From the time of Abel in Genesis 4, lambs were sacrificed as a costly and pure offering. When Abraham obediently went up the mountain to sacrifice Isaac as God said, Isaac asked, “Where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” Abraham, speaking prophetically, said, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son” (Genesis 22:8).


The lamb in the Jewish sacrificial system was without blemish. Isaiah prophesied that Jesus would be “led like a lamb to the slaughter” (53:7). Peter says that “You have been redeemed…with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect” (1 Peter 1:19).


Jesus was without sin, so He was able to do what none of us could possibly do for ourselves: offer up “a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction, for the sins of the whole world” (Archbishop Cranmer). God Himself in Christ came down to earth as man and took on His own back all the sin of the world. Isn’t that enough to make us stop in awe and really behold the Lamb of God?