When the first blossoms of Spring appear, the earth looks like we all should get dressed for a party! The buds on trees appear even before the leaves on tree branches! Life inside a dry tree bursts out from inside the branch and welcomes the birds and bees to turn those flowers into fruit. Our journey toward harvest has secretly begun.
Rosh Chodesh (New Moon)
I love the new beginning each spring brings. As Jewish Bible lovers, we know these blossoms are God’s invitation to begin anew – the FIRST month of the Bible’s calendar is coming with the new moon. Jewish people KNOW the new moon – when the sky is full of stars and the moon is hidden completely – the head of the month. The head of the month is called Rosh Chodesh in Hebrew. Every new moon is a day of rest, just like the weekly Sabbath. And, while many Bible lovers know that keeping the Sabbath holy every week is one of the Ten Commandments, few understand that there is a monthly Sabbath, too! That monthly Sabbath celebrates: FRUIT-FULLNESS.
Passover
Simply put, the first month begins with no moon in the sky, and fourteen days later, the moon’s fullness appears and the sky seems lit up with the full reflection of the sun’s brightness and THIS is the day that Jewish people around the world celebrate Passover! Passover is the celebration of FREEDOM! New beginnings and freedom go hand-in-hand. Biblical Judaism’s first holiday is the birth of the ‘Children of Israel.’
Throughout history, the Jewish people have celebrated Passover in their tents, their travels, their suffering and their regathering. Celebrating God restores them again and again to His heart and their land by using the annual Passover to teach their children to do the same. Every generation has to find the God of Israel for themselves, no matter what the life seems to throw at them. Passover is a sacred passage through the sea on dry land – a crossing over into trusting God to forgive our past mistakes and inviting us to follow Him home to ‘happily-ever-after.’
The Seed-Time Planner
This year, God really challenged me to try something new for Passover. First off, He urged me in my heart to create a TLV Seedtime Planner for my friends who want to simplify their standard daytimers! So, after our wonderful TLV Journey App Manager, Kerah, spent a few months rifling through my boxes of homemade Daniah Daytimers – WE DID IT! We decided to create TWO SEASONAL Planners instead of trying to make sense out of combining a Gregorian calendar with a Jewish calendar. Why? Because the easiest way to live a simply sacred life is to just peel away all the craziness and get back to the natural rhythms of life: night and day, week-by-week, month after month, semi-annual reflections every year from one generation to the next. THAT IS BIBLICAL!
Some Biblical Context
According to the promise God made to Noah and the rest of us, there really are only two seasons: Seedtime and Harvest. And each of them are six months apart. They both start with a New moon Sabbath that culminates in a Full moon Celebration. The seventh month’s new moon is called the Rosh Hashana – which means Head of the year. That is the Feast of Trumpets – the Sabbath that will herald the Messiah’s arrival! But, while we wait for Him, we build booths, which the Bible calls the Feast of Tabernacles – which the prophet Zechariah describes so joyfully pregnant with possibilities!
But, since the Jewish leaders want to be sure you KNOW we are waiting – even today – they created a tradition for reading the Torah ALL TOGETHER no matter where the Jewish people are scattered – by starting at the Book of Genesis on the first Sabbath AFTER the Feast of Tabernacles is fulfilled by His followers in Jerusalem. That day is called Simcha Torah – which means rejoicing over the Torah. This is exactly why Yeshua said – I have not come to abolish the Torah but FULL FILL the Torah. Fascinating, right?
Yeshua’s return is to Harvest! But you can’t harvest without planting and you can’t plant without seed and seed is hidden inside the fruit that falls to the ground. Seedtime leads to harvest, and harvest leads to seedtime. Man partners with God – but only God can make things GROW – including your faith.
A New Season
Now is the time – the blossoming season – when God awakens us to believe that He can bring flowers out of sticks, beauty out of ashes, new beginnings out of broken lives. Passover is on the way, and God wants to give you a new chapter, a drink in the desert, manna for the next leg of the journey, a hope that your future will have room for Him to breathe life into your body and defrag your cluttered brain.
One of my favorite ways to begin anew is to take out a fresh, clean white piece of paper and dream about what I can fill that blank canvas with. So, for now, just take a deep breath and ask God what you need to clean out of your thinking and behavior that has you constricted and adrift at the same time. Ask God what He needs to help you let go of, so that you can have a free hand to grasp the dream that feels just one step too far away to reach. Allow yourself to wonder what life would be like when you flourish instead of just surviving.
Our Passover Plans
Our family has agreed to celebrate our Passover dinner ONLINE – just like we would in our home ‘not staged – but genuine.’ This probably won’t be the most professional production of Passover you have ever seen, but honestly, the goal is not to impress you, but to implore you to live free.
Living the Bible with the people you love all around you is the joy of our salvation – in Messiah. Honoring God is a lifestyle of loving and believing the best about – and for – each other at the same time. Please invite your friends and family to your home, get the four essential things you need to celebrate the Passover: roasted lamb, bitter herbs, unleavened bread (matzah) AND YOUR CHILDREN to meet us live on Facebook at 7:00pm EST on Facebook at the TLV Bible Society Page.
Meanwhile, for the next few weeks, we will help you fill out YOUR own Passover with our homemade recipes and Passover placemats for the kids and Bible references that you and your guests can read together if you want to host a TLV Bible Study of your own. Order a planner if you want to live the Bible with us. And… if you want to learn more about becoming SIMPLY SACRED… stay tuned!
Much love always, Daniah ❤️
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