Celebrating the Passover in our Home

I was asked how our family celebrates the Passover each year.  I thought I would share my answer here for anyone else who may be curious about it.

As for how our family celebrates Passover, we try to stick to scripture over tradition.

Therefore, we have tried to keep it simple.  We begin reading the story of the Exodus usually on the first day of the Biblical new year, Aviv 1.  Sometimes we read it out of the Bible, other times we read story books.  I will share my favorites with you at the bottom of this post.

Then on the tenth day of the Biblical month of Aviv, we take a stuffed toy lamb and set it out in our main living area as a reminder that the Israelites were to bring a lamb to their home on that day.  We let the kids play with the toy.  From day 10-14 we do fun plague activities and discuss the plagues.

On the 14th day of the Biblical month, we clean our house from top to bottom, and look for any place where leavening could be hidden.

 We often invite a few people over for Passover dinner, but only believers, as this is an appointed time set apart for God’s people who have circumcised hearts.  We set our table with our best table clothes and often put flowers on the table, I usually get chocolate and place them on the plates.  We place matzah in baskets on the table, and we serve everyone grape juice in one cup, and water in another.  My family likes charoset, so we make it and serve it as a reminder of the mortar the Israelites had to make to lay bricks.  I make a big meal.  I usually make leg of lamb roast and also a beef roast to serve.  We serve a bitter lettuce salad, as a reminder of the bitterness of slavery.  The kids also like having the horserash to put on the matzah as a reminder of bitter slavery.  I often make my kids favorites like honey glazed carrots, angel eggs, fruit salad, mashed potatoes, etc.  We do not do a traditional Seder style meal, but more of a story telling style.  My husband leads the story telling and tells the story of Passover and why we eat the bitter herbs and what the lamb represents, and the story of Yeshua as our Passover Lamb.  We also sing together as a family after we finish eating.

Because we have a large family with small children, it is a very relaxed meal, with lots of fun.

The reason I do not serve a whole lamb is I do not want to confuse my children or guests into thinking we are actually offering a sacrifice.  We are not in Israel, and we can not truly “keep” the Passover, but we can remember and prepare for the Lamb of God to return to us.

I hope that is helpful.

Usually about six weeks before the feasts we like to remind ourselves of what the scriptures actually say, so we use Anne Elliott’s book to do that.

Here is a link to that book if you don’t have it. https://anneelliott.com/2016/03/the-biblical-feasts/

Here are some books we enjoy reading to prepare for Passover.

With a Mighty Hand by Amy Ehrlich

Amon’s Adventure by Arnold Ytreeide (this is an easter book I adapted for Passover)

Tirzah by Lucille Travis

I hope this is helpful.

The most important part of keeping Passover it to teach our children why we do it.  It is very important to teach our children about the bondage of slavery especially to sin, and the Passover Lamb, Yeshua Messiah.

Written by Katie

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