In Exodus 12, God instructed Moses to have each head of household take a lamb without blemish from his flock. The lamb was to live in the household four days, during which time the lamb would become a pet, something loved, a member of the family. Then the head of house was to hold the lamb with the love and affection built up over the four days and with respect for the innocent life he was taking, draw a knife across the neck of the lamb, catching its blood in a bowl, as the lamb’s heart pumped it out. The blood was then taken and spread over the door posts and lintel of the house and the lamb eaten. When the angel of death passed over Egypt, it would pass over the households with the blood on the lintel.
In 1Corinthians 5:7, we find these words: “Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you are really unleavened. For Christ, our Passover Lamb, has been sacrificed.” The question is, “When was the Passover Lamb sacrificed? The typology of Exodus 12 does not fit Jesus’ death on the cross.
We know Jesus bore our sin when He died on the cross (Isaiah 53) and we also know the Father abandoned Jesus before He died because He said, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me” (Matt. 27:46). When Jesus “became sin who knew no sin” (2Cor.5:21), He certainly was not unblemished before the Father. Yet, Hebrews 9:14 states that Jesus presented Himself, unblemished, before God. Again, the question is, “When did Jesus present Himself unblemished before God?” Jesus was certainly unblemished before he went to the cross but He took on Himself our sin, making Him blemished. He was the perfect sacrifice for sin, but Jesus’ blood was not applied to the doorpost at the cross.
In Luke 22:20, Jesus said. “This is my blood, which is poured out for you, but there was no knife lovingly and respectfully drawn across His jugular vein and His blood did not pour forth from any of His wounds. The water and blood that flowed from His side would indicate congestive heart failure and there is very little blood in this water. Jesus certainly died as a sacrificial lamb on the cross but was He the Passover lamb? Exodus 12 and the cross of Christ reveal two drastically different pictures. How can we reconcile these conflicting truths?
It is in Hebrews 9 where we find that Jesus was not of the house of Levi and had no authority from God to enter into the old covenant tabernacle with His blood but that He did enter into the new covenant tabernacle “in the end of the world…to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.” Again, Passover lambs were not tortured before they were killed; they were lovingly held. Jesus could not possibly be the Passover Lamb when He died on the cross.
In Romans 8:11, Paul informs us, “If the Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he that raised up Christ shall also quicken your mortal bodies,” but Jesus said, “Destroy this temple and I will raise it up in three days,” John 2:19. Moreover, in Galatians 1:1 Paul states: “Paul, an apostle, sent not from man or by man, but by Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised Him from the dead.” So who raised Jesus from the dead?
When John saw Jesus coming to be baptized, he exclaimed, “Behold the Lamb of God, come to take away the sins of the world,” and it is true the cross is where God reconciled the world to Himself. Colossians 1:20 states, “And through Him to reconcile to Himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through His blood, shed on the cross.” It reminds me of 1John 2:2, “And He is the propitiation of our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.” You see, Jesus died on the cross because of and for our sins, according to Isaiah 53, but His death on the cross was applied to the whole human race. So God reconciles the whole world to Himself through Jesus’ death.
This is supported by Hebrews 12:8, where it is stated that all have become partakers of God’s chastening for disobedience because God deals with the whole human race as sons. So if all have become sons, do all not go to heaven? Does this not make Jesus’ death on the cross our Passover? Sadly, no, the Father God sent Jesus to reconcile the world to Himself but according to Hebrews 12:2, Jesus endured the cross, despising the shame, for the joy set before Him. Jesus came for a completely different reason.
Jesus and His Father had two different reasons for coming to earth. The Father wanted the fulfillment of the old covenant; He wanted to reconcile the world to Himself. He wanted to be able to pass over the world’s sin. Consider Ephesians 2:13-15, “But now in Christ Jesus, you who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. For He is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of partition between us, having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances, for to make in Himself of two, one new man, so making peace.” The old covenant was made with the Jews alone, they were God’s chosen people, but Jesus broke down the partition between Jews and Gentiles by taking on Himself the sins of the entire world and paying the cost of those sins.
In Galatians 4:4-5 we find that “When the fullness of time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the (old covenant) law that we might receive the adoption of sons,” but Hebrews 9:15 states: “and for this cause He is the mediator of the new covenant,” and 8:13 states: “In that He said, a new covenant, He has made the first old.”
So, there is an old covenant Jesus was born under the authority of, “made of a woman, made under the law,” and there is a new covenant Jesus established after fulfilling the old covenant. This was the joy set before Jesus; this was the reason Jesus endured the cross. The blood Jesus shed on the cross was not used to ratify a new covenant. It was used to satisfy the old covenant.
Each covenant is governed by commandment. Jesus kept the commandments of the old covenant perfectly, then died as one guilty of transgressing each and every commandment of the law. It was after this that He established the new covenant. This requires two sacrifices. In order to redeem mankind from the law, Jesus had to offer a sacrifice that satisfied the law’s demands. He did this on the cross but a new covenant must be ratified with blood (Heb.9:23). This means Jesus arose from the dead with blood in His body and offered another sacrifice in heaven.
In Matthew 5:17, Jesus says, “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy but to fulfill.” Jesus did this by living up to the standards God set for righteousness, then dying as one guilty of transgressing the whole law. “For verily I say to you, till heaven and earth shall pass, not one jot or tittle shall pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.” A fulfilled covenant goes out of force; it loses all authority.
Jesus then continued, “Whoever, therefore, shall break one of these least commandments, and teach others to do so, shall be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven; but whoever shall do and teach them shall be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven.” Question, “If the old covenant was fulfilled and believers were redeemed from it, why would anyone teach adherence to a contract that has been fulfilled?” It would be like continuing to make payments on a car you already own. Moreover, there were no least commandments in the old covenant. Breaking the last would condemn as readily as breaking the first.
So what is Jesus talking about when He says, “Whoever shall break one of these least commandments, and teach others to do so, shall be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven.” Jesus used the terms, kingdom of God, and, kingdom of heaven, interchangeably throughout His ministry. However, in Matthew 11:11, He said “Truly I say to you, among those born of women there is no one greater than John the Baptist. Yet he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.” So if there is no one greater than John the Baptist yet he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than John, then the kingdom of heaven is subsequent to the kingdom John lived under. This would make the kingdom God the kingdom of the old covenant and the kingdom of heaven the kingdom of the new covenant.
A new kingdom and a new covenant suggest new commandments. Sin is defined as disobedience of God’s commandments. Jesus died on the cross in order to fulfill the old covenant and reconcile all of mankind to God. Its commandments no longer apply. So why then does John say, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive our sins and cleanse us of all unrighteousness,” in 1John 1:9? After Jesus had fulfilled the old covenant by suffering and dying on the cross, He established a new covenant and the commandments Jesus issued in conjunction with the establishment of the new covenant are routinely viewed as the lesser commandments. In fact, most Christians make no attempt to keep them.
This is the reason Jesus said, “Whoever shall break one of these least commandments, and teach others to do so, shall be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven.” The kingdom of heaven is not the kingdom John the Baptist lived under. The kingdom of heaven has a completely new set of commandments.
In Matthew 5:20 Jesus continues, “For I say unto you, that except your righteousness exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall in no wise enter the kingdom of heaven.” If all the world is redeemed from the law clothed with Jesus’ righteousness and Jesus fulfilled the law taking it out of the way and our righteousness must exceed that of the law, then we are in a new covenant and the definition of righteousness has changed.
The truth is: Jesus died three times. He died on the cross when His Father abandoned Him. He died again when His spirit left His body. He went down into hell for three days and was resurrected. After His resurrection, He presented Himself to His Father, Hebrews 9:14, a lamb without blemish, and it was the Father who held His Son with love and respect and honor, and cut His throat so that the precious blood of Jesus ran out into a bowl, Hebrews 9:26. Jesus died again when His blood poured out because a man’s body cannot live without blood and the Father God raised Jesus from the dead. Jesus took His blood and sprinkled it over the new covenant tabernacle to ratify the new covenant (Heb. 9:23-24). The new covenant is our door posts and lintel.
You see, it was the Holy Spirit who raised Jesus to life in hell after the Father abandoned Jesus on the cross; Jesus raised His body from the grave; and the Father God infused life back into the bloodless body of the man, Christ Jesus, in heaven. “The life is in the blood,” according to Leviticus 17:11, and Jesus’ body came from His mother, Mary, but His blood came from His Father, God. When Jesus’ throat was cut, it was the life of God that flowed out into the bowl. Jesus certainly lost blood during His suffering on earth. You cannot have your back whipped, beard plucked, a crown of thorns pressed down on your head, and be nailed to a cross without losing some blood, but the Passover Lamb “poured out His blood” (Luke22:20) in heaven before the new covenant tabernacle.
The old covenant was ratified with the blood of animals and each time the Israelites broke covenant with God, the covenant was re-ratified with more animal blood. Jesus lost blood through His suffering but did not enter into the old covenant tabernacle with His blood. Jesus took mankind’s sin in His own body on the cross and paid man’s penalty for sin. 2Corinthians 5:21 states: “For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of Christ. The old covenant can no longer wash away sins; there are no animals being sacrificed and Jesus’ blood is not sprinkled there. The world is redeemed from the old covenant law and credited with Jesus’ righteousness as a free gift. Since Jesus fulfilled the law but our righteousness must exceed that of the law, we are in a new covenant with new commandments and disobedience of those commandments is sin, sin the blood of Jesus washes away through repentance (Heb. 9:22).
If you are attempting to keep the old covenant law through keeping its Ten Commandments and believing Jesus’ blood was poured out on the cross for these sins, you have a rude awakening awaiting you. Jesus’ blood certainly oozed from each wound but did not pour from any. Jesus died on the cross as God’s perfect sacrifice but He died in heaven as the Passover Lamb. Each believer who accepts Jesus’ death on the cross for sin receives Jesus’ righteousness but unless “your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the old covenant law; you shall in no wise enter the kingdom of heaven.” The scribes and Pharisees were made righteous by the old covenant law.
If the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than John but John is as great as any person to have ever lived in the kingdom of God, then we are talking about two distinct and distinctly different ages. Although most scholars view the new covenant as a continuation of the old covenant with Jesus’ blood replacing the blood of animals, this cannot be true.
So, in 1Corinthians 5:7, when Paul says, “Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you are really unleavened,” he is contrasting the old and new covenants. To believe in the Christ who died on the cross is a good thing but nothing compared to believing in Jesus’ death in heaven as the Passover Lamb. The statement, “Except your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees,” indicates a new definition of righteousness.
After His death on the cross and resurrection from hell, Jesus presents Himself before the Father, unblemished. This is why Jesus told Mary, “Don’t touch me,” at the tomb. If Mary had touched Jesus, He would have been blemished when He presented Himself before His Father. His Father gently held Jesus, cut His throat, and collected His blood as His body died. The Father then raised Jesus from the dead by infusing life back into His body and Jesus took His blood and sprinkled it over the new covenant tabernacle, thus ratifying the new covenant. The new covenant is not the fulfillment of the old covenant. It is a completely different covenant.
The old covenant never promised eternal life. God promised the Israelites, “I will be your God and you will be my people.” As long as the Children of Israel kept covenant with God, He blessed their lives and protected them from evil. The blood of Jesus was not applied to the old covenant so Jesus’ death on the cross cannot change the old covenant. What Jesus did was to take mankind’s sin in His own body and pay mankind’s payment for sin against God as defined by the Father. It is a simple exchange of sin for righteousness.
The promise of the new covenant is eternal life. However, to inherit eternal life, you must live your life according to the requirements Jesus set for inheritance in His will. This is the reason Jesus says, “Whoever shall break one of these least commandments, and teach others to do so, shall be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven.”
It is not that those who break Jesus’ commandments are in the Kingdom of Heaven but that those who are in the kingdom call them least. There are two levels of mankind today. All of mankind has been reconciled to God through Jesus’ death on the cross for sin but only those who keep Jesus’ commandments and teach others to do so inherit eternal life.
The fulfillment of the old covenant and the establishment of the new covenant are back to back events. Both involve the death of Jesus and His blood. To the untrained eye, the two events appear as one in the scriptures. This is the reason most churches celebrate the death of the Saviour but call the ceremony, “The Lord’s Supper.” When instituting the Lord’s Supper, Jesus said, “This is my blood poured out for you,” but Jesus’ blood was not poured out on the cross. It was, however, poured out in heaven when He established the new covenant.
The two events are so closely interconnected most scholars have failed to see the two as separate events. Most Christians fail to discern the Lord’s body when they receive communion. They discern the body and blood of the Christ and eat and drink damnation to themselves. Going back to Hebrews 12, God chastises the whole human race equally for disobedience of the Lord’s commandments because it is through obedience that eternal life is gained, according to Hebrews 5:9, which states, “And being made perfect, He became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey Him.
Because of this confusion, most believers look to Ephesians 2:8 for the roadmap to salvation and fail to appreciate Ephesians 2:10. The good works we are ordained by God to perform is obedience of Jesus’ commandments and Jesus said, “If you keep my commandments you will abide in my love.” In another place He said, “If you love me, keep my commandments,” and again, “He that has my commandments and keeps them will be loved of my Father and I will love him and will manifest myself to him.” Disobedience of these commandments is sin and this is the sin the blood Jesus poured out in heaven washes away through repentance.
Jesus issued His commandments after He had fulfilled His Father’s covenant with its “law of commandments contained in ordinances,” after His death on the cross. They can be found just before His ascension back into heaven. It was at this time that Jesus gathered His disciples about Him and commanded them to wait in Jerusalem for a baptism with the Holy Spirit. He promised power to witness of His resurrection with the experience and further commanded them to go out preaching this message to their neighbors, the strangers around them, and the foreigners as far as the eye could see.
These are the lesser commandments Jesus spoke of in Matthew 5:19 and they define righteousness in this present age. Our modern scholars identify these commandments as lesser. In fact, they say the original apostles fulfilled the first because their obedience was so perfect but Jesus never identified this commandment as personal to eleven men alone. Neither does the scripture exempt obedience by anyone else.
Moreover, the baptism with the Spirit has been defined as an event that comes with the gift of tongues but Jesus never commanded His followers to wait for the gift of tongues. Therefore, what happened on the day of Pentecost must be defined as the baptism with the Spirit. And, Jesus said, “If you believe on me, rivers of the Holy Spirit will flow out of your belly,” (Jn.7:37-39). Therefore, the baptism with the Spirit has to be defined as the gift of tongues flowing out of your heart and the gift of tongues has to be seen as a manifestation of the Holy Spirit.
Curiously, the word, baptize, means to saturate. So, to be baptized with the Spirit is to be saturated with the Spirit and since the Holy Spirit is on the earth today to represent Jesus, to be baptized with the Spirit is to be saturated with Jesus. Those who keep Jesus’ commandments keep themselves saturated with Jesus and since Jesus is the resurrected Lord, those who believe on Jesus should do the works Jesus did and greater works than these. I say should, because the understanding of the two covenants was lost in the first century after Jesus’ death because the Church sought to go back under the old covenant law. It abandoned the new covenant Jesus died to ratify and went back under the covenant Jesus died to fulfill.
When Jesus said, “He that believes on me will have rivers of Living Water flowing out of His heart,” it should be obvious He is speaking of a belief on the Lord. A belief in the Christ will not cause rivers of the Holy Spirit to flow out of your heart but a belief on the Lord will. Consider Acts 10. The Lord Jesus sent Peter to Cornelius’ house, pointing out to Peter that God had cleansed all mankind through Jesus’ death on the cross. When Peter arrived he was amazed at the grace of God and had hardly gotten through his opening remarks when Cornelius and all his household received a baptism with the Spirit.
Jesus said, “A man must be born of water and of the Spirit.” The word, and, indicates two events. The death of Jesus on the cross has been applied to the whole human race but his death in heaven, as the Passover Lamb, is applied to those who believe. Christians must recognize the difference between morality and commandment, reckon themselves dead to the old covenant law that was fulfilled but alive unto the new covenant law that requires obedience. In order for our righteousness to exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees, God has to have provided a new definition of righteousness for us. In Exodus 12, the lamb was to be eaten after its blood was collected and Jesus said, “Except you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you have no part in me.” It speaks of saturation. We saturate ourselves with Jesus by allowing the gift of tongues to flow from our lips and by this obedience we inherit eternal life.
So was Jesus the Passover Lamb when He died on earth? Jesus bore our sins on the cross and took the penalties of our disobedience. He was not unblemished. Moreover, the Father abandoned Jesus on the cross. Jesus was not lovingly held while a knife was drawn across His neck. The blood Jesus lost at the cross was taken from Him by violence and with disdain and was not spread over door posts. Yet, the Father God observed Jesus’ perfect obedience for four days as He humbled Himself before the ridicule of the Roman soldiers, the pain of the scourge and the shame of dying on a cross, naked and innocent, on a busy Roman road. The Father watched as Jesus submitted Himself to the fires of hell in perfect obedience to His Father’s wishes. So when Jesus presented Himself before the Father in heaven, He was found unblemished. His obedience was perfect in the face of unfathomable hardship. The Father lovingly held Jesus and with great respect, pulled the knife across His throat to catch His blood and a new covenant was enacted.
Ask yourself this question, “Why did Jesus tell Mary, “Don’t touch me, for I have not yet ascended to my Father,” but later told Thomas, “touch me.” What changed during the interim? The typology set up by Exodus 12 more closely fits Jesus’ sacrifice of Himself in heaven, as presented by Hebrews 9, but it is Jesus’ suffering on the cross that causes God to pass over mankind’s sin against the kingdom of God, making it possible for all mankind to become Children of God. However, we live in the kingdom of heaven. In Matthew 28:28-32, Jesus said, “A man had two sons. He came to the first to say, “Son, go work in the vineyard today.” The boy said, “I will not,” but later changed his mind and went. The man then came to the second son and said the same thing. The boy said, “Yes sir, right away,” but he didn’t go. Jesus then asked, “Which boy did the will of his father?”
Both boys were born in the kingdom of their father but only one would inherit. The point of the story is that obedience is what causes you to inherit. It is not enough to say you love God if you do not keep His commandments. In that we live in the kingdom of heaven, it is not the commandments of the kingdom of God we need to keep. It is the kingdom of heaven we want to live in and therefore must strive to keep the commandments of the new covenant. Jesus has already given us the righteousness of the law as a free gift. In order to receive the righteousness of the new covenant and enter the kingdom of heaven, we must keep Jesus’ commandments.