The Feast of Passover is Prophecy Proclaiming Yeshua Ha-Mashiach - the Messiah Jesus Christ
Apr 4, 2023 03:23:58 #
(Part 1 of 3)
Christians are not bound to observe the Jewish feasts as the Jewish people of the Old Testament were, but we can learn much from them Romans 14:5: "One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind." While it is not required for Christians to celebrate the Jewish feast days (Colossians 2:16-17), it is beneficial to study them.
Passover (Hebrew Pesach) begins before sundown on Wednesday, April 5, 2023, and ends after nightfall on April 13, 2023. The holiday of Pesach, or Passover, falls on the Hebrew calendar dates of Nissan 15-22. We are currently in the year 5783 on the Jewish calendar. The Jewish new year started on September 25, 2022 (the 1st of the Hebrew month of Tishrei).
A standard Jewish year has twelve months; six twenty-nine-day months, and six thirty-day months, for a total of 354 days. This is because the months follow the lunar orbit, which is approximately 29.5 days.
The seven-day week, the notion of a weekly day of rest, and many Christian and Islamic holiday observances owe their origins to the Jewish calendar, Sabbath, and festivals.
Note: The Jewish calendar day is from sundown to sundown. The date begins at sundown of the night beforehand on the western calendar. Thus all holiday observances begin at sundown on the secular dates listed, with the following day being the first full day of the holiday. (The first Passover seder is held on the evening of the first date listed.) Jewish calendar dates conclude at nightfall.
For millennia the Jewish people have celebrated the seven historical God-ordained Feasts of Israel revealed in Scripture: Passover, Unleavened Bread, First Fruits, Shavuot or Pentecost, Trumpets, Yom Kippur, and Sukkot. With Passover almost upon us, it is timely to examine the feast that originally marked the beginning of the Jewish year.
The Feast of Passover was the first feast ordained by God for His chosen people. It points back to their bondage in Egypt and to His great deliverance through His servant, Moses. Exodus 11 and 12 describe the horrific final plague that had struck the Egyptians and God’s provision for preserving His people while the firstborn throughout the land were being killed by the Angel of Death.
When it comes to the Feast of Passover, in Exodus 13:10, the Lord commanded, “You shall keep this ordinance at its appointed time from year to year.” The Jews have done just that down through the many centuries.
The prophetic significance of Passover is so obvious that even the spiritually undiscerning can see its implications to the Christian faith and how it offers insight to those with spiritual eyes to see.
In order to peel back some of the mystery and expound on the beauty and prophetic implications of this feast, Dr. Richard Hill, a “Jew born anew” and recognized expert in all things Jewishness, instructs in its meaning. Richard serves with CJF Ministries and as the Messianic pastor of the [Hebrew Christian] Beth Yeshua Messianic Congregation in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Elements of the First Passover
Richard Hill: Thank you, yes, I am going to teach you about Pesach, which is the Hebrew name for Passover. It’s better to go to the Scriptures.
Let’s go to Exodus 12. We are going to look at the first 14 verses. Here we find the Lord speaking to Moses and Aaron while they are attempting to free the captives from the land of Egypt.
Verses one and two: “Now the Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt. This month shall be the beginning of months for you. It is to be the first month of the year to you.” So, obviously, this month wasn’t the first of the year prior to this time. While in Egypt, the Hebrews had been following the Egyptian calendar, but now God has decided to begin a new Hebrew calendar. This is now the beginning of a new year for the Jewish people.
Verse three reads: “Speak to all the congregation of Israel saying on the tenth of this month [the tenth of Nisan] they are to each one take a lamb for themselves according to their father’s household, a lamb for each household.” The Hebrew word here is śeh and it means “kid.” So, they could take a lamb, but they could also take a goat.
Verse four reads, “Now, if the household is too small for a lamb, then he and his neighbor nearest to his house are to take one according to the number of persons in them, according to what each man should eat, you are to divide the lamb.” So, each household had a lamb, but if you didn’t have enough people in your family, you had to invite your neighbor or another household close by to come over to your house and eat this lamb or goat together. The rabbis determined that for every lamb that is slain you are supposed to have at least 10 to 20 people. The lamb feeds a lot of people!
The lamb shall be a one year old lamb, for as verse five states, “Your lamb shall be an unblemished male, a year old; you may take of it from the sheep or from the goats.” (Imagine Jewish people eating goat for Passover!) The Jewish people always ate lamb, but not anymore, not since 70 AD when the Temple was destroyed. The rabbis determined from that time on that you are not allowed to eat a Passover lamb because you couldn’t sacrifice it in the Temple. Today, we substitute other meats such as brisket, chicken, and turkey. Different parts of the world eat different meats.
Verse six commands, “And you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same month when the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel is to kill it at twilight.” The families kept their poor little lamb for four days. Well, what about the children? What’s going on in their minds? They are becoming attached to that little lamb. Isn’t that the point? We become attached to the Passover lamb, better understanding how that little lamb is going to die for our redemption. So, yes, I think the Lord wanted us to become attached to better understand what this death really was going to mean to that household.
Verse seven orders, “Moreover, they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts on the lintel of the houses in which they eat.” They would slit the lamb right on the jugular vein so that the lamb dies instantly. There was to be no suffering whatsoever. That’s a kosher commandment within Judaism. You’re not allowed to let the animal suffer.
The families would then take a bowl and collect the blood. And, what were they to do with the blood? They painted it on their doorpost, particularly the lintel which is the upper-middle portion, then along the left and right sides. What sign is that? If you just paint a little bit up top, a little bit on one side, and a little bit on the other side, you make the sign of the cross.
Imagine being a Jewish person at that time and learning that God said, “I want you to paint the blood on the doorpost.” Being Jewish, I’m thinking: “I’m going to paint my whole house! I don’t want the Angel of Death to not see the blood that’s covering my household.” But, you just needed to go across the whole lintel, down one whole side, and then down the other side. This shape in Hebrew is called the chai. The first letter is a chet and chai means “life” — i’chaim — “to live”. And so, when you put the blood on the doorpost of your house, then you are going to have life; you’re not going to have death.
Verse eight continues, “They shall eat the flesh that same night, roasted with fire, and they shall eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.” All of the meat needed to be roasted by fire, so there’s no boiling it in water or anything like that.
Here’s where the unleavened bread comes in. Passover runs the whole day and then you eat the Passover meal at night. That first night serves then as the first night of the Feast of Unleavened Bread. God says to eat unleavened bread, but also, bitter herbs. Rabbi Gamaliel from the New Testament was Paul’s rabbi. He’s the one who said at that time on the Feast of Passover every Jewish person needs to talk about at least three things: the Passover lamb, the unleavened bread, and the bitter herbs.
Verses nine and ten read: “Do not eat any of it raw or boiled at all with water,” which we explained, “but rather roast it with fire, both its head and its legs along with its entrails. And you shall not leave any of it over until morning, but whatever is left of it until morning you shall burn it with fire.” So, there should remain nothing left of the animal. All of it would be destroyed. It’s a done deal. God’s grace is sufficient.
Verse 11 adds, “You shall eat it in this manner: with your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand: and you shall eat it in haste — it is the Lord’s Passover.” They were to eat in haste because the Jews of the Exodus were getting ready to leave as quickly as possible. Now, we know they didn’t leave right away, but God wanted them just to be ready to go at a moment’s notice.
Of course, today we do not celebrate Passover that speedily anymore. We are not killing lambs and putting their blood on our doorposts. Nor are we girding our robes into our waistbands. Rather, instead, we sit on nice soft cushy pillows, as if that will remind us of our past slavery.
The proper way to eat the Passover meal is to sit reclined at the table, and we still sit that way reclining. Jesus at the Passover would have used a smaller table than what we see in DiVinci’s famous painting “The Last Supper,” and they would have reclined on pillows on the ground.
The bread wasn’t as high as DiVinci depicted either, for the bread would have been very thin, as it was unleavened bread. Leaven is the yeast that makes bread rise. The Hebrews of the Exodus didn’t put yeast in their bread because they had to cook their bread and get out of Egypt as fast as possible. We see that right in verse 11 where it says that they’re going to eat it in haste and so weren’t able to take the time to put leaven in their bread. Later on, they baked leaven in, of course. The night after the Hebrews departed they likely baked leaven in their meals.
God reveals his plans for the Egyptian slavers in verse 12, “For I will go through the land of Egypt on that night and I will strike down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt, I will execute judgments — I am the Lord.” God’s punishment struck upon the Egyptians and Pharaoh and against all of their false gods. The ten plagues were in fact judgments against the Egyptian gods. Yahweh undermined the top ten Egyptian gods because Egypt had a whole lot of gods. God took their worthless gods to task thereby demonstrating that Yahweh is God alone and over all their gods. Yahweh stands apart as the one and only God. As Yul Brynner says at the end of the movie The Ten Commandments — [b]“Their God is God.”;/b]
Pharoah came to realize the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob — the Hebrew God — is the one true God because he had defeated all of the Egyptian gods.
The issue is that God needs to be honored and worshiped. We see the same need in Ezekiel’s prophecy of the Gog-Magog War, where God reveals that He supernaturally defeated Gog and his hordes so that, “I will be God for all.”
Verse 13 promises, “And the blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live; when I see the blood, I will pass over you…” That’s where we get the Hebrew word pesach, for in Hebrew it means “passing over you.” And, when the Angel of Death passes over the blood-protected houses, “no plague will befall you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.”
Ongoing Celebration of the Passover
Richard Hill: Exodus 12:14 gives God’s command for the Jewish people to continue the Feast of Passover: “Now, this day will be 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.” The Jewish people were to continue, even to this day and into the future, to celebrate Passover. By doing so, they will remember what God has achieved in providing the miraculous deliverance of His people out of the land of sin — out of the land of Egypt — and by bringing them into the land of Israel.
To think that it’s been over 3,400 years since the Exodus? And yet, today, the Jewish people still perform the Passover feast. What ancient ceremonies or celebrations are still being celebrated after millennia? And yet, the Jewish people still celebrate Passover after all of these centuries!
I know of no other religious ceremony that has been celebrated as long as the Passover has been celebrated.
In the second part of this look into the Feast of Passover in prophecy, the true Passover Lamb will be revealed!
What the Passover teaches Christians - To be continued:
Lamb & Lion Ministries - Dr. Nathan E. Jones
Christians are not bound to observe the Jewish feasts as the Jewish people of the Old Testament were, but we can learn much from them Romans 14:5: "One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind." While it is not required for Christians to celebrate the Jewish feast days (Colossians 2:16-17), it is beneficial to study them.
Passover (Hebrew Pesach) begins before sundown on Wednesday, April 5, 2023, and ends after nightfall on April 13, 2023. The holiday of Pesach, or Passover, falls on the Hebrew calendar dates of Nissan 15-22. We are currently in the year 5783 on the Jewish calendar. The Jewish new year started on September 25, 2022 (the 1st of the Hebrew month of Tishrei).
A standard Jewish year has twelve months; six twenty-nine-day months, and six thirty-day months, for a total of 354 days. This is because the months follow the lunar orbit, which is approximately 29.5 days.
The seven-day week, the notion of a weekly day of rest, and many Christian and Islamic holiday observances owe their origins to the Jewish calendar, Sabbath, and festivals.
Note: The Jewish calendar day is from sundown to sundown. The date begins at sundown of the night beforehand on the western calendar. Thus all holiday observances begin at sundown on the secular dates listed, with the following day being the first full day of the holiday. (The first Passover seder is held on the evening of the first date listed.) Jewish calendar dates conclude at nightfall.
For millennia the Jewish people have celebrated the seven historical God-ordained Feasts of Israel revealed in Scripture: Passover, Unleavened Bread, First Fruits, Shavuot or Pentecost, Trumpets, Yom Kippur, and Sukkot. With Passover almost upon us, it is timely to examine the feast that originally marked the beginning of the Jewish year.
The Feast of Passover was the first feast ordained by God for His chosen people. It points back to their bondage in Egypt and to His great deliverance through His servant, Moses. Exodus 11 and 12 describe the horrific final plague that had struck the Egyptians and God’s provision for preserving His people while the firstborn throughout the land were being killed by the Angel of Death.
When it comes to the Feast of Passover, in Exodus 13:10, the Lord commanded, “You shall keep this ordinance at its appointed time from year to year.” The Jews have done just that down through the many centuries.
The prophetic significance of Passover is so obvious that even the spiritually undiscerning can see its implications to the Christian faith and how it offers insight to those with spiritual eyes to see.
In order to peel back some of the mystery and expound on the beauty and prophetic implications of this feast, Dr. Richard Hill, a “Jew born anew” and recognized expert in all things Jewishness, instructs in its meaning. Richard serves with CJF Ministries and as the Messianic pastor of the [Hebrew Christian] Beth Yeshua Messianic Congregation in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Elements of the First Passover
Richard Hill: Thank you, yes, I am going to teach you about Pesach, which is the Hebrew name for Passover. It’s better to go to the Scriptures.
Let’s go to Exodus 12. We are going to look at the first 14 verses. Here we find the Lord speaking to Moses and Aaron while they are attempting to free the captives from the land of Egypt.
Verses one and two: “Now the Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt. This month shall be the beginning of months for you. It is to be the first month of the year to you.” So, obviously, this month wasn’t the first of the year prior to this time. While in Egypt, the Hebrews had been following the Egyptian calendar, but now God has decided to begin a new Hebrew calendar. This is now the beginning of a new year for the Jewish people.
Verse three reads: “Speak to all the congregation of Israel saying on the tenth of this month [the tenth of Nisan] they are to each one take a lamb for themselves according to their father’s household, a lamb for each household.” The Hebrew word here is śeh and it means “kid.” So, they could take a lamb, but they could also take a goat.
Verse four reads, “Now, if the household is too small for a lamb, then he and his neighbor nearest to his house are to take one according to the number of persons in them, according to what each man should eat, you are to divide the lamb.” So, each household had a lamb, but if you didn’t have enough people in your family, you had to invite your neighbor or another household close by to come over to your house and eat this lamb or goat together. The rabbis determined that for every lamb that is slain you are supposed to have at least 10 to 20 people. The lamb feeds a lot of people!
The lamb shall be a one year old lamb, for as verse five states, “Your lamb shall be an unblemished male, a year old; you may take of it from the sheep or from the goats.” (Imagine Jewish people eating goat for Passover!) The Jewish people always ate lamb, but not anymore, not since 70 AD when the Temple was destroyed. The rabbis determined from that time on that you are not allowed to eat a Passover lamb because you couldn’t sacrifice it in the Temple. Today, we substitute other meats such as brisket, chicken, and turkey. Different parts of the world eat different meats.
Verse six commands, “And you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same month when the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel is to kill it at twilight.” The families kept their poor little lamb for four days. Well, what about the children? What’s going on in their minds? They are becoming attached to that little lamb. Isn’t that the point? We become attached to the Passover lamb, better understanding how that little lamb is going to die for our redemption. So, yes, I think the Lord wanted us to become attached to better understand what this death really was going to mean to that household.
Verse seven orders, “Moreover, they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts on the lintel of the houses in which they eat.” They would slit the lamb right on the jugular vein so that the lamb dies instantly. There was to be no suffering whatsoever. That’s a kosher commandment within Judaism. You’re not allowed to let the animal suffer.
The families would then take a bowl and collect the blood. And, what were they to do with the blood? They painted it on their doorpost, particularly the lintel which is the upper-middle portion, then along the left and right sides. What sign is that? If you just paint a little bit up top, a little bit on one side, and a little bit on the other side, you make the sign of the cross.
Imagine being a Jewish person at that time and learning that God said, “I want you to paint the blood on the doorpost.” Being Jewish, I’m thinking: “I’m going to paint my whole house! I don’t want the Angel of Death to not see the blood that’s covering my household.” But, you just needed to go across the whole lintel, down one whole side, and then down the other side. This shape in Hebrew is called the chai. The first letter is a chet and chai means “life” — i’chaim — “to live”. And so, when you put the blood on the doorpost of your house, then you are going to have life; you’re not going to have death.
Verse eight continues, “They shall eat the flesh that same night, roasted with fire, and they shall eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.” All of the meat needed to be roasted by fire, so there’s no boiling it in water or anything like that.
Here’s where the unleavened bread comes in. Passover runs the whole day and then you eat the Passover meal at night. That first night serves then as the first night of the Feast of Unleavened Bread. God says to eat unleavened bread, but also, bitter herbs. Rabbi Gamaliel from the New Testament was Paul’s rabbi. He’s the one who said at that time on the Feast of Passover every Jewish person needs to talk about at least three things: the Passover lamb, the unleavened bread, and the bitter herbs.
Verses nine and ten read: “Do not eat any of it raw or boiled at all with water,” which we explained, “but rather roast it with fire, both its head and its legs along with its entrails. And you shall not leave any of it over until morning, but whatever is left of it until morning you shall burn it with fire.” So, there should remain nothing left of the animal. All of it would be destroyed. It’s a done deal. God’s grace is sufficient.
Verse 11 adds, “You shall eat it in this manner: with your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand: and you shall eat it in haste — it is the Lord’s Passover.” They were to eat in haste because the Jews of the Exodus were getting ready to leave as quickly as possible. Now, we know they didn’t leave right away, but God wanted them just to be ready to go at a moment’s notice.
Of course, today we do not celebrate Passover that speedily anymore. We are not killing lambs and putting their blood on our doorposts. Nor are we girding our robes into our waistbands. Rather, instead, we sit on nice soft cushy pillows, as if that will remind us of our past slavery.
The proper way to eat the Passover meal is to sit reclined at the table, and we still sit that way reclining. Jesus at the Passover would have used a smaller table than what we see in DiVinci’s famous painting “The Last Supper,” and they would have reclined on pillows on the ground.
The bread wasn’t as high as DiVinci depicted either, for the bread would have been very thin, as it was unleavened bread. Leaven is the yeast that makes bread rise. The Hebrews of the Exodus didn’t put yeast in their bread because they had to cook their bread and get out of Egypt as fast as possible. We see that right in verse 11 where it says that they’re going to eat it in haste and so weren’t able to take the time to put leaven in their bread. Later on, they baked leaven in, of course. The night after the Hebrews departed they likely baked leaven in their meals.
God reveals his plans for the Egyptian slavers in verse 12, “For I will go through the land of Egypt on that night and I will strike down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt, I will execute judgments — I am the Lord.” God’s punishment struck upon the Egyptians and Pharaoh and against all of their false gods. The ten plagues were in fact judgments against the Egyptian gods. Yahweh undermined the top ten Egyptian gods because Egypt had a whole lot of gods. God took their worthless gods to task thereby demonstrating that Yahweh is God alone and over all their gods. Yahweh stands apart as the one and only God. As Yul Brynner says at the end of the movie The Ten Commandments — [b]“Their God is God.”;/b]
Pharoah came to realize the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob — the Hebrew God — is the one true God because he had defeated all of the Egyptian gods.
The issue is that God needs to be honored and worshiped. We see the same need in Ezekiel’s prophecy of the Gog-Magog War, where God reveals that He supernaturally defeated Gog and his hordes so that, “I will be God for all.”
Verse 13 promises, “And the blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live; when I see the blood, I will pass over you…” That’s where we get the Hebrew word pesach, for in Hebrew it means “passing over you.” And, when the Angel of Death passes over the blood-protected houses, “no plague will befall you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.”
Ongoing Celebration of the Passover
Richard Hill: Exodus 12:14 gives God’s command for the Jewish people to continue the Feast of Passover: “Now, this day will be 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.” The Jewish people were to continue, even to this day and into the future, to celebrate Passover. By doing so, they will remember what God has achieved in providing the miraculous deliverance of His people out of the land of sin — out of the land of Egypt — and by bringing them into the land of Israel.
To think that it’s been over 3,400 years since the Exodus? And yet, today, the Jewish people still perform the Passover feast. What ancient ceremonies or celebrations are still being celebrated after millennia? And yet, the Jewish people still celebrate Passover after all of these centuries!
I know of no other religious ceremony that has been celebrated as long as the Passover has been celebrated.
In the second part of this look into the Feast of Passover in prophecy, the true Passover Lamb will be revealed!
What the Passover teaches Christians - To be continued:
Lamb & Lion Ministries - Dr. Nathan E. Jones
Apr 4, 2023 10:06:02 #
[quote=Zemirah](Part 1 of 3)
Christians are not bound to observe the Jewish feasts as the Jewish people of the Old Testament were, but we can learn much from them Romans 14:5: "One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind." While it is not required for Christians to celebrate the Jewish feast days (Colossians 2:16-17), it is beneficial to study them.
Passover (Hebrew Pesach) begins before sundown on Wednesday, April 5, 2023, and ends after nightfall on April 13, 2023. The holiday of Pesach, or Passover, falls on the Hebrew calendar dates of Nissan 15-22. We are currently in the year 5783 on the Jewish calendar. The Jewish new year started on September 25, 2022 (the 1st of the Hebrew month of Tishrei).
A standard Jewish year has twelve months; six twenty-nine-day months, and six thirty-day months, for a total of 354 days. This is because the months follow the lunar orbit, which is approximately 29.5 days.
The seven-day week, the notion of a weekly day of rest, and many Christian and Islamic holiday observances owe their origins to the Jewish calendar, Sabbath, and festivals.
Note: The Jewish calendar day is from sundown to sundown. The date begins at sundown of the night beforehand on the western calendar. Thus all holiday observances begin at sundown on the secular dates listed, with the following day being the first full day of the holiday. (The first Passover seder is held on the evening of the first date listed.) Jewish calendar dates conclude at nightfall.
For millennia the Jewish people have celebrated the seven historical God-ordained Feasts of Israel revealed in Scripture: Passover, Unleavened Bread, First Fruits, Shavuot or Pentecost, Trumpets, Yom Kippur, and Sukkot. With Passover almost upon us, it is timely to examine the feast that originally marked the beginning of the Jewish year.
The Feast of Passover was the first feast ordained by God for His chosen people. It points back to their bondage in Egypt and to His great deliverance through His servant, Moses. Exodus 11 and 12 describe the horrific final plague that had struck the Egyptians and God’s provision for preserving His people while the firstborn throughout the land were being killed by the Angel of Death.
When it comes to the Feast of Passover, in Exodus 13:10, the Lord commanded, “You shall keep this ordinance at its appointed time from year to year.” The Jews have done just that down through the many centuries.
The prophetic significance of Passover is so obvious that even the spiritually undiscerning can see its implications to the Christian faith and how it offers insight to those with spiritual eyes to see.
In order to peel back some of the mystery and expound on the beauty and prophetic implications of this feast, Dr. Richard Hill, a “Jew born anew” and recognized expert in all things Jewishness, instructs in its meaning. Richard serves with CJF Ministries and as the Messianic pastor of the [Hebrew Christian] Beth Yeshua Messianic Congregation in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Elements of the First Passover
Richard Hill: Thank you, yes, I am going to teach you about Pesach, which is the Hebrew name for Passover. It’s better to go to the Scriptures.
Let’s go to Exodus 12. We are going to look at the first 14 verses. Here we find the Lord speaking to Moses and Aaron while they are attempting to free the captives from the land of Egypt.
Verses one and two: “Now the Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt. This month shall be the beginning of months for you. It is to be the first month of the year to you.” So, obviously, this month wasn’t the first of the year prior to this time. While in Egypt, the Hebrews had been following the Egyptian calendar, but now God has decided to begin a new Hebrew calendar. This is now the beginning of a new year for the Jewish people.
Verse three reads: “Speak to all the congregation of Israel saying on the tenth of this month [the tenth of Nisan] they are to each one take a lamb for themselves according to their father’s household, a lamb for each household.” The Hebrew word here is śeh and it means “kid.” So, they could take a lamb, but they could also take a goat.
Verse four reads, “Now, if the household is too small for a lamb, then he and his neighbor nearest to his house are to take one according to the number of persons in them, according to what each man should eat, you are to divide the lamb.” So, each household had a lamb, but if you didn’t have enough people in your family, you had to invite your neighbor or another household close by to come over to your house and eat this lamb or goat together. The rabbis determined that for every lamb that is slain you are supposed to have at least 10 to 20 people. The lamb feeds a lot of people!
The lamb shall be a one year old lamb, for as verse five states, “Your lamb shall be an unblemished male, a year old; you may take of it from the sheep or from the goats.” (Imagine Jewish people eating goat for Passover!) The Jewish people always ate lamb, but not anymore, not since 70 AD when the Temple was destroyed. The rabbis determined from that time on that you are not allowed to eat a Passover lamb because you couldn’t sacrifice it in the Temple. Today, we substitute other meats such as brisket, chicken, and turkey. Different parts of the world eat different meats.
Verse six commands, “And you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same month when the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel is to kill it at twilight.” The families kept their poor little lamb for four days. Well, what about the children? What’s going on in their minds? They are becoming attached to that little lamb. Isn’t that the point? We become attached to the Passover lamb, better understanding how that little lamb is going to die for our redemption. So, yes, I think the Lord wanted us to become attached to better understand what this death really was going to mean to that household.
Verse seven orders, “Moreover, they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts on the lintel of the houses in which they eat.” They would slit the lamb right on the jugular vein so that the lamb dies instantly. There was to be no suffering whatsoever. That’s a kosher commandment within Judaism. You’re not allowed to let the animal suffer.
The families would then take a bowl and collect the blood. And, what were they to do with the blood? They painted it on their doorpost, particularly the lintel which is the upper-middle portion, then along the left and right sides. What sign is that? If you just paint a little bit up top, a little bit on one side, and a little bit on the other side, you make the sign of the cross.
Imagine being a Jewish person at that time and learning that God said, “I want you to paint the blood on the doorpost.” Being Jewish, I’m thinking: “I’m going to paint my whole house! I don’t want the Angel of Death to not see the blood that’s covering my household.” But, you just needed to go across the whole lintel, down one whole side, and then down the other side. This shape in Hebrew is called the chai. The first letter is a chet and chai means “life” — i’chaim — “to live”. And so, when you put the blood on the doorpost of your house, then you are going to have life; you’re not going to have death.
Verse eight continues, “They shall eat the flesh that same night, roasted with fire, and they shall eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.” All of the meat needed to be roasted by fire, so there’s no boiling it in water or anything like that.
Here’s where the unleavened bread comes in. Passover runs the whole day and then you eat the Passover meal at night. That first night serves then as the first night of the Feast of Unleavened Bread. God says to eat unleavened bread, but also, bitter herbs. Rabbi Gamaliel from the New Testament was Paul’s rabbi. He’s the one who said at that time on the Feast of Passover every Jewish person needs to talk about at least three things: the Passover lamb, the unleavened bread, and the bitter herbs.
Verses nine and ten read: “Do not eat any of it raw or boiled at all with water,” which we explained, “but rather roast it with fire, both its head and its legs along with its entrails. And you shall not leave any of it over until morning, but whatever is left of it until morning you shall burn it with fire.” So, there should remain nothing left of the animal. All of it would be destroyed. It’s a done deal. God’s grace is sufficient.
Verse 11 adds, “You shall eat it in this manner: with your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand: and you shall eat it in haste — it is the Lord’s Passover.” They were to eat in haste because the Jews of the Exodus were getting ready to leave as quickly as possible. Now, we know they didn’t leave right away, but God wanted them just to be ready to go at a moment’s notice.
Of course, today we do not celebrate Passover that speedily anymore. We are not killing lambs and putting their blood on our doorposts. Nor are we girding our robes into our waistbands. Rather, instead, we sit on nice soft cushy pillows, as if that will remind us of our past slavery.
The proper way to eat the Passover meal is to sit reclined at the table, and we still sit that way reclining. Jesus at the Passover would have used a smaller table than what we see in DiVinci’s famous painting “The Last Supper,” and they would have reclined on pillows on the ground.
The bread wasn’t as high as DiVinci depicted either, for the bread would have been very thin, as it was unleavened bread. Leaven is the yeast that makes bread rise. The Hebrews of the Exodus didn’t put yeast in their bread because they had to cook their bread and get out of Egypt as fast as possible. We see that right in verse 11 where it says that they’re going to eat it in haste and so weren’t able to take the time to put leaven in their bread. Later on, they baked leaven in, of course. The night after the Hebrews departed they likely baked leaven in their meals.
God reveals his plans for the Egyptian slavers in verse 12, “For I will go through the land of Egypt on that night and I will strike down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt, I will execute judgments — I am the Lord.” God’s punishment struck upon the Egyptians and Pharaoh and against all of their false gods. The ten plagues were in fact judgments against the Egyptian gods. Yahweh undermined the top ten Egyptian gods because Egypt had a whole lot of gods. God took their worthless gods to task thereby demonstrating that Yahweh is God alone and over all their gods. Yahweh stands apart as the one and only God. As Yul Brynner says at the end of the movie The Ten Commandments — [b]“Their God is God.”;/b]
Pharoah came to realize the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob — the Hebrew God — is the one true God because he had defeated all of the Egyptian gods.
The issue is that God needs to be honored and worshiped. We see the same need in Ezekiel’s prophecy of the Gog-Magog War, where God reveals that He supernaturally defeated Gog and his hordes so that, “I will be God for all.”
Verse 13 promises, “And the blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live; when I see the blood, I will pass over you…” That’s where we get the Hebrew word pesach, for in Hebrew it means “passing over you.” And, when the Angel of Death passes over the blood-protected houses, “no plague will befall you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.”
Ongoing Celebration of the Passover
Richard Hill: Exodus 12:14 gives God’s command for the Jewish people to continue the Feast of Passover: “Now, this day will be 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.” The Jewish people were to continue, even to this day and into the future, to celebrate Passover. By doing so, they will remember what God has achieved in providing the miraculous deliverance of His people out of the land of sin — out of the land of Egypt — and by bringing them into the land of Israel.
To think that it’s been over 3,400 years since the Exodus? And yet, today, the Jewish people still perform the Passover feast. What ancient ceremonies or celebrations are still being celebrated after millennia? And yet, the Jewish people still celebrate Passover after all of these centuries!
I know of no other religious ceremony that has been celebrated as long as the Passover has been celebrated.
In the second part of this look into the Feast of Passover in prophecy, the true Passover Lamb will be revealed!
What the Passover teaches Christians - To be continued:
Lamb & Lion Ministries - Dr. Nathan E. Jones[/quote]
A church I used to go to, put on a Seder dinner once. It wasn’t as meaningful as I expected. It felt like a movie, not a field trip.
Christians are not bound to observe the Jewish feasts as the Jewish people of the Old Testament were, but we can learn much from them Romans 14:5: "One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind." While it is not required for Christians to celebrate the Jewish feast days (Colossians 2:16-17), it is beneficial to study them.
Passover (Hebrew Pesach) begins before sundown on Wednesday, April 5, 2023, and ends after nightfall on April 13, 2023. The holiday of Pesach, or Passover, falls on the Hebrew calendar dates of Nissan 15-22. We are currently in the year 5783 on the Jewish calendar. The Jewish new year started on September 25, 2022 (the 1st of the Hebrew month of Tishrei).
A standard Jewish year has twelve months; six twenty-nine-day months, and six thirty-day months, for a total of 354 days. This is because the months follow the lunar orbit, which is approximately 29.5 days.
The seven-day week, the notion of a weekly day of rest, and many Christian and Islamic holiday observances owe their origins to the Jewish calendar, Sabbath, and festivals.
Note: The Jewish calendar day is from sundown to sundown. The date begins at sundown of the night beforehand on the western calendar. Thus all holiday observances begin at sundown on the secular dates listed, with the following day being the first full day of the holiday. (The first Passover seder is held on the evening of the first date listed.) Jewish calendar dates conclude at nightfall.
For millennia the Jewish people have celebrated the seven historical God-ordained Feasts of Israel revealed in Scripture: Passover, Unleavened Bread, First Fruits, Shavuot or Pentecost, Trumpets, Yom Kippur, and Sukkot. With Passover almost upon us, it is timely to examine the feast that originally marked the beginning of the Jewish year.
The Feast of Passover was the first feast ordained by God for His chosen people. It points back to their bondage in Egypt and to His great deliverance through His servant, Moses. Exodus 11 and 12 describe the horrific final plague that had struck the Egyptians and God’s provision for preserving His people while the firstborn throughout the land were being killed by the Angel of Death.
When it comes to the Feast of Passover, in Exodus 13:10, the Lord commanded, “You shall keep this ordinance at its appointed time from year to year.” The Jews have done just that down through the many centuries.
The prophetic significance of Passover is so obvious that even the spiritually undiscerning can see its implications to the Christian faith and how it offers insight to those with spiritual eyes to see.
In order to peel back some of the mystery and expound on the beauty and prophetic implications of this feast, Dr. Richard Hill, a “Jew born anew” and recognized expert in all things Jewishness, instructs in its meaning. Richard serves with CJF Ministries and as the Messianic pastor of the [Hebrew Christian] Beth Yeshua Messianic Congregation in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Elements of the First Passover
Richard Hill: Thank you, yes, I am going to teach you about Pesach, which is the Hebrew name for Passover. It’s better to go to the Scriptures.
Let’s go to Exodus 12. We are going to look at the first 14 verses. Here we find the Lord speaking to Moses and Aaron while they are attempting to free the captives from the land of Egypt.
Verses one and two: “Now the Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt. This month shall be the beginning of months for you. It is to be the first month of the year to you.” So, obviously, this month wasn’t the first of the year prior to this time. While in Egypt, the Hebrews had been following the Egyptian calendar, but now God has decided to begin a new Hebrew calendar. This is now the beginning of a new year for the Jewish people.
Verse three reads: “Speak to all the congregation of Israel saying on the tenth of this month [the tenth of Nisan] they are to each one take a lamb for themselves according to their father’s household, a lamb for each household.” The Hebrew word here is śeh and it means “kid.” So, they could take a lamb, but they could also take a goat.
Verse four reads, “Now, if the household is too small for a lamb, then he and his neighbor nearest to his house are to take one according to the number of persons in them, according to what each man should eat, you are to divide the lamb.” So, each household had a lamb, but if you didn’t have enough people in your family, you had to invite your neighbor or another household close by to come over to your house and eat this lamb or goat together. The rabbis determined that for every lamb that is slain you are supposed to have at least 10 to 20 people. The lamb feeds a lot of people!
The lamb shall be a one year old lamb, for as verse five states, “Your lamb shall be an unblemished male, a year old; you may take of it from the sheep or from the goats.” (Imagine Jewish people eating goat for Passover!) The Jewish people always ate lamb, but not anymore, not since 70 AD when the Temple was destroyed. The rabbis determined from that time on that you are not allowed to eat a Passover lamb because you couldn’t sacrifice it in the Temple. Today, we substitute other meats such as brisket, chicken, and turkey. Different parts of the world eat different meats.
Verse six commands, “And you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same month when the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel is to kill it at twilight.” The families kept their poor little lamb for four days. Well, what about the children? What’s going on in their minds? They are becoming attached to that little lamb. Isn’t that the point? We become attached to the Passover lamb, better understanding how that little lamb is going to die for our redemption. So, yes, I think the Lord wanted us to become attached to better understand what this death really was going to mean to that household.
Verse seven orders, “Moreover, they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts on the lintel of the houses in which they eat.” They would slit the lamb right on the jugular vein so that the lamb dies instantly. There was to be no suffering whatsoever. That’s a kosher commandment within Judaism. You’re not allowed to let the animal suffer.
The families would then take a bowl and collect the blood. And, what were they to do with the blood? They painted it on their doorpost, particularly the lintel which is the upper-middle portion, then along the left and right sides. What sign is that? If you just paint a little bit up top, a little bit on one side, and a little bit on the other side, you make the sign of the cross.
Imagine being a Jewish person at that time and learning that God said, “I want you to paint the blood on the doorpost.” Being Jewish, I’m thinking: “I’m going to paint my whole house! I don’t want the Angel of Death to not see the blood that’s covering my household.” But, you just needed to go across the whole lintel, down one whole side, and then down the other side. This shape in Hebrew is called the chai. The first letter is a chet and chai means “life” — i’chaim — “to live”. And so, when you put the blood on the doorpost of your house, then you are going to have life; you’re not going to have death.
Verse eight continues, “They shall eat the flesh that same night, roasted with fire, and they shall eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.” All of the meat needed to be roasted by fire, so there’s no boiling it in water or anything like that.
Here’s where the unleavened bread comes in. Passover runs the whole day and then you eat the Passover meal at night. That first night serves then as the first night of the Feast of Unleavened Bread. God says to eat unleavened bread, but also, bitter herbs. Rabbi Gamaliel from the New Testament was Paul’s rabbi. He’s the one who said at that time on the Feast of Passover every Jewish person needs to talk about at least three things: the Passover lamb, the unleavened bread, and the bitter herbs.
Verses nine and ten read: “Do not eat any of it raw or boiled at all with water,” which we explained, “but rather roast it with fire, both its head and its legs along with its entrails. And you shall not leave any of it over until morning, but whatever is left of it until morning you shall burn it with fire.” So, there should remain nothing left of the animal. All of it would be destroyed. It’s a done deal. God’s grace is sufficient.
Verse 11 adds, “You shall eat it in this manner: with your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand: and you shall eat it in haste — it is the Lord’s Passover.” They were to eat in haste because the Jews of the Exodus were getting ready to leave as quickly as possible. Now, we know they didn’t leave right away, but God wanted them just to be ready to go at a moment’s notice.
Of course, today we do not celebrate Passover that speedily anymore. We are not killing lambs and putting their blood on our doorposts. Nor are we girding our robes into our waistbands. Rather, instead, we sit on nice soft cushy pillows, as if that will remind us of our past slavery.
The proper way to eat the Passover meal is to sit reclined at the table, and we still sit that way reclining. Jesus at the Passover would have used a smaller table than what we see in DiVinci’s famous painting “The Last Supper,” and they would have reclined on pillows on the ground.
The bread wasn’t as high as DiVinci depicted either, for the bread would have been very thin, as it was unleavened bread. Leaven is the yeast that makes bread rise. The Hebrews of the Exodus didn’t put yeast in their bread because they had to cook their bread and get out of Egypt as fast as possible. We see that right in verse 11 where it says that they’re going to eat it in haste and so weren’t able to take the time to put leaven in their bread. Later on, they baked leaven in, of course. The night after the Hebrews departed they likely baked leaven in their meals.
God reveals his plans for the Egyptian slavers in verse 12, “For I will go through the land of Egypt on that night and I will strike down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt, I will execute judgments — I am the Lord.” God’s punishment struck upon the Egyptians and Pharaoh and against all of their false gods. The ten plagues were in fact judgments against the Egyptian gods. Yahweh undermined the top ten Egyptian gods because Egypt had a whole lot of gods. God took their worthless gods to task thereby demonstrating that Yahweh is God alone and over all their gods. Yahweh stands apart as the one and only God. As Yul Brynner says at the end of the movie The Ten Commandments — [b]“Their God is God.”;/b]
Pharoah came to realize the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob — the Hebrew God — is the one true God because he had defeated all of the Egyptian gods.
The issue is that God needs to be honored and worshiped. We see the same need in Ezekiel’s prophecy of the Gog-Magog War, where God reveals that He supernaturally defeated Gog and his hordes so that, “I will be God for all.”
Verse 13 promises, “And the blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live; when I see the blood, I will pass over you…” That’s where we get the Hebrew word pesach, for in Hebrew it means “passing over you.” And, when the Angel of Death passes over the blood-protected houses, “no plague will befall you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.”
Ongoing Celebration of the Passover
Richard Hill: Exodus 12:14 gives God’s command for the Jewish people to continue the Feast of Passover: “Now, this day will be 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.” The Jewish people were to continue, even to this day and into the future, to celebrate Passover. By doing so, they will remember what God has achieved in providing the miraculous deliverance of His people out of the land of sin — out of the land of Egypt — and by bringing them into the land of Israel.
To think that it’s been over 3,400 years since the Exodus? And yet, today, the Jewish people still perform the Passover feast. What ancient ceremonies or celebrations are still being celebrated after millennia? And yet, the Jewish people still celebrate Passover after all of these centuries!
I know of no other religious ceremony that has been celebrated as long as the Passover has been celebrated.
In the second part of this look into the Feast of Passover in prophecy, the true Passover Lamb will be revealed!
What the Passover teaches Christians - To be continued:
Lamb & Lion Ministries - Dr. Nathan E. Jones[/quote]
A church I used to go to, put on a Seder dinner once. It wasn’t as meaningful as I expected. It felt like a movie, not a field trip.
Apr 4, 2023 18:32:43 #
Marty,
The Supper that Jesus instituted on the night he was betrayed was a new Passover meal. Or we might say that the Passover was the Old Testament Lord’s Supper.
I too have been underwhelmed when observing the attempted reenactment of the Passover seder (ritual meal) by a well meaning local Christian congregation of Christ's body. It has a tendency to go off the rails.
First of all, the Passover meal was a family affair, occurring in the home - sometimes shared with one or two neighbor families. It is observed in that same manner today, not in synagogues or temples, but in Jewish homes.
When accurately apprehending the spiritual meaning of the O.T.'s Passover - historically accurate events which all point forward to their fulfillment in Jesus' life (as do the other six O.T. feasts/festivals), it is, IMHO, best understood cognitively, from the written scriptures - through the reasoning of the mind, rather than attempting to subjectively "experience" it through a living "video" of contemporary believers.
Jesus said over and over "It is written" never, "Well, rewrite this," or "dramatize that."
After Jesus observed His final Passover meal with His disciples immediately before His crucifixion, establishing Himself as the Passover lamb, they referred to it in the N.T., through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, twenty eight times as the Lord's Supper.
The reason the Lord instituted the Passover was so that people of Israel would always remember and proclaim their redemption from Egypt:
"This day shall be for you a memorial day, and you shall keep it as a feast to the Lord; throughout your generations, as a statute forever, you shall keep it as a feast. (Exodus 12:14)
And when you come to the land that the Lord will give you, as He has promised, you shall keep this service. And when your children say to you, 'What do you mean by this service?' you shall say, ‘It is the sacrifice of the Lord's Passover, for He passed over the houses of the people of Israel in Egypt, when He struck the Egyptians but spared our houses.'" (Exodus 12:25-27)
The Lord’s Supper was instituted for the same reason:
For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when He was betrayed took bread, and when He had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also He took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes. (1 Corinthians 11:23-26)
O.T. Israel looked back to the Exodus through the Passover meal. N.T. Christian believers look back to the cross and resurrection of Jesus through the Lord’s Supper.
As often as we eat this new Passover meal we remember a greater exodus: "for He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and translated us into the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sin." (Colossians 1:13)
The Supper that Jesus instituted on the night he was betrayed was a new Passover meal. Or we might say that the Passover was the Old Testament Lord’s Supper.
I too have been underwhelmed when observing the attempted reenactment of the Passover seder (ritual meal) by a well meaning local Christian congregation of Christ's body. It has a tendency to go off the rails.
First of all, the Passover meal was a family affair, occurring in the home - sometimes shared with one or two neighbor families. It is observed in that same manner today, not in synagogues or temples, but in Jewish homes.
When accurately apprehending the spiritual meaning of the O.T.'s Passover - historically accurate events which all point forward to their fulfillment in Jesus' life (as do the other six O.T. feasts/festivals), it is, IMHO, best understood cognitively, from the written scriptures - through the reasoning of the mind, rather than attempting to subjectively "experience" it through a living "video" of contemporary believers.
Jesus said over and over "It is written" never, "Well, rewrite this," or "dramatize that."
After Jesus observed His final Passover meal with His disciples immediately before His crucifixion, establishing Himself as the Passover lamb, they referred to it in the N.T., through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, twenty eight times as the Lord's Supper.
The reason the Lord instituted the Passover was so that people of Israel would always remember and proclaim their redemption from Egypt:
"This day shall be for you a memorial day, and you shall keep it as a feast to the Lord; throughout your generations, as a statute forever, you shall keep it as a feast. (Exodus 12:14)
And when you come to the land that the Lord will give you, as He has promised, you shall keep this service. And when your children say to you, 'What do you mean by this service?' you shall say, ‘It is the sacrifice of the Lord's Passover, for He passed over the houses of the people of Israel in Egypt, when He struck the Egyptians but spared our houses.'" (Exodus 12:25-27)
The Lord’s Supper was instituted for the same reason:
For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when He was betrayed took bread, and when He had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also He took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes. (1 Corinthians 11:23-26)
O.T. Israel looked back to the Exodus through the Passover meal. N.T. Christian believers look back to the cross and resurrection of Jesus through the Lord’s Supper.
As often as we eat this new Passover meal we remember a greater exodus: "for He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and translated us into the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sin." (Colossians 1:13)
Apr 4, 2023 18:56:40 #
Apr 4, 2023 23:04:19 #
(Part 2 of 3)
Christians are not bound to observe the Jewish feasts as the Jewish people of the Old Testament were, but we can learn much from them Romans 14:5: "One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind." While it is not required for Christians to celebrate the Jewish feast days (Colossians 2:16-17), it is beneficial to study them.
Passover (Hebrew Pesach) begins before sundown on Wednesday, April 5, 2023, and ends after nightfall on April 13, 2023. The holiday of Pesach, or Passover, falls on the Hebrew calendar dates of Nissan 15-22. We are currently in the year 5783 on the Jewish calendar. The Jewish new year started on September 25, 2022 (the 1st of the Hebrew month of Tishrei).[/quote]
Part 2 of 3
The True Passover Lamb
A later prophet, Jeremiah, would come on the scene and reveal that there’s a coming deliverance for the Jewish people that is even greater than God’s deliverance from their bondage in Egypt (Jeremiah 16:14-15; 23:7-8). This Passover feast that’s been commemorated for thousands of years and is so culturally central to the Jewish identity will be surpassed by a latter-day deliverance when God brings the Jewish people back into their own land a second time. The world has begun to witness the miraculous second regathering within our lifetimes. Still, people have yet to recognize that today’s regathering of the Jewish people from the four corners of the world back to the Holy Land is a greater miracle than even the Exodus.
The Jewish people regathering, as Isaiah 11:10-12 and Ezekiel 36:22-28 prophesy, and Israel being reborn as a nation again, as Isaiah 66:7-8 and Zechariah 12:3-6 prophesy, and then the Messiah soon returning to Israel, was prophesied to be remembered as greater than their deliverance from the Exodus had been.
Richard Hill: Yes, there were to be two prophesied worldwide regatherings of the Jewish people. The first was a return from Babylon, and now we are living through the second which will finally culminate at the end of the Tribulation.
It is fascinating that even as Abraham was about to sacrifice Isaac — at the last instant — God intervened and commanded, “Stay your hand!” Nearby there was a ram caught up in the bush. Like the Passover sheep or goat, God in providing a replacement animal was foreshadowing the ultimate sacrifice He would provide for all of the people of the world. While the Jews commemorated their deliverance every year that there remained a Temple by killing a lamb, the act pointed to an even greater Lamb who was to come. It took all the way to John 1:29 where John the Baptist in seeing Jesus coming toward him declares, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” The Passover comes full circle in pointing to the Lamb of God — Jesus Christ.
Richard Hill: Why did John call Jesus the Lamb of God? Because Jesus is the fulfillment of the Passover. He became the Passover lamb — the one and only. Christ would take the sins of the world upon Himself by His own sacrifice.
Some messianic Passover seders, even hosted by Jews for Jesus, show that the Old Testament Passover ceremony, as well as all of the other Jewish feasts, purvey Messianic implications. As we just read what John the Baptist declared saying, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world,” are we to say then that this declaration was meant to help the Jewish people to see Jesus Christ when He died on the cross and make that connection to the Passover sacrifice? And, if so, why haven’t they made that connection? Only a messianic remnant seems to have understood the Passover symbol.
Richard Hill: Yes, John the Baptist meant to make the obvious connection between the Passover lamb and Jesus. The Jews needed to see Jesus as the Messiah — the Passover Lamb — the one who would die for the sins of the world.
We Jews have a really difficult time understanding that a human being can die for another’s sin. That’s a very difficult concept for us to understand. We Messianic Jews don’t classify Jesus as only human, of course, for we consider Him to be God as well — 100% God and 100% man. But, Jews often don’t understand that, and yet we have to be able to try and reach Jews with that message.
Why haven’t many of the Jewish people made the connection between Jesus and Passover?
There’s a veil that the Lord has allowed to cover their spiritual eyes due to a greater glory coming. The answer to that question is because in the end God will be glorified even greater when He fulfills His promises to the Jewish people, for it really is about Him.
Richard Hill: But, it also has a lot to do with Jewish persecution under the name of Jesus. That’s really been the issue for the Jews over the past 2,000 years. Jewish people have been persecuted under Jesus’ name. Hitler claimed to be a Christian, and yet he killed six million Jewish people. Other mashugana leaders — crazy leaders — have killed Jews under the name of Jesus, and so Christianity has a problem that blinds a lot of Jews to anything related to Jesus.
Then we read the book of Malachi, about how the Jewish people were bringing blind, lame, blemished, and even stolen animals for their sacrifices. They didn’t understand why they had to sacrifice, why the lamb had to be white, why it had to be unblemished, why it had to be a certain age, and why its bones couldn’t be broken. It’s strange that for a feast that’s been practiced for say 3,400-3,500 years, the elements in it seem to have been lost to so many people, not just during the Church Age.
Or, they get caught up in the elements alone without realizing that they point to something greater. These were merely the shadows of something greater to come.
The third and last part of this look into the prophetic Feast of Passover will show why the Passover is tied to the Last Supper and Communion!
What the Passover teaches Christians - will be continued (Part 3 of 3):
Lamb & Lion Ministries - Dr. Nathan E. Jones
Christians are not bound to observe the Jewish feasts as the Jewish people of the Old Testament were, but we can learn much from them Romans 14:5: "One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind." While it is not required for Christians to celebrate the Jewish feast days (Colossians 2:16-17), it is beneficial to study them.
Passover (Hebrew Pesach) begins before sundown on Wednesday, April 5, 2023, and ends after nightfall on April 13, 2023. The holiday of Pesach, or Passover, falls on the Hebrew calendar dates of Nissan 15-22. We are currently in the year 5783 on the Jewish calendar. The Jewish new year started on September 25, 2022 (the 1st of the Hebrew month of Tishrei).[/quote]
Part 2 of 3
The True Passover Lamb
A later prophet, Jeremiah, would come on the scene and reveal that there’s a coming deliverance for the Jewish people that is even greater than God’s deliverance from their bondage in Egypt (Jeremiah 16:14-15; 23:7-8). This Passover feast that’s been commemorated for thousands of years and is so culturally central to the Jewish identity will be surpassed by a latter-day deliverance when God brings the Jewish people back into their own land a second time. The world has begun to witness the miraculous second regathering within our lifetimes. Still, people have yet to recognize that today’s regathering of the Jewish people from the four corners of the world back to the Holy Land is a greater miracle than even the Exodus.
The Jewish people regathering, as Isaiah 11:10-12 and Ezekiel 36:22-28 prophesy, and Israel being reborn as a nation again, as Isaiah 66:7-8 and Zechariah 12:3-6 prophesy, and then the Messiah soon returning to Israel, was prophesied to be remembered as greater than their deliverance from the Exodus had been.
Richard Hill: Yes, there were to be two prophesied worldwide regatherings of the Jewish people. The first was a return from Babylon, and now we are living through the second which will finally culminate at the end of the Tribulation.
It is fascinating that even as Abraham was about to sacrifice Isaac — at the last instant — God intervened and commanded, “Stay your hand!” Nearby there was a ram caught up in the bush. Like the Passover sheep or goat, God in providing a replacement animal was foreshadowing the ultimate sacrifice He would provide for all of the people of the world. While the Jews commemorated their deliverance every year that there remained a Temple by killing a lamb, the act pointed to an even greater Lamb who was to come. It took all the way to John 1:29 where John the Baptist in seeing Jesus coming toward him declares, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” The Passover comes full circle in pointing to the Lamb of God — Jesus Christ.
Richard Hill: Why did John call Jesus the Lamb of God? Because Jesus is the fulfillment of the Passover. He became the Passover lamb — the one and only. Christ would take the sins of the world upon Himself by His own sacrifice.
Some messianic Passover seders, even hosted by Jews for Jesus, show that the Old Testament Passover ceremony, as well as all of the other Jewish feasts, purvey Messianic implications. As we just read what John the Baptist declared saying, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world,” are we to say then that this declaration was meant to help the Jewish people to see Jesus Christ when He died on the cross and make that connection to the Passover sacrifice? And, if so, why haven’t they made that connection? Only a messianic remnant seems to have understood the Passover symbol.
Richard Hill: Yes, John the Baptist meant to make the obvious connection between the Passover lamb and Jesus. The Jews needed to see Jesus as the Messiah — the Passover Lamb — the one who would die for the sins of the world.
We Jews have a really difficult time understanding that a human being can die for another’s sin. That’s a very difficult concept for us to understand. We Messianic Jews don’t classify Jesus as only human, of course, for we consider Him to be God as well — 100% God and 100% man. But, Jews often don’t understand that, and yet we have to be able to try and reach Jews with that message.
Why haven’t many of the Jewish people made the connection between Jesus and Passover?
There’s a veil that the Lord has allowed to cover their spiritual eyes due to a greater glory coming. The answer to that question is because in the end God will be glorified even greater when He fulfills His promises to the Jewish people, for it really is about Him.
Richard Hill: But, it also has a lot to do with Jewish persecution under the name of Jesus. That’s really been the issue for the Jews over the past 2,000 years. Jewish people have been persecuted under Jesus’ name. Hitler claimed to be a Christian, and yet he killed six million Jewish people. Other mashugana leaders — crazy leaders — have killed Jews under the name of Jesus, and so Christianity has a problem that blinds a lot of Jews to anything related to Jesus.
Then we read the book of Malachi, about how the Jewish people were bringing blind, lame, blemished, and even stolen animals for their sacrifices. They didn’t understand why they had to sacrifice, why the lamb had to be white, why it had to be unblemished, why it had to be a certain age, and why its bones couldn’t be broken. It’s strange that for a feast that’s been practiced for say 3,400-3,500 years, the elements in it seem to have been lost to so many people, not just during the Church Age.
Or, they get caught up in the elements alone without realizing that they point to something greater. These were merely the shadows of something greater to come.
The third and last part of this look into the prophetic Feast of Passover will show why the Passover is tied to the Last Supper and Communion!
What the Passover teaches Christians - will be continued (Part 3 of 3):
Lamb & Lion Ministries - Dr. Nathan E. Jones
Apr 5, 2023 00:12:23 #
Zemirah wrote:
(Part 2 of 3) br br Christians are not bound to o... (show quote)
Part 2 of 3
The True Passover Lamb
A later prophet, Jeremiah, would come on the scene and reveal that there’s a coming deliverance for the Jewish people that is even greater than God’s deliverance from their bondage in Egypt (Jeremiah 16:14-15; 23:7-8). This Passover feast that’s been commemorated for thousands of years and is so culturally central to the Jewish identity will be surpassed by a latter-day deliverance when God brings the Jewish people back into their own land a second time. The world has begun to witness the miraculous second regathering within our lifetimes. Still, people have yet to recognize that today’s regathering of the Jewish people from the four corners of the world back to the Holy Land is a greater miracle than even the Exodus.
The Jewish people regathering, as Isaiah 11:10-12 and Ezekiel 36:22-28 prophesy, and Israel being reborn as a nation again, as Isaiah 66:7-8 and Zechariah 12:3-6 prophesy, and then the Messiah soon returning to Israel, was prophesied to be remembered as greater than their deliverance from the Exodus had been.
Richard Hill: Yes, there were to be two prophesied worldwide regatherings of the Jewish people. The first was a return from Babylon, and now we are living through the second which will finally culminate at the end of the Tribulation.
It is fascinating that even as Abraham was about to sacrifice Isaac — at the last instant — God intervened and commanded, “Stay your hand!” Nearby there was a ram caught up in the bush. Like the Passover sheep or goat, God in providing a replacement animal was foreshadowing the ultimate sacrifice He would provide for all of the people of the world. While the Jews commemorated their deliverance every year that there remained a Temple by killing a lamb, the act pointed to an even greater Lamb who was to come. It took all the way to John 1:29 where John the Baptist in seeing Jesus coming toward him declares, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” The Passover comes full circle in pointing to the Lamb of God — Jesus Christ.
Richard Hill: Why did John call Jesus the Lamb of God? Because Jesus is the fulfillment of the Passover. He became the Passover lamb — the one and only. Christ would take the sins of the world upon Himself by His own sacrifice.
Some messianic Passover seders, even hosted by Jews for Jesus, show that the Old Testament Passover ceremony, as well as all of the other Jewish feasts, purvey Messianic implications. As we just read what John the Baptist declared saying, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world,” are we to say then that this declaration was meant to help the Jewish people to see Jesus Christ when He died on the cross and make that connection to the Passover sacrifice? And, if so, why haven’t they made that connection? Only a messianic remnant seems to have understood the Passover symbol.
Richard Hill: Yes, John the Baptist meant to make the obvious connection between the Passover lamb and Jesus. The Jews needed to see Jesus as the Messiah — the Passover Lamb — the one who would die for the sins of the world.
We Jews have a really difficult time understanding that a human being can die for another’s sin. That’s a very difficult concept for us to understand. We Messianic Jews don’t classify Jesus as only human, of course, for we consider Him to be God as well — 100% God and 100% man. But, Jews often don’t understand that, and yet we have to be able to try and reach Jews with that message.
Why haven’t many of the Jewish people made the connection between Jesus and Passover?
There’s a veil that the Lord has allowed to cover their spiritual eyes due to a greater glory coming. The answer to that question is because in the end God will be glorified even greater when He fulfills His promises to the Jewish people, for it really is about Him.
Richard Hill: But, it also has a lot to do with Jewish persecution under the name of Jesus. That’s really been the issue for the Jews over the past 2,000 years. Jewish people have been persecuted under Jesus’ name. Hitler claimed to be a Christian, and yet he killed six million Jewish people. Other mashugana leaders — crazy leaders — have killed Jews under the name of Jesus, and so Christianity has a problem that blinds a lot of Jews to anything related to Jesus.
Then we read the book of Malachi, about how the Jewish people were bringing blind, lame, blemished, and even stolen animals for their sacrifices. They didn’t understand why they had to sacrifice, why the lamb had to be white, why it had to be unblemished, why it had to be a certain age, and why its bones couldn’t be broken. It’s strange that for a feast that’s been practiced for say 3,400-3,500 years, the elements in it seem to have been lost to so many people, not just during the Church Age.
Or, they get caught up in the elements alone without realizing that they point to something greater. These were merely the shadows of something greater to come.
The third and last part of this look into the prophetic Feast of Passover will show why the Passover is tied to the Last Supper and Communion!
What the Passover teaches Christians - will be continued (Part 3 of 3):
Lamb & Lion Ministries - Dr. Nathan E. Jones[/quote]
Hurry up!
Where’s 3?
🤩🤩🤩
Apr 5, 2023 03:20:08 #
Marty 2020 wrote:
Hurry up!
Where’s 3?
🤩🤩🤩
Where’s 3?
🤩🤩🤩
Here's a filler, Marty, before the actual 3rd part of the three.
Few people who do not annually celebrate the annual Passover seder have ever heard of the Afikomen, and few observant Jews who do, other than the Hebrew Christian/Messianic Jews actually understand it's symbolism.
Breaking the Matzah and Hiding the Afikomen - So what does the Afikomen have to do with the Messiah? Plenty.
There are three pieces of matzah (unleavened bread) used during a Passover Seder. Three pieces of matzah, each in a separate section, yet joined into one. The rabbis call these three “a unity.” Some consider it a unity of the three patriarchs - Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Modern Messianic Jews, those who worship Jesus consider it representative of the trinity—The Father, Son and Holy Spirit—Three in one.
The matzah is pierced and striped. Jesus, the Messiah, was without sin, yet He was "striped" by way of the Roman whip, and "pierced" by nails through His hands and feet and by a spear in His side. It is not a coincidence that the central item of the Passover, the matzah, points to the One that Paul called "Messiah our Passover."
If we examine the matzah carefully, we see that not only is it unleavened, but it is pierced and striped. King David wrote prophetically 1,000 years before Christ, of the Messiah in Psalm 22: "For dogs have surrounded me; a band of evildoers has encompassed me; They pierced my hands and my feet."
Each year, the matzah points to One who was sinless, striped, and pierced - the same One whom John the Baptist called “the Lamb of God” - the One whose sacrifice would bring redemption from the penalty of sin.
The matzah is unleavened. Throughout the Scripture, leaven is a symbol of fermentation and corruption and is a symbol of sin. For example, in Leviticus 2:11 we read: No grain offering, which you bring to the Lord, shall be made with leaven, for you shall not offer up in smoke any leaven…as an offering by fire to the Lord. This offering was to be made without leaven as a symbol that it was holy before the Lord.
Exodus 13:6-7 tells us that only unleavened bread should be eaten at Passover. Since leaven is a symbol of sin, to begin the Passover season by eating only unleavened bread is symbolic of beginning a life free from sin. Jesus was our perfect example of this because he lived a sinless life.
During the fourth part of the seder (called Yachatz), the leader will break the middle of these three pieces in two.
The smaller piece is returned to the seder table and the larger piece is wrapped in a clean white linen napkin and set aside. This larger piece is called the afikomen (The word afikomen - the prefix "epi-," is Greek for "over" - is from the Greek epikomen or epikomion, meaning “that which comes after,” i.e., "dessert." It is so called not because it is sweet, but because it is the last item of food eaten at the Passover seder meal.
Traditionally, after the afikomen is broken, it is hidden away/buried. The children leave the room and while they are gone, the leader “buries” (hides) the afikomen, this wrapped piece of matzah, somewhere in the room. Then the children return. They are encouraged sometime during the meal to earnestly search for the “buried treasure” of unleavened bread which is striped and pierced, wrapped in cloth, buried, earnestly sought, and when discovered, found to be of great value. This clearly parallels the events surrounding the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus.
Depending on the family, who are oblivious to it's meaning, either the leader hides the afikomen during the meal or the children at the table "steal" the afikomen and hide it. Either way, the seder cannot be concluded until the afikomen is found and returned to the table so each guest can eat a piece of it. If the seder leader hid the afikomen the children at the table must search for it and bring it back. They receive a reward (usually candy, money or a small gift) when they bring it back to the table. Likewise, if the children "stole" the afikomen, the seder leader ransoms it back from them with a reward so that the seder can continue. For example, when the children find the hidden afikomen they would each receive a piece of chocolate in exchange for giving it back to the seder leader.
Purpose of the Afikomen
In ancient biblical times, the Passover sacrifice used to be the last thing consumed during the Passover seder during the First and Second Temple eras. The afikomen is a substitute for the Passover sacrifice according to the Mishnah in Pesahim 119a.
The Mishnah is a man-made document that describes a life of sanctification, in which the rituals of the Temple are adapted for communal participation in a Jewish world that no longer has a Temple. The Mishnah is the first collection of the Jewish oral traditions - mostly halachic (Halakhah, (Hebrew: "the Way") also spelled Halakha, in Judaism, the totality of laws and ordinances that have evolved since biblical times to regulate religious observances and the daily life and conduct of the Jewish people). Jewish traditions compiled about a.d. 200 and written down as the basic part of the Talmud Mishnaic. It is not Scripture, it is the first major work of rabbinic literature.
The practice of hiding/burying the afikomen was not part of the original Passover described in the book of Exodus. It is often asked when it was introduced to the service; a very good question to which there is no definitive answer. The Hagaddah (the booklet used during the Seder) does not explain it. And how did the Afikomen get a Greek name anyway?
The Mishnah (ancient Jewish writings) instructs that the Passover lamb must be the last food eaten the night of the Seder. So because there are no more lambs served at the seder – the afikoman is now a substitute for the Passover sacrifice (Pesahim 119b.)
Again, since the destruction of the Temple in the year 70CE, the Afikomen has now become a symbolic “reminder” of the Passover lambs we used to eat, but no longer do.
Concluding the Seder
Once the afikomen is returned, each guest receives a small portion at least the size of an olive. This is done after the meal and normal deserts have been eaten so that the last taste of the meal is matzah. After the afikomen is eaten, the Birkas haMazon (grace after meals) is recited and the seder is concluded.
Messianic Jews delight in this ceremony. Why? Because this is a beautiful picture of the Messiah Yeshua (Jesus’ name in Hebrew!)
They know that the Messiah’s sinless body was ‘broken’ in death, wrapped in a cloth and hidden (as in burial), then brought back alive again; resurrected by the power of God. And He is still found by children (like us) who actively look for Him!
The entire Passover is pointing to Jesus Christ, who has already come as Messiah and fulfilled the symbolism. When we take communion, we read from 1 Corinthians 11:24: “And when He had given thanks, He broke it, and said, Take, eat, this is My body, which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of Me.”
Passover is the reminder of a sinless sacrifice made on our behalf. When the afikomen is eaten at the conclusion of the meal, it is a reminder of the sacrificial lamb which was eaten. Consider the symbolism of the matzah: unleavened, striped, pierced, broken, wrapped in a white linen cloth, “buried,” diligently sought, with a reward going to the discoverer. Now, it is freely offered, but as with all free gifts, one must accept it - otherwise it cannot be enjoyed.
Someday the entire surviving Jewish people will understand this and will rejoice.
This was an extra, Part # 3 is yet to come.
Apr 5, 2023 10:27:43 #
Zemirah wrote:
Here's a filler, Marty, before the actual 3rd part... (show quote)
Quite intense!
Thank you 🙏
Apr 6, 2023 00:20:59 #
The Feast of Passover is Prophecy Proclaiming Yeshua Ha-Mashiach - Jesus the Christ
(Part #3 of 3)
God established the Passover to ultimately see Jews and Gentiles celebrating it together.
The Passover table has four cups.
1) The Cup of Sanctification This cup represents holiness and the cleansing we receive from the Lord.
2) The Cup of Plagues This cup reminds us of the deliverance from the plagues of Egypt.
3) The Cup of Redemption We take “The Cup of Redemption” for our communion cup.
4) The Cup of Praise This was the cup Jesus declined to drink prior to His death and resurrection. In a Jewish wedding, the groom extends this cup to the bride, and she drinks from it to signify her acceptance of the covenant being offered, sealing the marriage. The fourth cup of Passover is the consummation cup.
Dr. Richard Hill, a “Jew born anew” who serves with CJF Ministries and as the Christian Hebrew/Messianic pastor of Beth Yeshua Messianic Congregation in Las Vegas, Nevada, will show how and why the Passover is tied to Jesus' Last Supper - (Communion).
Every element in the Passover Seder meal has meaning. The bitter herbs (horseradish) remind us of the bitterness of our slavery in Egypt. The bowl of salt water represents the tears shed by the Israelite slaves, and the charoset (a paste of nuts, apples, pears and wine) ...represents the mortar they were forced to make — everything points symbolically backward to the Exodus and also looks forward to its fulfillment in Jesus’ sacrifice, once-for-all on the Cross.
At the last Passover meal that Jesus shared with His disciples, in Luke 22:14-23, Jesus said, “I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover,” (the one they were about to partake the night before His crucifixion), "...with you before I suffer."
Then He added, "For I say to you, I shall never again eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God." So there’s yet another coming fulfillment. Yes, Passover points to Christ crucified, but there’s another greater fulfillment that Jesus says will come in the fullness of time in which the entire feast will be fulfilled.
Richard Hill: "Yes, because we’re going to be celebrating Passover and all of the Jewish Feasts during the Messianic Kingdom."
So Jesus' Last Supper and the ancient Passover became one and the same event at the time of Christ’s crucifixion!
Jesus established the Last Supper when He took the bread and cup and shared them with His disciples. In Luke 22:20, Jesus said, “This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant in My blood.”
The Apostle Paul explained that our commemoration of the New Covenant is by the act of Communion, and that we are to remember Christ’s sacrifice as often as Christians meeting together eat the bread and drink of the cup of wine to proclaim the death of the Lord until He returns. There is, therefore, a forward-looking aspect to the commemoration of Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection in the ordained Last Supper of His witnesses, His ekklesia.
Richard Hill: "At this Communion instituted at the Last Supper, Jesus was obtaining the elements from the ancient Passover Seder. He’s transporting the matzah, which is the bread eaten at the end of supper, and He’s drinking the "third Cup of Redemption," the cup now drank in Communion.
The Jewish people realize that they are anticipating something more because every family always leaves one seat empty at their Seder for Elijah, whose role prophetically?
Richard Hill: "Elijah is expected to appear to proclaim to the world the coming of the Messiah. The Jewish people at their Passover feasts each year all want Elijah to come to their meal because it would become even more a special time. So, they keep an extra chair at the table empty for Elijah who will be arriving to proclaim the advent of the Messiah. Should Elijah appear at their household, they anticipate with excitement that it would be a great honor to have Him proclaim the good news of the Messiah first to them. Afterward, Elijah will tell the rest of the world that the Messiah is coming."
These insights have been tremendously helpful in understanding the Jewish flavor of Passover and how central the feast is pointing to Jesus Christ. Even as the Jews hopefully anticipate Elijah coming to their table, they miss the bigger picture because Elijah was merely the precursor, the messenger announcing the Messiah whom they do not yet know. Rather than becoming excited about the messenger, we should all be excited about the Messiah!
From Malachi 3:2, the phrase "refiner’s fire" has been a popular verse in Western society for centuries due to its use in Handel’s famous oratorio Messiah. The verse reads, “But who can endure the day of His coming? Who can stand when He appears? For He will be like a refiner’s fire or a launderer’s soap.”
Jesus, the prophesied one is He about whom we should get excited. In the meantime, while the Jewish people are waiting, we who do know Him enjoy commemorating the Lord’s death, burial, and resurrection, as He requested, in Christian Communion, i.e., the Lord's Supper - or in a Passover Seder, - until He returns!
Lamb and Lion Ministries
Dr. Nathan E. Jones
(Part #3 of 3)
God established the Passover to ultimately see Jews and Gentiles celebrating it together.
The Passover table has four cups.
1) The Cup of Sanctification This cup represents holiness and the cleansing we receive from the Lord.
2) The Cup of Plagues This cup reminds us of the deliverance from the plagues of Egypt.
3) The Cup of Redemption We take “The Cup of Redemption” for our communion cup.
4) The Cup of Praise This was the cup Jesus declined to drink prior to His death and resurrection. In a Jewish wedding, the groom extends this cup to the bride, and she drinks from it to signify her acceptance of the covenant being offered, sealing the marriage. The fourth cup of Passover is the consummation cup.
Dr. Richard Hill, a “Jew born anew” who serves with CJF Ministries and as the Christian Hebrew/Messianic pastor of Beth Yeshua Messianic Congregation in Las Vegas, Nevada, will show how and why the Passover is tied to Jesus' Last Supper - (Communion).
Every element in the Passover Seder meal has meaning. The bitter herbs (horseradish) remind us of the bitterness of our slavery in Egypt. The bowl of salt water represents the tears shed by the Israelite slaves, and the charoset (a paste of nuts, apples, pears and wine) ...represents the mortar they were forced to make — everything points symbolically backward to the Exodus and also looks forward to its fulfillment in Jesus’ sacrifice, once-for-all on the Cross.
At the last Passover meal that Jesus shared with His disciples, in Luke 22:14-23, Jesus said, “I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover,” (the one they were about to partake the night before His crucifixion), "...with you before I suffer."
Then He added, "For I say to you, I shall never again eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God." So there’s yet another coming fulfillment. Yes, Passover points to Christ crucified, but there’s another greater fulfillment that Jesus says will come in the fullness of time in which the entire feast will be fulfilled.
Richard Hill: "Yes, because we’re going to be celebrating Passover and all of the Jewish Feasts during the Messianic Kingdom."
So Jesus' Last Supper and the ancient Passover became one and the same event at the time of Christ’s crucifixion!
Jesus established the Last Supper when He took the bread and cup and shared them with His disciples. In Luke 22:20, Jesus said, “This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant in My blood.”
The Apostle Paul explained that our commemoration of the New Covenant is by the act of Communion, and that we are to remember Christ’s sacrifice as often as Christians meeting together eat the bread and drink of the cup of wine to proclaim the death of the Lord until He returns. There is, therefore, a forward-looking aspect to the commemoration of Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection in the ordained Last Supper of His witnesses, His ekklesia.
Richard Hill: "At this Communion instituted at the Last Supper, Jesus was obtaining the elements from the ancient Passover Seder. He’s transporting the matzah, which is the bread eaten at the end of supper, and He’s drinking the "third Cup of Redemption," the cup now drank in Communion.
The Jewish people realize that they are anticipating something more because every family always leaves one seat empty at their Seder for Elijah, whose role prophetically?
Richard Hill: "Elijah is expected to appear to proclaim to the world the coming of the Messiah. The Jewish people at their Passover feasts each year all want Elijah to come to their meal because it would become even more a special time. So, they keep an extra chair at the table empty for Elijah who will be arriving to proclaim the advent of the Messiah. Should Elijah appear at their household, they anticipate with excitement that it would be a great honor to have Him proclaim the good news of the Messiah first to them. Afterward, Elijah will tell the rest of the world that the Messiah is coming."
These insights have been tremendously helpful in understanding the Jewish flavor of Passover and how central the feast is pointing to Jesus Christ. Even as the Jews hopefully anticipate Elijah coming to their table, they miss the bigger picture because Elijah was merely the precursor, the messenger announcing the Messiah whom they do not yet know. Rather than becoming excited about the messenger, we should all be excited about the Messiah!
From Malachi 3:2, the phrase "refiner’s fire" has been a popular verse in Western society for centuries due to its use in Handel’s famous oratorio Messiah. The verse reads, “But who can endure the day of His coming? Who can stand when He appears? For He will be like a refiner’s fire or a launderer’s soap.”
Jesus, the prophesied one is He about whom we should get excited. In the meantime, while the Jewish people are waiting, we who do know Him enjoy commemorating the Lord’s death, burial, and resurrection, as He requested, in Christian Communion, i.e., the Lord's Supper - or in a Passover Seder, - until He returns!
Lamb and Lion Ministries
Dr. Nathan E. Jones
Yeshua HaMashiach, Our Passover Lamb stepping from the tomb. Jesus is alive!
Apr 6, 2023 10:14:00 #
Zemirah wrote:
The Feast of Passover is Prophecy Proclaiming Yesh... (show quote)
Hmmmm, what a glorious day!
If you want to reply, then register here. Registration is free and your account is created instantly, so you can post right away.