Learning to Love God

I am a Christian Educator. My life’s work was to help people learn and live the words of the Bible. I prepared lessons and trained teachers to lead classes for all ages, from the youngest babies to the most elderly adults. Along the way I substituted, taught and worked alongside the teachers in each age group. Through my life’s work I fell in love with people and the end result of Bible lessons being incorporated into their lives.

Leading a Passover Seder at Fairview Baptist Church, Statesville

From a very young age I learned to listen to the words of scripture and love it’s stories. This did not happen in a church, for I did not go to church, I was raised in a Jewish home. My most memorable times of Bible learning occurred in the home. When I was young my mother would read to me from a book of Bible stories. Our family also celebrated the Jewish holidays and learned the traditions that go with each event.

Dressed up for our Purim Celebration

This month we will celebrate the festival called Purim. When I was young, my family would go to the Synagogue, where we would hear stories from the Megillah, the book of Esther. We dressed in costumes, played carnival type games, ate food (including hamantaschen), and heard a presentation from the book of Esther every half hour. These recitations could be story reading, puppet plays or dramas. Each telling was “child friendly,” and enabled me to remember the reason for the event.

My Passover Family

Next month we will celebrate Passover (or Pesach), the Jewish feast which remembers how God enabled my people to escape slavery in Egypt. During this festival we would go to Uncle Stuart and Aunt Betty’s home, for Uncle Stuart was the eldest son in the family. I would see my grandmother and spend the afternoon playing with my cousins. We were family.

Passover at Salem Baptist Church in Apex, NC

At the appointed time on Passover eve, we would all sit down at the long table to enjoy a feast. But before we ate, we participated in and heard the story of the Exodus from Egypt. The memorable words repeated year after year from the Haggadah for the American Family. My Uncle Stuart would lead and each of us would read our parts, as broken out in the book. After much more than a decade of following this tradition, some of the lines we read are etched on my memory from simple repetition.

Breaking Matzoh at Central Methodist Church, Mooresville, NC

During the evening we would spend at least an hour saying the blessings, reading the scripture, tasting the foods (like karpas, matzoh, morror and charosis), singing the songs, and reciting the story. A huge feast would come near the end of the book, once the story was told and the plagues of Egypt recited.

A Passover lesson at Lighthouse Church, Mooresville, NC 

My Uncle had a fantastic sense of humor, and made our visits to his home fun. Many stories could be told about what happened at our Passover table, but to recite them would get us off topic. The point is, my religious training was a family event, supported by the Synagogue. My family did a good job, and when my children were born I continued the tradition of sharing the story of the Bible through fun festivals and events so they could learn to love my God and my faith.

Buying a goat in Israel for two zuzim

Today, even as my children are grown, I continue to share the Jewish festivals with Christians across the country. I have taken time to study the holidays to see how they were celebrated during the first century in Israel. Jesus, himself, with his parents, participated in all of the Jewish holidays. There are many references to him going to Jerusalem to participate in the Passover, the Feast of Tabernacles and Chanukah. To miss the connection is to erase a portion of the New Testament.

My book celebrating Passover as a Relationship with God

To miss sharing the faith with our children in the same manner as Jesus’ parents shared the Jewish traditions with their children is to ignore the teachings of the Bible handed down since the days of Moses.

A Passover Haggadah with complete explanations and leader hints

My daughters and I have written several books (Spring: Connecting with God, A Christian Passover in the Jewish Tradition, two Kindle Haggadahs, and Advent Journeys) to help Christians understand the Jewish and early Christian traditions of Passover. We lead these services in churches to help people understand these traditions within their context, hoping the next generation will grow up with the same love of God I have enjoyed through life. I guide church Seder services for any who desire to know more. For more information, contact me through my e-mail address.