Easter

I have been saying that this is my favorite holiday, and it is. I am totally fascinated with it~the customs, traditions, meanings, all that is associated with it. I did a little (ok a lot) of research and thought I would share how it all kind of ties together. If this subject does not interest you, then stop reading here!

Passover is closely related to Easter. The actual date of Easter differs each year, but it is determined by the Passover calender. This year, Passover starts tonight at sundown, Wednesday April 8th, and will end at nightfall on Thursday April 16th.

Passover, quite literally means, "The hovering over and guarding of the houses of the Hebrews". This comes from the book of Exodus, but is also mentioned in Numbers and Deuteronomy. The passage in Exodus was when Pharaoh was ruler of Egypt. During the time when the Lord sent the ten plagues to Egypt, the tenth and last plague was the killing of all firstborn sons. The Lord protected the Hebrews during this plague, and He hovered over their houses and guarded them.

How did He do this? He had told them to take a lamb, to slaughter it, and to mark their doorways with the blood of this lamb. Do you get this??? How closely this is related to us? We are cleansed by the blood of Jesus Christ, and NOTHING can take that away from us.

So back to this...there are fourteen days of Nisan (which is from the Passover calender and it is March and April). During these days, the feast of the unleavened bread is also talked about in the Bible. This part I did not research, but I do know that Jewish people today still celebrate with this feast. They eat motza bread instead, which is...you guessed it. Bread without yeast. I also know that when the Hebrews were to flea from Egypt and return to their own country that God had promised them, they had to do so hurriedly. They didn't have time to wait for their bread to rise. So maybe I did research that part. Anyway, isn't that interesting? And especially because it's still carried out even today!

So how are Passover and Easter related? Well, in Christianity, Jesus is the paschal lamb, or the Korban Pasach in Hebrew, which means Passover sacrifice. See how it's all coming together? Jesus was the ultimate sacrifice, the paschal lamb. He was this because He died for our sins.

1 Corinthians 5:7&8 say this: "Get rid of the old "yeast" by removing this wicked person from among you. Then you will be like a fresh batch of dough made without yeast, which is what you really are. Christ, our Passover Lamb, has been "sacrificed" for us. 8 So let us celebrate the festival, not with the old "bread" of wickedness and evil, but with the new bread of sincerity and truth. *New Living Translation*

Another thing that ties together is the Last Supper. In the Synoptic Gospels {the gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke}, it says that Jesus' last supper was a passover seder, which is a Jewish ritual feast. Do you think this is why we celebrate Easter Sunday with a huge feast with our loved ones? Hmmm....I'm growing more and more fascinated.

One last thing, and I will stop. It really has nothing to do with Easter, but with spring. Do you know the phrase, "spring cleaning"? Well, this also came from Bible times! I'm laughing here, because God is just good, do you know what I'm sayin'??? Think back to the feast of the unleavened bread. Not only were they NOT to eat bread containing yeast, it was not even supposed to be in their homes. Chametz is what it was referred to as. They also had to throughougly clean and scrub their homes during this time, because it was to be NOWHERE. So, even today, we still do this!!! Isn't this amazing?

I told a story, and I am ending this, I promise. This is it. The first night of the Passover is when the Israelites fled from Egypt to return to their homeland, the land that YAHWEH had promised them. According to what I found on the internet (Wikipedia), YAHWEH is one of the many names they used for the Deity~God. And I thought of the song that we never got to sing in choir, about Yahweh~the words are "Yahweh, our Lord is coming".

I am floored by my God this morning. Yes, He is Yahweh, and yes, He is coming. Let it be, Lord, let it be. I may continue with some more tidbits tomorrow. Hope I didn't bore you too much. Love you all.