What Is a Seder Meal?

• Seder is a ritual practice first observed by the Jews to remember Passover and is now practiced by Christians to remember how Passover points to the cross.
• Seder provides an opportunity to slow down, be intentional with community, and reflect on God’s deliverance of his people through the Exodus and through the resurrection of Christ.
• Our staff have created a Seder guide that explains the process step by step for any family and or group that is interested in observing the practice.

Seder Guide PDF

Holy Week Webpage

Sermon on Exodus 12

Scriptures

1 Corinthians 5:7

John 1:29–37

John 19:31–37

This is just a tool, right? But the bigger question for our audience is what are the consequences of not remembering? You know, what are the consequences of, of, of not remembering this God of faithfulness, the God who ultimately provided Jesus to accomplish what we could not, the God who is a God of history, who is and was and forever will be. If we don't stop and remember those things, we get caught up in our own story. We get caught up in, in our own present struggles and lack of perspective and the tons of consequences that can, that can come from that.

And, and and really remembering is, is such a, it's a foundational part to growing or growing our faith. Hey, everyone, and welcome back to the Grace Church Podcast. I'm your host, Whitney Manus, and I'm here with Scott Mozango. How are you doing, Scott? Hey, Whitney. Good morning.

Good morning And today we are going to be talking about something a little It was new for me. I started hearing some conversations in our Com department and I was like that's really cool and I just want to learn more about it. And so we have Donald Spann in the studio with us today. He is one of our campus pastors and he has been working on a resource with our Com team for something called Seder Meal, which we will get into here in a minute.

But first, Donald, introduce yourself a little bit. What do you do here and tell us about your family? Tell us a little bit about yourself. My name is Donald Spann and I happen to be the campus pastor at Grace Church Taylors, which is on Wade Hampton Blvd. Been there for about 8 years now, actually, just last week made eight years and congratulations. Yeah, that's awesome.

No, but I've been a member for 20, Halloween right now, 21 years, so that's awesome. Been a member here for 21. And I'm married to Mary Beth and I have three beautiful children who all go to Grace and they're here now. That's C17. Eli is 16 and Landon is 14, so that's me, the kids and all the people that we got. Donald likes his coffee.

Donald likes going to Kenya. Donald is a great person to be around, so we're glad to have him in the studio today. And yeah, let's get started and talk a little bit about Seder Meal.

So this is a resource. It's going to go a little bit in conjunction with Easter and Holy Week. And so, Donald, will you explain a little bit to us about what a Seder meal is and just where did this come from? Yeah. For me, the Seder meal is something we started when we first got here. Tom Fowler from the TR campus, yeah, he ended up from Philadelphia, came down here and told us what a Seder meal was and showed us.

And we did it when my kids were little. Then Joey Espinoza, who actually attends the downtown campus, he hosted an event and Joey is part Jewish and so and he gave, he did a Seder meal for us and a bunch of young families and man, just the symbolism and the things that it stood for was amazing. So it always caught hold.

And so then I have the opportunity to do it for some of our high school students. When I was working in student ministry and when I became the campus pastor, I realized that I wanted this to be a big deal for us. I wanted to expose people to what it was all about. Yeah.

And so we're putting together a booklet. And in that booklet, it actually has just some understanding about what Seder is. And I'm actually going to read from the very front page on what what it says. What is Saturn? Why do Christians practice it? Because the Hebrew word Seder means order, right?

So it is structured some symbolic meal that retells the story of Israel's deliverance from slavery in Egypt, a practice commanded in Exodus. Exodus chapter 12, as a matter of fact. And the story of redemption unfolds through an intentional sequence of foods, readings, questions, and prayers.

Now this is distinctly Jewish, the celebration of Passover. But for many Christians, we observe Seder to better understand the biblical roots of their faith and the meaning of Jesus's final meal with his disciples. So for Christians, the Seder becomes a powerful way to see how God's rescue of Israel points forward to the greatest deliverance accomplished through Christ Jesus. OK, Amen. I know. That's cool.

So it is a meal. It is sitting down with some people in your house, I guess, and you know, you got these elements that you're working through. There's an order, there's a structure in steps. Why do you think that this is something that is helpful for us and for our people now? Like what? Why is this something that we want to OfferUp to our members this year and just encourage them to think about?

Well, over the last three years, we've done it over at the Taylor's campus and it has grown systematically. And in that growth, we've seen people outside of that, even go to the outside of Grace Church that have seen it on the website. And they decided to come in. Yeah. And and so the first year they thought it was just for families and young people because normally we only do it in Camp Grace. OK, Yeah.

Well, we said it was for families the last two years. And since then, man, it's we've seen an influx of people coming in and having insights and asking questions and just connecting the dots. And so as we get through Holy Week, as once we get past Palm Sunday, it seems like a lot of people outside of Grace Church are looking for tactical ways for people to get connected and to be able to be part of a service.

And so, so that's how it started. And so we talked about it as a staff on how to make this resource available for people to do in their homes more than just having to come to church to do it. And so the resource that we were putting together as a staff was so that people have various ways to be able to fulfill this.

So they can do it in a small group with their Home group. They can do it with those guys, or they can do it and invite some other families in, or they can just do it with their kids. And so that was that was the the purpose behind thinking about how to put this resource together. Because as we start to teach these young people more about it, and then we teach our adults more about it than just the connection of who Jesus is to us in the Exodus story is just phenomenal. OK.

So that's really good context for me because I was always pictured it as a camp grace thing, which again, like that's probably where we have the most opportunity for tactile instruction. I know you lose that as an adult, and I'll be the first to say that I really still benefit from that. Love that.

So the fact that you you move that into more of the family environment invited folks in and then now putting together resource where people could do it in their homes. I love, I love that even just the development of, of the idea because I, I think this is one thing that the, the, the Jewish people as they are examples for us in the Old Testament were really good at remembering, yes. Yeah. They would sometimes.

Well. Sometimes they weren't. Right, true, but. That's part of how they were. Better than us though. That's how they were. Yeah.

I mean, that's that's part of the irony, right? Right. Is that their, their culture was kind of set up around these feasts and festivals and gatherings and pilgrimages to Jerusalem to remember these unbelievable, miraculous moments in their history of which Passover was the the centerpiece going back to Exodus 12, like you said. And they're not just remembering the rescue. They're remembering the covenant that they formed at Sinai. They're remembering the wilderness wanderings.

They're remembering their interest into the promised land. They're, they're basically remembering their entire covenant history with God as a centerpiece. And so then you might ask the question, well, what does this have to do with Jesus?

Well, Jesus clearly explained that he was the fulfillment of this Passover lamb dialogue, and you even see it in First Corinthians 57. And so there's just, it's interesting because we're studying Corinthians now. We just studied Exodus. Yeah. This is a great time to pull those pieces together. Yeah.

And I love the fact that this is a tangible, tactile way to to do some, to do some teaching. It's great. Yeah, which Donald can you?

Well, first of all, how many steps are there to this? Traditional Jewish Passover is about 15 steps, but we have the way we typically do what we usually condense into about 12 to 13, so we're going to happen in 13 steps. All right, so we won't make you go through all 13 steps here now and we'll obviously connect y'all with that resource and you can go look at it for yourself.

But can you just give a few examples? We keep saying tactile, tangible. Yeah, just a few examples of how that works in kind of this paradigm, just to give people an idea of here's a practice that you do and then here's how you think about it, and that's how it helps you remember. No 100%.

So what's nice is in this resource that we put together, we actually have a list of things that you need to bring and prepare before that meal takes place. And just to be honest and real life in a Jewish Home, this is about a six hour event. And but no, but for our families, just to let them know, like we've gotten this thing shrunk down so that you can do it with your kids, probably about a 45 minute window, right?

And so and. Parents are grateful no there. There you go. There you go. But but if you were, if you want to prepare a meal and we are like, look, you can order rice and beans and chicken and then that can be your Passover meal. And then you can do the symbolic pieces around that.

Yeah. And so Or you can be, as you know, ornate and do a. Original as you want. To be yes. Yes. A little bit of freedom. In this a little bit of freedom.

In this personality into. It and so the plate that you would prepare would have a leg Shank of that would symbolize just the lamb. But then there's other pieces like the matzo would be important because as you're walking through the matzo and when we when we would talk about communion for us, we would say that like our matzo that we use, it is gluten free, right?

But it is unleavened bread without sin and it is pierced and it is striped. And then you have to break the peace. So we get to take that matzo and just the symbolism of what that means just reminds us of what happened to Jesus on that Friday. Yeah, right.

And so in this meal, there's a piece where you have three whole pieces of matzo, and then you take two of them and you place them to the side and you work through the meal with it. Then you take one of them, fold it and wrap it up inside a white cloth and you go hide it in the room. And at the end, you bring it back and it is the dessert.

And so I'm like, oh, God the Son, God the Father, Holy Spirit. So, so you, you, there's some connections that happens there. And so as you're reading through and practicing some of the pieces here, you're like, oh, it's, it's an easier step to step over and be like, oh, that makes sense. Somehow Jesus fulfills some of this. Yeah.

Well, and just to put a couple of just the verses, we'll we'll put these in the show notes. But yeah, when you think about John chapter one, that Jesus is the Lamb of God recommendation. I mean, the reference there talked about the lamb Shank and then you think about the prophecy that not one of his bones would be broken. Yep, right.

So you see that in John chapter 19, Jesus is the fulfillment of a lamb there. And so the connections, if you're walking through your eating, your touching and your teaching and even singing, we'll talk about that in, in just a second, you can see how it could really, really help make these connections, particularly for a younger child who's developmentally, imaginatively coming into these truths. So, and I even remember being a little kid and kind of, you know, starting to have the gospel like really fleshed out for me.

And I remember thinking like this would just be so much easier if I could see God and I could see Jesus. And, and sometimes I feel like that's an under talked about part of our faith where I mean, faith is believing without seeing. But I think we all struggle a little bit of I just, I need something to hold onto. I need something in front of me. And God actually does think about that. To your point, Scott, like throughout the Old Testament, he's giving them all of these practices.

And then later Paul talks about in Romans, like the law is not for us to get stuck on and for, for that to be the thing that we are like finding life in. But all of those practices are meant to help us understand what our sin is and understand who Christ is and understand how all of these people, all of these pieces across history are linked together because it is, it's, it's a complex, nuanced, abstract idea, you know, to connect all of these things. And so for kids, but very much so as an adult, I just need, you know, these tangible reminders.

And it's true for communion. It's true for baptism. We try to incorporate that often. But also in the tradition that I grew up in, that just wasn't always necessarily as much a part.

Well, and I think, you know, tying these couple ideas together, you have a Seder meal, which is really the start of of Passover, which was the, the main holiday. You have Jesus with his disciples in what was certainly a seder like a meal. And and he's doing that very explained that you're talking about. And when he is, he is basically saying, OK, we've been doing this thing for generations. We've been doing this for hundreds of years. We're going to be doing a new thing in the future.

And the cool picture there is, you know, Jesus is the host of of that meal, but then he talks about he's going to become the bread. Yeah. Yeah.

So the host becomes the meal. Yeah. And his blood is going to become the wine. And so as he is teaching those things, you can kind of begin to see this, you know, huge transformational moment in history that he is basically, you know, prophesying or alluding to. You're not exactly the same thing as this Seder mill that is attempting to do the same thing, which is make these connections so that we can see the God of our faith is a God of history, and he's a God of the present, and he's a God of the future, and he's a God that wants us to know Him.

And all of these tools are ways that we get to know Him and know his redemptive purposes. Yes, it's fast. We just did Exodus a year ago about this time, and it's just fascinating as you can recall and just remember all of the things that took place before the Exodus even happened.

And so this meal did not take place on that first night. It took place after they left. And then they got to recall, be like, you remember, remember, remember. Yeah.

And so like, Oh yeah, that's why they need to remember and that, and that's what this we need to do a lot more remembering as as people. And so and not just remembering of like the maybe good things, but even the hard things because it also points us back to Jesus. And so like the This is why for me doing this and setting up some reminders not to be wrote, but reminders of what I'm doing and why I'm doing. This Do you have some favorite parts that you like to lead through? Man. Better than most like yeah, Donald size remembrances.

Well, the, the matzo piece right, is like fascinating for me. And so there's a piece where you have salt water and you dip the bitter herbs. It reminds them of the tears in the brick and mortar and the things that they were doing back in each slavery. Yeah, yeah. They're like, what in the world, bro? I mean, this is, this is real.

And then there's a thing called corset, which is an applesauce mixture. And that thing is to remind them of just like how they had to make their own, like we would call concrete, but to to hold the bread together and all the steps. It's just amazing because it recalls on what they were doing tactically as a people for hundreds of years in Egypt.

But God's like, I'm bigger than all of that. Yeah. And tying all those together. Yeah. When I'm when I'm teaching this live, like, you know, it's supposed to keep on the script.

But you know you. Know. There's some freedom script, don't really go. Together they don't. No, no, no, no. It's called guidelines. That's right.

So, so at my home, if we're if we were to do this at 2 hour window, might stretch the six hours because because we're going to read and in in this guide and it gives us a little bit more of like some blessings to say over and then also read through. So let me let me just do step 6, which is the unleavened bread, which is the beginning of some of the pieces here. And so you're supposed to lift them on some and say this blessing over the bread, right?

And so blessed are you, Lord our God, King of the universe, who brings forth bread from the earth. And then we have it. So you can say it in Hebrew and try to get connected in that way. Will you try and do that for us right now?

Taha Adonai elohim nay melek ha Alam ha MO tizzi lakim me ha. There you go. I. Think it was better than if either of us had done it for. Sure.

So. Yeah. Just to give, you know, just kind of when people have an idea, yeah. Yeah, that's great. And so when you go deeper, we're asking you to reflect on God's God as a provider for both daily bread and spiritual bread, and then discuss how matza is like the unleavened bread the Israelites had when they left Egypt. See, the absence of yeast represents the absence of our sins in our lives when we are redeemed by Jesus.

So I, I think the little pieces that we're trying to help people do here, I think it's going to be really good. I think it's going to be really great resource that our com team put together. And I asked that it could be a book. We can take notes.

So it's something that you can remember and use the same book over and over again and you can do with different family members so that it's becomes a little bit more of a tradition. Yeah. And I think something else that strikes me as you're talking, I mean, we've mentioned there's a good many steps you can do it in 45 minutes, but could take longer. And we've talked on this podcast before about our difficulty and slowing down. Like part of the reason we struggle to remember is because we're just busy.

And Easter usually doesn't help with that because you have family coming into town and spring break was somewhere around there and school and all those things. And so I think that this is actually just a helpful structure and get like many of the sacraments that God developed for his people to just slow down, to sit and think about something. And and that is a little bit of our challenge to ourselves for y'all. Just that you would be able to sit, you would think about something, you would reflect on it.

And we just wouldn't rush to the next step. We wouldn't try to get this done as quickly as possible, and even though we would be able to enjoy the presence of those who are with us and treat it as a moment of community as well. But it does. It requires the slow, unhurried time together that forms intimacy with God and each other.

Well, I think the, the, you know, this is just a tool, right? But the bigger question for our audience is what are the consequences of not remembering? Good question. And what are the consequences of of not remembering? This God of faithfulness, the God who ultimately provided Jesus to accomplish what we could not, the God who is a God of history, who is and was and forever will be. If we don't stop and remember those things, we get caught up in our own story.

We get caught up in in our own present struggles and lack of perspective and the tons of consequences that can that can come from that. And, and, and really remembering is, is such a, it's a foundational part to growing our growing our faith. And so I'm all in favor of whatever it takes for us to slow down and to remember. And we have such an amazing story. And this also helps connect the Old Testament and the New Testament, which is one of the things we've been trying to do in the last few years as church, as we have really promoted reading through the scripture and, and just kind of helping to see how these ideas come together and how you know, Jesus and the, the new covenant is the fulfillment of the old covenant.

And so I'm thankful, Donald, that you're doing this and, and bringing it together. Do you still do it on the floor? Yes, yeah, yeah. What? Do you do tell us why you do it on? The floor.

So traditionally you would come in in the in a home and you would lounge and you would lay down and you would do it at the table at the feet. It's funny because we actually had to do a tiered system last year. And so we had all the kids and young families on the floor because that's traditionally how it's laid out.

But then we also had grandparents show up, some people from outside the community. And so we we had, you could lay down on the floor and round tables and we do it at the back of the worship center over at Taylor's. And then then we have a teared up where you can sit on the little kids tables. We bring those in. Yeah. And then you can sit in the little kids chairs with some of the kids. Not even the kids don't sit there.

It's. Older adults it's tables place to be. No, either. And then we have high bars for the grandparents or people who've got hip surgeries and all these other thing and they can't get all the way down, they can't get medium down. They can get down, but they can't get right up. They can't get. Back up, yeah, I understand that's yes, yes, yes, so yeah.

And it's really cool. Just a little bit more interaction in that way. And in this even in sector, there's distinctively things for kids to do. There's a part where they ask questions and so you take the you take the youngest kid.

So I just distributed around if we have like 75 people to 100 people, I'll walk to each table and I give one of the kids who can read the question to ask or like so on. On any other day, we sit up at the table and that is one of the questions, why do we recline? And it is actually one of the questions that they ask and say I. Love that. It reminds me, we did a video for Exodus where it was animated and it was a little granddaughter talking with her grandfather. Yes. And that is, but that that's so specific to Scripture where God is like, remember these things and talk about them often and remind them to your children and your grandchildren and your grandchildren's grandchildren.

Yeah, right. And so it's a cute thing, but it is. I mean, there's a spiritual discipleship that's happening in that moment, which is awesome. Yep.

And then just what stories kind of have come out of this? I mean, you've done a few things now with a lot of different people. What, what are like one or two things that stick out in your mind where someone was like, this is really helpful. And this is this is how it helped me in my spiritual formation. Yeah, Last year there was a lady who wrote. She came, didn't know who she was.

We asked people to sign up last year and just so he could be prepared because Emily was running around ordering all the things. And this family showed up and it was a grandmother and she was like, I had no clue that this symbolizes this. And that makes so much more sense to me. And that was the the light that came on for me. The first time that I did this was the light that came on for her where it just just gave me a a better understanding of like, oh, OK, All right. Like, I mean, like this is 2000 years before we even thought about Jesus coming to the earth, Jesus, our New Year's coming before we even had a right, you know, but for us to, to look back at all of that and be like, Oh, my goodness gracious.

You know, when we're talking about putting blood along the door, we're like, OK, so we're going to be protected and covered. OK, So I needed to hear those stories and then see it in a different light. I had different glasses on to see like the trueness of it more than just me reading it and and squinting to to read.

Now I've now that I got spectacles as old people would say. And so like it made it made it come to light a little bit better. And so talking to other people where that happens to them, I'm like, there we go. That is why we're doing this thing. And then I'll relate it to our last episode. We talked about just approaching Scripture with curiosity because I do think there's so many things that seem very random, even as, you know, you're describing this guide and some of the elements.

And I'm like, there's apples and there's a lamb Shank and how do all of these things fit together? And I think that's how we read the Scripture too, where we're like, well, that's just something that was old and it made sense to the Jews, but like, doesn't really have anything to do with me anymore. And I'm moving on. And this is an opportunity where we can really ask the questions with a childlike attitude and say, wait a second, what does this mean? And then if we do that work, then we see all of these connections.

Scripture becomes so much more rich. We see the history. We see how everything fits together. And I mean, those moments are so powerful and reveal to us who who God is. Yes, it's awesome. The beauty of, as you were saying that I have a desire to want to learn and it was just difficult for me just in reading in some areas.

And so there's other things you can do, you can listen, right? And so, so I'm an auditory listener, auditory listen, that's whatever. Like I learn auditorily.

And so it was, it's been really helpful for me to listen to things and then go back and read it or listen and read it at the same time. And it's a different perspective. And so when I was in high school and college, I'm like, how do all these pastors know all this, right.

And so then I'm like, OK, they all went to seminary, whatever. And now I'm like, anybody can do the same work and then we have resources at our fingertips right now. So even with concordances and everything else, you have the opportunity as you read and look at the footnotes and then go back and then listen to other people to be able to reflect and think for yourself. And that's what we want our people to do anyway. That's right.

So as a pastor, that's what like, I want our people to be curious about it. And then I want them to Fact Check me because that means they're doing the work. And if they're fact checking me and they're finding out that I'm wrong, which I mean, every once in a while that might happen.

But. But, but at least they're doing. We're asking, we're trying to make disciples. And being a disciple means you're doing some work on your own. Yeah, that's. Right as we close one, the thing that has captured my imagination and curiosity over the years. I probably heard this about 10 years ago, just as it relates to the night of the first Passover and you have this preparation of the Israelites.

This is the culmination of the 10 plagues and God is basically, you know, he's forecast today. This is what's happening. This is what you need to prepare for. You know, I heard this and it's like, all right, let's go back in time to that night and we have the Israelites who are inner mingled and interconnected with the Egyptians.

And so that fateful night, you have an Egyptian house and let's just say they have their their idols, whatever they look like, right? Let's just say they're carved wood idols, and they're in their house. They're on their mantle, so to speak, right?

And so they have their idols, and there's no blood on the doorpost. So there's death in the house. And then the next house is another Egyptian house, and they've got their idols. And there's no blood on the doorposts, and there's death in the house, and then the next house is an Israelite house.

But you know what they also have? They've got their idols on the mantle. They, they're, they're not perfect, they're not pure, they're not clean, but they have faith. They have blood over the doorposts.

And so there's a rescue. And I thought about, I've thought about that so much, particularly this time of year, that Jesus didn't wait for me to just clean up my life and get rid of all of the bad stuff and all the idols and, and, and to make myself pure so that he would accept me. It's the faith that that's why I need Jesus is because I can't do all of that.

And so just that picture of that first Passover and remembering that kind of God, that kind of faith, that kind of sacrifice, whatever we can do to, to contend for that memory. And I think the Seder mill is a great way that we can contend for that memory and drag it into our presence so that we can just taste and smell and see and live with God's people and really, really appreciate the sacrifice that God made for us through Jesus. Whatever we have to do. And I think this is a great resource. And Donald, I'm so thankful for just your testimony and years of, of doing this and keeping this in front of us.

Whatever we need to do to make that Jesus real in our lives is is worth doing. Yeah, that's so good. That's so helpful to think about and we want y'all to hear us say that this is so optional. You know, this is not mandatory requirement by any means. And to your point, Scott, that it is not communion, it is not baptism, it is not Seder meal, it's not the disciplines that make us holy, right? Like that is all Jesus Christ is, all the blood on the doorpost on the cross for us.

But these are things that help us to remember, help us to be dependent, help us to make sure that our motives are right and do the diagnostic check. Yeah, we like to say of how we're thinking about things and so is this is helpful for you. We will have this PDF and this booklet that Donald was talking about on our Easter and Holy Week web page. We'll put that in the show notes for you and we would just encourage you to go back and listen to the sermon we did last year on Exodus 12 in the Passover and just refresh your memory around all of that before we go into Easter and just see how all of these pieces start to connect for you.

And we're just praying that honestly, you would see a part of the gospel in a new way, that God would just reveal something to you that helps you continue to grow to become more like him. But also just to have that relationship with him continue to grow as well. So Scott, Donald, thank y'all for being here and we will see you guys next time.