Rabbi Schneider - Celebrate the Feast of Passover
This ceremony tells a whole story of redemption and there's so many things I could go into, but I'm gonna fast forward now and I want to talk about the ten plagues that fell upon Egypt. Many of you know the story. God sent Moses before Pharaoh and each time God sent Moses, Moses announced that if Pharaoh didn't yield to him and let God's people go to worship Him, that's why God called them out of Egypt; not just to be free, but additionally the Lord said, "Let my people go that they might come into the wilderness and worship Me". And Moses proclaimed this word before Pharaoh ten times and each time Pharaoh resisted a plague fell upon Egypt. And so we speak of these ten plagues and as we do we take our finger and we dip our finger in the wine, or the juice ten times, once for each one of the plagues.
I want you to hear this, the same plagues that fell upon Egypt locally during the exodus, thirty five hundred years ago, are gonna fall upon the word globally, almost identically, during the Great Tribulation. Here we go. The rivers became blood. Sores came upon men. Hail stones fell, frogs, death, darkness, locusts, lice, wild beast, the death of the cattle and we go on until finally the death of the first born. And at this point beloved, we're gonna take a second, a second cup of wine, the cup of plagues. I'm gonna be washing my hands now the second time, which is traditional in the Seder, but there's an added dimension to it. The leader of the Seder is sanctifying himself as well as the participants in order to eat of the Passover in a way that they're holy before the Lord. It's not just a health benefit, but we're washing our hands as a way of ceremonial purifying our self through the washing of water.
So watch, I'm gonna take the pitcher. I'm gonna pour it over my hands. This is to prepare me before the Lord, to wash me of all sin, to be holy before Him. But here's something I want you to get, when Jesus did this it was most likely at this point in the Seder that we read about, this is very important, in the Gospel of John chapter thirteen, that in this point in the Seder Jesus went a step further than just washing His own hands. Rather we read beloved ones, that He girded Himself with a towel and He began to wash the disciples feet. You see the Bible says that Jesus came to fulfill the law and the prophets. And what does that mean? He filled it up with meaning. He brought it to it's fullest intent. Yeshua said, "I sanctify myself that I might sanctify them".
As we continue on tonight, we're gonna take the piece of matzah once again in the afikomen. Baruch ata Adonai Eloheinu Melech ha-olam hamotsi lechem min ha-arets. Blessed art thou Lord our God, King of the universe who brings forth bread from the earth. Jesus said, "Take and eat. This is my body broken for you". We're gonna talk about that in a moment, but right now we're gonna have a piece of matzah. Now we read in the scriptures that there are three elements that are Biblically commanded to partake of during the Passover Seder, the lamb, unleavened bread, which we just ate and bitter herbs. So we are now going to partake of the bitter herbs and we're gonna do that by taking a piece of matzah. I'm gonna dip the matzah in the bitter herbs. Now remember that I told you that when Jewish people celebrate the Seder, the Passover Seder, they want to make it personal. They want to place themselves in the position that the ancient Israelites were in thirty five hundred years ago, because they were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt.
So in order to help them do that they dip the matzah in the bitter herbs and as they eat it they're reminded of how terrible it was for Israel when Pharaoh was such a cruel task master over them, keeping them in bondage, beating them, working them mercilessly and that's why the herbs are bitter. Remember what it was like for them and to try as much as possible to put ourselves in their shoes. I want you to now watch and if you have some, you'll take it with me. The maror, the bitter herb. Now over here I have an apple nut mixture, it's a sweet mixture and it's called charoset and this mixture symbolizes the mortar that the children of Israel used. Doesn't it look like mortar? It symbolizes the mortar that the children of Israel used when they were under Pharaoh's bondage having to make bricks for him, to build the city.
And so the question arises, well that's such a hard, cruel thing to be somebody's slave and to have to make bricks for them while they treated you so cruelly. Why would you make the mortar the children of Israel used today to be so sweet? And the reason is, is now that we're free, even our hard times, the memories of how hard it was have been replaced by the sweetness of our deliverance. And so we're now going to take the charoset, but we're gonna do it in a way that's interesting. We're gonna take our matzah, dip it in the maror, the horseradish and then we're gonna dip the same piece of matzah with the horseradish into the charoset, the sweet mixture and we're gonna eat it like this. And this is actually called "Hillel's Sandwich". And Hillel was a famous sage that lived about the same time as Jesus that Jewish people all over the world revere even today, so in memory of him they call it Hillel's Sandwich. I'm gonna take and eat.
Now you'll notice my friends, on the plate I have a bone. This is the shank bone of a lamb. The reason that we have a shank bone of a lamb on the plate, is because Jewish people around the world no longer are eating lamb during Passover. Remember I shared with you that in the book of Exodus chapter twelve the Lord said, "Unleavened bread with bitter herbs you shall eat". And we've eaten the unleavened bread. We've eaten the bitter herbs. But the third element that the children of Israel were to eat during ancient times was a lamb. The reason that they're no longer eating lamb is because the temple that once stood in Jerusalem, the temple that Jesus ministered in was destroyed by the Romans in 70 A.D. And when the temple was destroyed, the priesthood dispersed and as a result of not having a temple and not having a priesthood the sacrifices stopped. And so no longer in the temple on Passover are they able to offer up a lamb on behalf of the people. And as a result of that they use a shank bone to remind us of the lamb that was sacrificed in the temple, while the temple stood.
Notice also on the plate I have an egg. The egg is an element that was added and the reason it was added was because it symbolized again, the sacrifices that use to take place while the temple was standing. And the question that some may be asking themselves is, Why an egg as a symbol of the sacrifice? So how many times do we sin? And the answer is every day. We're answering the question, Why an egg? The next question is this, how many times does a chicken lay an egg? And the answer, every day. So many Christians around the world don't understand that when they partake of communion of the Lord's Supper, what they're actually doing is celebrating Passover. You see it's out of Passover that the Lord's Supper and communion comes. We read in the book of Matthew and in the other gospels as well that Jesus during, get this now, hear me, during the Passover meal Jesus took a piece of matzah. He broke it. He gave it to His disciples and He said, "Take, eat and do this in remembrance of me".
What I'm gonna do now is show you something very fantastic. We're gonna go back to that mysterious napkin called the afikomen, which means that which comes after. That matzah that was broken, then half of it was returned to the three fold pouch. Remember three different pockets. One for the Father I believe. One for the Son, the middle one, which is the one we removed and one for the Holy Spirit. Let me just point out here, this is an ancient tradition that goes back to about the time of Jesus and there's many different interpretations to where this special ritual comes from. We believe that it was actually introduced to the church by, or to the Jewish world I should say, was introduced into the Jewish world by the first Jewish believers of Jesus that were a part of the Jewish community at that time. And that this special ritual symbolizes again, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The middle piece of matzah taken out, broken, even as Jesus came out of glory, came to earth, was broken and then what happened? He was put to death. They buried Him and so we're retrieving the piece of matzah now that was broken and hidden and wrapped in a linen cloth. He was broken, wrapped in a linen cloth.
This is what they do all over Judaism today. They're doing this right. They may have different interpretation, but they're doing this. We believe it's because they haven't yet discovered why, many, that they're not relating to Jesus. We believe that they will see Him at some point soon. We take it out. We unveil Him once again, even as Jesus was buried and then rose from the dead. And Jesus took that piece of matzah at Passover. We read it in Matthew chapter twenty six, twenty six through twenty eight. And He took the matzah and He gave it to His disciples and He said, "Take and eat. This is My body broken for you". And then we read in like manner He took the cup, the third cup of the Passover meal, the Cup of Redemption and He said, "Take and drink. This is my blood shed for you for the forgiveness of sins". And then Jesus said, "As often as you do this do it church in remembrance," Yeshua said, "of me". What was Yeshua saying there when He said, "As often as you do this, do this in remembrance of me"? I believe that what Jesus was saying beloved, is that as often as we celebrate Passover do it in remembrance of Him, the Passover matzah and the Passover wine.
So Father God we thank You today. We say Baruch ata Adonai Eloheinu Melech ha-olam hamotsi lechem min ha-arets. And we say Father Baruch ata Adonai as we bless the wine. Eloheinu Melech ha-olam borei pri hagafen. Jesus thank You for coming to earth for us, giving Your life for us, so that we would be redeemed and brought back to Father. We love You Jesus and now we take.
I want you to join me now if you have that piece of matzah beloved one. Let's take now this unleavened bread knowing that as we do, symbolically we're receiving Jesus deep into our inner most being. We receive You Jesus. And now if you're prepared, take your juice with me.
Father thank You for sending Your Son. Jesus thank You for shedding Your blood. We eat Your flesh Jesus according to Your word and drink Your blood that we would have life in our self. Jesus we receive Your gift of forgiveness. Even as the ancient Israelites had to put the blood of the lamb over their doorpost, Jesus we receive Your blood over our lives today. Thank You for forgiving us of our sin and protecting us from the judgment of God that falls against sin.
Take and drink beloved. Beautiful. I have another cup tonight. Notice I have a chair that's set. You may be wondering why I'm having a place set here when there's nobody joining me tonight. This is an ancient tradition that goes back to the book of Malachi. The scripture tells us in the book of Malachi that before Messiah comes that Elijah will come first to announce He's coming and so Jewish people all over the world recognize that Passover is not about just what God did in the past, but that it also points to a future deliverance that will come when Messiah comes. And so they set this chair for Elijah at Passover and they're inviting Messiah to come, they're inviting Elijah to come, because they know when Elijah comes he'll announce that Messiah's coming. And Messiah will come and bring the children of Israel total deliverance forever.
And so we set the chair for Elijah, inviting him to come. Traditionally a young person in the home will go to the front door, look down the street looking for Elijah, saying "Come Elijah. We're waiting for you". Remember they said to Jesus in the gospels, they said, "If you're who you say you are, if you're really the Messiah then where's Elijah? Because the prophet told us that before Messiah came Elijah would come to first announce His coming". Jesus did something very mysterious. He pointed at John the Baptist and He said to the Jewish onlookers, "He is Elijah if you can receive it".
And so to incorporate the tradition we have the chair set for Elijah today. Jewish people traditionally right now are looking for the Messiah to come, but beloved for those of us that have had the veil lifted and we see that Yeshua is the Messiah, remember Jesus said to the Jewish people, "Unless you believe that I am he you will die in your sins". Paul said to the Jewish people, or concerning the Jewish people, He said, "There's a veil over their eyes right now. They're not able to see until the Lord removes the veil". Maybe the Lord is talking to you tonight my dear beloved Jewish friend. God's removing the veil from your eyes. God loves you so much right now. Those of us that have had the veil removed, we're not looking for the Messiah to come the first time. We're waiting for Him to return. We're saying, "Come Lord Jesus" just like Revelation twenty two tells us.
Maybe you're watching right now and you'd like, to receive King Jesus into your heart, some of you for the first time. On your screen right now there's a link for those of you that will be receiving Jesus. It's called the find Jesus link. I'm gonna lead you in a prayer right now. If you'd like to pray along to Father God with me and receive the King of Israel, Yeshua Hamashiach, Jesus into your life, just repeat after me and then hit that find Jesus link. We want to get you some free material.
Father God thank You for revealing Your love to us. Father thank You for Your glory that rest upon us even now. Jesus thank You for all You've done for us, for becoming that lamb that was put to death for us just like that ancient Passover lamb. We receive Your gift of forgiveness. We thank You for shedding Your blood that we could be protected against the judgment that Father will pour upon those that will not repent upon sin. We receive You tonight Jesus. We eat Your flesh and we drink Your blood, even as we partook of the unleavened bread and the wine. Jesus come right now. Minister, minister to us Lord by Your Spirit. Father I pray that those that might be fearful right now, Father give them the courage to open their heart, to hit that find Jesus link.
Maybe you're a Jewish person watching tonight and this is just so culturally new to you, don't let fear hold you back. Don't let the unknown hold you back. Jesus loves you.