In the last week, more than once, someone asked me about preparing for Passover.  They were not asking about my Spring cleaning, but about preparing Spiritually as a family.

I thought I would update a post I wrote last year, and add some resources I have enjoyed using over the last 30 years with our family, as we journeyed from celebrating Easter to Resurrection Sunday, to Passover and the week of Unleavened Bread, and the Day of Shavuot. In other words, how we went from celebrating the mainstream Catholic holidays to celebrating the feasts found in the Bible in Leviticus 23.  If you want to learn more about that click on the “Torah/Bible” link above and go to God’s Calendar and Biblical Feasts to find more.

Last year in school, My children and I learned about other traditions that are common in our culture, yet our family may not observe.  Growing up in a Nazarene church, which is a Holiness denomination that came out of the Wesleyan movement, we observed a time of Lent.  Not the same as the Catholic/Lutheran church,  but similar.

Lent is 40 days before Resurrection Sunday (commonly called Easter in our culture).  Lent is a 40-day season of prayer, fasting and giving, held in preparation for the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus. This year, Lent began on Wednesday, February 18th and ends on Thursday, April 2. Lent is 40 days long to represent the 40 days that Jesus spent fasting and praying in the desert before starting his own ministry.

I took time to explain this beautiful time of preparation, and how we could apply it to our lives as a time to prepare for Passover.  So, we decided to take these weeks leading up to Passover, and dedicate ourselves to prayer, fasting, and purposeful Bible study.

This is not a new concept for our family.  Since we started our family, Jeremy and I have continued the traditions my parents taught me of preparing for (Easter and Christmas).  We just moved those activities to to the Biblical feast days.  I wanted to share some of the books we have read as a family during these preparation seasons.

Some books we have used are:

Arnold Ytreeide has a series of Advent books, that he later added an Easter and Pentecost book series, that goes all the way through the book of Acts.  We have been reading these books as a family for years.  We don’t use them every year, but about every four years.  We just change the words to Tabernacles, Passover, and Shavuot.  I will place links to these books below.  He just finished the latest book called Ethan, and we haven’t read it yet.  But we are super excited to read and discuss it.  These books are best for ages 9 and up.

This year I purchased a set of children’s Bible storybooks by Laura Richie.  We have been reading through The Easter Storybook.  These books are geared more for 3-12 years.  Links below.

I will link a few stand alone books we have used as well.  We try and rotate the books each year.

Preparing for Passover:

Amon’s Adventure: A Family Story for Easter by Arnold Ytreeide

Tirzah by Lucille Travis

This is one of our favorite out of Egypt books.  Age range 12+

The Easter Storybook 40 Bible Stories Showing who Jesus Is by laura Richie

Shavuot/Counting the Omer Books:

Amon’s Secret by Arnold Ytreeide

Amon’s Mission by Arnold Ytreeide

These books are best read in the same year.  You begin by reading Amon’s Adventure leading up to Passover/Resurrection, then read Amon’s Secret leading up to Shavuot/Pentecost.  Follow that book by reading Amon’s Mission.  (If you begin your reading at Tabernacles, read Bartholomew’s Passage by Arnold Ytreeide.)

The Go and Tell Storybook: 30 Bible stories Why we should Share Jesus

Preparing for Fall Feasts:

Jotham’s journey by Arnold Ytreeide

Bartholomew’s Passage by Arnold Ytreeide

Tabitha’s Travels by Arnold Ytreeide

Ishtar’s Odysseys by Arnold Ytreeide

These four stories are about four different young people as they journey to the birth of Christ, and each book is connect to the others.  They also connect to Amon’s Adventures in the Easter/Pentecost series.  We like to read them leading up to Fall feasts. Rotating them each year. Age range 9+

The Advent Storybook 25 stories showing why Jesus came by Laura Richie

  Age 3+

These are a few of our favorite books to use in our family reading time as we prepare to celebrate God’s Holy Days.  Other book series we have read as a family and discussed are linked below.  We want to make it clear that all these materials in this post are fun fictional books, not actual Scripture, and we only recommend them for entertainment and discussion purposes, not as Bible Study.

Another great Passover series:

Out of Egypt Series by Connilyn Cossette  She has several fun Biblical Fiction series, another we have enjoyed reading as a family is her Refuge Cities series.

Gods and Kings: Chronicles of the Kings #1: A Biblical Ancient World Novel about Hezekiah by Lynn Austin

Return to Me: A Biblical Ancient World Novel about Zechariah (The Restoration Chronicles) by Lynn Austin

I hope this post blesses you.

May Your time of preparing for the Lord’s appointed times, be full of peace, hope, and encouragement.  May we all seek Him wholeheartedly.

Shalom

Written by ktmom15