Learning About Passover at a Seder Dinner

Tonight we went to a Seder dinner at our church to learn the symbolism of the items used in the Passover celebration.  It was quite interesting and I wish I could say that I clearly remembered each item, but I don't.  There were OT remembrances as well as NT and the presenter gave an interesting perspective on that that I might go into on another post.

• It started with eating parsley dipped in salt water.  The green herb representing spring, the time of Passover and the salty water representing the tears of the Hebrew slaves and the water in the Red Sea.
• Then there was a big to do over lighting the candles-but now that I think about it that was probably first-yes it was.  The mother lights the candles to illustrate the mother of Jesus bringing Light into the world.
• After the parsley there was a big to do over taking matzah bread from the center of the Unity Bag and hiding half of it after it's wrapped in a special linen bag.  The remaining half is distributed to each family member-3 pieces each. 
• The first piece is eaten with horseradish to represent the pain of the slaves, immediately follwed by the other two pieces topped with an apple mixture, the sweetness of God taking that pain away.
• Somewhere during this we have taken 2 sips of our "wine" after a prayer is read.
• There are roasted eggs on the table to eat, but I can't recall their purpose.
• We stopped at this point to share in a pot luck meal.
• After the meal, a child is sent to find the piece of hidden matzah, and is rewarded for finding it.  The linen bag it was tucked into has a saying on it that is Greek for "The I Am that has come".  Greek?  I thought the slaves were Hebrew.  This practice came AFTER Jesus, proving that many Jews in that day became believers.
• One thing we did at the beginning was to dip our right index finger into the "wine" 10 times, shaking the drop off onto our plate-1 for each plague.
• The newly found matzah is shared communion style with another sip of "wine".

There was a bit of hostory taught, as well as some other customs.  It was an interesting lesson and I'm glad we went!