A Jewish Celebration of the Sabbath: How to Celebrate Shabbat

Shalom and welcome today on back to our roots we are going to experience a traditional Sabbath opening I'm glad you're with us hello and welcome to back to our roots I'm pastor Alex Schuessler and I'm Rachel Hyman minister of music this is Havas and this is Laurie and we want to welcome you today to our program today is a very special program indeed we are going to be looking at a traditional celebration of bringing in the Shabbat Rachel this this is going to be so exciting I know we've had so many people really interested in this so we're going to just get right into it and a little bit later we'll be explaining exactly what's happening so just sit back and enjoy as from a traditional perspective we welcome in the Shabbat baruch ATA adonai eloheynu melech ha-olam asher krishana boo mitzvah tov move dom yeshua hamashiach receive a new lihiot tor Ligurian venit on lay new Yeshua Misha he knew or ha-olam blessed are you O Lord our God King of the universe who has sanctified us by His commandments and the blood of Yeshua the Messiah and has commanded us to be a light to the nation's and has given us yeshua our messiah the light of the world Amane and we take the cup which is filled with the fruit of the vine and we say the blessing baruch ATA adonai eloheynu melech ha'olam Borei pre - blessed are you O Lord our God King of the universe who created the fruit of the vine and in front of us we have to Hollis and we have to Hollis because we remember how when the children of Israel wandered through the desert he gave the manna to eat but he also gave them a very special commandment that on the Sabbath day they weren't to work so God poured out a double portion of his heavenly bread the manna an extra amount so that the day before Shabbat they could collect all that bread the manna and they wouldn't have to worry about being fed so we remember this double blessing that our God pours out on all of those who are faithful to honor his Shabbat and we say the blessing of the bread but look at ah adonai eloheynu melech ha'olam hamotzi Lechem min Haaretz blessed are you O Lord our God who brings forth bread from the earth and we break the bread and because we know that our Messiah Yeshua is the bread of life we remember him and Yeshua he was born in a very special place the Bible tells us it says that he was born in a place called Bethlehem or Beit lehem which literally means the house of bread so how wonderful is it that the that our Messiah the bread of life was born in the house of bread okay is that good okay let's come around and let me bless your children so on on that evening of Shabbat as we're beginning it's called Arab Shabbat we gather our children together because one of the most important things that we do on the Shabbos on the Shabbat is as a family we spend time together and we bless each other so we take this time as the dad of the house brings his children around and he first says a blessing over his children and then traditionally he would read from the book of Proverbs chapter 31 which is the virtuous woman he would read that over his wife as well and so we're going to just say the blessing over the kids and we say from the Book of Numbers may the Lord bless you and may he keep you and may the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you and may the Lord lift his countenance upon you and bring you his peace and then I say it in Hebrew a heave are Ithaca deny Valley Shamar a hey hey hey hey ho yaha ear I don't I travel a ha Varuna hey hey-ho yes uh I don't know uh ha ha ha ha hi Panov ellika V AHA SEM la ha ha ha ha ha lone and we say Shalom which means peace and blessings upon you thank you so much children and you can go and we'll see you back in just a little while all right all right so we we want to now get into it and and talk with you just a little bit about what you saw what the significance of these things aren't and so we're we're going to invite our our brother Alexander Biletnikoff we call him Sasha he's our resident theologian just keeps us on track Sasha why don't you come on out well shabbat shalom shalom it's good to see you Sasha you know sashide-no-iso many years and Sasha is as I I kid he's our theologian but truly Sasha's is completing his PhD and he's just one of the most knowledgeable people in these areas that I know so it's just a great blessing to have you with us as we celebrate the shahboz good to be with you again on this Shabbat evening yes thank you so much so we did some interesting things here that are our traditional within the Jewish faith the Jewish religion and and let's start first of all with with the lighting of the candles as I said in the beginning the tradition is is that because the woman is the one who Messiah would come through she is the one that brings the light of the Sabbath in and and I know that there's a lot of concepts and ideas the things about the the Shabbos Queen and all those can you talk just a little bit about some of those traditional things for us one of the thing is the principle behind all the tradition to make the Sabbath special yes absolutely and of course we didn't have at this time first century second century we want to backtrack to when Jesus lived on this earth yes there was no wax candle and a nice candle holders you know with but but you know what while you're before you go any further let me bring one thing in about this because the question was asked you know we have these beautiful things that the beautiful silver cup and plate and these beautiful candle holders you know one of the things that I always loved within Judaism is and it's not that you're you're trying to be over the top with these things but it's just this whole idea that everything that we do we want to honor God to the highest that we can so with whatever resources God has given you when it comes to the things that we are using especially to honor him the Shabbos cup the candle holders we want to be able to provide the best that we possibly can so that's why these things have a tendency to be more decorative and more orange and the ornament on these candleholders it's very typical for Jewish community that lives in diaspora it's the images of Jerusalem again let me say diaspora means this is these are Jews that live outside now would be outside of Israel but it would have been outside of Judea anyone anyone that lives so we're in the diaspora yeah but the regardless of where Jews live their eyes are always focused on Jerusalem so you got this Jerusalem candleholders yes but back in those time in Judea of the first century and the turn of the era's there was nothing like this there was the archaeologists have found numerous clay lamps like this shape and this lumps were that was the the lighting fixture of the day the problem was that these lamps were basically using oil olive oil yes and the Orlov oil is a major staple the level of poverty you can't compare it to anything back in those days the majority of the people lived an extremely simple life in poverty literally and you know the gallon of olive oil I mean you can spend today 30 $35 you buy a nice gallon of olive oil and you know 3 hours of work something like this the the same amount of olive oil would cost back in those days for some day laborers up to three months of their loom and so lighting in the house it wasn't the option for many families it wasn't the option people would go to sleep with sundown and and rice will work with the sunrise so the Sabbath was exception because that day you're supposed to spend time together as a community so you do light the candles so this is this is how far we can trace the idea of having the light on Shabbat right so let's let's talk about the the idea now of the fruit of the vine and and this blessing and it's really probably rightly put sanctification of the Sabbath through through the cup correct yes yes and and when we talk about the Sabbath we have to take in heaven mind a Genesis chapter 2 what the Lord does he blesses he sent if eyes and he makes right so I also know within within Jewish tradition today there's the two main themes and actually he rests so he rested less and sent if I so everything is everything on the Sabbath greeting is about this three action right and it's the remembrance the core to remember what God had done exactly exactly right so let's let's talk a little bit about the bread you know I've had many people get confused because within the Christian community as soon as you you talk about bread and or wine they right away their mind goes to the Lord's table or communion and this isn't anything like that at all that goes yes this is a totally different thing so you know that's that's maybe a different program at a different time so let's just talk a little bit you know that what the challah you know and the idea that that this represents all foods not just black without the idea of the bread on Sabbath goes back to the showbread table which is at the sanctuary and you already mentioned also the mana and that's why we have to but the general idea biblically goes back to the ritual of the showbread because remember in the sanctuary there were daily rituals offerings of the Lambs and lighting of the seven lamp candle and instance the word yearly ritual we discussed the the festivals and there were weekly ritual and the only one weekly ritual which we have it's a ritual where a priest would consume and replace the bread the twelve breads of a special table in the holy place right this ritual is important because it shows it goes directly opposite to a pagan sanctuaries in the pagan worship the theology is that people are heed God okay yeah that's right and here we pray to God and we say blessed day a lot of God who gives the bread to us from the ground right right so a really important part of this then is is is the idea of us gathering together and Shabbat is so much about community and about fellowship within the family and and it's really from a Jewish perspective it never should be a burden it never should be a labor that Shabbat is always a joy to us that it's something that you work hard all week long and then when we come to the Shabbat it's not man it's the Shabbat now I know it's oh thank you Lord it's the Shabbat I don't have to pick up my cell phone I don't have to check my I can just have to work I can just be together with my family and friends and rejoice in the Shabbat Rachel you've prepared a song for us today and I'd love to invite you to go over and get ready we have our friend Martine is with us once again welcome Martine and Rachel what's the name of the song today it's called Shabbos a Koi - which means holy Sabbath it's kind of like the Hebrew version of this is the David all right well let's rejoice yes shop the shop you Oh to question you hey yeah you you later - junkies boy amen amen Rachel why don't you come on back over at Martine why don't you come join us as we close the Shabbat we've had just a wonderful Sabbath with our family together and a Sabbath meal and a day with the Lord and as the Sun begins to set on the Shabbat we have a special little ceremony that we do that's called Havdalah Havdalah the hebrew word it comes from the hebrew Lahav deal and it means to separate or to differentiate and what it is is that we're leaving the sacredness the beauty of the Shabbat but now we're going into the secular week but see the thing is is that when we leave the Shabbat we don't want to just leave it behind we want to be able to take a little bit of the Shabbos with us throughout the week so Havdalah we start and it's chanted with a cup and we fill it with with the fruit of the vine and we fill the cup and we say a blessing over the cup baruch ATA adonai eloheynu melech ha-olam boray pre hug ofin blessed You Lord our God King of the universe who brought forth the fruit of the vine we don't pass this one around sorry he's looking at me I want some juice and then these other strange things that we have we we have a special little container this is called a spice box now I wish those of you watching could could enjoy the smell in just a minute we're going to pass this around and it's got this beautiful aromatic smell of cinnamon and cloves and all kinds of things and it's to remind us of the sweetness of Shabbat and what the newness of creation will be when God returns since Shabbat is a memorial of creation we also have this special braided candle now if you remember when we started the Shabbat Rachel lit two candles and there was a small little flame but we're going to light this one in just a minute you're going to see it's a much bigger flame and the whole idea is that the light that we go out of the Shabbat with should be so much more than the light that we came in with because we've spent the whole time with God yes amen and we say behold god is my salvation i will trust and i will not be afraid for the lord my god he is my strength and my song and he also has become we could say my yeshua which is his name but that also means my salvation and we like this and then we come back over to the spices and i'm going to open it up mmm I love this no here smell this you smell it it's melon he's afraid to stick his note down there here and we're going to pass this around and everyone will get a get a sniff and we say Baraka Tajani eloheynu melech ha-olam Hamas deal beret man Navis Amin bless to you our Lord our God creator of the universe who creates the species of spices then that's not good you know some in some traditions they'll take the cloves and they'll have a big handful and everyone will take a little handful of cloves and they put it in their pocket so that when they leave on the Shabbat when it's over they have these cloves in their pocket but all week long you can take the cloves and you can smell them and I can't wait for Shabbos to come again because it smells so good and then we take this special candle and we say the blessing over the candle baruch ATA adonai eloheynu melech ha'olam Borei man a boar a milray ash blessed are you O Lord our God King of the universe who creates the light of fire and then because we believe that Yeshua is the light of the world Jesus is the light of the world we add this and we say in him was life and the life was the light of men and the light shined in the darkness and the darkness didn't understand it now there's such a great and beautiful teaching that we have with the hub dalek handle and and because we're in a studio we have all these bright lights we can't see it as well but you have to imagine that you know no matter how small the light is how small the flame is you can take one little candle or one little match and you could be in a completely black dark room and that one little candle once your eyes adjust you'll be able to see the whole room right so the idea is that this light that we see the light always pushes the darkness away and Jesus Yeshua is the light of the world you see there where that light is darkness can never dwell isn't that a wonderful thing yeah yeah say yeah yeah and then we say arise and shine for the light has come and the glory of the lord has risen upon you and the glory of the lord that we're speaking of of course for us is our Messiah Yeshua Amen he truly is the light of the world and then we say blessed are you O Lord our God King of the universe who makes a distinction between the holy and the secular light and darkness Israel and the nation's the seventh day and the sixth day of Labor blessed are you O Lord our God who makes a distinction between the holy and the secular and at this point the Shabbat is is coming completely to an end now we've had a beautiful day and and we've rested and we've enjoyed fellowship and we've had great meals don't you love the Shabbat meals I do you know what what I love about the Shabbat meals is that they're just waiting we come home from service after the morning and there's this big meal just waiting for us to dive in and eat it you know do you like that yeah we all like that and and you know guys the whole idea for us and the Shabbos is that even to say that I keep the Shabbos infers that it takes work to do it so we should never say we keep the Shabbos we keep the Sabbath no we celebrate the Sabbath we celebrate what God has given us we celebrate that God he created all things and then the scripture says on the seventh day he rested and he said I want you to remember that if God can rest then how much more should you as my creation as my children rest on the Sabbath day so we have to remember that that the Sabbath day is joy it is a time to sit back and and be with friends and and talk and share things it's it's a time that we put aside all the things that we do normally through the week right every you know a good rule to remember is if you do it through the week you don't do it on Shabbat right because then it's common that's right you know for some people Oh to relax is to sit down on the couch and maybe put the TV on that's not the right thing to do is it because all week long people are sitting on the couch watching TV we're supposed to get together as a family and talk and enjoy good food and and and really look forward you know for a lot of people that might be the only time that they actually come together as a family and and some of the best memories that we ever make are the ones of us sitting around and you know our our society is so full of broken families of children that never have the time with their parents and and if we were honoring if we were celebrating the Shabbat in the way that God asked us to do that wouldn't be happening because we would be focusing we would be saying blessings upon our children and our wives and our friends and our family we would be coming together especially that one time and you know what I found is that when you do it on the Shabbat and it's such a joy you get hungry for it right man I really love the time that we sat down together and we had a meal and we just talked and you know just because we do this on the Shabbat doesn't mean we can't do it many other days through the week and that's the idea that we want to be hungry the Shabbat is something very special but God created it so that we could rest so that we could fellowship so as the Sun has set on another Shabbat the last thing that we do is what's left of the juice as we take the cup and we begin to pour out the cup and for us as believers in Jesus as our Messiah what I believe we should understand is just as we pour out this cup we need to remember that our Messiah that Jesus poured out his life for us and may we through this week God with your strength and your Holy Spirit may we also pour out our lives for him mm-hmm and we pour it all out and the last thing that we do is we take the Havdalah candle and we extinguish the candle in the juice sorry no one gets to drink it we extinguish the candle and we declare that God is holy he is holy he is holy and we see Kadosh Kadosh Kadosh that means God is three times holy because he is the one that gives us the Shabbat god bless you and we hope to see you very soon and back to our roots you you

Channel: Healthy Lifestyle Choices

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Keywords: sabbath, jewish sabbath, how jews celebrate sabbath, Shabbat (Holiday)

Id: jeNyJlBv5AQ

Length: 28min 30sec (1710 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 09 2012