I'm sorry I've been so woefully neglectful of my blog -- I just haven't had that much newsyness going on in my life lately, but I promise I'll try to do better.
As you can see by the title of this post, "Passover 2014", I'm a little late in posting as Passover was nearly a month ago, but a friend asked me to share our Passover, so I will gladly do my best if my memory holds out.
First a little background of why we do Passover...
No, we haven't always celebrated Passover. My husband & I grew up in typical Christian homes where we dyed eggs, had Easter baskets full of chocolate, Sunrise Service, and ate Easter ham with extended family. We had "Easter" break from school, and I always looked forward to Easter because I knew mom would buy or make me a beautiful new dress; and of course it meant I could wear white shoes again because NOW it was Springtime. I was always taught of Christ's death/burial/resurrection reason for Easter, but as a young child, all the other things were probably my real focus.
When Jeff & I married in 1993 and our first child arrived in 1994, although we had fond memories of many holiday traditions with our families, we determined to exclude Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and Halloween from our little family celebrations because, after all, we wanted to honor Christ and only teach the "real" reason for Christmas, Easter, and well, nothing is Christian about Halloween so we totally don't
do that one. For several years we thought we were doing good just by eliminating fictitious characters and teaching what I thought was the "real" reason, but yet retaining "innocent" fun things like dying eggs and Easter baskets.
As the years passed, little-by-little I began learning more & more about the pagan roots and meanings behind the symbolism in almost all of our American and "Christian" holidays. So, now armed with ever-growing information and great determination to focus on the "real" Christian meanings, I would tweak our celebrations yearly until there was very little left that resembled our holidays of yesteryear. In fact, once I realized that the REAL reason behind all of the holidays (Thanksgiving being the exception) was pagan and that history/tradition shows that Catholics or Christians just tried to Christianise them, it pretty much put a kibosh on it all. God never told us it was okay to take something He called an abomination and now turn it into a "Christian" holiday, like pretending it's His birthday or celebrate Christ's Resurrection mixed with the celebration of "Easter (Ishtar)" (the name of the pagan sun goddess "Queen of Heaven").
There is much that can be said about the pagan roots of our holidays, but since I don't believe in re-inventing the wheel as there are several good books and websites that can articulate it all far better than I, I'll just leave it up to you to research. Let's just say it's quite eye opening.
Then around 2004 the Holy Spirit tugged at my heart about several things that I had been reading in Scripture that didn't match up with what I had always been taught. Not that I hadn't wondered about these things in the past, but having grown up in a Christian home, attending a Christian school & college, and sitting under the teaching of many wonderful big-name Bible scholars, I figured these Bible experts must know and I would just take their word as the gospel truth since I must be missing something somewhere (ahem). Thus the Holy Spirit started me on a journey -- one that has taken me on a big renewing of the mind; testing everything to Scripture, not just taking for granted what I'm taught, no matter how well-respected the teacher or accepted the belief may be (Acts 17:11). How could it be that so many have been so wrong?? Could it be that they were taught thus & such in seminary, as I, and accepted it too without question? The teachings just weren't lining up with Scripture! So getting back on track with the subject at hand, Passover. One of the areas that I began to explore was that of our Christian celebrations.
We know honestly that the Bible never tells us to celebrate Christmas, Easter, or any of our traditional holidays; but what does the Bible tell us? Well, in Leviticus 23 we find Yahweh's (God) instructions to keep HIS feasts. In Lev. 23 and throughout the Bible, we find these feasts as God's Feasts, not Moses' feasts or the Jews' feasts, but God's. God has given us 7 wonderful feasts, far better than the world or man's tradition could ever give us that honor and glorify God and directly point to what God has done & will do soon.
Passover is the first of the Spring Feasts and the Bible has quite a bit to say about it, in fact, there are 86 verses about Passover (
http://www.openbible.info/topics/passover), and none of them tell us that it's been done away with. In Exodus 12:24 we are commanded: "And ye shall observe this thing [Passover] for an ordinance to thee and to thy sons FOREVER."
(emphasis mine). Passover was not just for the Jews! Scripture repeatedly instructs that Passover (& the Feasts in general) was given to not only the native born Israelite, but the the mixed multitude (Ex 12:38, Numbers 9:14, Joshua 8:33, etc. ~ it's amazing how many times "foreigner" & "strangers" are mentioned as included in God's Covenant/Law). Not only that, but if we believe Romans 11 to be true -- that we are grafted in (i.e. We are 100% Israel).
Anywho, our family has found that celebrating the Feasts of the LORD are so much more fun and have
such a beautifully deep meaning to them that why would we choose to do anything else. And the girls both agree that the Biblical Feasts are so much more FUN! Now, I wish I could say that we jumped in with both feet making the switch from traditional holidays to Biblical overnight, au contraire, some do, but for our family, it's been a very gradual learning process. We have been on quite a learning curve and I'm thankful that the Father knows our heart. ♥ What probably makes it harder is we just have a smattering of local friends who also celebrate the Feasts, no one close by to help instruct us, so we make mistakes along the way, but we are learning and it gets easier and sweeter with every passing year. This Passover was the BEST...
Jeff leading our family Passover Seder (order) from a Haggadah (the telling). I forget why now, but this year's Passover was a bit hurried in the preparation, so the table is less than perfect, but it was still sweet. We make a point of trying not to follow rabbinic oral law & traditions (Talmud), but mostly stick with just the written law (Torah). There are over 3,000 ways of doing the Seder. This year we chose to use the simple Haggadah found in Robin Sampson's book, "A Family Guide to the Biblical Holidays" (a great book for beginners). Some Seders can take hours, but Jeff did a beautiful job and it took less than an hour
(not that I was timing him, teehe).
The 4 Spring Feast come in pretty fast succession and some overlap. First there is Passover and our special Sedar dinner, then the Feast of Unleavened Bread comes right on the tail of Passover. We eat nothing with yeast for a week (yeast represents sin in the Bible) so we eat lots of Matzo... we tried a fantastic garlic flavored one this year. Matzo is great, but prepare for crumbs everywhere. :) I do try to have several special suppers for the family such as Beef Brisket and Lamb with Mint Sauce for the week. The young guy at the meat counter at Whole Foods seemed amazed that I asked for lamb, but perhaps he was just trying to make conversation as he kept looking at my daughters, haha. I have a lamb ordered from a organic farm now, so perhaps we won't have to pay the high store prices next year. (rolling eyes) First Fruits also overlaps the 7 days of Unleaven Bread and begins at the time Yeshua (Christ Jesus) arose from the grave -- He is our First Fruit. Then we Count the Omer 50 days (Lev. 23:15-16; Deut. 16:9-10) to Shavu'ot (Feast of Weeks/Pentecost) which is a time of rejoicing; when Moses received the 10 Commandments and the Holy Spirit was given to believers. It's a 1-2 day (depending if you are reform) time of "refreshing", rededicating ourselves to the study of God's Word, even staying up all night reading/studying/memorizing (a good time to watch the movie, The Ten Commandments). Pentecost ends the Spring Feasts.
The Friday following Passover we joined Jeff's parents at their church for "Christ in the Passover". This is the third time we have attended this Jews for Jesus presentation, but it was a special treat to see David Brickner, the Executive Director of JfJ give the presentation. We saw several friends there. Very fun!
We chose not to make a big issue of us celebrating the feasts with our extended families. We still spend Resurrection Sunday (First Fruits) & Christmas Day with my 85 yr. old mother; at this point in her life, why bother making a rift in the family? And we spend Christmas Eve with Jeff's side of the family more as a family time. Jeff's mom seems to have a new found interest in all-things Jewish (including the feasts) after discovering that perhaps she has some Jewish ancestors (her maiden name is "Abrahamson" (ya think? haha)). But as for our immediate family, beside the fact that we are at the Grands and aren't really home for these holidays, we no longer exchange gifts at Christmas (now we go all out at Hanukkah); and we would rather celebrate Passover instead of Easter (I've gotten rid of all my Easter decorations and set up Palm Sunday and Passover things). It makes for a much more focused time on the TRUE Biblical meanings. Not that one can't celebrate Christ's resurrection, but the Bible never instructs us to.
So Pretty! Whenever we visit my mom on a Sunday, we attend a favorite church near her. This was just a fraction of the floral decor they had on Resurrection Sunday. I wish I had thought of snapping a picture earlier, before everyone stood up to leave.
So I guess there you have it -- our 2014 Passover and some of the whys & wheretos to boot. We are still always learning which is part of the fun! Please don't get me wrong. We still believe that salvation is by grace through faith; it always has been. This has nothing to do with legalism, earning one's salvation, or gaining better favor with God. It's not bondage, far from it. Each Feast is a beautiful picture -- each of the Spring Feasts are a picture of Christ's first coming. Jesus was sacrificed for our sins on Passover, buried on Unleavened Bread, arose on Firstfruits, and sent us His Holy Spirit on Pentecost. The fall holidays are a picture of His second coming and of things to come. The LORD willing, I will share those with you later this year.
Like I shared with my friend, I don't really wish to be labeled as Messianic or Hebrew Roots (or I suppose any denomination for that matter). Each has it's share of flaws and kooks that I don't really care to be recognized with thank you very much. Not that we are perfect, but we just simply desire to love God and His Word and seek to obey Him in all Truth -- following Scripture rather than the traditions of man.
Truly these are the LORD's Feasts, and they are glorious, for they glorify Him!
