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The first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread pictures the beginning of a new living way. But that new living way was not joyous when Israel left Egypt — days of affliction — and our departure from our “house of bondage” isn’t either. They were learning to live in a way, and so are we.
The Messiah rode into Jerusalem on a small male donkey, on the day that we call Palm Sunday. Why was the donkey so important that God said to break its neck if you don’t redeem it by killing the lamb instead. Imagine sacrificing a lamb to save a donkey?
Today is the day that you are to redeem your first born son and make him holy. Did you know that your first born son is holy to God? Did you know that the donkey, even though it’s an unclean animal, is holy to God?
God writes His law deep in our hearts, which flow with “living water.” We are to grow in grace and knowledge as we get older. We never stop growing, even when we are very old.
The first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the 15th day of the first month. The Passover is now passed and we have to ask ourselves “Why is it that God called the first day of Unleavened Bread to be a holy day?” We will find out.
“Then the Lord spoke to Moyses, saying: ‘Consecrate to me every firstborn, first–produced, opening every womb among the sons of Israel, from human being to animal. It’s mine!’
Then Moyses said to the people, ‘Keep remembering this day in which you came out of Egypt, from a house of slavery. For by a mighty hand the Lord brought you out from there. And leaven shall not be eaten. For on this very day you are going out in the month of the new things.’” (Exodus 13:1–4 New English Translation of the Septuagint)
On the first holy day, God tells Moses that the children of Israel are to sanctify their first born of both man and beast. Seems a little unusual to set aside the first born of the animals. We need to learn what His choice and purpose for the first born of both animal and man.
The children of Israel left Egypt in the middle of the night, after the messenger of death had done his work. If you look back, Moses was told to return to Egypt when he was 80 years old. He was still 80 years old when the children of Israel reached Sinai.
The plagues were inflicted on Egypt in rapid succession, one right after the other. When you look at the pattern, you see that Pharaoh was not forewarned of every single plague. He was warned before the 1st, 3rd and 5th plagues but not the 2nd, 4th or 6th plague.
We should see this pattern in our own lives. Sometimes a person will warn us of a problem and we ignore them. Later the same issue comes again without warning and we ask God, “Why did you do that?” God says, “You didn’t listen to me the first time, did ya?”
So on this day, the 15th day of Aviv, the Day of Unleavened Bread, the children of Israel didn’t get to relax and play cards, they were on the move. They were on their way to the land that God promised them through Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
If we don’t see why today is a holy day, we won’t appreciate it. We are to participate in unleavened bread for seven days.
“And it shall be whenever the Lord your God brings you into the land of the Chananites, in the manner which he swore to your fathers, and he gives it to you, you shall also set apart (devote) everything opening the womb, the males, for the Lord. Everything opening the womb from the herds or among your animals, whatever belongs to you, you shall consecrate the males to the Lord. Everything opening the womb of a donkey you will exchange for a sheep. But if you do not make an exchange, you shall redeem it. Every firstborn of a human being among your sons you shall redeem.” (Exodus 13:11–13 NETS)
Why do we put aside or offer God something that He asks for? Why doesn’t He simply accept whatever the people want to give Him?
I ask questions and I may or may not have the answer. I don’t want to tell you the answer because, half the time, I don’t have the answer. If I do know the answer, I don’t want to give it up quickly because I want you to come to the conclusion on your own.
The Messiah rode into Jerusalem on a small male donkey, on the day that we call Palm Sunday. Why was the donkey so important that God said to break its neck if you don’t redeem it by killing the lamb instead. Imagine sacrificing a lamb to save a donkey?
Today is the day that you are to redeem your first born son and make him holy. Did you know that your first born son is holy to God? Did you know that the donkey, even though it’s an unclean animal, is holy to God?
When my son was born, nearly 40 years ago, I didn’t know what to do. So I lifted him up to God and said, “Here, God, he’s yours. I don’t know what to do with him.” I asked myself, “How do I buy my son back?”
“Everything anathematized among Israel’s sons shall be yours. And everything that opens the womb from all flesh, which they offer to the Lord, from human to animal, shall be yours, but the firstborn of people shall be redeemed with a ransom, and the firstborn of the unclean animals you shall redeem. And its redemption is from a month old; its evaluation is five shekels, according to the holy shekel; twenty obols there are. But firstborn of calves and firstborn of sheep and firstborn of goats you shall not redeem; they are holy. And you shall pour out their blood against the altar, and the fat you shall offer up as an offering for an odor of fragrance to the Lord,” (Numbers 18:14–17 NETS)
God is addressing Aaron and his sons in this chapter. Every devoted thing in Israel shall belong to the priests. The people give these things to God and God gives it to the priests. Why is God the middle man here? Why not just bypass God and give it directly to the priests? Because the devoted things need to be dedicated and set aside to God. It is God who turns it over to the High Priest. God turns it all over devoted things to His High Priest, Yeshua.
The first born males of the animals don’t belong to you. If you don’t redeem it, you are to kill it because it’s God’s, not yours.
I find it interesting that God focuses on how to redeem the unclean animals before the clean. The unclean animals that carry burdens (except for the donkey) are redeemed with money. This would include animals such as camels, horses. There are a lot of unclean animals that did work. This doesn’t apply to redeeming dogs, cats, pet snakes, etc.
Cows, sheep and goats, which are clean animals, are not redeemed. How were the first born sons redeemed? They were replaced by the sons of Levi.
How long did that take to sanctify all the firstborn males, both of man and beast? You begin to devote the first born on the First Day of Unleavened Bread.
How do you set them apart from the others who were born next? What do you do with them? Give them to God!
What does God do with them? He gives them over to the High Priest, to serve him. Even the unclean animals are to serve our High Priest, the Son of Man. He chose them for a reason!
He then talked about a donkey needed to be redeemed by a lamb. The Lamb who rode upon the donkey was killed.
Next God tells that the first born of man is to be redeemed. Where is the connection? How does that relate to us today?
We spend time purging out all the bread products from our homes. We get overwhelmed by doctrines to explain why we do this every year.
“Then the sons of Israel, when they departed from Sokchoth, camped at Othom on the edge of the wilderness. Now God was leading them, by day by a pillar of cloud to show them the way but during the night by a pillar of fire. The pillar of cloud during the day and the pillar of fire by night did not depart from before all the people.” (Exodus 13:20–22 NETS)
There were no towns, villages or cities in this region the children of Israel were traveling through at the time. The cloud controlled all their travels. Now at the end of this journey they cross the sea and are on the other side. They were removed completely from the house of bondage on the seventh day.
God gave them super strength to continually move for 7 days with no rest. Just as God was able to keep their clothes from wearing out, He was also able to sustain their bodies with no sleep to escape Egypt.
The Apostle Paul tells the Corinthians why Unleavened Bread is important.
“For I do not want you to be unaware, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea; and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea;” (1Corinthians 10:1–2 NASB)
The First day of Unleavened Bread pictures the beginning of a new living way. By the way, that new living way was not joyous, wonderful and fantastic, but days of affliction. They were learning to live in a way they had never lived before.
They had this “wonderful” manna, which didn’t cease until they entered the land.
This first day of the Days of Unleavened Bread, pictures our beginning of a new living way. We are living differently than ever before by every Word of Elohim. All the good and all the not so good are behind us and we are heading forward. They were baptized into the death of Yeshua and into the Spirit of God.
“Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection,” (Romans 6:4–5 NASB)
Remember that Israel didn’t want to leave Egypt, they just wanted the Pharaoh to stop oppressing them. God had to show the children of Israel their bondage. They didn’t realize how bad they really had it.
The first day of Unleavened Bread represents the first day their lives belong to God. He sanctified them before their baptism in the Red Sea.
We still have our aches, pains, burdens, afflictions, trials, sicknesses, and losses. We aren’t in the promised land yet.
This is how God always works. He is the same today, yesterday and tomorrow. The children of Israel died in the wilderness and just as they died in the wilderness, we have to let the old man in us die daily so God can bring forth our new man. That is the picture.
When you are ready to be transformed by Yeshua, the sin and death will be gone. We are moving towards Yeshua’s likeness but we aren’t there yet.
God purchased the entire house of Israel by taking the first born of Egypt. That was the payment, the transaction that brought about their redemption. Nothing comes for free, even freedom.
God had to show me how I was living and what would happen to me so I could understand that how I was living was going to lead me to death and not to life. God showed me that I was in bondage to sin, before I was baptized. I opened up by Bible and started reading. God wants us to leave behind the not-so-good and the bad.
The children of Israel left their homes, their gardens, everything behind.
The death of the lamb delived the Israelites from Egypt. They didn’t fully understand that, but they didn’t have to fully understand that to be spared, delivered and made “unleavened.” They still had to go through the days of affliction, just as we do. Our afflictions will not end until we are dead. I’m ok with that.
We have to learn to accept whatever trial our Father allows to come our way. We need to accept it with joy. I know that’s not easy. We don’t want to be afflicted. We are not in yet in the likeness of Yeshua’s resurrection. We are still in the likeness of His death.
We are to worship the Lord in spirit and in truth. That’s what Yeshua said. How do we do that?
“For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 1:6 NASB)
If we are already unleavened, how do we purge out old leaven? We become obedient from the heart by the teachings we have heard from God.
“Watch out and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.” The Son of Man said to beware of the leaven; of the teachings of the Pharisees and Sadducees; and the leaven of Herod.
Then the Son of Man also said: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three pecks of flour until it was all leavened.”
When God adds His Spirit to us, it increases. He keeps filling us with His Spirit.
We do not have to be aware of the teachings or authorities of the Pharisees, the Sadducees or those of Herod. They do not exist in our world or in our time.
However, there are other teachings and authorities in our understanding of the Word of God, even the Leadership of our communities and our nation.
All of Israel went through the sea, not just the first born.
The Old Leaven; we are not of this world.
After they were delivered for bondage at the end of the seven days, they were to continue going forth. They were to go forth all the way to the Land that was promised to them.
It is a picture for our lives to day. We are out of bondage by the Son of Man when He became our Passover. The people had many pitfalls on their way to the Land. A lot of them wanted to return to the Old Leaven way of living. Some even got so upset with the journey that they desired to go a different way.
Faith without trust is incomplete. As the Israelites wondered over that 40 years, from camp to camp, more things were left behind, more of the past was gone, more people died. The old leaven stopped.
The reason we are able to live unleavened is because Yeshua is our Passover, He freed us from the house of bondage by His death.
There’s a difference between first-born and first fruit. Yeshua is the First-Born of the dead. We are a type of First-Fruits of the rest of mankind, and those who have died before us and then those who will change into the full living way at His returning.
We are, as many before us have already completed, to present ourselves in a new living way, a people who live their lives by only Word of Elohim.
“And the Lord spoke to Moyses, saying: Speak to the sons of Israel, and you shall say to them: When you enter into the land that I give you and you reap its harvest, you shall also bring an omer as the first fruit of your harvest to the priest.” (Leviticus 23:9–10 NETS)
We know that by God did not choose Manasseh as the First Born but Ephraim. God is the one who chose and He always chooses the first born and first fruit.
“For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities — all things have been created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything.” (Colossians 1:13–18 NASB)
When you have a hard test and overcome it, you have compassion and mercy to offer someone going through a similar test, rather than offering them judgement.
We are unleavened from our old living and of all of the old teachings into the Truth of God and heading towards Life Everlasting. We are the ‘callout ones’ unto God.
It may be necessary to note, that if a father had neglected to redeem his first-born, the son himself was obliged to do it when he came of age. As this redeeming of the first-born was instituted in consequence of sparing the first-born of the Israelites by taking the first-born of Egypt. The first-born of a useful unclean animal to be redeemed by a clean animal of much less value. And the tribe of Levi in place of all the first-born of the tribes in general.
Apostle Paul said to follow him as he follows the Messiah. We as individuals can lead other people to the will of God. The will of God is for all to have life. We don’t judge, condemn, curse, lie, cheat, find fault, find bad things about people. We just let it be. We let God deal with it. God writes His law deep in our hearts, which flow with living water. We are to grow in grace and knowledge as we get older. We never stop growing, even when we are very old.
The Pharisees weren’t teaching paganism. They were teaching the law but they were twisting it to their advantage. They weighed people down, oppressing them with the law. They heaped judgment and condemnation on people.
The light is there to shine so others can see themselves. They can see what they are doing. Do you think that when your light shines that everyone will be happy about it? Yeshua was the true light and they put Him out. Through the Messiah, we learn about life. We get to be a part of His life.
Summary: Tammy