Help Teach Your Children the True Meaning of Easter
My friend, Daja at The Provision Room, has co-written Radiant Inside & Out, an ebook that I think you will love! Give your children a comprehensive, hands-on view of the true meaning of Easter this year!
“Easter and Passover are just around the corner! Are you ready?
Parents, are you constantly looking for ways to make holidays more meaningful for your family? Things that lift the spirit from just bunnies, eggs, and chocolate to the glory and beauty at the root of our Holy Days? Things that plant our focus on the Lord and His Redemptive plan for the whole world?
We have a resource for you!”
“We are confident this devotional will be a blessing to moms and children as they journey through the 10 plagues Egypt experienced, finding the common thread of God’s Redemption and Love! Along the way, your children will have Spring Cleaning assignments–some for the house and some for their hearts! By the time Passover and Easter arrive your home and hearts will be ready to welcome the Risen Lord!
This incredible resource will unite your family in blessing your home and uplifting your hearts! (Read an excerpt and see sample pages.)”
christian living | Word Warrior | 
March 20, 2013 9:43 am
Thanks for mentioning Passover! It is often ignored by Christians I think, but it isn’t just a Jewish holiday. One way my family tries to keep Christ at the center of Easter is by eating food that Christ would have eaten for Easter dinner. We have unleavened bread, lentils, goat cheese, dried fruits such as figs and apricots, and this year we might even have fish and honeycomb! It is so fun for the little kids to think “Jesus ate this!” And I think it makes Him feel more real to all of us. This is a tradition that I want to carry on to my own family when I get married.
That’s great, Eva! The more we can connect our everyday lives to our eternal life in Christ the better! Food is actually a really powerful way to communicate spiritual lessons! Your kids are blessed to have your example!
Actually they are my siblings
But yes we are all very blessed!
We are really changing our focus this year. My husband and I realized that we were doing all the typical holiday traditions (baskets, candy, easter eggs, etc) and we went to church, taught the kids about the real reason for celebrating, but it seemed it was candy, fun, candy, eggs, candy, laughing, candy, fun, “oh yeah, Christ died and rose again…back to the eggs”.
This year we removed ALL the trappings of the holiday that are typically used. Oh, we didn’t totally get rid of them. We feel that Spring is such a lesson on it’s own we now celebrate the changing of the seasons from winter to spring. We use it as a time to teach the kids about the seasons in school, celebrate God’s creation of the seasons, new life on the earth, and more (we are farmers so this is very easy for us and very relevant). We have cute little peep candy occasionally, fun bunny and chick crafts, long walks in nature, new coloring books, and so on.
Then, on the weekend we celebrate Christ’s death and resurrection it is so much easier to make the focus all about Him. There is nothing pulling at our minds and hearts. Oh, we celebrate. His resurrection is worth celebrating. This year we are going to try and do a simple Passover type meal for the kids to show them the beauty of what Christ celebrated and what it meant prophetically.
That’s really beautiful, Kari!
Likewise we started observing Passover several years ago. By going through the Seder (special way to clean, special foods to eat, Scripture reading, etc.) you see so clearly God’s plan of redemption laid out from the start. Every year when we do it I see more Christ and am in awe. It really helps us to prepare our hearts of Easter.
Passover starts on the 26–next Tuesday. And the kids already can’t wait!
Kari–love it! If you get the chance to go through a formal Passover Seder, I highly recommend it. Like Daja said, it is SO incredible to see all the ways it points to Christ.
I went through one that was being taught. It was awesome. I just wanted to sit there for hours and take it all in over and over. How can so many be so blind kept going through my mind. People partake of these special holy days and miss the significance. I want to make sure our children don’t miss it.
I, too, have begun to get away from the secular Easter trappings, and yes they are a TRAP! I have always done a cookie activity with the kids the night before Easter – the cookies are made and then “sealed” in the oven overnight (it is off overnight) and then they wake up, grab a cookie and find it is hollow inside like Jesus’ tomb was empty so is the cookie! We read the Bible and do the regular Church activities.
Recently I have begun to look into the Jewish celebrations like Passover – I have a great grandmother that was Jewish and I was interested to find out more about the Jewish religion since it birthed Christianity. Does anyone have any good resources to use to actually go through the Passover celebration? I need something simple & easy that I can use…next year obviously since I can’t do the entire holiday, but I know I can still incorporate the food into our celebration.
I think it’s important for the kids to learn more about Judaism since it is part of our Christian “history”…
This was our jumping off point to celebrating Biblical feasts and holidays: A Family Guide To Biblical Holidays by Robin Sampson and Linda Pierce: http://www.amazon.com/A-Family-Guide-Biblical-Holidays/dp/0970181604/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1364852141&sr=8-1&keywords=family+guide+to+biblical+holidays
It’s very family friendly and includes lots of ideas for the children. Really good for hoemschooling families.
I know it’s kind of last minute asking here..I will be teaching the 3yr.old Sunday School class on Easter morning and I wondered if anyone had any ideas that would work well with 3 yr.olds. I have them all on a pretty regular basis and they listen well but I would really like it to not be about all the bunny stuff and eggs although I have been told from one of our pastor’s that they want me to do an egg hunt with the kids because the older siblings will be having them and they want the younger kids to have them…Okay. Will do the egg hunt but I plan on doing an emphasis on the real meaning of easter. Have heard of the cookies that are hollow but don’t have the recipe. Any ideas?
Here’s the cookie recipe if you want it:
Ingredients:
1 cup whole pecans
1 teaspoon vinegar
3 egg whites
Pinch salt
1 cup sugar
Directions:
#1-Preheat the oven to 300ºF/150ºC. Place the pecans in a zipper baggie. Let the children beat them with the wooden spoon to break them into small pieces. Explain that after Jesus was arrested, the Roman soldiers beat him. Read John 19:1-3 together.
#2-Encourage each child to smell the vinegar. Put the teaspoon of vinegar into a mixing bowl. Explain that when Jesus was thirsty on the cross, he was given vinegar to drink. Read John 19:28-30 together.
#3-Add the egg whites to the vinegar. Eggs represent life. Explain that Jesus gave His life to give us life. Read John 10:10-11 together.
#4-Sprinkle a little salt into each child’s hand. Let them taste the salt and brush the rest into the bowl. Explain that the salt represents the salty tears that were shed by Jesus’ followers, and the bitterness of sin. Read Luke 23:27 together.
#5-Sweeten it. So far, the ingredients are not very appetizing. Add the cup of sugar. Explain that the sweetest part of the story is that Jesus died because He loves us. Read Psalms 34:8 and John 3:16 together.
#6-Beat with a mixer on high speed for 12 to 15 minutes until stiff peaks are formed. Explain that the color white represents the purity in God’s eyes of those whose sins have been cleansed by Jesus. Read Isaiah 1:18 and John 3:1-3 together.
#7-Fold in the broken nuts. Drop teaspoons-full of the cookie mix onto a wax paper covered cookie sheet. Explain that each mound represents the rocky tomb where Jesus’ body was laid. Read Matthew 27:57-60 together.
#8-Put the cookie sheet in the oven, close the door and turn the oven OFF. The cookies will bake with the residual heat. Give each child a piece of tape and seal the oven door. Explain that Jesus’ tomb was sealed. Read Matthew 27:65-66 together.
#9-Explain that they may feel sad to leave the cookies in the oven overnight. Jesus’ followers were in deep despair when the tomb was sealed. Read John 16:20 and 22 together.
#10-Go to bed!
#11-On Easter morning, open the oven and give everyone a cookie. Notice the cracked surface and take a bite. The cookies are hollow! Explain that on the first Easter Jesus’ followers were amazed to find the tomb open and empty. Jesus had risen! Read Matthew 28: 1-9 together.
***Things you’ll need also***
Zipper baggie
Wooden spoon
Tape
Bible
I used this before with Sunday School classes. The kids really enjoyed it – especially the 3-5 yr olds who loved making cookies! I made a batch the night before so there was a finished batch and then we mixed the ingredients together just like they tell you and used a pretend oven to seal them in so it was like the tomb. Then I just switched the finished ones with the dough. Best of luck to you!