[The following paraphrase is taken from Bob Lamb’s Book The Overcoming Blood]
The phrase “pleading the blood” is not in the Bible. But to understand the concept let us use the phrase “appeal earnestly.” Let us take a look at that Passover night when 2.5 million Israelites walked out of 430 years of slavery in Egypt under the leadership of Moses and by the miracles of God.
The last of the plagues against Pharaoh was to be the death of the firstborn. The Israelites would escape this terrible plague if they applied the blood to the lintel and the two door posts as instructed. If the blood was not applied, death surely came as it came to entire Egypt (see Exodus 12:30).
A great cry is God’s description of that horrible event—the death of the firstborn that happened to the Egyptians.
Surely the Israelites understood what was happening. Again, what did they do during that night? I most certainly believe they ‘pleaded the blood.’ Or, they “appealed earnestly the blood.” Or, “they used arguments for or against something” in relation to the blood applied to the doorways.
I imagine the Israelites inside their house were huddled around their firstborn and were loudly crying out to God that they had followed His instructions. They “pleaded the blood.” They “appealed earnestly the blood.” They cried out using the argument that they had sprinkled the blood as they were instructed. The Israelites rested their case on the sprinkled blood.
See, it was of no use if the blood was kept in a basin on the table with the hyssop near it. The instructions were to dip the hyssop in the basin of the blood and sprinkle the lintel and the doorposts. In other words the blood had to be applied. We have to use it. But how do we Christians apply this to our lives to overcome the devil?
The analogy is clear for us. We are to “plead the blood” for our deliverances. We are to overcome the devil by pleading the blood of Jesus Christ and by our word of testimony regarding its power to deliver us (see Revelation 12:11).
Just as the pleading of the blood worked for the Israelites because they followed the instructions regarding applying the blood correctly, when we are threatened to be overcome by the devil’s attacks, we can plead that the blood of Jesus Christ avails for us.
We may not understand how it works anymore than the Israelites could understand how blood on the doorpost would prevent the death of their firstborn. But, we like them, are overcomers by “pleading the blood.”
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