Tonight its Passover! Recently I was talking with a sister who has been a Christian all her life, and is just now beginning to turn toward a more Hebraic understanding of the faith. We had been speaking about Passover, and then began talking about the Lord's Supper. As we spoke, an ah-ha look came over her face and she said something like: "That must mean the Lord's Supper is actually a part of Passover! Is that right?" As I gave her the answer that she had just put together for herself, that 'yes, that's right', she let out a sigh, as if to say; "All those years as a Christian and I never knew the Lord's Supper is part of Passover." She seemed saddened in that moment that she had never known, so had missed out on one of the most important events of the year. Happily, she is not missing out this year!

The Biblical Hebrew year is composed of lunar months and begins in the spring. The days start at sundown, running from sundown to sundown. Passover is one of YHWH's appointment days, to be observed on the evening of the 14th day of the first month of the year - tonight of this year. Probably most people know it as the night that YHWH struck the firstborn of the Egyptians to set His people, the Israelites, free from slavery in Egypt. To many people that makes Passover a "Jewish thing" that does not apply to them. They couldn't be more mistaken.

Yeshua ("Jesus") and the Apostles celebrated Passover, and all of YHWH's appointed days. They were all of Israel and were duty-bound to keep all the commands of the Torah of Moses, including observance of Passover and all of the days that were appointed by YHWH. Matthew reports on the Lord's last Passover on this earth: 

The disciples did as Yeshua commanded them, and they prepared the Passover. Now when evening had come, he was reclining at the table with the twelve disciples.    Matthew 26:19-20 HNV

As they ate the Passover that night a number of important things happened, including the sending away of Judas, the betrayer. After that, what we call the "Lord's Supper" was instituted. Here is how it happened:

As they were eating, Yeshua took bread, gave thanks for it, and broke it. He gave to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is my body. He took the cup, gave thanks, and gave to them, saying, All of you drink it, for this is my blood of the new covenant, which is poured out for many for the remission of sins. But I tell you that I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on, until that day when I drink it anew with you in my Father's Kingdom.  [bolding mine - Matthew 26:26-29 HNV, see also Mark 14, Luke 22, Jn 13-17, 1 Cor 5]

Notice that while "they were eating" the Passover Yeshua took elements from the Passover meal of wine and unleavened bread and used them in instituting what we call the "Lord's Supper" - which was actually part of the Passover meal. Further, by including this in our Passover each year we are claiming our place in the "new covenant" which was put into effect by the shed blood of Messiah, poured out the next day, still on Passover. This makes Yeshua our true Passover Lamb. This "new covenant" was not made with some new entity sometime referred to as the "Christian Church." Actually, this was a fulfillment of the prophecy of Jeremiah, who quoted YHWH as saying; 

"Behold, the days come, says YHWH, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah" Jeremiah 31:31 HNV

Notice that the "new covenant" is with the two houses of Israel. This is the only "new covenant" of Scripture, and it is not made with some Gentile group known as "The Church." Actually, the Gentile Church is a schism that broke off from the original Hebraic Messianic believers in the second century. They rebelled against all things "Jewish" - which is why Passover was stripped away while "communion" and "Easter" were adopted instead. This was not the practice of the early believers. Notice these words of Paul:

Purge out the old yeast, that you may be a new lump, even as you are unleavened. For indeed Messiah, our Passover, has been sacrificed in our place. Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old yeast, neither with the yeast of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.  1 Corinthians 5:7-8

This makes it very plain that the early believers were observing Passover, with Messiah as their Passover Lamb. This was complete with the unleavened bread of Passover. Paul even states about Passover: "let us keep the feast." Clearly, those early believers were Israel, keeping this most important feast of Israel. No wonder the Gentile heretics wanted to get rid of Passover! They wanted to stamp out all connection with Israel.

This war against Passover began soon after the schism of the Gentiles, in the second century. By then the Gentiles were far greater in number than Hebraic believers, so 'had the votes' to change things their way. Spearheaded by Rome, they made a big offensive against observance of Passover. Those believers who continued to celebrate the Passover on the 14th of Nisan were labeled Quartodecimani (Latin for “fourteenthers”) because of holding their celebration on the Biblical fourteenth day of Nisan. Rome eventually succeeded in getting rid of Passover altogether, and replaced it with "Easter Sunday" and "communion" after the pattern of pagan customs already well known in the empire. [Eusebius, Historia ecclesiastica, 5.23]

It may seem irrelevant to some where "Communion" as a rite separate from Passover came from, while also seeming unbelievable that it was derived from paganism.  However, this has been well document by scholars, as below:  

"Early Christianity spread through a Hellenized populace. ..Dionysus was "god of 'the vine' - representing wine, the most universally popular beverage in the ancient world. ..Christian notions of eating and drinking the "flesh" and "blood" of Jesus were influenced by the cult of Dionysus." [Harris, Stephen L., Understanding the Bible. (Mayfield Publishing Company 4th ed.) p. 287.ISBN 1559346558 - Powell, Barry B., Classical Myth Second ed. With new translations of ancient texts by Herbert M. Howe. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1998. Wikipedia, Origin of the Eucharist]

"Transubstantiation" is the name of the ancient doctrine borrowed from Dionysus worship still claimed by the Catholic Church today, stating that the body and blood of the god is actually changed like magic by the priests into his actual body and blood, which is then consumed by the worshippers. Protestants dropped this doctrine, but kept the "communion" of which it was a part, forgetting Passover altogether.  

All of this is why, like the sister mentioned above, many Christians today have no idea that Passover, including the Lord's Supper with the New Covenant Israel connection, was observed by the early believers, or that it was replaced in the Gentile Church by pagan customs. Today these facts are becoming known to a growing number of truth-seekers who want to return to the true faith of Messiah and the Apostles.

That brings us to our celebration of Passover tonight.

We invite you, and any person you invite, to our live video stream for Passover at tsiyon.net, at 8 pm cst. Tell your friends to register free at  https://tsiyon.net/register/ to take in a special Passover broadcast tonight. We will begin with a short introduction to explain what we will be doing through the rest of the event. After that we will be enjoying our local Passover while also streaming appropriate music and video from Tsiyon members around the world. This part of the program will allow you to be eating your own Passover meal, while enjoying this special Passover broadcast, if our broadcast works into your Passover plans. At 9:30 we will be presenting comments on Yeshua Our Passover Lamb, and then we will be commemorating the Lord's Supper together. You can join in this with other believers around the world! Just have your unleavened bread and wine ready, so that you can partake of those symbolic items with the rest of us, who wish to commemorate the death of our Messiah and our union with Him and one another in the New Covenant of Israel. 

Passover greetings to you and yours in the name of Yeshua Messiah!