Passover as the Template for Israel’s History and Future

We just gathered with our families and celebrated the Passover together. It is a strange experience, celebrating in a time of war. Many of us in Israel are so very focused on this war every day. We grieve over those in the world who fall for the propaganda of the terrorists, Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran.

Jewish history recounts many periods when Passover was celebrated in times of terrible duress with the hope that as God delivered in the Exodus, He will yet deliver our people again.

Most followers of Yeshua are aware that a great fulfillment of Passover meaning took place in the death and resurrection of Yeshua. Luke 22:14-38 is my favorite account of the celebration of Passover led by Yeshua. It is the only account that describes the first cup of wine, the Kiddish (sanctification) which begins the day of the Feast. The bread then is made to stand for his body given for us, and the cup after the meal, as his New Covenant blood shed for us. He is our Passover Lamb! He undergoes a new exodus in his death and resurrection, and we follow Him in an exodus of death and resurrection.

However, most Christians are not aware of Passover as the template of Israel’s history. We as a people again and again experienced terrible oppression, in the destruction and captivity under Babylon (586 B.C.) and in the destruction again of 70AD and 135 A. D. Again, we are oppressed, this time scattered to many nations. We survive terrible persecutions and yet find new lands and new opportunities. Our people went though the Seder during the Holocaust and some maintained hope of deliverance as they did so. Today, we go through the seder with hope of deliverance again from this terrible war. However, the greatest Passover Exodus is predicted as in the last of the last days when our people are brought back to the Land in a new Exodus. We are told that this new exodus will be so great the original Exodus will be eclipsed. In Jeremiah 16 and 23 we are told that we will not emphasize the Lord who brought us out of Egypt but out of the nations from which we had been scattered. We will be brought back to our Land. In addition, the events of the book of Revelation should be understood as last days world judgments, but also the deliverance of Israel and all of God’s people in the ultimate event that ends this age, the return of Yeshua the Messiah, King and Savior. For the Messianic Jewish community in Israel, the celebration of Passover is very much more serious this year and connected to our experience in the immediate trials.

As we seek to establish a Bible College that will train leaders and expand the numbers of the saved remnant of Israel, let us be mindful that we are investing in the ultimate redemption of Israel and the nations with the hope of a final Passover and Exodus.