God Did for Me What I Could Never Do for Myself

“When I see the blood, I will pass over you.” (Exodus 12:13)

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In my all-time favorite musical and well-known novel, Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables, Jean Valjean walks out of the galleys after nineteen years carrying a yellow passport that identifies him to every innkeeper in France as a convict. Doors close across the town of Digne until a bishop named Myriel takes him in, seats him at the family table, and gives him a bed. Valjean answers the welcome by stealing the household silver and slipping out before dawn. Gendarmes catch him on the road and drag him back to the bishop’s door with the plate still in his sack.

The bishop looks at the stolen silver in the soldiers’ hands and tells them it was a gift. Then he crosses the room, picks up two candlesticks Valjean left behind, and presses those on him as well. The soldiers let go of his arms and leave.

Nineteen years had taught Valjean what his own hands could accomplish. They could break rock, pull an oar, and lift a latch in the dark. The word that opened the courtyard gate came out of another man’s mouth. He stood free on the strength of testimony he had no part in earning, and he spent the rest of the novel living inside the redemption he received.

Scripture keeps returning to that picture. This week’s readings come from four different corners of the canon, written across a thousand years, and in each one the decisive movement belongs to God.

Exodus 12:1-14: A House Marked by Blood God Supplied

Israel spends its last night in Egypt indoors. God gives Moses and Aaron the instructions: choose a lamb on the tenth day, keep it until the fourteenth, slaughter it at twilight, and brush the blood on the two doorposts and the lintel of the house (vv. 3-7). Israel’s hands are busy all evening. They select, they roast, they eat standing up with belts fastened and staffs in hand (v. 11).

God’s promise, though, attaches to the blood. “When I see the blood, I will pass over you” (v. 13). The family inside the doorway is kept by a sign God specified and gave. God even moves the calendar so that Israel’s year begins on the night of the rescue (v. 2). From that point forward, Israel counts time according to God’s watch.

Psalm 119:33-40: A Heart God Turns

Eight verses, eight requests; every one an imperative addressed to God. Teach me. Give me understanding. Help me stay on the path. Turn my heart toward Your decrees. Turn my eyes from what is worthless. Confirm Your promise. Take away the disgrace I dread. Give me life.

Here is a man who has the law of God open in front of him and who wants to keep it with his whole heart (v. 34). He asks God to supply what is lacking. “Turn my heart to Your decrees” (v. 36) is the prayer of somebody who has watched his own affections drift and has learned where redirecting power comes from. The Israelite family in Exodus 12 needed a lamb from outside the house. The psalmist needs a hand from outside himself. Both requests are answered by the same God.

Ezekiel 33:7-11: A Summons God Sends

Israel in exile reaches the same disposition from the other side of ruin. The people take stock of their sins and ask: “How then can we live?” (v. 10). They are counting the cost of their own iniquity and coming up short.

God answers by appointing a watchman and putting words in his mouth (v. 7). Then God discloses His heart on the matter. He takes pleasure in the wicked person turning from his way and living (v. 11). The people ask how to live, and god sends a summons through a man he stationed. Even the call to repent is a gift given in advance.

Matthew 18:15-20: A Savior Who Reaches First

Jesus hands the watchman’s office to the congregation. When a brother sins, the one who was wronged goes to him privately (v. 15). Meditate on that. The person carrying the injury takes the first step toward the person who caused it. The goal is stated plainly: “you have won your brother.”

That order matches the way God has dealt with each of his children. Jesus came looking for the party at fault, which is the point of the lost sheep four verses earlier (18:12-14). Then He attaches His own presence to the ministry of reconciliation: “where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there among them” (v. 20). The blood on the doorpost kept a household from death. The risen Christ stands in the middle of the gathered church, doing for the sinning brother what the sinning brother would never initiate on his own.

Romans 13:8-14: A Debt Love Keeps Paying

Paul writes to people who have already been rescued, and he tells them how a rescued person handles obligations. “Owe no one anything except to love one another” (v. 8). Loving a neighbor fulfills the commandments (vv. 9-10). This is the only account a Christian keeps open, and it is a lifelong debt.

Then Paul names the hour. The night is nearly over, and the day is near (v. 12). Israel ate the Passover in the dark with sandals on, ready to move at the word of the God who was already at work in Egypt. The church waits in the same posture, discarding the deeds of darkness, putting on the armor of light, and putting on the Lord Jesus Christ (vv. 12-14). We dress ourselves in Someone else’s garments. Jesus Christ is the Christian’s clothing.

Conclusion: Model the One Who Went Before

Trace Jesus through this cycle, and He appears at each location. He is the Passover Lamb whose blood marks the house (1 Corinthians 5:7). He is the Word from God’s mouth that calls a dying people to turn and live. He is the Shepherd who goes after one wandering sheep. He is the Christ standing among two or three who gather in His name. He is the garment a believer puts on every morning.

Model Him this week by going first. Somewhere in your congregation, there is a conversation you have been waiting for the other person to start. Matthew 18:15 puts that journey on your calendar and gives you the objective: a brother won. Go privately, go early, and go with the dream of restoration rather than revenge.

Take Psalm 119:33-40 into your mornings and pray those eight imperatives in your own words, beginning with “turn my heart.” Settle one overdue obligation of love this week, whether that is a hospital visit, a phone call, or a thank-you you owe somebody who invested in you years ago.

And when the congregation gathers on Sunday, sing with the Passover doorpost in view. Every hymn about the blood, every prayer of confession, and every trip to the Lord’s Table announces the same thing over your life: God did for me what I could never do for myself.

Points to Ponder

1. Israel’s calendar restarted on the night God delivered them (Exodus 12:2). What date would you mark as the beginning of your reckoning, and how often do you count from it?
2. Psalm 119:36 asks God to turn a heart. Where have your affections drifted this year, and what would it look like to ask God to redirect them rather than managing them alone?
3. Ezekiel 33:11 reveals what God takes pleasure in. How does that verse change the tone you use with somebody who has wandered?
4. Matthew 18:15 assigns the first step to the person who was wronged. Who comes to mind, and what has kept you waiting?
5. Romans 13:14 describes putting on Christlike clothing. What did you put on this morning?

A Prayer

Lord God, You marked the doorway when Israel had no standing of its own, and You have marked me with the blood of Your Son. Teach me the meaning of Your statutes. Give me understanding so that I keep Your word with my whole heart. Turn my heart toward Your decrees and my eyes away from what is worthless. Give me life in Your ways.

You take pleasure when a wanderer turns and lives, so make me quick to turn and gentle with those who are turning. Send me to the brother I have been avoiding, and let me go with the aim of winning him. Keep the account of love open in me until the day breaks. Clothe me in the Lord Jesus Christ, in whose name I pray. Amen.

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“Put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no plans to satisfy the fleshly desires.” (Romans 13:14)