For many days Moses had been trying to persuade Pharaoh to let the Children of Israel go out of his land; and though God had sent great and dreadful plagues to warn the Egyptians that they must obey Him, yet Pharaoh would not listen.
At last, God sent Moses to him again and told him that if he would not let His people go, God would send His destroying angel through the land, and the first-born of every man and beast must die! And there would be most dreadful sorrow through all the land of Egypt.
[XLIII. The Passover]
The Easter full moon was shining down in all its white glory on the land of Egypt, more than three thousand years ago.
It was the last night that the Children of Israel were to stay in Egypt! To-morrow they would be free.
For that night, at midnight, the destroying angel would pass through the land of Egypt, to kill all the first-born of the Egyptians; and there would not be one house where there was not one dead.
Perhaps you think to yourselves, children, "But would the first-born of the Israelites die too? How would the destroying angel know which were Egyptians, and which were the Children of Israel?"
Ah! God had foreseen how to prevent that! He had not let plagues touch the houses of His own people!
He told Moses that all who wished to be safe on that dreadful night, must take a lamb, and when they had killed it, they must put its blood in a basin, and sprinkle the blood on their houses.
God told them to take a bunch of hyssop, and to sprinkle the top of the doorway and the side posts with blood; and He promised that when He saw the blood He would pass over that house, and not allow the destroying angel to enter.