Celebrating my salvation in Jesus Christ is something I need to do regularly.
This concept was covered in Sunday’s sermon on September 28, 2025 entitled “Celebrate God Times,” looking at scripture in Exodus 12.
When it was time for the last plague to be enforced on Egypt, to force Pharaoh to let the Israelites go free, God gave the Israelites instructions to celebrate their salvation from Egypt.
The Passover was to be remembered in Israel for all generations, to commemorate the first time when God instructed the Israelite families in Egypt to kill an unblemished lamb and mark its blood on their doorposts, so the angel of death would pass by their houses and not kill the firstborn in their homes.
All the other houses in Egypt who did not have the lambs’ blood on their doorposts would find their firstborn child killed.
Generations later, when Jesus celebrated the Passover supper with his disciples the night he was to be betrayed, our God instituted the celebration of the Lord’s Supper to now be celebrated, honoring Jesus as our new Passover lamb.
After that first Lord’s Supper, Jesus instructed his followers to celebrate on a regular basis that Jesus was part of the new covenant. He also told them that whenever they ate the unleavened bread and drank the wine together, they would proclaim Jesus’ death until He comes again to the earth in all His glory.
Our pastor instructed us to:
Celebrate regularly.
Celebrate together.
Celebrate faith.
Celebrate belonging.
The Passover celebration connects us to God’s deliverance, first for the Israelites’ freedom from slavery in Egypt, and then later celebrates freedom from sin as Jesus’ shed blood on the cross covers us and makes us righteous in God’s sight through the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper, or communion.
So each time I take communion, I can celebrate regularly my salvation in Jesus Christ.
It’s also important to note that the Passover in Egypt was celebrated together as a family. Households ate the passover lamb together. Conversely, we celebrate communion together as a church body.
The Israelites then and Christians now celebrate by responding to God in faithfulness. The Israelites were instructed to have on their cloaks and sandals, ready to leave Egypt. They had to be ready and act in faith. They had to believe that this was going to be their night of freedom from slavery–that God would deliver them that very night after 430 years of living in Egypt.
Each time we, as Christians, celebrate communion, we act in faith that we believe Jesus’ died for our sins and that one day we will celebrate the same Lord’s Supper with Him in heaven.
Finally, we can celebrate belonging because the Israelites belonged to God, and He rescued them from oppression of slavery in Egypt. In the same way, with communion, we can celebrate God’s reconciliation to us through Christ’s blood and our freedom from bondage to sin.
Now, today, we can celebrate being rescued by Christ. We belong to Him.
Celebrating our salvation is deeply important. When Jesus celebrates the Passover with his disciples, He is telling them that they will be free in Him when he will soon die for their sins.
And we are to remember that celebration of the Lord’s Supper until Jesus comes back for us.
This celebration is a gift. A personal gift–the gift of salvation.
It’s time to celebrate!
—Ann Elizabeth Yeager