by James C. Whitman, CJCS President
You and I have been swept up into an earth-shattering reality called salvation. Selah (Stop, Look, Listen). God is the greatest thought we can think, true? His Word, the Bible, offers a reciprocal thought that staggers the imagination; the Holy One thinks about us.
Can the upcoming Fall Feast season* give us insight into our great God and His grand covenant plan? Yes. As I have written elsewhere, the annual feast cycle powerfully proclaims God's good news about Jesus (Yeshua), the Jewish Messiah and Savior of the human race. Salvation, from the worldview portrayed in the Bible, is God rolling up His sleeves and getting dirty to solve the problems we create(d) by our disobedience.
Which leads us to an even larger question, When Adam and Eve disobeyed their Father in the garden of Eden, what was the initial consequence? Although the answer is multi-faceted the text is clear,
You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die. - from Genesis 2:16-17
Again, the question to ponder is, "what was the initial consequence?" Without theologizing, every man, woman, and child can grasp the simple truth—from the text and from experience—that disobedience results in death. The wages of sin is death.
Before death makes an appearance however, the Book of Beginnings describes and celebrates life. Life is God's design and intent. He calls created life in all of its vastness and splendor "good." And when He made us in His image and likeness, He calls the whole "very good." Notice carefully my use of the present tense in this paragraph. Life is gift, life is good because the God of Life is good. Enter death ... and the rest is history, a history of man's inhumanity to man.
Let's ask our "initial consequence" question from a New Covenant perspective. According to the early church what was the promised result of Jesus' crucifixion and resurrection? Hint: It's the big idea taught by Pentecost.
So it is written: The first man Adam became a living being; the last Adam became a life-giving Spirit. - 1 Corinthians 15:45
The telos [end, aim, goal] of Crucifixion/Resurrection (Passover) is the restoration of His Holy Presence (Pentecost); the indwelling Spirit of the Author of Life returning to His rightful resting place.
If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. - John 14:15-18
Using our King's language from John's Gospel, we are on solid ground when we picture death's entrance—the initial consequence of disobedience—as separation from Daddy (Abba). Orphans.
My proposition, for your consideration, is that Tabernacles (Sukkot) as the last of the pilgrim feasts represents the ongoing, indwelling of the Spirit of Jesus in, with, and through his people. Life in the wilderness accompanied by divine Presence. In the world but not of it. We, as Image-Bearers, serve as Life-Bringers to the dying world around us.
Selah.
Based on the way we've been taught our tendency is to give a nod to this as we rush on to thoughts about our resurrection after physical death. This is true, so wonderfully true ... but it is not the whole truth. Real life begins the moment we are reconciled with our true Abba! This is the point at which we stop dying and begin truly living. This is our message, our mission, our hope.
For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons and daughters, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God […] - Romans 8: 15-16
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* The Fall Feast Cycle:
Feast of Trumpets (Yom Teruah)
Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur)
Feast of Tabernacles (Sukkot)
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Want to study this subject in-depth? We recommend Redemption, Revelation, Celebration.
Take me back to the library. Or if you prefer, back to the topic Biblical Feasts.