Those of you who know me well, know I LOVE PASSOVER!
Those of you who don't know me well, please allow me to explain...
I am not Jewish, nor am I pretending to be Jewish. However, without going into a long theological discussion, I believe that as a follower of Jesus Christ, I have been adopted into God's family and I am able to celebrate Jewish feasts and festivals that magnify the Messiah.
About 5 years ago, my husband and I began to wonder if we were making too much fuss about Santa and the Easter Bunny and not focusing enough on the wonderful events of those holidays. We finally came to the conclusion that Santa and the Easter Bunny can be a fun game that our family plays, but we wanted our family to really focus on the fact that #1 God became man (Christmas) and that #2 God, sacrificed Himself for all of mankind, and #3 God raised Himself from the dead. (Easter)
Then I stumbled across a great DVD called, "The Miracle of the Passover." In it, Zola Levitt, explains systematically how every article of the Passover Seder is a perfect picture of Messiah. He is our Passover Lamb. His blood is what covered our sins and gives us Life. Just like the Matzah, He was pierced, He was without sin (no leaven), He was broken and hidden (Afikomen) and He was resurrected (finding the Afikomen). While watching this DVD, I realized that the Last Supper was in fact the Passover dinner and that what we celebrate as Communion is actually the 3rd cup of the Passover, the Cup of Redemption. And believe me the list goes on and on and on....
So the first year we observed Passover was very interesting. We really had no clue what we were doing but we stumbled along. But during our preparations God brought 2 Jewish people into our lives. They were able to instruct us on preparing for Passover and we were able to share with them how we see Messiah pictured in the Seder. By the second year we were beginning to get the hang of it and decided to invite more people to celebrate Passover with us. And that year God brought a Ukranian, Orthodox Jewish woman to my door (while I was preparing for Passover) and I was able to talk with her about the Messiah. As the years have gone by, we continue to observe Passover. We have celebrated with our familes and friends and continue to share with people why we observe Passover.
This year our church has invited Rabbi Silverman from the local Messianic Congregation to lead us through the Passover Seder. I can't express how excited I am to help organize this event. We have enough seats for 328 people and so far our sign up is around 400!! The next few days are going to be stressful as we try to figure out how to fit everyone into the auditorium. I hope to post some more information about Passover in the next few days. Hopefully you will want to try it with your family.
God Bless!!
Katie
