Passover, Resurrection, and When Understanding Begins to Shift

Type v-s Anti-Type

For over twenty years now, our family has gathered to observe Passover. We started doing it when we led adult Sunday School and have kept this tradition going in our family.

We are not Jewish, but we have always felt a deep respect for what it represents. It has been a meaningful time for us—one of reflection, remembrance, and a recognition of something much bigger than ourselves. The story of deliverance, of protection, of a people set free, has never felt like just history. It has always felt personal.

But lately, I’ve found myself sitting with a quiet question.

Not one that comes from wanting to challenge tradition, but one that seems to rise on its own when understanding begins to deepen or resurface.

What exactly are we remembering—and what was it ultimately pointing to?

Passover, at its core, is about freedom. A people marked and protected. A movement out of bondage and into something new. It is also about preservation—not just of individuals, but of a lineage, a people through whom something would come into the world.

As Christians, we believe that something was fulfilled through Jesus Christ or his spoken name back then as Yeshua.

And this is where the question begins to take shape.

If Passover was a foreshadowing—a type—then should not Christ be the fulfillment or what is called the ant-type, aka the real thing? The reality that the symbol was pointing toward all along?

And if that is so, then what do we do with that understanding?

Do we continue to hold onto the symbol in the same way, or do we begin to shift toward what it revealed?

These are not easy questions, especially when they don’t just affect us individually, but touch something shared—family & friends traditions, long-held practices, and the meaning we have built together over time.

For us, there has also been another layer.

We moved away from celebrating what is commonly called Easter years ago, based on what we had been taught about its origins. There were concerns about pagan roots, about things that did not feel aligned with what we believed we were honoring. And so, we stepped back from it.

But stepping away from something does not always answer the deeper question.

Because underneath the name, underneath the traditions that surround it, there remains something central—the resurrection.

Not as a holiday, but as an event. Not as a ritual, but as a turning point.

If Passover represents being brought out of bondage, then the resurrection represents something even deeper—life overcoming death, a transformation that is not just external, but internal.

And so the tension begins.

Not between right and wrong, but between earlier understanding and what is beginning to unfold now.

When this happens, it can create a quiet divide. Not always outwardly spoken, but felt. One person begins to see things a little differently, while others are still grounded in what has always been. Neither side is trying to be difficult. Both are simply standing where they are.

The question then becomes less about what is correct and more about how we move forward without losing one another.

I have come to see that there may not be a need to choose one and discard the other.

Passover can still be honored as the foundation—the story of freedom, the beginning of the path.

And the resurrection can be acknowledged as the fulfillment—the continuation of that path into something deeper and more complete.

One does not have to cancel the other.

In fact, when held together, they may reveal more than either one alone.

Perhaps the real shift is not in what we celebrate, but in how we understand it.

Traditions have value. They anchor us. They give us shared moments and continuity across time. But understanding is not meant to stand still. It grows, often quietly, sometimes uncomfortably, asking us to look again at what we thought we already knew.

And when that happens, we are faced with a choice.

Not simply about what to believe, but about how to carry that belief in the presence of others.

It is possible to see differently without needing to correct.

It is possible to grow without needing to divide.

And it is possible that what we are being invited into is not a rejection of the past, but a deepening of it.

Freedom was the beginning.

What comes after may be something even greater. Let’s celebrate this time not only in memory of the freedom of a people long ago, but freedom for all of us now in the present!