I had heard Jesus called the Lamb of God countless times at Mass.
Reading the account of Passover helped me understand how much those familiar words carry.
God gives His people instructions
In Exodus 12, God prepares Israel for deliverance from slavery in Egypt.
Each household is instructed to select an unblemished lamb, sacrifice it, and place its blood on the doorposts. The blood marks the homes that will be spared during the judgment that night.
The people are also instructed to eat the lamb, together with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.
The sacrifice and the meal belong together.
That detail made me stop. God was teaching His people how to participate in the deliverance He was bringing them.
Jesus is identified as the Lamb
When John the Baptist sees Jesus, he says:
“Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”
Reading those words after Exodus gave them a depth I had missed. Here is Jesus, identified as the Lamb, whose saving work reaches to the sin of the world.
Paul makes the Passover connection explicit:
“Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed.”
This connection is already present in the New Testament itself. It helped me recognize how the earlier deliverance prepares us to understand Christ’s saving death.
The Lamb is given as food
The command to eat the Passover lamb became especially meaningful to me when I read it alongside John 6.
Jesus speaks of giving His flesh for the life of the world and calls His followers to eat His flesh and drink His blood.
Then, at the Last Supper, He gives His disciples bread and wine as His Body and Blood.
For me, these passages illuminate one another: the Passover lamb, the sacrifice, the meal, and Christ giving Himself to His people.
Read John 6:51–58 and Luke 22:14–20.
The Catechism explains that Jesus gives the Jewish Passover its definitive meaning through His death and Resurrection, and that this new Passover is anticipated in the Supper and celebrated in the Eucharist.
Explore Catechism §§1339–1340.
Hearing the words differently at Mass
Now, when I hear Lamb of God, I have more of that story in mind.
I think of God delivering His people, the blood of the lamb, and the meal He instructed them to share. I think of John pointing to Jesus and Paul identifying Him as our Passover Lamb.
And I think of Christ giving Himself for us—and to us.
The Church teaches that the Eucharist makes present His one, completed sacrifice. At Mass, we are invited to participate in that saving gift.
Explore Catechism §§1366–1367.
Words I had repeated for years have become an invitation to recognize who is before me.