“Get rid of the old yeast, so that you may be a new unleavened batch—as you really are. For Christ, our Passover Lamb, has been sacrificed” (1 Corinthians 5:7).

Paul, having just written about sin, refers back to the graphic picture of deliverance in the Old Testament—the Passover. At the Passover God delivered His people, Israel, from the bondage of Egypt. Now Paul explained that it is Christ who is the Passover Lamb. He, our Passover Lamb, delivers us from the bondage of sin.

A phrase that strikes me as significant is Paul’s expression “as you really are.” He isn’t telling us to get rid of the old yeast so we can be an unleavened batch. He is explaining that we are already an unleavened batch because Jesus has already been sacrificed. The difference is huge.

God doesn’t say, “Do something so you can be….” He says, “Do this because you already are.” The sacrifice of Christ has already made us new creations so the changes in our behavior are possible because we aren’t who we used to be. We “really are” because Christ, our Passover Lamb, has been sacrificed.

Religion begins with the command to do something. Christianity begins with “you really are” and makes the change possible. The Christian life is simply our response to the freedom we have from sin because our Passover Lamb was slain two thousand years ago. What we do now is because we believe in what He did for us then.