made into a covering for you and me

On Easter Sunday - I read a fantastic section of this book that I thought was perfect for Easter. And I had hoped that I would have time to get it posted that day but I was very busy with other things and did not get it done. I still wanted to share it with you all. I hope you are blessed by it as well. 

 

A section from this book : "Sanctuary Secrets to personal prayer" by Carrol Johnson Shewmake

 

"The sacrifice most often offered on the altar in the earthly sanctuary was a lamb, representing Jesus. God once gave me an illustration of that sacrifice, which took me several years to understand. But once understood, I can never forget it, for it touches my heart so deeply.

Several years ago my husband surprised me with the gift of fluffy white lambskin seat covers for my little red Buick skylark. The contrast of the white seat covers with the maroon interior and the red exterior of my car pleased me.

A few days after we had installed them, my 4-year-old granddaughter Kimi went for a ride with me. Kimi likes new things- and pretty things- so after I had safely installed her in her car seat, she investigated my new seat covers. In silence she surveyed them, fingering them.

"Grandma," she asked, "did they have to cut a sheep to get your seat covers?"

I gulped. I hadn't thought of it in that light before. It doesn't hurt a lamb to remove its wool, but lambskin cannot be removed from a live lamb. In order for me to have lambskin seat covers for my car, a lamb had to die.

"well, yes, Kimi," I finally managed to say. "Yes, I guess that someone did have to cut a lamb to make these seat covers."

She sat in silence, looking straight ahead as I started the car. "Grandma," she finally said, looking at me sadly, maybe sternly, "I don't think God likes you to cut sheep to make seat covers."

Suddenly I didn't like my new seat covers anymore. They didn't wear well either, and I was glad when I finally could replace them with man made fleece covers.

That was years ago. Kimi is now grown up. But God taught me a lesson from that story. Here is how it happened; I was listening to a tape. The speaker began to pray. In his prayer he thank the Lord for dying and for giving us His fleece. I had never heard anyone word a prayer just like that. In my mind's eye my lambskin seat covers appeared, and I saw that they represented the fleece of the Lamb of God. Unless a knife was applied to the Lamb, I could not be covered by His fleece. His death made my covering possible.

In my imagination I was back in Eden. The first sinners had just discovered that they were naked. And innocent Eden animal was brought forward, killed, and from its skin God Himself fashioned garments for Adam and Eve. They could never forget that an animal had to be cut so that they could be clothed.

Jesus Himself was the Lamb slain for my sins, the Lamb without spot or blemish. His beautiful fleece, His perfect righteousness, was made into a covering for you and me."