What Is a Messianic Seder?

A Seder is simply a meal with a very special "Order" of Service. Seder means "order". For centuries and in every Jewish community this wonderfully rich evening, while varying in detail, has included the same essential ingredients and same essential order of service enjoyed today. The Seder dinner is the traditional Jewish celebration and TELLING of the Passover story.  It is a time of joyous celebration for Jews around the world-- a celebration of God's miraculous victory over the Egyptians and their formation as a distinct people with a calling from God.  It is celebrated by many today as a remembrance of freedom, liberation, and deliverance.

For believers in Yeshua, Jesus the Messiah, the Feasts of Passover, Unleavened Bread, and Firstfruits are all prophetically linked and fulfilled by the death, burial, and resurrection of our LORD.  The Feasts of the LORD themselves are tremendous tools for teaching... and they call  us as believers (whether Jewish or Gentile) to remember the great goodness and provision of God in adopting us into His family.  The Last Supper where our Lord instituted the new covenant with His first disciples was a Passover meal that has some resemblance to the Seder order of service that developed in the following centuries:  there were cups of wine, dipping in sop, and the use of unleavened bread.  When Jesus took the "bread" and broke it, for example, and said, "This is my body, broken for you", this has a much more significant meaning when seen in the context of the Seder order of ceremony.  When he took the "cup" and said "This cup is the new covenant in My blood, which is shed for you.", this is no less than the cup "after supper" which is the Cup of Redemption in the Seder order of service.  
  
The modern day Seder is most likely very close to what Yeshua celebrated with His family EVERY year during the Feast of Passover/Unleavened Bread and also the same meal He shared the night before His arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane.  Many Christians are completely unaware and uneducated about the significance of Jewish culture in our New Testament beliefs--and this is referred to as the "Biblical" roots of our faith.  Part of these roots include celebrating and learning about the Feasts of the LORD... Biblical holidays that are still as valid for us to celebrate today as they were when God gave them to Moses for God's people through the Law.  Through faith in Jesus, there is a great freedom and enjoyment that we can have in celebrating His "holy" days.  We know that such celebrations, which are liturgical in some ways, do not make us righteous before God--rather, we can enjoy them as God's prophetic gift to us that outlines His plan of redemption in the past and His fulfillment of the ages in the future.  They also give a great opportunity for teaching our children what God has done in redemptive history and what He is going to do in the future.  Most of all, they can be used as a point of contact for both remembrance and prayer for the nation of Israel and the Jewish people in general-- for God's protection over them and for God's full redemptive purposes to be fulfilled.

The Messianic Seder is simply the traditional Jewish Passover meal and ceremony but with a clear recognition that Jesus, our Passover Lamb, has been sacrificed (1 Corinthians 5:7).  The order of service is a loose form of liturgy and is known as the Haggadah, or "The Telling".  The word comes from Exodus 13:8 where the Hebrew word v'higgad'ta is rendered:   "... and you shall tell (your son)..." 

The Messianic Seder is a chance to tell the story of our redemption in a unique way that incorporates praise, fellowship, food, and singing! What more could you ask for?  It is a teaching time that will certainly add a depth of understanding about God's redemptive story in a way unlike any you have experienced.
 

 
Links and Further Reading
Here are some links with more information and writings from threemacs on Passover:

The Significance of Passover (from Threemacs)
Biblical Holidays Website
Passover Seder Dinner - Messianic Haggadah
Messianic Seder