BOSTON -- Jonathan Bernd, missionary from a Boston-based Jews for Jesus, presented “Christ in the Passover” at Central Baptist Church, where he explained the ancient rituals of the Jewish Passover feast to help gentile Christian community to gain deeper knowledge of the Passover.
Shayne Childers, associate pastor at Central Baptist Church added: “I thought it would be something our church and our community would enjoy. This helps us learn more about the Jewish roots of Christianity.”
Bernd explained in detail about the rituals of the Passover that are still being practiced today among the Jews.
“Just as my ancestors had to put the blood of the lambs on their doorposts so the Angel of Death would pass over them, we today need to have the blood of the Messiah on the doorposts of our hearts,” Bernd during his presentation.
During the time of Moses, Jews had to kill and eat a lamb and sprinkle its blood on the doorposts of their homes so that they could be protected when God sent the plague to kill the firstborn of all the Egyptians. But now Jews place a dry shank bone of a lamb on the plate.
“The whole point of the Passover was eating a lamb, but in most American Jewish homes, the lamb will never, ever be eaten at Passover,” Bernd said. “The purpose of this item (the bone) is to remind us of the sacrifices that according to God’s law we have to make, but we cannot make since the Temple has been destroyed by the Romans.”
Bernd also explained the modern interpretation of the Passover by Jews for Jesus that certain elements in ancient Passover rituals were intended by God to symbolize the stripes and piercing of Christ during his crucifixion, death, burial and resurrection.
“This is the actual origin of the communion service we observe as Christians. This is what Christ was doing the night before he died in his celebration with his disciples,” Bernd said. “My Passover lamb is Jesus — you can see this all points to Jesus.”
Bernd told the audience at Central Baptist that his organization focuses on Jewish outreach, but experiences the same difficulties missionaries face in nations where Christianity is not welcomed.
“Less than 1 percent of my people know Jesus, but the vast majority of us live in predominantly Christian communities, so we are largely an unreached people group,” Bernd said. “(Jews for Jesus) exists to make the messiahship of Jesus an unavoidable issue for Jews worldwide.”
