The Eucharist

The Lord’s Supper

Passover is a very sacred holy time for the Jewish people. The meal eaten in haste in rooted deeply in tradition and meaning. Each portion of the meal is embraced in prayer, historic narrative, and ritual.

The Passover foods each have a meaning:

Maror, The bitter herbs, usually horseradish represented the bitter slavery. This is usually eaten with a pice of Matzo, the unleavened bread.

Chazeret, In America this is usually a piece of romaine lettuce as a second bitter herb.

Charoset, a mixture of sweet roughly chopped, apples, walnuts, and seasoned with cinnamon and sweet red wine.

Karpas, parsley, or another green leafy vegetable is dipped in saltwater representing the tears of the Israelites during their slavery.

Z’roa, this is the lamb shank that is not eaten during the dinner, which serves as a visual reminder of the sacrificial lamb offered at the Temple.

Beitzah, is a hard-boiled egg eaten with salt water and represents the second offering at the Temple, the sorrow at its destruction, and the hope in rebuilding it someday.

Our roots stem from Judaism, the Old Testament directs us to Jesus, the Messiah, the chosen one of God to bring peace and order the the fallen world. Jesus’ ministry points to this last meal and the events to follow bringing us to the triumphant resurrection.

We all like to eat, and the meal is a very speacial time fo the day, espeacailly if it is spent with family around the table. Two TV program that i am aware of close the episode at the family diner table, Blue Bloods, and Duck Dynasty. There maybe others, i hope so.

It is difficult today for the entire family to gather at one specific time for a meal. Who’s working, who at sports event, organizational meetings. This is sad becasue God wants us to have strong relationship and one way of building relationships is by sharing a meal together and praying together. If we cannotgtalk while breaking bread we can set aside a small amount to family time discussing tghe events of the day.

The Bible begins with the eating of the forbidden fruit, and ends with the banquet at the marriage supper of the Lamb. The Garden of Eden is restored. Eating and drinking in the Bible have a deeper meaning far beyond appearsances, these experiences are “sacramental;” to set apart or blessed by Christ to promote righteousness and to increase devotion to God. Our custom of saying grace before a meal comes from the Passover Seder.  In thanking God for the food and relationships, we are acknowledging our dependence upon God for all the good gifts of life.

There are many accounts of Jesus easting with Pharisees, feeding the thousands, using food in parables like the return of the pradical son.

As I said the Passover meal has many meanings and memories: deliverance from slavery to freedom, a feast of joyful celebration and commemoration, an offering of thanksgiving, a sign of divine love, it is truly the banquet of the Messiah. Adding the importance Jesus placed on breaking bread together we can see the depth of God’s message in the Scriptures.   When Christ invited his disciples to the table, blessed the food, broke the bread, and shared the bread and the cup, the meal became a vivid, visible sign of God saying to them: “I am your God.  You are my people.”