Exodus 12:1-13 and 13:1-8 | Mission First: Called Series | Twentieth Sunday After Pentecost | October 2, 2016 | Dennis Sanders, preaching
The one time that you tend to be aware of how something tastes is when you aren’t able to eat or have your first bite of something after a period not eating. I can remember when I had my tonsils out at age 12. You know that old saw about having all the ice cream you want after getting your tonsils out? They lie. You are in pain for a few days and the last thing you want is to have to swallow...anything. But after a while, things heal up enough that you are able to eat and those first few bites of food taste great.
When I came down with a severe case of pneumonia two decades ago, there was a period when could not keep anything down. The only thing I was able to accept was Vernors, a ginger ale the official drink of Michigan. When I was able to taste that unique flavor, I felt good if not for a few minutes. When I was able to take solid food, I delighted in the food I was able tasted, even if it was hospital food.
Thanksgiving occurred during that period, and I was still stuck in the hospital. I can remember my mother had made some things for the holiday, and she brought some to the hospital. Even though it was food that my mother had cooked every holiday for years, it tasted better than it ever had because it was a sense of normality.
Taste is a way we remember things. We don’t simply remember with our minds, but also with our other senses including our taste buds. Tastes and sounds and smells remind us of some important or sad event. I can remember the taste of a simple ham sandwich with butter that was offered at the funeral for Daniel’s father even though that happened nearly 10 years ago. When we remember, we remember with our whole self.
Our text today basically are instructions on how to eat a specific meal. God is getting ready to unleash the final plauge on the Egyptians. Now last week, we learned about Joseph and how his family came down to Egypt to live as guests of the Pharoah. The book of Genesis ends with the people of Israel living in safety in Egypt.
When Exodus opens, years have passed. Joseph must have passed from the popular memory, because when a new leader assumes power, they said he didn’t know Joseph. He is afraid of the Jews and their rising numbers. He decides to make them slaves building his new cities. He also authorizes as genocide as all Hebrew males infants were to be killed, in order to reduce the population and their supposedly apparent size. Out of all of this emerges Moses, who leads his people to freedom. He and Pharoah have a battle of wills, with God sending 9 plauges to afflict the Egytpians. Each time the Pharaoh wouldn’t budge.
So now we have this final plague, one so horrible that it would cause the Egyptians to basically throw the Hebrews out. An angel of death would sweep over the land killing every first born, unless your house had the blood of lamb smeared on your door. Then, the angel would pass over Hebrew households, but go after the Egyptians.
In preparation for their journey, that’s when we get these dinner instructions. Eat unleavened bread with bitter herbs. The lamb was supposed to be cooked over an open flame, not boiled or eaten raw. Verse 14 tells us that this day would be a day of remembering for the Israelites. It would be a day when they would gather and tell the story anew. They would eat this meal annually to remember something: that it was God that brought them out of Egypt and to the Promised Land. This is something that they would have to remember many times over the years and cenuturies as they forgot what God had done. But the intent was that the taste of the herbs, the cooked lamb and the flatbread would cause people to remember what God had done f
