2 Chronicles 30:18
18 For a multitude of the people, even many of Ephraim, and Manasseh, Issachar, and Zebulun, had not cleansed themselves, yet did they eat the passover otherwise than it was written. But Hezekiah prayed for them, saying, The good LORD pardon every one
For Jewish festivals think of Christian ordinances, and apply the principle of the text to their observance. Take the two great ordinances of baptism and the Lord's Supper. Baptism by water will save no man; neither will eating and drinking, the symbolical elements at the Lord's Table. The vital baptism is the baptism of the Holy Ghost; the saving act is eating and drinking the body and the blood of Jesus Christ by faith. Far be it from me to assert that a man cannot have the spiritual because he has not had the material baptism, or that a man cannot have partaken spiritually and savingly of Jesus Christ because he has never attended what is known as the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. At the same time, those who have had the opportunity of fulfilling such ordinances and have neglected to do so need to be prayed for as having omitted services which are full of spiritual meaning and privilege. Apply this thought (1) to church attendance; (2) to Church membership; (3) to various methods of thinking.
Parker, The Ark of God,p. 230.
References: 2 Chronicles 30:18. Homiletic Quarterly,vol. i., p. 232. 2 Chronicles 30:21. J. E. Vaux, Sermon Notes,2nd series, p. 96. 2 Chronicles 30:27. Spurgeon, Evening by Evening,p. 310. 2 Chronicles 31:1. Ibid., Sermons,vol. v., No. 238.