With Liberty and Justice for All...

Happy July! I'm getting ready to take off for multiple celebrations, including a certain little girl's birthday party and of course Independence Day, so look forward to a blog entry relating all the fun details when I return.

But for now, I wanted to wish you all a Happy Fourth of July.

As for the subject line... Little Girl hurt her leg today (nothing serious), and a little while later, Grandma asked her how it was. She looked at it carefully, and then replied:

"It still hurts, but you can't see it now. It's indivisible."

Creation Museum Review

Last week, I went to the Creation Museum, which is just outside Cincinnati, Ohio. I've been once before, but that was a couple of years ago when they were just starting to put it together and they didn't have any of the exhibits finished at that time, but were doing behind-the-scenes tours for charter members. The museum just opened to the public about three weeks ago, so this was my first "official" visit.

My first thought was wow -- not for the museum itself as I already had a pretty good idea of what to expect, and had come away with a wow for the museum after seeing what they were putting together two years ago -- but wow for the crowds!! When they finally posted the admission rates last month, I was really surprised at how high (to me) they were, and I wondered, "is anyone going to pay that??" Apparently, many anyones will!! The line to get in took about half an hour!

Our first stop was a movie, "Men in White", featuring a girl who is asking the age-old questions of life... is there any meaning, is there anything beyond death, is there a God?, and two angels, Gabe and Mike, as the men in white. The movie is cute and comedic, but addresses the purpose of the museum -- to dispel the lies the world feeds us about evolution and its proof that there is no God -- using scientific evidence. The movie is a special effects movie, and I must warn you that if you go, when it comes to the part about the Flood, put your hand over the little hole in the top of the seat in front of you, or you will be very wet. A "mist" is what they called it... it's no mist, it's water squirting at your face repeatedly as if coming from a squirt gun. Not my idea of pleasant, but easily shielded with a hand over the hole...

Next we began the "Walk through Biblical History". I'm disappointed that I didn't get to see much of this. We had planetarium tickets for 12:30, and entered the walk at 11:45, thinking we'd just walk through pretty quickly to get a grasp of what's inside and then come back later for anything we decided we wanted to give a more thorough look. It was SO crowded that it took forever to walk through exhibits. When by 12:15, we had gotten through about 5 of the 40+ exhibits, we turned around and went back. What we did see was very well done, and I was very sad that we didn't make it to the "time tunnel" to go back and see all the exhibits from the past, like scenes from the Garden of Eden, and Noah's Ark.

So next we visited the planetarium. Amazing. There's just no other word for it. Just seeing the vastness of space, learning HOW BIG some of those stars are compared to our sun, and how far away in space all these other stars and systems are compared to the size of our solar system is just mind-boggling. The sheer numbers of stars out there that we can't even see from earth blows my mind, and those are just the ones we've been able to discover through technology -- who knows how many more might be beyond that??

This brought to mind a question for me. When God promised Abraham that his descendants would be as many as the stars, do you think this was merely a figurative statement, as in, "See, there's too many to count, same for your descendants", or do you think this was a literal statement, and there really will eventually be the same number of descendants of Abraham as there are stars in the sky? Because if it's literal, then anyone anticipating an imminent Rapture better take off their coat and stay awhile, because it's going to be many more thousands of years before the descendants of Abraham could come anywhere close to the number of stars in the sky.

Another question that came to mind was, WHY? This is a very earth-centered perspective, but I believe that the world IS very earth-centered in the physical realm, as I don't believe there's another race of people on some other planet, so as the only planet bearing people, God created these things for His glory, but for our enjoyment also. So why so many stars? Stars and planets and entire galaxies that we can't even see from the earth... that even with modern technology, we can't even begin to imagine how vast the universe must be. Why create all these planets with nobody to live on them and enjoy them? Why would God bother to do all of that?

Randy Alcorn, in his book Heaven, theorizes that God will give each person his own planet to live on and enjoy that will be specially created and suited just for that person's pleasure, based on their likes and their personality. I don't know why he thinks that, but as many planets as there are out there, who knows but that maybe he's right. Maybe they don't serve as much now, but God has plans for those planets and stars and galaxies in the future. Who knows! It's all very overwhelming to my small brain, but I'd be very interested in hearing what others think -- why do YOU think God created such vast amounts of things we can't even see from the earth?

As far as the earth-centric idea, one interesting thing they showed was the constellations as viewed from earth, the constellations as viewed from other stars within our galaxy, which still essentially looked the same, and then leaving our galaxy and going way way out in space somewhere, showing our constellations. All the lines connecting the same stars that our constellations connect now made no pictorial sense, except that all together they made a cone-like shape, as if all the lines were "pointing our way home". Not sure if I described that well enough for you to visualize, but it was a rather cool thought.

Unfortunately, this was all of the museum that we were able to experience on this visit, as we had to get home to babysit everyone's favorite Cincinnati baby (aka, my other nephew, who is one month younger than Baby Boy who is previously referenced on this blog), and none of us wanted to miss a moment of that opportunity. :)

I look forward to returning, however, and despite the high admission fees if you're not a member, which I thankfully am and free is always a nice price, I highly recommend a visit to the museum if you're ever in the Cincinnati, Ohio -- or even if you're not. I couldn't believe how many people were traveling there from far far away -- this was their family vacation this year!! (Fortunately, Cincinnati does have good family attractions to offer, such as Kings Island, the Newport Aquarium, and the Cincinnati Zoo, so the Creation Museum makes a nice addition to a family trip rather than having to be the ONLY thing done on the trip!)

I imagine that the crowds will die down as the summer progresses -- it was a Saturday and only two weeks after the museum had opened, after all, so it probably isn't as crowded on the weekdays and the novelty will dwindle eventually, especially come fall. In the meantime, if you do go, plan on an all-day trip in case you do run into the crowds.

"My Personal Policies"

I've never done a meme before, but have certainly seen quite a few floating around out there in blogland. This one looked interesting, and kittyhox tagged everyone, so I guess that means me!!

Here's the description:

"My Personal Policies

I think it would be safe to say that we all have personal rules that we live by. Surely it's not just ME. I'm not talking about moral rules, like "Do not kill." I'm talking about the silly policies we impose on ourselves, like "Never eat anything you can't identify," or "Don't step on sidewalk cracks." For some reason, I started mentally listing the quirky rules I follow and got curious about other people's personal rules.

As an added bonus, I will include parenting policies I USED to think I would follow before I actually became a parent: (feel free to add yours, too!)"

Okay, trying to think of some self-oddities here -- it's always fun to see what really weird things other people do because then you feel more comfortable with your own weirdness. :)

1. Eat a hamburger every day. But I can ONLY have one a day. If I had a burger for lunch and am REALLY craving one for supper too, then I will allow myself a veggieburger as a substitute, though I attempt not to do that terribly often as I KNOW I need to eat other things too!! (I'm really not kidding about this...it's an addiction, I'm telling you!)

2. No pop allowed except rootbeer (since most rootbeers have no caffeine) and even then, ONLY when eating in a sit-down restaurant.

3. If a muscle clenches for any reason on one side of the body, the other one must do so to match it. Same thing with touches. If something brushes against one arm, the other arm must be equally brushed. If one eye closes tighter than the other, the blink must be repeated with the other eye tighter. It can sometimes take several back and forths to get both sides of the body balanced out correctly.

4. Spend twenty minutes at the computer upon awakening. I do fine to break this rule when at other people's homes; this is just a rule for at MY house. I can only break this rule at my house in case of an emergency, which of course almost never happens. I need that twenty minutes to transition from sleep to awake.

5. Go to Disney World every year. I LIKE this one!! :) I can't remember the last year I missed but I think I've gone pretty much every year for at least the last ten or so and usually more than once. I'm a Disneyite. :)

6. Read before falling asleep. Even when I'm soooo tired I can't keep my eyes open, I still have to read a couple pages before turning out the lights or it just doesn't seem right!!

7. No bare feet in the house. Strangely enough, I'm fine with bare feet outside. I used to be fine with bare feet in the house. Now I can't stand to be without socks inside. But if I'm walking around the house in socks and need to go out to get the mail or take out the trash, I don't put on shoes to do so, I just take off the socks (so they don't get dirty), leave them by the door and put them back on as soon as I get back inside. I know it doesn't make sense... but that's okay! :)

8. NEVER peek ahead in a book or read the end first to see what's going to happen. Totally ruins the book. Can't understand people who do that!!

As for the parenting principles from before one was a parent -- well, I'm in the before stage, unfortunately, so I'll go ahead and post five principles I anticipate living by, and if I ever have the privilege of becoming a mother, then I can look back and laugh at myself as my child breaks all the rules! :)

1. Tv time will be LOW. Only occasional during infancy. In toddlerhood, they can watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Sesame Street (based on current programming available :) ), plus a Disney (or similar) movie together as a family once or twice a week. That's it, unless they're sick or some other extenuating circumstance is going on that makes more on a particular day reasonable. I will probably get a little more lax as the child gets older because I know kids have to watch certain tv shows to be able to fit into conversations with friends, but I will always be very cautious as to the content of what they're watching.

2. Hands-on learning will be incorporated into everything we do, and I want them actively playing throughout most of their day. Thus the small amount of tv time. I want them outside running, jumping, and climbing when weather permits, and inside reading, constructing, and playing games when it doesn't. NOT sitting in front of a screen all day. Being an early interventionist and doing this all day long with other people's kids anyway, I do think I'll probably manage to keep this rule.

3. No junk food (including sweets and fast food type items) when little except when necessary to fit in socially. Cake and ice cream at parties, a few pieces of candy at Halloween, Christmas, and Easter, snacks at preschool if they go, etc. I think I really will be a real stickler on this the first 3-4 years of life at least, and then will get more lenient as they get older.



Now then, I guess I'm supposed to tag someone. Since I don't know too many people who blog personally, I reckon I'll tag KiwiRia. :)

A Busy Month

I realize it has been a long time since I've posted here, but I've been so busy doing this month that there's not been much time for thinking, so there's really been very little to post.

Little Girl is having her first (and last!) dance recital today. We aren't happy with the requirements, but she enjoyed the classes so my sister decided to go ahead and let her finish this out, do her recital, and then she'll be done with dance.

We first weren't pleased with the choice of music she will be dancing to: I'm a Barbie Girl... Excuse me, but this song is about far more than Barbie dolls, and we really don't want our four-year-old singing it. Of course, she knows every word of it. Sigh...

The dress itself was to be expected, so we aren't upset as far as it's concerned. The hair MUST be curly, and that's a huge pain, as mentioned in a previous post, although Little Girl seems to have resigned herself to having curly hair for these events now, at least.

What we really hate is the makeup. And not just a little makeup, either, they want it smeared all over these little girls. When we went in a couple weeks ago to have the pictures made, the dance instructor started arranging Little Girl's hair, and suddenly gasped and summoned my sister over. She then proceeded to scold her for not putting on enough eyeliner! The child is FOUR!

Anyhow, when all was said and done, we had a room full of little Jon Benets. Now where I live is a dance studio run by a Christian woman which teaches interpretive dance to praise and worship music. Last weekend, the four little girls my niece's age who take dance at this studio performed in church. They wore no makeup, they wore long-sleeved white shirts with a knee-length blue tulle skirt, and carried scarves which were used in their dance. The song selection? Deep and Wide!! They were so sweet and did such a nice job. Now that's the kind of dance that preschoolers should be doing! If only such a studio existed in my niece's town...

Here is a picture of the little Jon Benets. I won't identify Little Girl except to say that she is the sweetest and cutest one in the picture. That should make it easy for you to figure out which one she is. :) Click to enlarge.

Bam Bams

I may be the only person in the world who finds this cute and funny, but I'll share it anyway.

I have a little three year old boy that I work with who could not say words with 3 or more syllables intelligibly if his life depended on it. We worked and we practiced and we worked and we practiced, and he's doing so much better. He can say triangle and rectangle, helicopter and firetruck. But his favorite thing in the world to play with is his toy ambulance, and despite the thousands of times we've practiced saying ambulance, he can't say it anywhere even close enough that anyone outside his family would have any idea what the word was supposed to be.

In conversation, he calls them "bambams", but when we slow down the word to practice, it could come out as just about anything. He's called them bambams so long that it's a struggle for his family and for me not to just call it a bambam!!

Well, Friday we were practicing once more, and we went over it and over it, AM... BU... LANCE, then put it together, and again some unintelligible muttering that sounded nothing like ambulance. I sighed, then looked at him and said, "Someday you are going to be able to say ambulance perfectly, aren't you?" He nodded happily and said, "Yeah. But *I* say bambams!"

Yep. You sure do. :)

Update: May 4, 2007 He said ambulance today, as clear as could be!! I'm wearing a green shirt today, and when I walked in his house, he said something that floored me, as he's never said any such thing before: "You wear green shirt, I like green shirt!" I started working with this little boy exactly one year ago, and he had less than ten words, and every single thing he's learned to say has been with huge effort. I can recall the weeks upon weeks of modeling two word phrases over and over, one word at a time, and try as he might, he just could not put two words together. And now listen to him chatter. :)

Beautiful Scandalous Night

We sang this in church Sunday. As we sang, I was fascinated by the thought-provoking imagery of the lyrics, but not immediately drawn to the song itself. By the time we finished it, however, I knew this song necessitated further meditation. The first run-through just isn't enough to convey the depth of the message that I recognized this song had to offer. So I came home, found it online, listened to it a few times, and haven't been able to get it out of my head all week. The juxtaposition of such paradoxical but true descriptors has really caused me to consider the cross at yet another level. I wanted to share this song in the hopes that others will experience this, as well. Don't just listen to it once! It requires repetition to grasp its full significance!


Beautiful Scandalous Night

Lyrics by Steve Hindalong; music by Derri Daugherty

Download the file here

Go on up to the mountain of mercy
To the crimson perpetual tide.
Kneel down on the shore,
Be thirsty no more,
Go under and be purified.

Follow Christ to the holy mountain,
Sinner sorry and wrecked by the fall.
Cleanse your heart and your soul
In the fountain that flows
For you and for me and for all.

At the wonderful, tragic, mysterious tree
On that beautiful, scandalous night, you and me
Were atoned by His blood and forever washed white
On that beautiful, scandalous night.

On the hillside, you will be delivered,
At the foot of the cross justified,
And your spirit restored
By the river that poured
From our blessed Savior's side.

At the wonderful, tragic, mysterious tree
On that beautiful, scandalous night, you and me
Were atoned by His blood and forever washed white
On that beautiful, scandalous night.

Go on up to the mountain of mercy
To the crimson perpetual tide.
Kneel down on the shore,
Be thirsty no more,
Go under and be purified.

At the wonderful, tragic, mysterious tree
On that beautiful, scandalous night, you and me
Were atoned by His blood and forever washed white
On that beautiful, scandalous night.

Uncurly Hair

My four-year-old niece is taking dance lessons and her first recital is coming up next month. Curly hair is apparently a recital requirement, so my sister thought it best if she experimented now to find out the best way to curl her hair and make sure it was going to turn out nicely.

So Saturday night, Little Girl wore sponge curlers to bed, and Sunday morning, when the curlers came out, and her hair was combed and bows added, my sister reported that she was simply too beautiful for words. Eagerly, Little Girl looked in the mirror to see her beautiful self -- and burst into tears.

"What on earth is wrong?" my sister asked, and Little Girl answered, "Everybody will laugh at me!"

My sister tried and tried to convince her that everyone would think she was beautiful. Little Girl's response was to say that she looked like the Beast when he was all fixed up to go to dinner with Belle and his fur was in curls and bows, and they said, "You look..." and he muttered, "Stupid!"

She was so upset that my sister offered to put her hair in a ponytail. Little Girl agreed, and my sister said the curly ponytail was still adorably cute. However, when Little Girl looked in the mirror, she again burst into tears, saying she was still curly, and she wanted to be uncurly!!

My sister told her that everyone at church would tell her how pretty her curls were, but she was not convinced. And so it was a very sad Little Girl that went off to church Sunday morning. Of course, everyone told her that her curls were beautiful, and after the fourth or fifth compliment, Little Girl became quite uppity about her new hairstyle.

Apparently, compliments aren't enough to make up for one's own assessment, however, because when she went to bed last night, she asked, "Is my hair gonna be uncurly tomorrow? I like it better uncurly."

Shirley Temple she will never be... :)

The Passion

And so one night I experienced Passover, as Jesus and his disciples did, and the next night found me in the Garden of Gethsemane praying with Jesus just before his arrest and subsequent crucifixion.

A group I am involved with from church is exploring nontraditional methods of worship, outreach, etc. We had an incredible worship experience one night last week.

As we had been instructed ahead of time, we arrived at the church, entered and found our own private place to worship. The lights were dim, candles were lit, music was playing softly. A chair was set up here and there, and couch cushions were piled up in several places on the floor. I quietly selected a cushioned floor spot and began to pray.

This was supposed to be a spiritual check-in time, and so I began by bringing God all of the cares and concerns I've had over the last few weeks. It was wonderful to have time to do this without either being interrupted by a husband or a phone, without falling asleep because it was time for bed, without feeling like I needed to hurry because I had ten million other things I needed to do. I do have prayer and Bible study time daily but it's very rare I get the lengthy uninterrupted time like I had on this particular night. And so I had time to bring everything to God and hand it all over to Him so that I could be free to worship.

And then the movie began -- we watched Mel Gibson's version of The Passion, without subtitles. It was a movie we had all watched before, but this time was different -- we weren't supposed to merely watch the movie, we had been instructed to experience it, whatever that meant to us personally.

It was an incredible experience, one I encourage anyone to take some time and do. Do it alone, make sure you'll not be interrupted, take the phones off the hook, don't make any more plans for the evening, set aside this time as God's, and try to experience the events you see on the screen instead of just watching them. It's amazing what God can show you and teach you through this. Much of what I experienced was too personal to share, but I will share a few things.

First, Jesus tells us to take up our crosses daily and follow Him. I may not have a literal cross as Jesus did, but Jesus' death on the cross was the Father's will for His life, something He didn't wish to do but decided to do anyway, and therefore to take up my cross daily, I must also decide each and every day to do whatever the Father's will for me that day is. I have been struggling with doing His will in one area of my life for awhile now, and though I have spent much time in prayer over the matter and on many days have made that decision that I AM going to do it even though I don't want to, my good intentions fall so quickly to the wayside when faced with the issue and I have to start all over again the next day.

So I came to this experience in anticipation of dealing with this matter of taking up my own cross by immersing myself in the experience of Jesus' taking up His cross, and trying to identify as completely as possible with Him. It was my sin He bore so that I can identify with Him, and therefore it was my desire to truly focus on identification with Christ tonight in whatever way that might lead to.

With this in mind, I prayed along with Jesus in the garden that not my will, but His be done. At the same time, I attempted to feel what Jesus must have been feeling that night, knowing what was to come -- not just the physical torture and death He was about to experience, but the heartwrenching knowledge that God was going to turn His back on Him -- something we will never have to suffer. Beth Moore offered up the idea in her study Jesus the One and Only that Jesus may have suffered more emotionally from the anticipation and dread of what He knew was to come than He actually did during the crucifixion itself. So often when we know we're going to have to do something extremely distasteful to us, the nervousness and dread while waiting for it to happen are harder than just doing it and getting it over with. I thought of this while watching Jesus' suffering in the Garden.

The first thing in the movie that was really eye-opening for me was when Pilate was offering up the traditional release of a prisoner during Passover. Jesus or Barabbas? I recognized for the first time that I identified with Barabbas. It wasn't a comfortable thought. I'd prefer to identify with the women who loved Jesus, or with the disciples, but the reality of it struck me as I saw the two men standing side by side, and Barabbas released. Portrayed in the movie as dirty, filthy, wicked, and crazy -- and had it not been for God's plan that Jesus be crucified, there is no way Barabbas ever would have been chosen by the people to be released. How blatant was the comparison that Barabbas' freedom was granted only because of Jesus' death, just as my freedom was also purchased by Jesus' death. And then as the movie depicted, did the man display the gratitude that Jesus deserved? Did he say so much as a thank you? Did he worship at His feet as he should have done? No -- in fact, he didn't seem at all grateful. He laughed and jeered and mocked the very one who made his freedom possible. And I identified with that man. After all, don't I make a mockery of the cross when I minimize its significance? When I choose my own will over God's in spite of all that He's done for me? When I fail to share its meaning with those who need most to know? Yes -- I am Barabbas.

The most difficult part for me was the flogging. My first thought was, how could men be so evil as to inflict such torture upon another human being? But I knew, and reminded myself, that it was me inflicting those wounds. He was bruised for MY transgressions. He was crushed for MY iniquities. And I kept repeating in my mind over and over with each crack of the whip, by HIS stripes I am healed, by His stripes I am healed. Every gash, every whiplash, brings healing to me. I found myself crying out to them as the beating just went on and on and on to stop it, to leave Him alone, He'd suffered enough. But I realized that I needed to cry out to myself to stop it. It was my sin that was inflicting those wounds, and yet I continue in my sin, just as the men continued the beating. How incriminating for me, to see firsthand what my sins, what my selfishness, what my pride causes to the One I love more than anyone else. If that isn't motivation to stop, nothing is.

I finished off the experience by feeling the pain that my sins bring upon Him, asking for forgiveness, and recommitting to take up my cross daily. Now if I can just bring to mind that flogging every time I am tempted to sin, maybe I can keep that resolution.

Funny Kids

Sorry I haven't gotten the rest of Easter posted yet, I had a large part of it written last night and then the browser froze on me and I lost it all, and haven't had time to redo it yet.

But I had a thought today that I should probably share some of the funny things kids do and say on here. Everybody loves laughing at kids, right?

So here's my funny moment of the day. Two year old was being most uncooperative. His mother says to him, "You sure are being stubborn today." His five year old sister OH so seriously stated, "I think he has mad cow disease."

LOL.

Passover

Happy Easter, everyone.

I wanted to share a little bit about how I experienced Easter this year. I taught Sunday School this morning so was unable to attend the worship service, but that was fine, because I had my Easter all week long. I'll post about Passover tonight, and everything else in a later post, as this will be very long...

Passover:

This truly is the epitome of Easter anyway, isn't it? Just think, all those hundreds of years before Jesus was ever born, God designed Passover to demonstrate to His people what He was going to do. The Messianic symbolism in the Seder meal is unmistakable -- to anyone who is open to the idea that Jesus could be the Messiah, of course, which is how Jews can continue to celebrate Passover year after year and sadly miss the whole point.

I celebrated Passover this year with five other families at our pastor's home. We didn't do the full meal, we did the shortened version. I would like to share some of the symbolism and how it applies to that first Easter. God paints such beautiful portraits that it is such a shame we don't always see them.

The first step in celebrating Passover is to remove all leaven from the home. The yeast symbolizes sin, and as we enter into a celebration of Passover, the removal of the leaven from the home shows a willingness to remove corruption from our lives.

Next we partake of the first cup, the cup of sanctification and freedom. God promised this to the nation of Israel, and although they view it as a promise yet to come, we know it is a promise He has fulfilled through the sacrifice of His Son.

The next step is the washing of hands, to represent the cleansing from sin. We know of course that Jesus took this a step further and washed the feet of His disciples at His last Passover meal with them.

After partaking of parsley dipped in saltwater (to represent the tears of suffering of the Jews in slavery) comes the breaking of the middle matzah. On a plate sits three pieces of matzah -- to represent, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The middle matzah, representing the Son, is then broken in half. One half is replaced on the plate, while the other half is wrapped in a linen napkin and hidden. To think that Jews do this year after year without realizing the symbolism of Jesus' body being broken for us just as He explained to His disciples as they performed this part of the ceremony together, and buried.

Next the youngest child asks the four questions, which enables the parents to share with the children the story of the Exodus, and to remind them of the promise God made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob -- a promise which has now been fulfilled, but for which they continue to wait expectantly.

The second cup is taken at this time, the cup of praise. Following this, the bone of the lamb is shown, representing the Passover lamb killed so that the children of Israel might live. Of course, Jesus is our ultimate Passover lamb, and His blood covers our sins, just as the sacrificial lamb represented this covering of sins in the years before Christ for the Jewish people.

After the meal, the piece of matzah that was hidden away (i.e., Jesus' crucified body) is found, broken, and eaten. "Take, eat, this is My body, which is broken for you," Jesus told His disciples. And then the cup of redemption follows, with Jesus' commentary that "This cup is the new covenant in my blood" -- the original cup of redemption was a reminder of God's promise that He would one day redeem His people, and now by Jesus' blood, we are indeed redeemed.

I couldn't help but cry at the next part of the Seder meal. At this point, a child was sent to the front door to look for Elijah, for Malachi prophesied that Elijah would prepare the way for the Messiah. An empty seat is always ready for Elijah at every Passover meal, in case this is the year that he comes. Of course, the child does not see Elijah coming, and his father tells him that maybe next year Elijah will come. This saddened me more than any other part of the entire Passover meal, to think of all those Jewish people looking for Elijah year after year after year in hopes that God's promise to send a Messiah will come true in their lifetime -- and here, Elijah already came 2,000 years ago, (Jesus identified John the Baptist as the Elijah who would prepare His way) as did the Messiah, and they missed him! How can a people looking so expectantly for someone miss him entirely when he arrives? It is truly heartbreaking.

The fourth cup is the cup of acceptance, or hope. Jesus says in Matthew 26, after taking the cup of redemption, that this fruit of the vine He will not drink until He takes it with the disciples in the Kingdom. This cup represents the hope of the Jewish people that they will live in a Kingdom of peace. Someday we will drink that cup with Jesus in His glorious Kingdom of eternal joy and peace, and the final promise will be fulfilled.

Is it any wonder, with this much symbolism, that Jesus commands His disciples to do this in remembrance of Him? I truly feel that the typical communion service practiced in many churches is not what Jesus had in mind. Perhaps it's fine... but isn't the symbolism lost when only this part of it is segmented out of the entire Seder that way? I feel that Christians would greatly benefit from celebrating the Passover in this way, in remembrance of Him. All of the traditional Easter celebrations are great, but a Seder reinforces the picture God drew for His people thousands of years ago and reminds us that all but the last promise is already fulfilled. It reminds us of Jesus' sacrifice as the Passover lamb, and reminds us of His broken body and His shed blood, by which we are redeemed. Yes, I believe that Passover is what "Easter" is all about.