewhere private and decorative. Put it right on the doorframe — the most visible, unmissable part of the house, the thing everyone walking by would see.
I love imagining this scene a little: an entire nation, in one single night, painting blood over their front doors, roasting lamb with bitter herbs and unleavened bread, dressed and ready to move with their sandals on and staff in hand, eating in a hurry like people who might have to run at any moment. It's not a quiet, contemplative meal. It's Passover eaten standing up, coats on, bags practically packed — dinner and an escape plan rolled into one.
And then God tells them exactly why the blood matters: "The blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live: when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and no plague shall destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt." The blood isn't a magic charm that wards off evil on its own merits. It's a sign — something visible, something that testifies to whose household this is, something God himself promises to look for and honor. The destroyer doesn't pass over because the family behind that door was more righteous than the family next door. He passes over because of the blood. Full stop. Nothing else about that night saves anyone.
If that sounds familiar, it should — because this is the exact shape of the gospel showing up more than a thousand years before Jesus ever walked into Jerusalem for his last Passover meal with his disciples. Blood applied to a doorframe, marking a household as covered, sparing it from judgment that fell everywhere else. It's not hard to see why Paul would later call Jesus "our Passover lamb" without much explanation needed — the story had already been telling us what to look for.
And then God adds one more instruction that I find strangely moving: this day shall be a day of remembrance for you, you shall celebrate it as a festival to the Lord, throughout your generations, as a perpetual ordinance. God isn't just rescuing this generation of Israelites. He's building a memory into the DNA of a whole nation, so that centuries later, families would still be gathering around tables, still asking "why is this night different from all other nights," still telling their children about the blood on the doorframe that meant death passed over their house.
There's something worth sitting with here about how God saves. It's specific. It's visible. It requires trust — because imagine being the one family on the block wondering if maybe this time the blood thing was overkill, maybe we don't really need it. It's applied, not assumed. And it points, unmistakably, all the way forward to a cross.
PRAYER: Lord, thank you for the blood that covers us and the judgment that passes over because of Jesus, our true Passover Lamb, in Jesus' strong name we pray, amen.
Have a great and blessed day in the Lord! OUR CALL TO ACTION: Take a few minutes today to thank Jesus specifically for being the Lamb whose blood covers you, rather than assuming your safety is automatic.
I love you and I thank God for you! You matter to God and you matter to me!
Win the world for Jesus with your love!
Pastor Eradio Valverde, Jr.
