Why did Israel need three days separating them from their place of captivity in Egypt?
The three days served as God’s required separation between Israel and Egypt’s captivity, prefiguring Christ’s three days and nights in the tomb. Just as Israel could not be freed from Egypt without that separation, sinners cannot be freed from sin’s bondage apart from the gospel’s three-day burial and resurrection.
Les explains that way back in Exodus, God was already giving a picture of basic premises: there is no setting us free from the shackles of sin any more than there was reason to expect Israel to be set free of Egypt unless they could have three days separating them from their place of captivity. He connects this to Matthew 12:38-40, where Jesus cites the sign of the prophet Jonah: as Jonah was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly, so the Son of Man would be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. Les teaches that the same pattern applies to salvation. If we ignore the basic premise of the gospel—that Christ died, was in the grave three days and three nights, and rose from the dead—we have no gospel. But when we put our faith in that gospel, that three days and three nights in the tomb separates us from the old life of sin and bondage.