Passover and Unleavened BreadBy Dr. Don Meecha, Director Light of Messiah Ministries International    In the twenty-third chapter of Leviticus, God reveals to Moses that He has specific fixed times called "His appointed times."  These eight appointed times not only outline a yearly cycle for the Jewish Nation to follow, but they also stipulate how the Children of Israel were to conduct themselves at these times and how they were to approach a Holy God.  This cycle extends from the Shabbat, a once a week appointed time (23:3), to the Feast of Booths, an annual eight day celebration (23:34).   When each of these feasts can be understood as a piece to an elaborate puzzle, a stunning depiction begins to unfold of God’s plan of Salvation.  Within each of these appointed times, at the very heart of each, was something great which God had done for His people, and He wanted them to remember it annually.  At the same time, He was, and is, pointing to great prophetic events He was (and is) yet to accomplish, both for the Israelites and for the rest of the world throughout the ages.    The pieces of this elaborate puzzle are the individual feasts themselves and in them are seen such things as the Holiness of God, man’s personal sin, corporate and individual, sacrifices and the shedding of blood for atonement and the possibility of personal and national salvation for those who trust in the Lord.    Contained within the month of Nisan are three feasts which come in quick succession.  These feasts are:  Passover, Unleavened Bread and First Fruits.  Each of these feast days contains strong symbolism.  The Feast of Passover tells of the redemption of a nation by the passing over by the angel of death.  As the angel saw the blood of the lamb on the doorposts, he would move to the next.  In the homes of those who did not have the blood applied, death struck.  In these cases, all the firstborn males were killed.  We then see the nation of Israel delivered from the bondage of pharaoh and brought out of slavery into a covenant relationship with God their Deliverer.  Egypt is left with death and destruction.    When seen spiritually, a beautiful picture develops of how God took a people for Himself and of how He provided a sacrifice for them.  Sha’ul (Paul) tells us in 1 Corinthians 5:6, “Messiah our Passover has also been sacrificed.”  We can, therefore, understand that when we apply Yeshua’s blood to our “doorposts”, the angel of death passes over us at the second death.  And, just prior to that first passing over, Moses told the Israelites that God had commanded them to only eat the unleavened bread with their Passover meal.  So, for the next seven days were to be a feast in which they were to be free from all leaven as well, “On the first day you shall remove all of the leaven from your houses; for whoever eats anything leavened from the first day to the seventh day, that person shall be cut off from Israel” (Exodus 12:15).  Not only were they to be free, if anyone was caught with leaven they were to be “cut off” this means the individual was “to be put to death.”   Why was the freedom from yeast during this time so important?  First, it was to be a sign of freedom for Israel from the bondage of their slavery in Egypt.  This unleavened bread was to be called the "Bread of Affliction" because it was born out of Israel’s affliction through slavery (Duet. 16:3).  This means that the Jewish people could reference the absence of yeast with freedom.  This ancient feast also calls to mind a picture of the Jewish woman meticulously cleaning her home each and every year prior to the feast days.  This search for leaven, tediously looked after, was to be a physical sign of a spiritual truth and it was to be a symbol, or a teaching tool  for the generation to come that they may know of the Lord’s mighty works (Psalm 78).  

 Sha’ul tells believers in 1 Corinthians 5:7-8, “Clean out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened, for Messiah our Passover has been sacrificed.  Let us therefore celebrate the feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.” 

 In the Bible, yeast is a symbol for sin.  This means all of the physical cleaning done in those physical homes was to point the Children of Israel inward that they might clean out the leaven of the heart, the malice and wickedness, the sin!  This is what Sha’ul means when he says that believers are to celebrate the feast; they are to celebrate the feast of Unleavened Bread!  I believe this is not just the searching out the leaven in our lives through confession, but also through physically cleaning the leaven as God commanded.  Did not Yeshua say, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments?”  We are to rejoice in Yeshua’s sacrifice on our behalf & I believe without a physical sign how will others see God in us?  No, God’s people must do physically those things that God commanded that He might be revealed to others.  So too, as Yeshua used the unleavened bread at Passover and He pointed to Himself when He said, “This is My body…” we understand the matzah bread to symbolize Yeshua’s perfect, sinless life and our necessity to be satisfied with “the true Bread out of heaven” (John 6:32).  And this Bread was offered that others might be saved.  

 I hoped you cleaned the leaven out this year…we did.