Each year as my family gathers around our Passover table, I’m struck by how this ancient biblical feast reveals something new about Jesus. What God established thousands of years ago in Egypt wasn’t simply a historical deliverance but a prophetic picture encoded with the message of salvation that would find its ultimate fulfillment in Christ.
Many Christians hesitate to engage with Passover, perhaps viewing it as belonging solely to Jewish tradition or feeling uncertain about its relevance to their faith. Yet when we separate the New Testament from its Old Testament foundation, we miss the rich tapestry God has woven throughout Scripture. The death and resurrection of Jesus doesn’t stand isolated from Israel’s story—it’s the climactic chapter that gives meaning to everything that came before.
This is precisely why I celebrate Passover with my family each year. It creates a powerful opportunity to teach the context of God’s redemptive plan from Genesis to Revelation, helping us see how the biblical story fits together as one unified narrative of salvation.
Paul identifies Jesus as “our Passover lamb” in 1 Corinthians 5:7, confirming that the early church understood Christ’s death in light of Passover.
When John the Baptist declared Jesus “the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29), he wasn’t creating a new metaphor but revealing the fulfillment of a promise God had been illustrating for centuries. This declaration formed a bridge between two testaments and confirmed what God had been foreshadowing through every Passover celebration since Egypt.
This identification wasn’t merely poetic language. Jesus died during Passover week at the precise hour when Passover lambs were being sacrificed in the temple—timing that reveals divine orchestration rather than coincidence. The Apostle Paul, with his extensive training in Hebrew Scriptures, explicitly confirms this connection when he writes, “For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed” (1 Corinthians 5:7).
Paul’s statement is revolutionary. He doesn’t say Jesus is “like” the Passover lamb or that He can be “compared to” the Passover lamb—he directly identifies Jesus AS our Passover lamb. This declaration reveals that the original Passover wasn’t merely a historical event but a prophetic enactment of what God would accomplish through Christ.
Just as the Israelites applied blood to their doorposts for deliverance from death, Christ’s blood provides eternal salvation for all who place their faith in Him.
The parallels between the first Passover and Christ’s sacrifice reveal God’s brilliant foreshadowing. In Egypt, the destroyer passed over homes marked by lamb’s blood. At Calvary, judgment passes over those marked by Christ’s blood.
During the Last Supper—itself a Passover meal—Jesus deliberately established the new covenant using the elements before Him. When He raised the cup and declared, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you” (Luke 22:20), He was revealing that the Passover wine had always been pointing toward His sacrifice. The bread, pierced, scarred, and bruised; broken for the meal foreshadowed His body broken for humanity.
In Exodus, God instructed the Israelites to apply blood to their doorposts and lintels, creating a visible boundary between judgment and mercy. This blood-marked threshold determined who would come under God’s protection. This physical object lesson illuminates a profound spiritual truth: the lamb was sacrificed in place of the firstborn, foreshadowing how Jesus would die in our place, taking on the wrath due to us because of our sin.
Just as Pharaoh functioned as a merciless slavemaster over Israel, sin holds humanity in bondage. The Passover narrative reveals that God’s redemption always involves both liberation from slavery and protection from judgment. Israel needed deliverance not only from Pharaoh’s oppression but also from the angel of death that would pass through the land.
We too face this dual threat—bondage to sin and exposure to divine judgment. Scripture is clear that “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) and “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness” (Hebrews 9:22). Here we see God’s justice and mercy perfectly balanced. His holiness demands accountability for sin, yet His love provides the means of forgiveness.
Christ, in magnificent grace, steps into humanity’s desperate situation. By voluntarily taking our sin upon Himself and enduring a brutal death on the cross, Jesus absorbs the judgment we deserved. The wrath that should have fallen on us fell on Him instead.
The profound truth in this atonement is that no human can boast of earning salvation. Just as the Israelites did nothing to earn their deliverance except believe and trust in God’s means of salvation, we too are saved not by our actions but by faith alone. Just as each Israelite family had to trust in God’s provision of the lamb’s blood, we must individually place our faith in Christ’s sacrifice. When we do, His righteousness is credited to our account—not because we deserved it or earned it, but because He graciously gives it. This gift of imputed righteousness allows us to pass from spiritual death to eternal life, from bondage to sin into the freedom of God’s children.
The Passover lamb’s unblemished nature and sacrificial death foreshadowed Christ as the perfect sacrifice who takes away the sins of the world.
God’s requirement for an unblemished Passover lamb carried profound theological significance that points directly to Christ. This wasn’t an arbitrary detail but a vital truth: only something flawless could substitute for those who were flawed.
The standard for the Passover lamb was perfection—”without defect” (Exodus 12:5). This requirement illustrated God’s holy standard and the perfection required to approach Him. The unblemished animal foreshadowed what humanity truly needed: a perfect sacrifice who could bear our imperfection.
Christ fulfilled this requirement through His sinless life. Though “tempted in every way, just as we are,” Jesus “did not sin” (Hebrews 4:15). This sinlessness wasn’t incidental to His mission but essential to it. Only one who was Himself without sin could bear the sins of others. Peter makes this connection unmistakable when he writes that believers are redeemed “with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or spot” (1 Peter 1:19).
The examination process for Passover lambs further illuminates Christ’s passion. Sacrificial lambs underwent meticulous priestly inspection to ensure perfection. Similarly, Jesus faced intense scrutiny from every quarter—religious leaders questioned Him, Roman authorities examined Him, and crowds evaluated Him. Yet none could identify legitimate fault. Even Pilate, after thorough investigation, declared, “I find no basis for a charge against this man” (Luke 23:4).
This perfect Lamb, thoroughly examined and proven flawless, became the sacrifice that the millions of Passover lambs throughout Israel’s history had merely foreshadowed. What was symbolized in countless temple sacrifices has been gloriously fulfilled in the once-for-all sacrifice of Christ. The prophetic mystery encrypted in Passover has been decoded at the cross, where the perfect Lamb of God takes away the sins of the world.
When we understand Passover, we see Jesus more clearly and appreciate the unity of God’s redemptive plan.
When we divorce Jesus from His Jewish context, we miss the richness of what God has been saying through thousands of years of Scripture. The New Testament writers didn’t see Jesus as the beginning of a new story but as the magnificent fulfillment of a story God had been telling since Genesis. Paul, trained in the Hebrew Scriptures, recognized this connection immediately, which is why he could confidently proclaim Jesus as “our Passover lamb.”
This understanding transforms how we approach communion. Those small pieces of bread and cups of juice aren’t isolated religious symbols but extensions of a redemptive story that began with a people huddled in their homes in Egypt, doorposts marked with blood, ready for deliverance. When Jesus said, “Do this in remembrance of me,” He was building upon centuries of remembrance that God had established through Passover.
I encourage you this Easter season to look at Christ’s sacrifice through the lens of Passover. Consider hosting a Christian Passover meal with your family or friends. Explore how each element—the bitter herbs of suffering, the unleavened bread of sinlessness, the cup of redemption—reveals something profound about what Jesus accomplished. In doing so, you’ll discover that when Old and New Testaments are read together, both shine more brightly, illuminating the glorious truth that from beginning to end, Scripture tells one unified story of God’s redemption through the blood of the Lamb.
