Real Presence, Part 4

“A type is a person, thing, or event in the Old Testament that foreshadows something to come later in time. It is like a taste or hint of something that will be fulfilled or realized. Types are like pictures that come alive in a new and exciting way when seen through the eyes of Christ’s revelation.” The type is always lesser than the anti-type. The anti-type (New Testament event) is always greater than its type (shadow of an event in the Old Testament). And both are independent of each other.

Many of the first Christians used this method to find new insights in the Scriptures. We see these‘types’, or ‘figures’ or examples in many places in Scripture like in 1 Cor 10:11 and Heb 11:19 for example.

One of these instances can be found in the Gospel of Matthew where we see that the Egyptian Exodus told in Hosea 11:1 is quoted exactly in Matt 2:15 when speaking of Jesus’ return to Israel from Egypt: “where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: "Out of EgyptI called my son."”

What Matthew has done here is he took an historical event and interpreted it as a shadow of something greater to come in the future, which he sees as ‘fulfilled’ in the person of Jesus the Messiah.

Other examples of Jesus Christ type/antitype pairs are:

A) Jonah in the belly of the whale is a type of Christ in the tomb. For Jonah stayed in the belly for three days as did Christ stay buried for three days until His resurrection as Jesus explained Himself “In the same way that Jonahspent three days and nights in the big fish, so will the Son of Man spend three days and nights in the depths of the earth. “(Matt 12:40)

B) The deadly bites of serpents are healed by the brazen serpent, which was lifted up that those bitten might look at it and live (Num 21:9). Jesus Himself gives the explanation of this: “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of man be lifted up, that whosoever believes in Him may not perish, but have everlasting life.” (John 3:14)

C) In God’s request that Abraham sacrifice his son Isaac (Gen 22:2) we find another type of Christ. The birth of both was supernatural (remember, Abraham was a hundred years old and Sarah an elderly woman when she bore Isaac). Both are sons of promise. Both were called “the only begotten son.”Both carried the wood of their own demise up the same mountain, Moriah. Both consented to endure death. Both were bound. Both were offered by their fathers. Both were laid on the wood. Both were in the vigor of life, and both live again after the offering.

D) Melchizadek is another type of Christ. We see evidence of this in Heb 6:20 “On our behalf Jesus has gone in there before us and has become a high priest forever, in the priestly order of Melchizedek.” and “Melchizedek, who was king of Salem and also a priest of the Most High God, brought bread and wine to Abram [whose name was later changed to Abraham] and blessed him, and said, "May the Most High God, who made heaven and earth, bless Abram!”(Gen 14:18)

In the Paschal lamb which the Israelites were commanded to eat as part of the Passover celebration is another strong foreshadowing of Christ. Each family is commanded to take a lamb without blemish and to sacrifice it (Exo 12:7-8). The lamb was to be roasted and eaten with unleavened bread and wild lettuce. The Paschal Lamb prefigured symbolically Christ, “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29).

We can agree that Jesus is a priest forever of the order of Melchizedek (Heb 6:20), and that he is also the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29) because we find these statements in Holy Scripture. By putting these to types together we see that Jesus is a priest forever but also the sacrificial lamb to atone for our sins. Jesus as priest offers up to God a perfect sacrifice to atone for our sins, Himself. That sacrifice, as in the Passover sacrifice of the lamb, we are to EAT the lamb. Now, how are we to eat the lamb when the sacrifice is in the form of bread and wine? We find the solution in Jesus’ own words in the Last Supper when He raises up the bread and then the wine and says: “this is my body…this is my blood”. The bread and wine presented and consecrated is transformed into the body and blood of our Lord but in keeping the same form of bread and wine! A perfect fulfillment of both types including a third type where Jesus calls Himself the true bread of Heaven which gives eternal life! John 6:48-50 states “I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate manna in the desert, but they died. But the bread that comes down from heaven is of such a kind that whoever eats it will not die.”

The difference between Christ’s death on the cross – the event- and the Eucharist – the sacrament – is the difference between history and liturgy. The historical event happened once and it will never again be repeated (Heb 9:25-26). The liturgical sacrament, however, not only keeps the past from being forgotten; through it the Eucharist of history –Jesus’ passion and death – is made present again. While his act of physical death will never be repeated, Jesus’ act of total self-giving to the Father for us (Rom 8:32) continues eternally in Love – that is, the Holy Spirit.

This moment in salvation history is the culmination of all of Scripture. As the Israelites were to sacrifice and eat the Passover lamb, so now are we to re-present His sacrifice forever in the form of bread and wine and eat His body and drink His blood because HE is the perfect sacrificial Lamb that we are to eat for our salvation (John 6:51). As the first Isrealites had to eat the sacrificial lamb, so too must we do the same.

God Bless
Nathan

The Passover Lamb

It all started on that fateful night when the Angel of Death came to kill the first-born son of every family whether Egyptian or Hebrew.  The Hebrew people were to sacrifice an unblemished lamb and mark the posts of their door so that the Angel of Death should ‘pass over’ their household. That night marked the birth of the nation of Israel but it also was a picture of a greater birth and a greater sacrifice to come many centuries later; the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ and his sacrificial death upon the cross as the true Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.  But before going on let’s see what John wrote about the circumstances of Jesus’ death, the death of the Lamb of God (John 1:29).

John is at the foot of the Cross holding Mary, suffering a mothers grief at losing ones son.  John tells us in his account of Jesus’ death that although they broke the legs of the other two being crucified they didn’t break those of Jesus “so that the scripture passage might be fulfilled: ‘Not a bone of it will be broken.’” Here John is referencing the requirement that the bones of the Passover lamb were not to be broken as found in Exodus 12:46 “You shall not break any of its bones.”

We can confidently say that John wants us to link the sacrifice of Jesus on the Cross to the first Passover because not only does John mentions ‘not breaking any bones’ but even before that statement John still points to this night of the first Passover when he mentions how Jesus was given wine to quench His thirst by using a sprig of hyssop, the same type of plant used to mark the doorframes with the blood of the sacrificial lambs (Exo 12:22).

So what happened at the first Passover that John would bring us back to this point in time while Jesus is being crucified?  Maybe so we see the connection between the sacrificial lamb (John 1:29) who saved us from the bondage of sin with the lamb who saved the Israelites from the bondage of the Pharaoh in Egypt.  Maybe because he believed the same as Paul did when he wrote to Timothy that “All scripture is…useful for teaching… and for training in righteousness” (2 Tim 3:16).  So we know that the sacrificial system of the Jewish liturgy of the Passover celebration teaches us, trains us in righteousness.  We also see in Malachi that this liturgy will be changed and fulfilled or brought to fruition through his prophecy that: “For from the rising of the sun, even to its setting, my name is great among the nations; And everywhere they bring sacrifice to my name, and a pure offering; For great is my name among the nations, says the LORD of hosts.” (Malachi 1:11)

First, we see that at the time the book of Malachi was written, God’s name was NOT great among the nations, therefore this is a prophecy of things to come.  Second, at the mention of “a pure offering”, what is the only pure offering ever brought to His name?  Jesus is the only pure offering.   And finally, “from the rising of the sun to its setting”.  All day long in other words.  Which worship ceremony uses incense and brings a pure offering all day long (from rising to setting of the sun) all around the world?  The Catholic Church is the only church which can claim this. 

But what about the pure offering?  What are we to do with it when we offer it to God?  Well, just look at what John was pointing to when Jesus was dying on the Cross.  Look at what the Israelites had to do at the first Passover sacrifice – they had to kill the lamb and then eat it (Exo 12:7-8 or Exo 12:43-47).  It wasn’t enough to sacrifice the lamb and to put its blood on the door frames.  To save the first-born sons of each household, they also had to eat the lamb as well.  How can we be sure of this?  By listening to Jesus’ own words of John 6 which states “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world”(verse 51).  And to confirm this suspicion, the account of the Last Supper as described by Matthew, Mark, Luke and Paul all say the same when holding the unleavened bread once it was blessed.  Jesus says “This IS my body…this IS my blood”.

 Prepared by a St-Denis parishioner