This article is a little technical; if you’re just getting into the truth, I wouldn’t start with this article. But for those of you who don’t know the argument, the Bible says that passover was kept on the 14^th day of the first month of the Hebrew calendar.

But for thousands of years, bitter battles have raged between those who keep passover at the beginning of the 14^th day, just after sunset (the Bible reckons days sunset to sunset), or at the end of the 14^th day, around 3pm – or even after dark that day, on the 15^th.

Now Jesus ate the last supper at the beginning of the 14^th day, and called it plainly “the passover” (Luke 22:7-15). But most people believe that the passover should be kept the next afternoon/evening to commemorate the actual death of Jesus.

So the point of this article is, does the fact that Jesus died at 3pm make that the passover? Or does the fact that Jesus kept the passover the evening before and said “this do, in remembrance of me”, make THAT the passover?

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Probably the biggest reason people keep a 15^th passover is because “Christ died in the late 14^th therefore we should keep passover then”. Now this seems compelling at first – after all, Christ was “our passover”, “sacrificed for us” (1 Corinthians 5:7). And since Christ was the real fulfillment of passover, then He MUST have died at the same time the Old Testament lambs were sacrificed!

And that sounds like nice, tidy reasoning. Unfortunately, that’s ALL it is, human reasoning without a shred of scripture, and it only considers a fraction of what actually happened that day – and the quite massive weight of symbolism fulfilled.

Firstly, Christ never told us to do this. Not once. He never told us to remember the exact time He died, nor to observe the moment of His death year by year until He returned… or anything of the sort! What He DID say, the night before His death, is…

Luke 22:19 And he took bread, and gave thanks, and brake it, and gave unto them, saying, This is my body which is given for you: THIS DO IN REMEMBRANCE OF ME.

He did NOT say “Do something LIKE this tomorrow night after I’m dead”! He said DO THIS in remembrance of me! To say anything else is changing clear scripture. Do THIS – what you’re doing RIGHT NOW – in remembrance of me! To believe that He meant “do THIS, but tomorrow night after I’m dead” is absurd!

Matthew 26:18 And he said, Go into the city to such a man, and say unto him, The Master saith, My time is at hand; I WILL KEEP THE PASSOVER AT YOUR HOUSE WITH MY DISCIPLES.

That’s what Jesus said, plain and simple. And just to show that the reasoning I just referred to isn’t as tidy as it seems to be at first glance, think about this: if Christ was the exact picture of the Old Testament lamb, and his death is the exact parallel to the death of the lamb, down to the very minute of the day it was sacrificed, then I ask you…

The Old Testament lamb was roasted in fire. Was Jesus burnt at the stake? Was He roasted in fire? Then it wasn’t a direct parallel!

Was the Old Testament lamb beaten and tortured, spit upon and scourged for hours before it was killed? Then it wasn’t a direct parallel!

Was the Old Testament lamb given a crown of thorns? Then it wasn’t a direct parallel!

Did the Old Testament lamb have to drag its instrument of death (a stake) while suffering and in pain? Then it wasn’t a direct parallel!

The remains of the Old Testament lamb had to be burned before morning. Was Christ cremated before morning? Was His body destroyed, or did it decay at all? Then it wasn’t a direct parallel!

Was the Old Testament lamb persecuted and unjustly judged all night before it was killed? Then it wasn’t a direct parallel!

Was the live Old Testament lamb nailed to a stake for hours before it died? THEN IT WASN’T A DIRECT PARALLEL!

Beyond the fact that both have the same name, practically NO similarity exists between the OT lamb and the NT lamb, Christ! Think about it! What do they have in common? Both died and gave us their blood. Ummmm. Both were called passover lambs. Ummmmm. Not much else in common, is there?

So the reasoning isn’t as tidy as it seemed up front, is it? Now, there IS a massive amount that they have in common – but not in the way you’ve probably always thought. See, everything that happened in the NT is a DIRECT parallel of something that happened in the OT at the same time – down to tedious, minute details – but only if you look at it the right way. And to start looking at it the right way, the first DIRECT, and CLEAR parallel we can draw – much more clear than the death of the lambs – is what was DONE with the lambs!

The Old Testament lamb’s flesh was eaten and its blood was used – (which, let’s face it, was the REAL point of sacrificing the lamb in the first place!) – At the same time that the New Testament Lamb’s flesh and blood were EATEN! Now that IS a direct parallel! For at the BEGINNING of the 14^th, Christ said, BEFORE he died “And as they were eating, [according to verse 19, they were eating THE PASSOVER] Jesus took bread, and blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; THIS IS MY BODY. (Matthew 26:26)

The symbol of the Passover lamb – of eating the body of Christ – was done THE NIGHT BEFORE Christ died WITH HIS DISCIPLES! Not at the moment of His actual death, and certainly not after the start of the 15^th! Now compare that to this scripture:

Exodus 12:7-8 And they shall take of the blood, and strike it on … the houses, wherein they shall eat it. And they shall eat the flesh in that night, …

Jesus – the NT lamb – gave us HIS BODY to eat, and moments later He gave us HIS BLOOD to drink – to cover our “houses”, which is of course our bodies! And this happened at the very beginning of the 14^th – the same time as the Old Testament passover took place. The OT lamb had died shortly before, at sundown beginning of the 14^th. But the NT lamb wasn’t to die until the next day, about 3pm, give or take. Now why is that? I had to ask myself that question, and here is the answer I found.

I started by drawing out, on a chart, every single event that happened on the 14^th in the New Testament, and in the Old Testament, and laying them up side by side, as you can see on the accompanying chart. Take some time to get familiar with it, since we’ll be referring to it quite a bit. Obviously not every event is timestamped in the gospels, but they are in their successive order built around the ones that are clearly timestamped, such as the death of Christ, the Death Angel, Pilate releasing Barabbas, etc. Also there isn’t a great deal of detail regarding the daytime events of the Exodus, but we can safely extrapolate quite a bit, as you’ll see. (click the image to see a larger version – it will open in a new window)

We know of course that Jesus had to keep the Old Testament passover “to fulfill all righteousness”, before He instituted the new symbols. He had to first fulfill the old before He could institute the new. This is why John said “and supper [the passover lamb] being ended…” (John 13:2), before Jesus started the footwashing and then the bread and wine ceremony.

And after the most obvious parallel of the Old and New Testament blood and body (wine and bread), the next easy one is that the OT lamb was to be burned before morning. Since most agrarian societies are built around sunlight and therefore go to bed early, they probably didn’t wait too long after the meal to burn the lamb so they could get to sleep. So the OT lamb which gave us his body was burned no doubt sometime before midnight.

The primary Biblical symbol for fire is testing; “…concerning the fiery trial which is to try you…” (1 Peter 4:12) “…the trial of your faith, …though it be tried with fire…” (1 Peter 1:7)

So to find a parallel for this that applies to Christ, we would look for some great “fiery” trial He suffered before Midnight.

Luke 22:28 (Murdoch) Ye are they who have continued with me in my trials:

Jesus had many trials in His life, but none like the last night.

Verse 44 And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly: and his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground.

So it isn’t much of a stretch to say that the NT lamb went through a fiery trial after giving us His body and blood, at the same time that the OT lamb went through a fire after giving us HIS body and blood!

But an even stronger connection was made a bit later in the Garden, when Jesus said:

John 16:11 Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged.

The prince of this world is, of course, Satan. Who was judged somewhere around midnight, according to that. But compare that scripture to this one, which happened the same day of the year (the early part of the 14^th) at the exact same time…

Exodus 12:12 For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and will smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgment: I am the LORD.

God said He was going to execute judgment AGAINST THE GODS OF EGYPT at midnight that same night! And who was the god of Egypt, if not Satan, the “prince of this world”! And even more, God was going to smite the firstborn of Egypt; And the firstborn, or eldest of sin is of course, Satan. Is that not a solid connection of events between the OT and NT passover day!

Now I need to skip ahead to explain an important concept. This will be a bit shocking, but it’s true nonetheless. God has promised that we can be healed today (Psalms 103:3). But how it is that we are healed? What makes it possible?

Isaiah 53:5 But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.

It is with His stripes we are healed. The beatings, the crown of thorns, the whipping, all of those things didn’t happen to the old testament lamb! They didn’t happen to it because the Old Testament lamb DID NOT PROVIDE HEALING! Because healing is the forgiveness of sin (Mark 2:7-10), and the blood of bulls and goats CANNOT take away sin (Hebrews 10:4)! And so beating the old testament lamb in our place would have been pointlessly cruel, for it COULD NOT have helped us!

This is why it is not a direct parallel! The Old Testament lamb only represented a very small part of the sacrifice, the part that was fulfilled by Jesus at the beginning of the 14^th well before midnight! And it didn’t have stripes because there was no healing in it, and without the stripes we cannot be healed!

…But who do we have to thank for those stripes? I know the question seems a bit strange, but think about it; who do we have to thank? The Father? Well, I suppose in a way; but not in the sense I mean. Who made it possible? WHO GAVE CHRIST THAT BEATING?

Of course it was Pilate, Herod, the Pharisees, the Jews in general, and in a sense all of mankind; but in a literal buck-stops-here sort of way, WHO was responsible? Satan! If it was not for Satan, there would have been no one to give Christ that beating! And without that beating, WE COULD NOT BE HEALED!

Now of course Satan hardly did this for our benefit; in fact, if he’d had ANY idea what he was doing, he wouldn’t have touched a hair on Jesus’ head!

1 Corinthians 2:8 Which none of the princes of this world knew: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

But they did NOT know! This wisdom was HIDDEN from the princes of this world – Satan and his fallen angels – as verse 7 says – and so they unwittingly played RIGHT INTO GOD’S HAND!

And so the process of beating Jesus, mocking him, spitting on him, giving him a crown of thorns and making Him drag the stake up the hill, crucifying and ultimately killing Him, gave us every good thing that we have available to us! And SATAN MADE IT POSSIBLE!

Matthew 26:24 The Son of man goeth as it is written of him: but woe unto that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! it had been good for that man if he had not been born.

Of course, Satan did this for his own selfish motives and hardly to give us a helping hand; nonetheless, we got it at HIS expense. Hopefully you’re with me so far, so let’s build the next step; as you probably know, throughout the Bible Egypt is a symbol which represents sin. Now Pharaoh represents the king of Egypt, and so he represents Satan (the king of Sin), and Pharaoh’s armies represent the fallen angels.

Exodus 12:35-36 And the children of Israel did according to the word of Moses; and they borrowed of the Egyptians jewels of silver, and jewels of gold, and raiment: And the LORD gave the people favour in the sight of the Egyptians, so that they lent unto them such things as they required. AND THEY SPOILED THE EGYPTIANS.

When Israel was preparing to leave Egypt after Pharaoh kicked them out (Exodus 12:31), it says that they spoiled the Egyptians – just as a victorious army takes a booty in precious gold, silver, and jewels, so on the daylight portion of Passover from a period roughly between dawn and midafternoon Israel spoiled the Egyptians. To put it differently, they got rich off the Egyptians, their oppressors for many years.

The connection is this; during that EXACT same timeframe when Israel was getting rich off the Egyptians, WE, who are spiritual Israel, were getting rich off of Satan! For Satan was, at that very same moment, persecuting Jesus; and every stripe, every drop of blood he caused to be shed, was that much more grace, mercy, and healing we could receive! And so Jesus was spoiling Satan for those hours between sometime right at dawn when He was first slapped, until the time He died! The exact same time Egypt was spoiled “according to the word of Moses”!

And if that connection isn’t strong enough for you to believe, then the Bible SPECIFICALLY says that Jesus spoiled the demons and Satan that day!

Colossians 2:13-15 And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses; … nailing it to his cross; And HAVING SPOILED principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in it.

Now that connection is downright rock-solid! And I could go on for several papers drawing analogies – about how Judas coming to bring Jesus to the chief priests was doing the same thing as the men sent to bring Moses (a type of Jesus) before Pharaoh…

Or the great cry that went up in Egypt after midnight was first about mourning for their children, but then about fear for their own lives (Exodus 12:33), for they said “we be dead men” if Israel doesn’t leave…. and they were thrusting Moses out because he was causing this problem… I could explain how that is a direct parallel to the chief priests who were in such a hurry that they rushed the trial and judged Jesus by night, so that He would be dead before the feast day (Matthew 26:3-5). But you can figure those things out for yourself from the chart, and no doubt more that I haven’t figured out yet.

But what about the death of Jesus? The real subject of this paper? Well, Jesus died about 3pm in the afternoon. But what did His death provide for us? Salvation you say? Wrong!

Romans 5:10 For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.

We are saved BY HIS LIFE! Billions of people have died! Hundreds of Millions have been martyred, and died for a cause higher than themselves! But they didn’t save us! And if Christ hadn’t been resurrected, neither could He! It is His LIFE that saves us, not His death!

His blood pays for our sins, it is true – but it would have been of no value if He hadn’t been resurrected! Because paying for our past sins, as necessary and important as that is, only makes up a very small part of the road to salvation!

Romans 8:10 And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.

It is the SPIRIT that brings you life! The spirit of Christ that is IN you! And it is that spirit of Christ in you that is your ONLY hope of glory (Colossians 1:27)! Without Christ’s spirit living IN you, you could DROWN in Christ’s blood and it wouldn’t do you a lick of good! For “…if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.” (Romans 8:9)

It is the death of Christ that made it possible for that spirit to come and live in you! For as long as Jesus was here, He needed His spirit in HIM – just as you need YOUR spirit in YOU – to stay alive! And so it was NECESSARY that He die, in order to give you His spirit!

John 16:7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go NOT away, THE COMFORTER WILL NOT COME unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you.

So the death of Christ allowed His spirit, your only hope at salvation, to live in you. Now to explain one more symbol first; Manna fell on Israel during the 40 years in the wilderness. Christ said that the Manna was a symbol of Himself (John 6:48). So the bread represents Jesus. Leaven represents sin (1 Corinthians 5:7-8, etc). Therefore Manna was unleavened, since it represented Jesus, who had no sin. At the passover, we eat a bread that is broken. Bread that is made of wheat, unleavened, and broken. As Jesus said “this is my body which is broken for you” (1 Corinthians 11:24).

But starting the next night, for each of seven days following we eat a different unleavened bread – made the same way, but not broken. A whole bread. This bread represents the spiritual body of Christ taken in you, not the broken physical body, but Christ’s complete spirit. And we eat this bread seven days. Those seven days during which time Pharaoh was chasing Israel out of Egypt, even as Satan now pursues us out of the realm of Sin where we were once in bondage.

And THIS bread was being baked on the afternoon of the 14^th!

Exodus 12:39 And they baked unleavened cakes of the dough which they brought forth out of Egypt, for it was not leavened; because they were thrust out of Egypt, and could not tarry, neither had they prepared for themselves any victual.

They had been thrust out of Egypt just that morning, and had no time to prepare food; they had to gather up all their possessions, their livestock, everything they owned, AND spoil the Egyptians – and just spreading the instructions from Moses among 2 million people would have taken massive amounts of time. So they baked unleavened bread. We don’t known the exact time they finished it, but considering what they had to do before they left, and the time involved in making even unleavened bread and baking it in those days, we can infer that they probably finished it sometime in the early afternoon.

This bread was to represent the spirit of Christ for the next seven days. It was finished early afternoon. And it was made in haste. And the spirit of Christ wasn’t “baked” – it wasn’t ready for us to take in us and symbolically eat it – until He left us (John 16:7). He left us at the moment of His death, at about 3pm. At that moment, the Spiritual unleavened bread was baked – and baked in haste, for Pilate marvelled that He was so soon dead (Mark 15:44)! And He was finished at the exact same moment as the PHYSICAL unleavened bread was baked, over 1500 years before! And THAT is why Jesus died at 3pm that afternoon!

Because FAR overshadowing the payment for our sins that was His sacrifice, was the chance to have His spirit – the very NATURE of God, His MIND living IN us! And His death made that possible, when He said “It is finished” (John 19:30) and died, and “gave up the spirit” so that we might have it.

And He was laid in the tomb to fulfill all the scriptures regarding His death; and at that moment, they were all finished. Nothing else could go wrong now. It was set in stone – literally. And at sunset ending the 14^th, as Jesus’ perfect body lay still in the tomb, Israel went out of Egypt with a high hand, rejoicing, for their oppressors had been conquered, never to afflict them again.

And on that “night to be much observed”, just after sunset, we remember year by year the fact that SPIRITUAL Israel left spiritual Egypt with a high hand, rejoicing, knowing that Jesus had overcome the world, that Satan had been spoiled and that all the ingredients for our salvation were finished – and that for those who were obedient to Christ, Satan could never again afflict us in any way.

Exodus 14:13 And Moses said unto the people, Fear ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD, which he will shew to you to day: for the Egyptians whom ye have seen to day, ye shall see them again no more for ever.