Passover

"Now this day will be a memorial to you, and you shall celebrate it as a feast to the Lord; throughout your generations you are to celebrate it as a permanent ordinance"

(Exodus 12:14)

In our study of Old Testament history we are celebrating some of the biblical feasts.

The Jewish days begin at sundown, so Passover began at sundown on Good Friday.

That night we were supposed to clean the house and remove any leavened bread.

I broke up an English muffin and left pieces around the kitchen for the kids to find.

They were supposed to hunt for the leavened bread by candlelight and put anything they found into a paper bag.

In the Bible, leaven often symbolized sin (see Matt 16:6, 1 Cor. 5:8.) In the morning, we took our bag of leavened bread outside to the fire pit and we burned it. This was to symbolize the Passover Lamb, Jesus Christ, cleansing us from our sin, making us unleavened.

Later that day we had our Passover meal. Moriah was hoping for lamb, but I haven't done lamb before and I just wasn't up for trying that yet! I decided to have roasted chicken with red potatoes and carrots.

We also made some of the traditional Passover items, like charoseth, which is made from apples, walnuts and brown sugar. It symbolizes the mortar the Israelites worked with as slaves in Egypt.

I also bought matzoh bread (unleavened bread) at the grocery store for our dinner.

The kids all liked it, but the next day Emma was examining the package and found that it was marked

"Not for Passover Use"

Ooops.

As we ate our dinner together that night by candlelight, we talked about the Israelites living in Egypt.

They were living in bondage, as slaves to the Egyptians.

God wanted to remove them from bondage and lead them to a land that He had promised them.

However, Pharoah refused to let them leave Egypt, and God was coming to strike down all the first born in Egypt that night. He told the Israelites to sacrifice a lamb, and put the blood of the lamb on their doorposts. Upon seeing the blood, God would pass over their house and they would be protected from the judgement of death.

It is such a beautiful picture of One who would come to rescue all of mankind out of bondage to sin and protect us from the judgement of death. Christ, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, came to be our Passover Lamb. For those who choose to stand under the covering of His blood, God will pass over them with His judgement of death. He will free them from bondage to sin, and lead them to His promised land.

Celebrating Passover made our Easter weekend much more meaningful. Our Passover meal was such a beautiful and quiet time together, and it prepared our hearts for the next morning, Resurrection Sunday.