Against the Ordinary

Passover is right around the corner.   This year, Justin and I are attempting to observe each of the biblical feast days. The first few have been fulfilled in Jesus' death and resurrection, but that doesn't nullify the beauty or significance of them. Just as Easter is a way we remember and rejoice in Jesus rising from the dead, I hope you can see the deep meaning and joy we can find in Passover and the consecutive feasts.  To set the stage, I want to give a brief overview of the first three festivals ordained by God for the Israelites to observe. The first feast commanded in the Bible is Passover , which was to be celebrated on the 14th day of the first month (according to the Hebrew calendar).   The very first Passover took place when Israel was in bondage to the Pharaoh of Egypt. They knew God had promised to make them into their own nation, but yet here they were 430 years later, still in slavery. God spoke to Moses and told him to lead His people out of Egy

The Bible was not written to you.   There, I said it. It took me years to realize and months to share with others. I'm not exactly sure why, but I've spent most of my life convinced that the Bible was written as a "love letter from God to me". Hear me out. I promise that I'm not going off the deep end and rejecting the Bible and God, or that what I've been learning is even controversial. In fact, this may be common knowledge to everyone else but I was just too dense to hear it before recently. Growing up in the christian church, it wasn't uncommon for me to hear a pastor define a word in the Bible using the greek/hebrew or give a few historical facts about the times surrounding the passage of scripture. What I never heard was that when the writers of the New Testament said things like "All scripture is God-breathed and useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness..." (2 Timothy 3:16) they were