Dual Citizenship: Hebrews 11:13-16 and Philippians 3:10-4:1

Presented to The Salvation Army Alberni Valley Ministries, 03 July 2022 and 30 June 2024, by Major Michael Ramsay

This is the 2022 version. The see the 2024 version, click here: https://sheepspeaks.blogspot.com/2024/07/dual-citizenship-hebrews-1113-16-and.html

I was at a board meeting for the Neighbourlink Society: a group that provides food for children in the schools. Many of the people on the board have been friends for years. They were telling a few good stories. John and Carol are very good friends. John was giving Carol a hard time about her cooking because apparently shortly after she fed him a grilled cheese sandwich he had a heart attack – he was saying, ‘don’t let Carol make anyone any food’. Carol then told us more of the story. John was coming over to mow her lawn and after he had a lunchbreak, he headed outside to finish the work… and he did have a heart attack. They called the ambulance. It was quite significant. Carol was quite concerned. They took him to the hospital and then they actually had to fly him out by helicopter. You have to really understand the humour of these two for the rest of the story. As he was going up in the helicopter with his family and everyone around Carol yelled out, ”and don’t think I’m paying you! You didn’t finish the job!” The paramedic with John, in the helicopter, apparently said “I wouldn’t want to work for her” and then they heard her yell, “and don’t think I’m going to give you a reference”. John and Carol were laughing hysterically as they were recounting the story – especially as no one else there, at the hospital, at the time (including his adult son, I believe) realized that it was a joke. This made them laugh all the more.

This then got the stories going. One of them was telling the story of when their husband was in the hospital. A friend of theirs came to see him. Now he was in one of those rooms with more than one bed and there was a curtain drawn around his bed; so the friend went up to the other bed and thinking it was Fred (or whatever the husband’s name is) said, “Oh my goodness – Fred you look so bad I don’t even recognize you!” Fred's family then poked their heads out of where they were and said, “cut that out, come over here...”

 

Another lady told a story about when her mother went to the hospital to see her father and she leaned over to give him a big kiss only to realize that the fellow she kissed wasn’t her husband.

John then relayed the story of when he came up behind his friend and blew in his ear, for a joke, only to find out that it wasn’t his friend at all. It was some complete stranger’s ear he was blowing into. That gentleman did not receive that gesture very well at all. Board meetings can fun...

Friday was Canada Day. The Salvation Army had a float in the parade. It was a lot of fun. In light of the fact that it was just Canada Day, I thought that we would look at the verse from the Order of Canada (and more) today. Can anyone tell me:

 

• What is the motto of the Order of Canada? desiderantes meliorem patriam, meaning "they desire a better country"

• Where does it come from? Hebrews 11:16

 

The Motto of the Order of Canada comes from Hebrews 11:16, “they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them.” 

Pierre Eliot Trudeau when he established the Order of Canada applied this verse to our nation but of course this verse refers to more than just our nation or any nation. It is great that he wanted to apply these Christian ideals to our country, just as an earlier generation had applied the Christian ideals of Psalm 72:8 to our nation – with the hope that our country would always take care of the poor and those on the margins. But to fully ascribe this verse to our nation, of course, would be a case of mistaken identity not entirely dissimilar from our opening stories. This verse and this passage (though extended) obviously isn’t actually referring to Canada. It is referring to someplace else. The second part of the verse, where it says that God has prepared a city for them… to what city is the author of the Hebrews referring? The new Jerusalem. 

 

• Hebrews 12:22, “But you have come to Mount Zion, to the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of the living God” (cf. 13:14)

• Revelation 3:12 “Him who overcomes (I will make a pillar in the temple of my God. Never again will he leave it.) I will write on him the Name of my God and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which is coming down out of heaven from my God; and I will also write on him my new name.”

• Revelation 21:10 And he carried me away in the Spirit to a mountain great and high, and showed me the Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.

At the eschaton – the end of everything – the New Jerusalem, as referred to in Hebrews, Revelations, Philippians, and Thessalonians (where it mentioned the saints going to meet the Lord as He comes down) among other places, the city prepared for God’s children will come down from heaven to earth. 

Philippians 3:20 says this, “… our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Saviour from there, the Lord Jesus Christ,”

Let us read again from Chapter 3 because this Friday we have just celebrated Canada Day and today, like all Sundays, we are celebrating on the Lord’s Day with our fellow citizens of Heaven. Let’s read some encouragement from Heaven, where as Christians, our primary citizenship resides. How should we, who will be resurrected, live out our time here in Canada as dual citizens of Heaven? While we are living here, we are actually primarily citizens of Heaven and the new Jerusalem which will descend from Heaven. Philippians 3:15 through 4:1 says this: 

 

15 All of us, then, who are mature should take such a view of things. And if on some point you think differently, that too God will make clear to you. 16 Only let us live up to what we have already attained [our citizenship in Heaven].

17 Join together in following my example, brothers [and sisters], and just as you have us as a model, keep your eyes on those who live as we do. 18 For, as I have often told you before and now tell you again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. 19 Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is set on earthly things. 20 But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Saviour from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, 21 who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.

4 Therefore, my brothers and sisters, you whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, dear friends!

We have just had Canada Day this week and there are many good things and other things about celebrating Canada Day. I always used to love Canada Day – the parades, the picnics, the celebrations, some places have fireworks. Last Canada Day was quite somber as I spoke at the legion in light of both Covid-19 and the discovery of probable graves at the IRS and all the controversy around our government lowering our flag and not knowing how to raise it appropriately. This year it was good to celebrate again the many good things that we experience as part of Canadian community but there is more to life than that. There is much more. You see, even as good as the best parts of being Canadian are, we do have a dual citizenship and our other citizenship is Heaven and so even as we rejoice in the things God has done in and through Canada – and there are many good things, Hebrews 11:16, we are still longing for a better country—a heavenly one. For God is not ashamed to be called our God, for he has prepared that city for us.

 

That is our hope.

 

Let us pray.

www.facebook.com/salvogesis

www.sheepspeak.com

A MESSAGE OF RECONCILIATION ON CANADA DAY TO OUR VETERANS AND OTHERS IN LIGHT OF THE RESIDENTIAL SCHOOL REVELATIONS

 PRESENTED AT THE ROYAL CANADIAN LEGION, 01 JULY 2021.[1]

 

In the Alberni Valley today we would like to acknowledge Winston Joseph, who has passed on since the previous Canada Day. He was the driving force behind our community's Canada Day activities for many years.

 

Canada Day is very important to our veterans as they offered up their lives and many of them laid down their lives for Canada and for all of us.

 

Today we are gathering to remember Canada and, as always at the Legion, those who have lived, fought and died for Canada and for our future. One of the many brave people from this area who offered their lives up for the future of others was Edward John Clutesi of the Tseshaht Nation. (Our community is on the un-ceded territories of the Tseshaht and Hupacasath First Nations)

 

Today, heavy on our hearts is the tragedy of the horrors of the residential schools and those who suffered and even lost their lives, across this country and even in our community. This is why I am wearing this pin in the shape of the orange ribbon on my uniform today. Every child matters.

 

Our veterans fought for a brave new world. It was hoped that the First World War would be the war to end all wars. It wasn’t. After the Second World War one amazing thing did happen though and that was we were reconciled with old foes: Germany, Japan, and Italy are now some of our closest allies, trading partners and friends. 

 

Many people passed before they could see the culmination of those wars and that reconciliation. Today in Canada we do have heavy hearts remembering the residential schools and today we have grateful hearts for all of those who died for us – including Edward John Clutesi.

 

Reading from Hebrews 11:16, the verse on the Order of Canada: "But they now desire a better country, that is an heavenly, wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God for He has prepared for them."

 

Today We are hoping now that we will all commit to and be a part of the inauguration of a new era of reconciliation and healing in our nation and in our community in our people and in ourselves. May there be peace in our time and may there be peace in our hearts. 

 

Let us pray:

 

Eternal God, we thank you for the peace we enjoy and for the opportunity that is ours of building a better order of society in this Canada for the generations still to come. Amen. 

 

---

[1] This was presented after conversations with the current and previous Chief Councillor of the Tseshaht First Nation. The current Chief Councilor was unable to attend as he was out of town but committed to send a member of the council to be present.

Exodus 12:24-28: Remember.

Presented to Alberni Valley Ministries, 30 June 2019; Swift Current Corps of The Salvation Army, 06 July 2014. Based on an earlier version presented 01 July 2012 by Michael Ramsay

This is the 2019 version, click here to read the 2012 version of this homily: http://sheepspeaks.blogspot.ca/2012/06/exodus-1224-28-remember.html

I am a Rotarian and this week I am speaking at one of the Rotary clubs in town. While thinking about this I was reminded of  a harrowing story I heard at the Swift Current club about a family vacation that Dave, one of the members, took in Acapulco in 1968:

Dave and his wife are on holiday down in Mexico. They check into their hotel. They are near the ground floor and there are these little lizards - Geckos or something else – climbing all up the walls; so they speak to the hotel and ask to be moved as far away from the lizards as they can, up to the top floor. They do move up to the top floor. This turns out to be a mistake. In the middle of the night, they are woken up as people are running through the halls screaming. Some girls from Quebec tell them what is happening: the hotel is on fire. The stairs, they are concrete for the top few floors and then wood beneath and the wooden stairs are ablaze. The girls from Quebec jump over the railing from the 10^th storey or more up and plunge all the way down. Dave and his wife and his two sons, aged six and nine, are trapped. Without thinking they run to the elevator but the door closes with people inside it just before they get there. Actually I think Dave may have even gotten his hand in the closing door but they don’t catch the elevator, which is good because we know what happens to people in elevators in a fire. Dave and his family are trapped. They try to tie sheets together to scale down the outside of the building but as Dave is heading over a balcony, it is good that he has an arm linked through the railing because someone unties the sheets. He then climbs down the side of the balcony and swings onto the balcony below. His wife then drops one of his children for him to catch and then the other and then she scales down as far as she can, then falls and Dave catches her legs and pulls her in. They do this until the third story or so of the building when they run out of balconies. Dave then throws one child down onto a straw thatched roof, hoping that will break his fall. He sees the boy fall through the roof and run away; so he throws the other son down who makes a new hole as he crashes through the thatched roof. He runs to safety. His wife jumps next and Dave is able to scale a palm tree to the bottom. They are injured but they survive. It was quite a tale to hear recalled. They survived by the grace of God but others on their floor who leapt over the railing or who took the elevator did not.

What had happened was, apparently there was a dispute between two ownership groups – one local and one foreign – the foreign group was residing in the hotel on that day and some local people had attacked the hotel with Molotov cocktails – hoping to collect insurance, I believe.

It was quite something to hear this story. There is more to his story here too. One of  Dave’s sons had a piece of the thatched roof he fell through stuck into his foot. The other had a twig protruding from his neck with blood spurting out. They were okay though. There was another miracle in this story. (Dave and his wife recognize this as a miraculous salvation.) When Dave and his wife were climbing down the balconies to escape the flames, they left somewhere her straw purse with their passports, money, plane tickets, and the like. The next day Dave went back and began looking in this burned out hotel building for this straw purse. God saved it for them. It was on a balcony on a burned out floor but this straw purse with its contents was still there. It was fine. God protected it and God protected them. God was there for them in the midst of this ordeal.

It is the same with the Hebrews in our text today. A few months ago Sarah-Grace preached a sermon for us here on the stories of the plagues in Exodus. They are quite something with each one becoming more awe-inspiring than the previous one.[1]

1. The Nile turning to blood (7:14–25)
2. Plague of frogs (7:25–8:11)
3. Plague of lice or gnats (8:12–15)[2]
4. Plague of flies or wild animals (8:20–32)
5. Plague of pestilence (9:1–7)
6. Plague of boils (9:8–12)
7. Plague of hail (9:13-35)
8. Plague of locusts (10:1–20)
9. Plague of darkness (10:21–29)

I still remember vividly the closest thing to a plague of darkness that I have ever experienced and that was in Swift Current in 2017. I can still recall the dread that came over us all as at noon, in the middle of the day, this darkness just swept over a corner of the city: it was really quite something. I have not seen anything like that before. It was an ominous, fear-provoking experience as that blackness approached: you could see blue skies fleeing from its presence. There was a tornado warning. When it came, we were driving to pick up Rebecca, who was in her elementary school, for lunch. The school had announced that the children were not to go outside. Some students, of course, were pressed up against the windows to see what was happening, others were in tears hiding safely under their desks. These feelings of fear and awe, of terror and wonder, that we were experiencing on that day are probably a reflection of the intensity of the emotions that would have been swirling around the Israelites through the first nine plagues of Exodus, as they are experiencing the power of God in a metaphorical funnel cloud of awe and terror preparing for the final plague, the tenth plague: The Angel of Death (11:1–12:36).

It is in the context of the children of Israel huddled in their houses preparing for Death’s arrival that our pericope today is found. In the opening 13 verses of this chapter, God tells Moses and Aaron exactly what is about to happen. Just like Tsunami alert, like we still hear tested here: ‘Get ready’, God warns them, ‘the Angel of Death is coming’.

Now there has already been a lot of flooding and states of emergency declared across this country and here we have been very thankful for the rain as we prepare for fire season. And just like we have emergency disaster plans that we are to follow in the city and in The Salvation Army when disaster strikes, God here is giving Moses and Aaron their instructions as to how to save themselves and their families when the Angel of Death strikes at Goshen, in Egypt. I don’t know if anyone here remembers the Tsunami of 1964 or if you have ever huddled in a storm cellar or was forced to take shelter or head beneath deck on a boat being tossed about in a storm but I imagine that it is the same feeling. The people take all the right steps and now they are just waiting and hoping, and praying for Death to pass.

I have binders and binders full of the Army’s and others’ plans of what we need to do in the event of a major disaster:  flood, fire, tsunami. God in Exodus here gives Moses and Aaron a disaster preparedness plan to share with the Hebrews in Egypt for the impending strike by the Angel of Death. It looks like this. Picture with me - you and your family – you have received your disaster preparedness plan from your leaders. Disaster is going to strike, you are fearful (like the school children hiding under their desks awaiting a tornado) and you are in awe as you await the Angel of Death who is coming to claim many from your country on this very night. On this very evening as Death is approaching; this is the plan:

1. You are to take a lamb or a kid to share as a meal with everyone in your household. If there aren’t enough of you in a household to eat a whole lamb, you must share it with your closest neighbour (12:3-4);
2. The animal must be 1 year-old and without defect (v.5);
3. You have already been taking care of the animals for 14 days in preparation for this day – now everyone in town is to go and slaughter the lamb at twilight (v.6);
4. You will then – this is important – take some of the blood and put it on the sides and the tops of the doorframes of the houses where you will eat the lambs (v.7);
5. Then you will eat the meat roasted over a fire with bitter herbs and bread without yeast and you must eat it all. You may not leave any of it until morning! If there are leftovers, you must burn them (vv. 8-10);
6. When you are eating this meal, you are to eat it with your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on, and your staff in your hand (v. 11). In our language today: you are to have your coats, hats and shoes on and your car keys in your hand. You are to be ready to go. You are to eat it in haste because it is the LORD’s Passover.

God tells Moses and Aaron that as the people follow this plan they will survive the impending strike by the Angel of Death. Then God tells them, ‘You must never forget this night. You must remember how I saved you.’ I imagine this evening must be as clear to those who experienced it as the images were to Dave and his wife of that night climbing down the side of the building – and Dave’s wife, she is afraid of heights. I imagine that every time they think about this night, they remember every feeling that was racing through their heart and mind and I imagine that they’ll never forget it.

I remember when I was in Nipawin and the building exploded right behind The Salvation Army Ministry Centre downtown. My office shook. It felt like a truck had struck it. With others, I headed outside to see what had happened, I saw injured or dead or dying people lying on the ground as the flames began to engulf part of the downtown. My children and everyone else around on that day have stories surrounding those moments. I imagine each of us have had times like these that will never leave our minds.

The thing with events like these is that as real as they are to us, they are not as real to people who don’t actually experience them and as time passes people tend to forget the important lessons that come from them. We recently marked the 75^th anniversary of D-Day. I had the honour of speaking at the 70^th D-Day memorial on the prairies five years ago. For those hundreds and thousands of soldiers present on June 6, 1944, as long as they live, D-Day is a day they will never forget; but if I were to guess I would say that less people across this country officially attend ceremonies to remember the anniversary than lost their lives on the beaches on that day in 1944. Remembrance Day and the Legion remind us of the horrors of war, lest we forget. It is no coincidence that as the Cold War ended and more and more of our veterans pass away, that there are more wars in our world than ever before. Did you know that from end of the cold war -1989 or 1991, until the end of the twentieth century there were more wars in that one decade than there were in the whole rest of the century prior. People forget and then another generation experiences the same horrors. 

As the Israelite families of our pericope today are sitting in their houses awaiting the impending calamity, God tells Moses that they are never to forget this day.[3] They are to remember it forever. They are to tell their children and their children’s children. This should a permanent feature in the school curriculum, so to speak. It is to be like our annual Remembrance Day ceremonies in that there are some elements that must be observed. As far as the Passover remembrance ceremonies for the Israelites, they are to incorporate some of their Emergency Disaster Preparedness Plan into a ceremonial dinner and they are not have any yeast in the house at all for seven days prior and they are to eat only unleavened flat breads. Then God tells them, Exodus 12:24-27:

“Obey these instructions as a lasting ordinance for you and your descendants. When you enter the land that the Lord will give you as he promised, observe this ceremony. And when your children ask you, ‘What does this ceremony mean to you?’ then tell them, ‘It is the Passover sacrifice to the Lord, who passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt and spared our homes when he struck down the Egyptians.’” Then the people bowed down and worshiped.

One reason that the people were to remember this was so that they would not forget what the Lord had done for them in the past. This is so important: a people that forget their past forfeits their future.

We were in Ottawa for Canada's 150th Celebrations. We met friends there which made it quite fun but the official events were a really big disappointment. They made Canada seem like a country with no culture, no history, no past. A recent Canadian survey shows that we Canadians know little and care less about our accomplishments, history and traditions. These seem to be increasingly removed from the things that we direct the greatest value at… Canadians between the ages of 18 and 24 are more likely to take pride in the Toronto Raptors, who recently won the [US based] NBA Championship, than [Canadian] Confederation… [The Raptors] They've given us something to celebrate," The survey conclusion stated about the team. "They're champions, so they're more current.” The monarchy, Confederation, and noted Canadians are neglected and forgotten.[4]

One reason Canadians need to remember our past is so that we will continue to exist in the future. One reason that the people of God were to remember the Passover was so that they would not forget what the Lord had done for them in the past and another reason is to wait for a future deliverance. As this Passover ceremony developed over the generations, it came to incorporate an act of ceremonially ‘looking for Elijah’. This is because tradition later stated that Elijah must return before the Messiah is to come.

Now Elijah does return and Jesus the Messiah does come and when he does and as Jesus is celebrating this very important Passover remembrance with his disciples, Jesus the Messiah utters the very important words, “Do this in remembrance of me.” This is, I think, a big reason why God wanted the Passover ceremony etched so deeply in the minds of humanity for so long because just as when the Egyptians gave up their firstborn sons, God saved His people through the blood of the Passover lamb; so when God gives up His firstborn son –Jesus Christ – He also saves us; His people, all His people, He saves through the Blood of the Lamb.[5]

This is the most important event in the whole history of the world: The death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. God, through the giving of His only begotten son has made it – just like with Exodus and the Angel of Death – so that none of us need to perish but all of us can have salvation in Christ Jesus our Lord. This is important to remember.

This is why we come to church, this is why we go to Bible studies, this is why we pray and this is why we read our Bibles; this is why we have our Mercy Seat and this is why we commemorate Good Friday and Easter Sunday/Monday every year. That is why we are here today: because just as God offered salvation to all His children from the passing over of the Angel of Death and the preceding plagues; so too He offers salvation to all of us, this very day, from Sin and Death and from everything that is plaguing us. As that is the case, it is my hope and my prayer that if any of us have not yet implemented our eternal disaster preparedness plan, that you would delay no longer and that we would all experience that salvation both today and forever more.

I am going to invite everyone up to the Mercy Seat or Holiness Table on this Canada Day Eve to take a card with a verse on it, in remembrance of Christ and what He has done for this nation and what He has done for us. There are three cards (you can take 1, 2, or 3 of them):

·        One with John 3:16 –the ultimate Passover verse- on it,  “For God so loved the world, that He gave his Only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

·        One with Hebrews 11:16, the verse from the Order of Canada, “But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for He hath prepared for them a city.”

·        And one card with the verse from Canada’s Motto, Psalm 72:8, “He [The LORD] shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth.”

These are God's promises for us as Canadians that we are not to forget. Of the Passover, Jesus says, “do this in remembrance of me.” God asks us to remember what He has done for us: how God has saved us all from Death, just like He saved the Hebrews so many years ago. Our Lord tells us not to forget, so I encourage each of us to come forward to the Mercy Seat, take a card back to your seat, mediate and pray about it and today when you leave put it in your wallet or somewhere else and every time you see it this week, I encourage you to remember what the Lord has done.

 thank the Lord for His mercy and for the price He paid on our behalf.

In Jesus’ Name, Come.

---

[1] Cf. Walter C. Kaiser Jr., The Expositor's Bible Commentary, Pradis CD-ROM:Exodus/Exposition of Exodus/I. Divine Redemption (1:1-18:27)/E. The Passover (12:1-28)/1. Preparations for the Passover (12:1-13), Book Version: 4.0.2. for more detailed list.

[2] R. Alan Cole, Exodus: An Introduction and Commentary. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1973 (Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries 2), S. 113: In the evening: literally ‘between the two evenings’. Jewish scholars are not agreed as to the exact meaning. The phrase is also used of the time for the regular evening sacrifice (Exod. 29:39) and of the time for lighting the lamps in the meeting-tent (Exod. 30:8). The orthodox piety of Pharisaic Judaism understood the meaning as being between the time in the afternoon when the heat of the sun lessens (say 3 or 4 p.m.) and sunset. Other groups preferred the time between sunset and dark, or other similar explanations.

[3] Thomas W. Mann, “Passover: The Time of Our Lives.” Interpretation 50, no. 3 (July 1, 1996): 240-250. ATLASerials, Religion Collection, EBSCOhost (accessed June 28, 2012), 241-242: The Passover narrative is arguably the most important section of the entire book because it is primarily here that the experience of exodus is communicated not simply as a moment in historical time (in the past) but as a perennially recurring moment in the present life of those for whom the story is sacred.

[4] Nicole Thompson, The Canadian Press. Published Friday, June 28, 2019 4:27AM EDT. Cited from CTV News: https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/canadians-more-likely-to-take-pride-in-the-present-than-history-poll-1.4486436

[5] Norman Theiss, "The Passover Feast of the New Covenant." Interpretation 48, no. 1 (January 1, 1994): 17-35. ATLASerials, Religion Collection, EBSCOhost (accessed June 28, 2012), 17: In the eyes of the first three evangelists and Paul, Jesus construed his last supper with the twelve disciples as the fulfillment of God's plan to inaugurate a new Passover meal. In this new meal, Jesus interpreted his death as a new Exodus in which the new people of God were liberated from all that enslaves them and freed to serve God in holy living.

www.sheepspeak.com

https://www.facebook.com/Salvogesis

Isaiah 12:2: Surely God is my Salvation

Presented to Swift Current Corps on February 23, 2014 and February 14, 2010. By Captain Michael Ramsay

Click here to read the 2010 version: http://sheepspeaks.blogspot.ca/2010/02/isaiah-122-surely-god-is-my-salvation.html

Isaiah 12:2 “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation” (see Exodus 15:2).[1]

VBS was great this week. The youth did a wonderful job with the SonCastle Faire. In the Vacation Bible School play that the girls performed for us, we saw how the people were saved by the king and we know that we are all saved by the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, God Himself. Isaiah 12:2 “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation” (see Exodus 15:2).

Now last weekend in Manitoba they celebrated Louis Riel Day. Louis Riel was a Métis leader. I have been truly honoured to be a part of many important Métis celebrations here in this community and have a lot of respect for all of the work that is done here. A very important person to this community was ‘Promoted to Glory’ this week. Walter and Cecile Blanke have done so much for the local Métis and Lac Pelletier and Swift Current and we will mourn Walter’s passing as we celebrate what the Lord has done in his life in a ceremony this Wednesday.

Last weekend in Manitoba they celebrated Louis Riel Day. Louis Riel is an interesting character. In Winnipeg where we lived for a couple of years, there is a giant statue of him outside the legislative buildings. Depending on when and where you live in Canadian history Louis Riel has been cast as everything as an expectant messiah to the devil himself. Certainly for some in his lifetime he seems to have embodied attributes of both.[2]

Louis Riel's greatest work was in the Red River area. He is credited by some as being a father of confederation for the work he did around bringing Manitoba into Canada. Louis Riel was sadly also one of the leaders of the NW Rebellion. In the NW Rebellion, Canada sent in our version of the US cavalry to quell the revolt: we sent in the RCMP, the Mounties. And – well – Canada being much more efficient that our Southern neighbours, instead of sending the RCMP all the way west on horseback to save the day for Ontario, they took the train. There was a certain irony to this as well because one of the reasons for the rebellion on the prairies was that its supporters did not want the railroad to come through the prairies and of course the rebellion was put down with the help of this newly-built CPR Railroad on the prairies.[3] For Louis Riel’s rebels the CPR contributed to the ongoing destruction of their traditional way of life but for the settlers in the area, the Mounties on the train had become their salvation.[4]

Now we know of course that this is only a temporal salvation and we know as well that not everyone was saved. While the Canadian Anglophones celebrated the end of this rebellion as a great victory for Canadians, it was a sad day for the First Nations, the Metis and other Fracophones. The Francophones protested fiercely the hanging of Louie Riel and the First Nations suffered the loss of much of their leadership. Did you know that Louie Riel’s Northwest Rebellion resulted in the largest mass hanging in Canadian history? Most of the victims were First Nations.

The salvation brought by the Mounties on the CPR did deliver the settlers of what would be Saskatchewan and Alberta but – of course – it did not and could not possibly benefit all. There is only one who has brought that kind of salvation and that one is God. That one is Jesus Christ. Isaiah 12:2 “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation” (see Exodus 15:2).

I think we in Canada forget this sometimes in our lives: that God is our salvation. I think we in the churches forget this sometimes: that God is our salvation. I think that often here even in the churches instead of looking to God for our salvation we look to our contemporary equivalent of the Mounties riding in on the train.

These comics illustrate some of the ways that I think we look for salvation from our problems instead of turning to the Lord…[5]

Just relying on others…

or money… or

or cheating…

or –worst of all, sometimes- just relying on our own judgement…

These are all ways that sometimes we can be tempted to try to solve a problem or look for salvation in the face of a crisis other than relying on God and as the cartoonist Bill Watterson points out, the results of this can be sorrowfully amusing.[6]

Because Isaiah 12:2, “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation.”

Sadly, even in the churches instead of looking to God for our salvation, I think, we can be tempted to look to our contemporary equivalent of the Mounties riding in on the train. Some of the false Mounties, false messiahs that we look to are self, pride, money…

I have heard prosperity gospel proponents speak as if they think that capitalism; the service of money is the salvation of the world when of course we know that neither a person nor a country can serve both God and money (cf. James 3:6-10; Hebrews 13:5; 1 Peter 5:2). The Bible says that if we try to do this we will wind up hating one master and serving another (Matthew 6:24; Luke 6:13). Nonetheless some who call themselves Christian can tend to put their faith in their money. How many people in this country put their faith in their investments or retirement plans (cf. Luke 12:13-21)? If we have learned nothing from our 20th century history and the Great depression, surely the current global economic downtown should wake at least us Christians up to the fact that money is not from where our salvation comes.

Isaiah 12:2, “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation” (see Exod. 15:2).

As far as other things that people in the Canadian churches look to for their salvation instead of God, I have read published comments by professing Christians declaring that it justifiable to invade a foreign country and kill however many women and children and other collateral damage as may happen in order to ‘save’ these people by bringing democracy to them. We kill them to save them all in the mistaken belief that a political system can save anyone, let alone one that is based on no more than a glorified popularity contest every couple of years (cf. Genesis 3; Numbers 11:5, 14:1-4; Judges 21:25).

This really frustrates me actually. I don’t know how many conversations I have listened to where people talk about the Conservatives, NDP or (not so much here) the Liberals as if they are our salvation, as if one of them will actually really change the world for the better. It won’t. Whoever we elect in the next election, won’t give sight to the blind, won’t walk on water, and won’t stamp out poverty. This is not where our salvation comes from. Don’t look to politics or politicians to help us, they won’t. They can’t save us.

Isaiah 12:2, “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation.”

How about our own hard work? How many of us believe that we will be okay so long as we work really hard. I have heard people say that the only reason people go to a food bank is because they are lazy. People who say these things seem to believe that our salvation comes from our work alone. Scriptures tell us, of course, that this is not the case: the race is not to the swift nor the battle to the strong (Ecclesiastes 9:11). Scriptures tell us that even the best, the most altruistic work on the face of this planet, without faith in our God, yields nothing but death. Don’t listen to the secular humanists: no matter what we tell ourselves, we can’t save ourselves.

Isaiah 12:2, “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation.”

In the time of the prophet Isaiah we remember that he rebuked King Ahaz of Israel because King Ahaz refused to seek confirmation from the Lord that his salvation was secured by the Lord (Isaiah 7:1-2).

Not unlike the NW Rebellion on the Canadian prairies, in the time of Isaiah we remember that there was a rebellion in the works as well. We remember that Egypt was trying to whip up the Palestinian states (including Aram, Israel and Judah) into a disastrous state of rebellion, just like some were trying to whip up the Métis and First Nations and went to the US looking for a false saviour (indeed Riel himself, by this point, arguably thought he was either a prophet or the Messiah himself). And just like the Northwest Rebellion in the prairies resulted in the largest mass hanging in Canadian history and the destruction of so many lives, so too the rebellion in Palestine at the time of Isaiah resulted in the destruction of Syria and of Israel (See Isaiah 7:1-2, 37:1-7, 37-38; see 2 Kings 15:38 - 16:20; 19:1-7, 36-37).

We remember from Bible studies, the trouble that Israel got into under Joshua because they acted on their own and made a covenant without first consulting God (Joshua 9; Judges 2:1-5; Cf. also 2 Samuel 21 and Deuteronomy 7:1-4).

We also remember from our Bible studies what happened when Moses struck the rock, disobeying God, instead of talking to the rock. What happened? What happened when Moses didn’t give God the honour for God’s miracles? With others possibly tempted to look to Moses instead of God for their salvation, he died. Because of this disobedience he died outside of the Promised Land (Numbers 20:6-10; Deuteronomy 34).

We also remember from the book of Numbers that when the Israelites refused to follow the Lord into the Promised Land but tried to invade it on their own initiative, what happened? What happened when they relied on themselves for their salvation? They died outside of the promise.

What about Abraham? What about David? What about the Kings? What about ancient Israel? What about us in 21^st Century Swift Current, Saskatchewan? What will happen to us if we look for our salvation from people, politicians, systems or our own ability? What will happen? Death.

We know that Jesus died because of our sins and we know that Jesus rose from the dead again defeating sin and death in the process and we know that Jesus is coming back.

Chapters 5-11 of Isaiah talk about the disobedience of Judah and its resultant destruction. Even in light of the consequences of humanity’s sin, God still loves us and is offering us salvation if we will just take Him up on it.[7]

Isaiah 12:2, “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation.”

God is a God of miracles. He is real and He is really active in this world. I have met people whom God has healed of cancer. I have met people whom God has healed of AIDS. I have met people whom God has cured of diabetes. I have met people whom God has delivered from demonic attack. God is real. God has already defeated sin and death so when we are faced with life’s problems, let us grab onto this good news.

Isaiah 12:2, “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation.”

If the economy is bad, if we are out of work, if we have lots of money or if we have no money at all; more money, freer capitalism, or even conversely secular communism is not going to save us.

Isaiah 12:2, “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation.”

And as the government of the day here in Canada wipes out more and more of our social programs and raises the cost of living across this country by reckless tax cuts or even if it changes direction and reduces our potential access to frivolity through tax increases - when the government of the day continues to curtail our religious freedoms in this country, let us not be tricked into believing that a particular political party or person will be our saviour. They won’t. This is a lot of Obama’s problem in the States. He is not any better or any worse than all those who have gone before him in his job but people set him up as if he was a messiah. They are figuring out now that he isn’t his popularity has taken a nosedive. No politician or political party can save us.[8]

Isaiah 12:2, “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation.”

Likewise we in The Salvation Army here are administering food banks, hosting pro bono free legal clinics, counselling people in need and providing Christian social services in this city. These are all wonderful ways to worship and serve our Lord by helping our brothers and sisters but we can’t put our faith in our ministries and in ourselves. The Salvation Army, apart from God, has never saved anyone.

Isaiah 12:2, “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation.”

We need to realise this. We need to stop turning to people and parties and institutions and hard work and good deeds and everything else we are tempted to turn to for our salvation. Last weekend was Valentine’s Day. Today we just need to accept God’s love present to us “for God so loved the world that He sent his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him need not perish but has eternal life” (John 3:16). For, “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation.”

Let us pray.

www.sheepspeak.com

----

---

[1] Cf. Christopher R. Seitz, Isaiah 1-39 (Interpretation: Louisville, Kentucky: John Knox Press, 1993), 112-113 for an interesting discussion about the term used for Salvation here and the prophet’s own name. It is significant in light of Isaiah 8:18 where Isaiah tells us “I and the children whom the LORD has given me are signs.”

[2] There are many good sources on this topic from many different perspectives. A good starting point for easy access to researched information is from The Centre for Canadian Studies at Mount Allison University. ‘Louis Riel and The North-West Rebellion’ (Mount Allison University: 1999). Available on-line at http://www.mta.ca/about_canada/multimedia/riel/index.html

[3] W. Stewart Wallace, ed., The Encyclopedia of Canada , Vol. V, Toronto, University Associates of Canada, 1948, 401p., pp. 19-22. Available on-line at http://faculty.marianopolis.edu/c.belanger/quebechistory/encyclopedia/North-WestRebellion-CanadianHistory.htm

[4] Geoffrey W. Grogan, Expositor's Bible Commentary, The, Pradis CD-ROM:Isaiah/Exposition of Isaiah/I. Oracles Concerning Judah and Jerusalem (1:1-12:6)/S. A Song of Joyous Praise (12:1-6), Book Version: 4.0.2 : “In view of the contiguity of v.1-2, it would be attractive to interpret the salvation declared in v.2 in spiritual terms, so that it would become a virtual synonym of the forgiveness seen in v.1. This would bring it into line with the normal use of the word "salvation" in the NT instead of with the physical connotation it usually possesses in the Old. The physical and spiritual could be combined here, but there can be little doubt that the prophet had chiefly in mind the deliverance of the people from all their enemies that was to be a consequence of God's forgiving grace.”

[5] Cf. Captain Michael Ramsay, ‘2 Kings 1:6: Is it because there is no God in this place?’ Presented to Nipawin Corps 31 May 2009. Available on-line at: http://sheepspeaks.blogspot.com/2009/05/2-kings-16-is-it-because-there-is-no.html

[6] Bill Watterson’s Calvin and Hobbes cited from: http://www.marcellosendos.ch/comics/ch/ Disclaimer: This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml  . If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

[7] Cf. Geoffrey W. Grogan,  Expositor's Bible Commentary, The, Pradis CD-ROM:Isaiah/Exposition of Isaiah/I. Oracles Concerning Judah and Jerusalem (1:1-12:6)/S. A Song of Joyous Praise (12:1-6), Book Version: 4.0.2

[8] Cf. Captain Michael Ramsay, ‘Vote for Jesus’, Journal of Aggressive Christianity, Issue 57, October 2008 – November 2008, pp. 27-30. Available on-line:  http://www.armybarmy.com/pdf/JAC_Issue_057.pdf

Exodus 12:24-28: Remember.

Presented to Swift Current Corps of The Salvation Army, 01 July 2012*

presented to Swift Current Corps of The Salvation Army, 06 July 2014

Presented to TSA Alberni Valley Ministries, 17 August 2025

By Captain (Major) Michael Ramsay

To read the 2025 version, click here:

https://sheepspeaks.blogspot.com/2025/08/exodus-1224-28-remember-plan.html 

To read the 2014 version, click here:

http://sheepspeaks.blogspot.ca/2014/07/exodus-1224-28-remember-today.html 

I heard a harrowing story this week. Dave, a member of the Rotary club here in town, told this story of a family vacation that he took to Acapulco in 1968. Dave and his wife are on holiday down in Mexico. They check into their hotel and there are these little lizards - Geckos or something else – climbing all up the walls; so they speak to the hotel and ask to be moved as far away from the lizards as they can, up to the top floor. They do move up to the top floor. That turns out to be a mistake. In the middle of the night, they are woken up as people are running through the halls screaming. Some girls from Quebec tell them what was happening: the hotel is on fire. The stairs, they are concrete for the top few floors and then wood beneath and they are ablaze. The girls from Quebec jump over the railing from the 10^th storey or more up and plunge all the way down. Dave and his wife and their two sons, aged six and nine, are trapped. Without thinking they run to the elevator but the door closes with people inside it just before they get there. Actually I think Dave got his hand in the closing door but they didn’t catch the elevator, which is good because we know what happens to people in elevators in a fire. Dave and his family are trapped. They try to tie sheets together to scale down the outside of the building but as Dave is heading over a balcony, it is good that he has an arm linked through the railing because someone unties the sheets. He then climbs down the side of the balcony and swings onto the balcony below. His wife then drops one of his children for him to catch and then the other and then she scales down as far as she can, then falls and Dave catches her legs and pulls her in. They do this until the third storey or so of the building when they ran out of balconies. Dave then throws one child down onto a straw thatched roof, hoping that it will break his fall. He sees the boy fall through the roof and run away so he throws the other son down who makes a new hole as he crashes through the thatched roof. He too runs to safety. His wife jumps next and Dave is able to scale a palm tree to the bottom. They are injured but they survive. It was quite a tale to hear recalled. They survived by the grace of God but others on their floor, those who leapt over the railing or those who took the elevator, did not.

What had happened was, apparently there was a dispute between two ownership groups – one local and one foreign – the foreign group was residing in the hotel on that day and some local people attacked the building with Molotov cocktails – hoping to collect insurance, I believe.

It was quite something to hear this story. I don’t think many of us in Rotary knew about this incident in Dave’s life at all. There is more to his story too. One of his sons had a piece of the thatched roof he fell through stuck into his foot. The other had a twig protruding from his neck with blood spurting out. They were okay though. As well as their salvation, there was another miracle in this story. (Dave and his wife do recognize this as a miraculous salvation.) When Dave and his wife were climbing down the balconies to escape the flames, they left somewhere her straw purse with their passports, money, plane tickets, and the like. The next day Dave went back and began looking in this burned-out hotel building for this straw purse. God saved it for them. It was on a balcony on a burned-out floor but this straw purse and its contents were still there pretty much unscathed. It was fine. God protected it and God protected them. God was there for them in the midst of this ordeal. They remember and they’ll never forget.

It is the same with the Hebrews in our text today. Those of us who have been keeping up with our reading the Bible plan, will have read the stories of the plagues as recorded in Exodus this week. These plagues are quite something with each one becoming more terrifying and awe-inspiring than the previous one:

1. The Nile River turns to blood (7:14–25)
2. Plague of frogs (7:25–8:11)
3. Plague of gnats (8:12–15)
4. Plague of flies (8:20–32)
5. Plague on the livestalk (9:1–7)
6. Plague of boils (9:8–12)
7. Plague of hail (9:13-35)
8. Plague of locusts (10:1–20)
9. Plague of darkness (10:21–29)

We may have gotten a little taste of hail and darkness this past week here in Swift Current. I don’t know how many of us were outside Tuesday at about 11:30 a.m. or noon. That darkness that swept over a corner of the city was really quite something. I have not seen anything like that before. I heard people refer to it as an ‘ominous presence’ or a ‘fear-provoking experience.’

This blackness is steadily approaching at mid-day; you can see blue skies fleeing from its presence. We leave to pick up Rebecca from school for lunch at that time. There is a tornado warning. The school has just announced that the children are not to go outside because of this. Some students, of course, are pressed up against the windows to see what is happening, others are in tears hiding safely under their desks.

These feelings of fear and awe, of terror and wonder, that people were having here this past Tuesday are probably a but fractional reflection of the intensity of the emotions that would be swirling around the Israelites as they are experiencing the power of God through the first nine plagues and the Hebrews now are, I imagine, in a metaphorical, emotional funnel cloud of shock, awe and terror themselves as they prepare for the final plague, the tenth plague: The Angel of Death (11:1–12:36).

It is in the context of the children of Israel huddled in their houses preparing for Death’s arrival that our pericope today is found. In the opening 13 verses of this chapter, God tells Moses and Aaron exactly what is about to happen. Just like a Tornado alert: ‘Get ready’, God warns them, ‘the Angel of Death is coming’. And just like we have emergency disaster plans that we are to follow for the city and for The Salvation Army when disaster strikes, God here is giving Moses and Aaron their instructions as to how to save their families when the Angel of Death strikes at Goshen in Egypt, killing the first-born sons. I don’t know if anyone here has ever huddled in a storm cellar or has been forced to take shelter on the open prairie or has had to head beneath deck on a boat being tossed about in a storm but I imagine that this is the same feeling. The people take all the prescribed steps and now they are just waiting and hoping and praying for the storm of the Angel of Death to pass, leaving them unharmed.

I have binders and binders full of the city’s and the Army’s plans of what to do in the event of a major disaster: a flood, a fire, a tornado strike… God, in Exodus here, gives Moses and Aaron a disaster preparedness plan to share with the Hebrews in Egypt for the impending strike by the Angel of Death. It looks like this - picture this with me: You and your family, you have received your disaster preparedness plan from your leaders. Disaster is going to strike, you are fearful (like the school children hiding under their desks) and you are in shock, awe, and maybe even terror, as you await the Angel of Death who is coming to claim many from the country where you live on this very night. On this very evening as Death is approaching, this is the plan:[1]

1. You are to take a lamb or a kid to share as a meal with everyone in your household. If there aren’t enough of you in your household to eat a whole lamb, you must share it with your closest neighbour (12:3-4);
2. The animal must be 1 year-old and without defect (v.5; cf. Leviticus 22:20-25, Malachi 1:8);
3. You have already been taking care of the animals for 14 days in preparation for this day – now everyone in town is to go and slaughter the lamb at twilight (v.6);[2]
4. You will then – this is important – take some of the blood and put it on the sides and the tops of the doorframes of the houses where you will eat the lambs (v.7);
5. Then you will eat the meat roasted over a fire with bitter herbs and bread without yeast and you must eat it all. You may not leave any of it until morning! If there are leftovers, you must burn them (vv. 8-10; cf. Exodus 23:18, 34:25 and Deuteronomy 16:4);
6. When you are eating this meal, you are to eat it with your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on, and your staff in your hand (v. 11; cf. Deuteronomy 16:3). In other words you are supposed to it on the run. In our language today: you are to have your coats, your hats and your shoes on and your car keys in your hand. You are to be ready to go. You are to eat it in haste because it is the LORD’s Passover.

God is there for them. They are to be ready. God tells Moses and Aaron that as the people follow this plan they will survive the impending strike by the Angel of Death. Then God tells them they must never forget this night. They must remember how He saves them. I imagine this evening must be as clear to those who experienced it as the images were to Dave and his wife, 40+ years later, of that night climbing down the side of the building – and Dave’s wife, she’s afraid of heights. I imagine that every time they think about this night, they remember every feeling that was racing through their heart and mind and I imagine that they’ll never forget it.

I remember when I was in Nipawin and the building exploded right behind The Salvation Army Ministry Centre downtown. My office shook. It felt like a truck had struck it. With others, I headed outside to see what had happened, I saw injured or dead or dying people lying on the ground as the flames began to engulf part of the downtown. My children and everyone else around on that day have stories surrounding those moments. I imagine each of us have had times like these that will never leave our minds. God is there for us and there are many stories of salvation, His mercy and miracles in the midst of tragedy.

The thing with these events as real as they are to us, they are not as real to people who don’t actually experience them and as time passes, people tend to forget the important lessons that come from them. I had the honour of speaking at the D-Day memorial again this year. For those hundreds of thousands of soldiers present on June 6 in 1944 that is a day they will never forget but if I were to guess I would say that this year across our country less people came to services to remember that anniversary than the number of those that lost their lives for us on the beaches on that one day. On Remembrance Day, the Legion and the surviving WWI and WWII veterans remind us of God’s salvation in the midst of the horrors of war, lest we forget. It is no coincidences that since the Cold War has ended and as more and more of our veterans pass away that there are more wars in our world now than ever before. Did you know that from the end of the Cold War -1989 or 1990, until the end of the twentieth century there were more wars in that one decade than there were in the whole rest of the century prior? As people choose to forget God’s salvation, they are not ready and so they seem to put themselves in the midst of calamity. It appears that another generation is cursing itself to experience anew the same horrors and calamities from which the LORD has saved previous generations. 

As the Israelite families are sitting in their houses awaiting their impending calamity, God warns Moses that they are never to forget this day.[3] They are to remember it forever. They are to tell their children and their children’s children. This should a permanent feature in the school curriculum, so to speak. They are to incorporate some of their Emergency Disaster preparedness plan into a ceremonial dinner and they are not to have any yeast in the house at all for seven days prior and then they are to eat only unleavened flat breads (Exodus 12:17-20, Deuteronomy 16:3). God tells them, Exodus 12:24-27:

“Obey these instructions as a lasting ordinance for you and your descendants. When you enter the land that the Lord will give you as he promised, observe this ceremony. And when your children ask you, ‘What does this ceremony mean to you?’ then tell them, ‘It is the Passover sacrifice to the Lord, who passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt and spared our homes when he struck down the Egyptians.’” Then the people bowed down and worshiped.

A main reason that the Israelite people are to remember this is so that they will not forget what the LORD has done for them in the past and another reason is to wait for a future deliverance. As this Passover ceremony developed over the generations, it came to incorporate an act of ceremonially ‘looking for Elijah’. This is because tradition later stated that Elijah must return before the Messiah is to come. The Passover isn’t just looking back to God’s deliverance of the Israelites from the Angel of Death; it is also looking forward to God, through Jesus, delivering all of mankind from Sin and Death (cf. Exodus 34:25; Leviticus 23:5-6; Numbers 28:16-17; Deuteronomy 16:16; 2 Chronicles 30:13, 21; 35:1, 17; Ezekiel 45:21; Ezra 6; Ezekiel 45:21; Matthew 26:17; Mark 14:12; Luke 22:1, 7; John 2:13, 23; 6:4; 11:55). Biblical Scholar Norman Theiss reminds us “Jesus construed his last supper with the twelve disciples as the fulfillment of God's plan to inaugurate a new Passover meal.”[4] Jesus, when He is celebrating the Passover with his disciples, generations later, utters the very important words, “Do this in remembrance of me.” (Luke 22:19, 1 Corinthians 11:24).[5] This is, I think, a big reason why God wanted the Passover ceremony etched so deeply in the minds of humanity for so long because just as the when the Egyptians gave up their firstborn sons, God saved His people through the blood of the Passover lamb; so also when God offered up His firstborn son –Jesus Christ – He provided salvation for us all (May we all we choose to accept it!), through the blood of the Lamb (cf. John 3:16; cf. also TSA doc. 6).

This is the most important event in the history of the whole world: The death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. God, through the giving of His only begotten Son has made it – just like with Exodus and the Angel of Death – so that none of us need to perish but each of us can experience salvation through Christ Jesus our Lord. This is important to remember. Jesus pointed out that the Passover ceremony points to Himself (Matthew 26:27-30, Mark 14:12-26, Luke 22:7-28).[6] The early Christians would celebrate Christ’s death and resurrection and the fact that Christ has saved us from Sin and Death with a meal every time they came together (1 Corinthians 11:17-34, cf. 2 Peter 2:13, Jude 1:12). Later the churches summed up this meal of remembrance with a ceremonial act of eating a piece of bread or a wafer and of drinking some wine or grape juice from a common cup or little personal cups. They would do this to remember that Christ saves us from Sin and Death just like He saved the Israelites from the Angel of Death. In The Salvation Army, traditionally, we have held that every meal should be a meal held in remembrance of Christ. As such, we used to always not only ask the Lord’s blessing at the commencement of the meal but we used to return thanks at the conclusion of the meal just as Jesus and his disciples would have done when they participated in Seder meals in the first century C.E. In The Salvation Army, we also have the Mercy Seat and the Holiness Table. When you see people come forward here, it is our way of remembering the salvation that Christ has provided for the whole world (It can also provide a venue for someone to take advantage of that offered salvation for the very first time!) Coming to the Mercy Seat is an act of remembering what the Lord has done for us.

 ---

Today, We are going to do something a little bit different. Instead of singing a concluding song before we leave, Susan is going to play the piano quietly here and I am going to invite everyone up to the Mercy Seat or Holiness Table on this Canada Day to take a card with a verse on it, in remembrance of Christ and what He has done for this nation and what He has done for us. There are three cards.

q       One with John 3:16 –the ultimate Passover verse- on it,  “For God so loved the world, that He gave his Only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

q       One with Hebrews 11:16, the verse from the Order of Canada, “But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for He hath prepared for them a city.”

q       And one card with the verse from Canada’s Motto, Psalm 72:8, “He [The LORD] shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth.”

I ask us as we exit the sanctuary now to stop at the Mercy Seat or the Holiness Table, pick up a card, and read it quietly or pray it back to the Lord. Then take it with you as you leave and put it in your wallet or somewhere else and every time you see it this week, I encourage you to remember what the Lord has done.

Jesus says, “do this in remembrance of me.” God asks us to remember. Our Lord tells us not to forget, so I encourage each of us to come forward to the Mercy Seat, take a card, read or pray a verse, thank the Lord for His mercy and for the price He paid on our behalf. Now please come, take one of these little verses in remembrance of Jesus and how God has saved us all from Death, just like He saved the Hebrews so many years ago.

In Jesus’ Name, Come.
---

---

* Click here to read a condensed version of the homily by Captain Michael Ramsay presented to Swift Current corps of The Salvation Army, 06 July 2014: http://sheepspeaks.blogspot.ca/2014/07/exodus-1224-28-remember-today.html

[1] Cf. Walter C. Kaiser Jr., The Expositor's Bible Commentary, Pradis CD-ROM:Exodus/Exposition of Exodus/I. Divine Redemption (1:1-18:27)/E. The Passover (12:1-28)/1. Preparations for the Passover (12:1-13), Book Version: 4.0.2. for more detailed list.

[2] R. Alan Cole, Exodus: An Introduction and Commentary. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1973 (Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries 2), S. 113: In the evening: literally ‘between the two evenings’. Jewish scholars are not agreed as to the exact meaning. The phrase is also used of the time for the regular evening sacrifice (Exod. 29:39) and of the time for lighting the lamps in the meeting-tent (Exod. 30:8). The orthodox piety of Pharisaic Judaism understood the meaning as being between the time in the afternoon when the heat of the sun lessens (say 3 or 4 p.m.) and sunset. Other groups preferred the time between sunset and dark, or other similar explanations.

[3] Thomas W. Mann, “Passover: The Time of Our Lives.” Interpretation 50, no. 3 (July 1, 1996): 240-250. ATLASerials, Religion Collection, EBSCOhost (accessed June 28, 2012), 241-242: The Passover narrative is arguably the most important section of the entire book because it is primarily here that the experience of exodus is communicated not simply as a moment in historical time (in the past) but as a perennially recurring moment in the present life of those for whom the story is sacred.

[4] Norman Theiss, "The Passover Feast of the New Covenant." Interpretation 48, no. 1 (January 1, 1994): 17-35. ATLASerials, Religion Collection, EBSCOhost (accessed June 28, 2012), 17: In the eyes of the first three evangelists and Paul, Jesus construed his last supper with the twelve disciples as the fulfillment of God's plan to inaugurate a new Passover meal. In this new meal, Jesus interpreted his death as a new Exodus in which the new people of God were liberated from all that enslaves them and freed to serve God in holy living.

[5] Leon Morris, Luke: An Introduction and Commentary. Downers Grove, IL : InterVarsity Press, 1988 (Tyndale New Testament Commentaries 3), S. 320: Strictly the feast of Unleavened Bread was distinct from the Passover (Num. 28:16f.). But the two occurred together and they could be regarded as the same festival. Josephus sometimes speaks of them as distinct but, like Luke, he can give the same name to both (Antiquities xiv. 21). Walter C. Kaiser Jr., The Expositor's Bible Commentary, Pradis CD-ROM:Exodus/Exposition of Exodus/I. Divine Redemption (1:1-18:27)/E. The Passover (12:1-28)/2. Preparations for the Unleavened Bread (12:14-20), Book Version: 4.0.2 : The OT uses both names to refer to the same feast: "Passover Feast" in Exodus 34:25; Ezekiel 45:21; and "Feast of Unleavened Bread" in Deuteronomy 16:16; 2 Chronicles 30:13, 21; Ezra 6:22. Yet the two rites are treated separately, even if in sequence, in Leviticus 23:5-6; Numbers 28:16-17; 2 Chronicles 35:1, 17; Ezra 6; Ezekiel 45:21 (likewise the NT uses this twofold designation for the same feast: pascha in John 2:13, 23; 6:4; 11:55 et al., while azymos is used in Matt 26:17; Luke 22:1, 7; cf. Mark 14:12).

[6] Norman Theiss, "The Passover Feast of the New Covenant." Interpretation 48, no. 1 (January 1, 1994): 17-35. ATLASerials, Religion Collection, EBSCOhost (accessed June 28, 2012); Cf. RCH Lenski, The Interpretation of St. Mark’s Gospel, (Minneapolis, Minnesota: Augsburg Publishing House, 1964), 613.