Daily Devotions

In the Old Testament, the sacrificial system of the temple depended on the sacrifices of innocent animals.

The most typical of these sacrifices was the perfect, spotless lamb. Even in Old Testament times, as in Isaiah 53, the lamb was used as a symbol of the Messiah to come, and his work of removing the sin of his people.

When Jesus arrived, John the Baptist announced him as the “Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.” In the gentleness and meekness of the lamb, we can see the true nature of God.

"Lamb of God" stirs biblical overtones: of the Passover lamb, and of the Suffering Servant in Isaiah, led like a lamb to the slaughter, bearing our sins.

In his book “Eternity in their Hearts”, Don Richardson a Missionary writes of cultural compasses in other cultures and their language that point to one and only one person, Jesus, preparing the way for the Gospel to be heard.

A story is told of Robert Morrison who landed in China in 1807 and began to translate the Scriptures into the Chinese language with the help of a Chinese man with a limited English vocabulary. Chinese uses more than 200 pictures to combine in different ways to make Chinese words. When he got to the word righteous, he asked how to translate it and when his Chinese helper wrote the word in Chinese, Robert Morrison saw him use two symbols. 

On top was a picture of a lamb and on the bottom was the symbol for I, first person singular. So when the Chinese were writing the word righteous, they were writing the symbols which means the lamb over me. Jesus, the Lamb of God, spoke through the Chinese language and that became the cornerstone for Robert Morrison introducing them to Jesus, the lamb under whom you and I are found to be righteous.

God comes to us as a lamb, as the Lamb of God, to prove that He is for us, not against us.

Loving Heavenly Father, thank You for sending Jesus as the true Lamb of God Who has taken away all my sins. I am so thankful that Jesus died on the Cross for me, becoming the only substitute for my sins. In Jesus' name I pray, AMEN.