LEVITICUS 23 APPOINTMENTS WITH GOD2018 Teaching by Jerry B Simmons

Teaching Transcript: Leviticus 23 Appointments With God

You are listening to FerventWord, an online Bible study ministry with teachings and tools to help you grow deeper in your relationship with God. The following message was taught by Jerry Simmons in 2018. Well, this morning we're here in Leviticus chapter 23, looking at this chapter that we read this week, going through the Bible in three years. And we're going to be talking about the feasts.

And the feasts of the Lord that are listed here in chapter 23 are the things that the Lord established for the schedule of the nation of Israel. And man, there is so much in each of these feasts. We could literally spend, you know, weeks looking at each one individually with the

the depth that is there with the context of why the Lord established the feast for the nation of Israel and what it reminded them of and how that, you know, was to influence them as a nation. Then you could look at the feast with the understanding of Jesus, the fulfillment of the feast and how he fulfills and the prophetic things that are attained in the feast. And it's incredible depth there. But

the thing that the Lord highlighted for me as I was preparing to teach this chapter is not those things. And so I'm going to be like skipping stuff and wishing I could talk more about other stuff. And you'll see that, you know, and you'll understand that. But there is something very important that the Lord wants to speak to us about this morning as we look at these feasts. And you can find that in the title. I've titled the message this morning, Appointments with God.

And this morning, I want to ask you to consider your schedule, your calendar, and your appointments with God. Looking again at verse 4, it says, Now there's a couple key things to focus on here in chapter 4 as we get started this morning, and that is this word, feasts.

Now, we think of a feast and automatically, I don't know about you, but my mind is filled with, you know, a table full of food. I'm thinking of, you know, some type of great buffet or, you know, Thanksgiving meal where the table is just packed and it's a feast. You know, a feast is kind of like all you can eat, right? It's just, it's more food than you can handle, more food than you can consume. That's kind of the visuals that begin to enter my mind with this idea of the word feast, right?

But it's interesting to note that the word feast actually just by itself doesn't have any connection with food at all. The word feast literally just means an appointed time.

An appointed time. In fact, as you see the word translated appointed times at the end of verse 4, that's the same word as feast found throughout all the chapter here. That what God is talking about is appointed times. Spiros Zodiatis, the Hebrew scholar, puts it this way. He says it designates a determined time or place for

without any regard for the purpose. And so you can have an appointment. It's a designated time at a designated place. It is a specific point of time that could be for a variety of purpose. And so consuming a lot of food, that might be part of it. But there's also other types of appointments that we might have. Now, the Jewish festivals, their feasts, you know,

Did include a lot of food, and we'll see that as we work our way through these feasts. And so, you know, for us, it is an appropriate connection many times. But as we consider these things this morning, I want you to think about, we're not talking about just the times where you get to go eat a lot or have a great meal, but specifically talking about the feasts that

of the Lord. Notice it says in verse 4, these are the feasts of the Lord, or these are the appointments of the Lord. These are some set aside, some special times, some designated times that God wants for his people.

You'll also see this illustrated in Genesis chapter 17 verse 21 where the same word as feast is used but in a different context where God tells Abraham, my covenant I will establish with Isaac whom Sarah shall bear to you at this set time next year.

What is God talking about when he says an appointment? He says, look, there's a set time. It's a specific time frame, a specific time. Next year, I'm going to come back, Abraham, and Sarah will be bearing you a child. It's talking about those specific times that God has established. You'll also see this illustrated in Leviticus 1, verse 1, and throughout the Old Testament, where the tabernacle is referred to as the tabernacle of life.

It's the tabernacle of meeting. That word meeting, it's the same word. It's the appointed place. This is where we have our appointments with God. In other words, for the nation of Israel, they met with God at the tabernacle. That's where God said, I will meet with you. And so these designated times were typically at this designated place. And it was their appointments to meet with God and to spend some time with God.

with God. And so we're going to be looking at the calendar. We're going to be looking at this schedule, these appointments that God established. Now, as we look at these things, understanding a little bit the Hebrew calendar, I've laid this out. This is 2018, but it's March through December because the Hebrew calendar that God established for them is

began in our month of March. It was Nisan 1, and, you know, that was the first day of, or yeah, the first month, the first day of the year was March 16th, according to the Hebrew calendar that God established. And so that was...

you know, what God said, and so we'll follow the feast along with that. But looking at the calendar and just beginning to ask the question, I would ask you to consider on your calendar, so you pull up your app or pull out your journal or whatever it is that you use to manage your schedule, I would ask you to kind of begin to envision and think about where on that calendar, where on that schedule are those appointments with God, that these things are not

for us today in the sense of a legalistic exactly. We practice these feasts exactly the way that God prescribed. We dealt with that a little bit last week and we'll see that some more. But instead that we understand this is the heart of God being revealed. That God wants to have some set times with you where he gets to designate. Here's the purpose. Where he gets to say, this is the agenda. When he makes an appointment, he's the one who's calling the shots and saying, look, this is the purpose of our meeting today.

A lot of times we, of course, you know, we want to meet with God and we want to set the schedule. Here, I'm going to go to church today and God, here's what I want to get out of it. You know, here's the agenda, here's the purpose, here's the, and this is the opposite of that. This is the Lord saying, I want to meet with you and God says, here's what I want to get out of this. Here's what I want to accomplish. It's God who is setting the plans. And so I would ask you to consider your schedule, your appointments with God and

his involvement in that. What does your calendar with God look like? And as we walk through these feasts, I think that the Lord will minister to you about some of the different types

of ways that he wants to meet with you. It's not always in the same way. It's not always in the same exact thing, but there's different types of appointments that God wants to have with you. And that is bound up in this idea of appointments. And so we'll look at the first type of appointment that God wants to have with us. And that is found in verse three, as the Lord addresses the Sabbath, God wants to have times of rest with you. God wants to establish in your life

Times of rest. Check out verse 3. Six days shall work be done. But the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy convocation. You shall do no work on it. It is the Sabbath of the Lord in all your dwellings.

Here the Lord addresses the Sabbath. Now there's a lot more said about the Sabbath and some more structure applied in other parts of the law. This is just a reference and kind of a collection of, you know, reminder of the different feasts and set appointments that God had established for his people. So there's not a lot of detail here.

But there is a lot of detail in the rest of the scriptures about the Sabbath and what was the purpose of the Sabbath and what God intended for the Sabbath. And it was intended to be a day of rest. You can see that here in verse three. He says, look, there's six days to work.

Now in the cultures and communities around the nation of Israel, there was no schedule like this. It was just every day was a work day. Every day, you know, when you're living in the farm territory and that kind of thing, it's like there's work to be done every day. And so there was a different kind of schedule. God says, I want to set your schedule and I want to establish it this way. Six days are for working.

It is appropriate to work. There is a right place for work. Work is, you know, something that God wants for us for the most part, unless you're retired, but still God has a work for you. But you get the point, right? So there's six days for that kind of stuff. But then the seventh day, God says that is a solemn rest, a holy convocation. Now convocation is just a long word that essentially means meeting. It's a time to meet, right?

It's a time to stop working and to have a meeting with the Lord. He says, you shall do no work on it. It is the Sabbath of the Lord in all your dwellings. And so if we take a look at Israel's calendar, God says, I kind of lightly colored it. I should have made it a little bit darker so you could see it. But all the Saturdays are marked Saturdays.

It's kind of like, if you're familiar, you know, if you've ever got the annual pass from Disneyland or somewhere, you know, you can see your blockout dates and stuff. And here's what God says. Mark every Saturday, he says this to the nation of Israel, mark every Saturday, that one's mine. You don't get to do what you want to do on that day. You don't get to do just anything that you want. You don't get to do and pursue your career and, you know, meet your goals and do all the things that you want to. No, that day is mine. I get to tell you what to do on that day.

And here's what I'm going to tell you to do. I want you to rest. Now talking about the Sabbath can get a little bit tricky and sticky because, well, there's all kinds of things that are attached to the Sabbath in different kinds of doctrines and things that are taught today. And so I would encourage you to reflect on what we covered last week. We talked about when to obey an Old Testament law.

And there's some things that you can work through to think about when these things apply to us in a law type of fashion. And so when a command is repeated in the New Testament, well, then it still applies to us. We're still bound to that command. When it's not reversed in the New Testament, well, then we're still bound to that command. And when God's heart is clearly revealed, then we know this is what God wants. And so we need to be performing that law in a certain way or following the things that

God does care about. And you can look at those things. But there's some evaluation that needs to go on. Because when it comes to the actual practice of the Sabbath, in that the literal specific Saturday, the seventh day, is a particular kind of rest in this kind of way, we don't find that command in

continued in the New Testament. So that the actual practice of the Sabbath for us as believers today is not the requirement that it once was for the nation of Israel. Paul puts it this way in Romans chapter 14 verse 5. He says, "...one person esteems one day above another, another esteems every day alike. Let each one be fully convinced in his own mind."

So there are some people, Paul says, who still practice the Sabbath on Saturday and still have this as a designated special day. Others practice a different day or every day alike. And, you know, every day is designated to the Lord. And Paul says there's room for the Holy Spirit to move on each of our hearts. You need to be fully convinced. In other words, you need to have your own talk with God about how he wants you to handle these days that are set apart and designated special.

to him. Your Sabbath days, your special days that are given over to the Lord, Paul says, you need to be fully convinced in your own mind. And you need to do that with the Lord. And he goes on to say, if you observe it, then do it to the Lord. And if you don't observe it, that's to the Lord also, that you're saying, God hasn't called me to do that. But on this day, God has called me to set aside some time and to meet with him and to rest. Now, a

Another esteems every day alike. Yeah, yeah. I don't really practice the Sabbath, but that's the one I do. I do every day alike. Every day is for the Lord. It would be easy for us to say that, to kind of grab hold of that idea. But as you kind of reach for that concept and try to take that for your own, I would ask you to consider, does God share your same perspective? Does God share your perspective?

I mean, it's easy for you to grab hold of that and say, yeah, I don't really have a Sabbath. You know, we're not under the law. But every day alike, I worship God every day. And that's easy for us to say. But if you were considering it from God's perspective, would God look at you and say, yeah, Harvey does honor me today.

every day and allow me to set the schedule and set the agenda and follow me in the way that I've called him to. Yeah, Harvey does do that. Does God have the same perspective? It's easy for us to grab hold of it, but does every day really belong to the Lord? If that's what you would say. The people of Israel came to the prophet Zechariah. This is later on in Israel's history. And they had established not just these feasts that God had set, but they also had times of fasting that they had established throughout the year.

And they came to the prophet Zechariah and they said, hey, what does the Lord want? Should we continue these practices of fasting, these times of fasting that we've set up? You know, what do you think? Should we continue that? Is that what God wants? And the Lord brought back kind of a challenge through the prophet Zechariah and said, were you really fasting? All those years that you had that practice, were you really fasting for me?

And God's assertion was, you are not fasting for me. You are fasting for you. You are fasting to be religious. I didn't set that schedule. You set that schedule. And God challenged them in that. And that's where I would ask us to consider and evaluate. Who's setting our schedule? When it comes to times of rest,

although we are not bound by the law in that it has to be Saturday, it has to be fulfilled in this way, we can see the heart of God. It was modeled after his creation that he worked for six days and then he stopped to rest. And that is God's heart for his people, that there would be a designated time to stop and rest. And you can negotiate the different days. You can negotiate the details of how that works with the Lord. But do you have that?

And is the Lord in agreement with that? Is that the Lord saying, yeah, this is the schedule I've set and you are resting when, where, and how I want you to rest. God wants us to be able to have these times of rest.

rest, where things stop, the schedule stops, the pursuits stop, the activities stop. And there is some confusion also around Sabbath and that it's thought of many times as like primarily about like worship and when you go to church. But Sabbath actually was not connected to that in this context. For most of the nation of Israel, listen, you met with God at the tabernacle.

But not everybody lived in close enough proximity to the tabernacle to be able to go to the tabernacle to be able to meet with God on the Sabbath. For most people, it was a stay-at-home-with-your-family type of day. Even later on, when the synagogues were established throughout Israel...

There was not always a synagogue in every area for everybody to be able to attend, to be able to go to some kind of service or meeting. Again, it was primarily about God saying, stay at home, be with your family, and rest. It was the heart of God. I saw a billboard a while back. It said, Sunday worship is the mark of the beast. That's not what the Bible teaches. And you can search the scriptures and twist the scriptures if you want to, to make it say that. But it's not about...

that it's about hearing from the Lord what He wants for you in regard to times of rest, days of rest. And if you, you know, struggle with that, join the club. We all do, but we need to have that connection with the Lord. There is a rest that's fulfilled in Christ and a rest from our works in trying to

have access to God or to be pleasing to God. And that's, you know, the spiritual application of fulfillment in Christ. But I'm also suggesting to you this morning that God wants you to actually have a break in your schedule, a time that you're not pursuing all your normal activities, that's scheduled, that's set by him, that he gets to say what you do, what you don't do.

that you would have a break from those activities. And what are those times of rest for you? Why is it that you are so busy? Are you so busy because that's what God has for you and it's pleasing to God and you're pleasing God with your schedule? Or is it for other reasons that you are so busy and so active and so scheduled and so hectic and all of that? Are you having times of rest? And not just, okay, well, yes, I have times of rest and

But then in that time of rest, is it scheduled by the Lord? And the activities that you involve yourself in in that time of rest is

are those activities that the Lord has called you to do. Again, is he setting the agenda? I mean, a time of rest to you may look like, you know, laying on the couch all day. I love that kind of time of rest, but you know, God may want to break my schedule and have me take a rest, but that doesn't necessarily mean laying on the couch all day, but maybe there's something else that the Lord wants. And, and it's about letting the Lord set the schedule, having an appointment with God where he says, this is my day. And you say, okay, here's, here's, here's the Lord's day.

And here's what he wants for today. Here's what's on his agenda for today. This day belongs to the Lord. It's an important appointment that God wants to have with us. Times to be able to rest.

Well, we also need to keep on moving. So we're going to move on to verse five now and see the first feast, the feast of Passover. And here we get the second kind of appointment that God wants to have with us. And that is time to celebrate God's deliverance. God wants to have a time where you and him meet in celebration of the deliverance that he's brought in your life. In verse five, it says on the 14th day of the first month at twilight is the Lord's Passover. And

So God sets a specific day, a specific month, at a specific time for them to celebrate what is called the Passover. And again, not much detail is given here because it's elaborated on throughout the rest of the scriptures. And this is just kind of a gathering together of all those feasts and reminders of them. But the Passover established in Exodus chapter 12 was that event where they were in Egypt. It was the final plague of the 10 plagues of Egypt.

And the destroying angel was going to come and wipe out the firstborns for all in the land. But God said to the nation of Israel, you take in a lamb, care for it for a few days, then kill it on the 14th day, put the blood of the lamb on the doorpost on the top and the sides, and the destroying angel will pass over your house. Your family will be protected. Your firstborn will be passed over there.

And then the rest of those who did not have the blood on the doorposts, well, they will experience that 10th plague. And God established it there in Exodus chapter 12. From now on forever, Israel, you are going to practice this feast of the Passover to remember how I delivered you out of the land of Egypt. And so as you look on the schedule, here's what God said on the 14th day of the first month.

This year that worked out to March 30th for us on our calendar. That's the day. And every year on that day, you are to stop. You are to take some time to go through these procedures and remember how God delivered you out of Egypt. Now I made the point to time to celebrate God's deliverance. And I think this is an important thing to understand as we look at these feasts.

primarily these feasts are about celebrations. A lot of times we think about, you know, submitting our schedule to God or, you know, God wants this and God wants that. And we can kind of have the impression that it's going to be, you know, a grim, somber, solemn, gloomy day. But that is not really what God wants. There is a day that kind of goes along with that picture. We'll see that in the day of atonement. But

But for the most part, when God says, look, give me your schedule. Let me be in charge of laying things out and set these appointed times with me. A lot of times it's times where God just says, I want you to stop and remember and celebrate the work that I have done. And for the nation of Israel, that was their deliverance from Egypt. On this particular day, stop, reflect, consider how I've delivered you.

Where does this appointment with God fall on your calendar? Do you have a designated time? Has the Lord put something, you know, in your life in a way that you have a set time to really just be devoted to thinking about, reflecting on, remembering, and appreciating how God has delivered you? Maybe if you remember, you have a spiritual birthday and you remember the day, you know, you prayed the prayer.

You encountered God. You became a believer in Jesus Christ. And I know many people have that. They have that spiritual birth date. We celebrate the physical birth date two days from now, Tuesday, the 8th of May. Very important day. I don't know if you're familiar with it, but good friend of ours, good looking guy, Jerry Simmons turns 40 on Tuesday. It's a big day. We celebrate that, right? We remember that. Every year it comes around and we mark that. Maybe it would be appropriate for you to

Have a day. Maybe it is that spiritual birthday. Maybe it's another. It's between you and the Lord. You got to work this out with the Lord as far as how he wants to set your schedule. But the point is there needs to be a time God wants to meet with you where there's a time that's just set apart for, devoted to, hey, let's just stop and think about and celebrate how God has delivered us out of the world and into the kingdom of God.

There's a great time of celebration that God has scheduled for you in this way. Time to celebrate God's deliverance. What does your calendar with God look like? I think this is important because these are things that just don't happen automatically. God established these feasts. He commended these feasts. He repeated these feasts. He built this structure into their calendar because the nation of Israel as a people, they would not

do these kinds of days and have these kinds of times and meetings with God just automatically. That wasn't going to happen because their life was, well, you know how life is for us too. Life gets filled and there's things going on and it is easy to lose perspective. It is easy to lose connection with God and there has to be this deliberate structuring of time, this deliberate appointing of time.

And so what does that look like for you? Where this day belongs to the Lord for this purpose, to celebrate the Lord's work of delivering me out of darkness and into his glorious light. Well, then as we move on to the next feast, it follows along with Passover, and that is the Feast of Unleavened Bread in verses six through eight. And here we get the third type of appointment that God wants to have with us. It's time to search out and to remove sin.

Check out verse 5. It says,

Here God describes a little bit the Feast of Unleavened Bread. Again, this is one that there's a lot more elaborate details in other parts of the scripture.

But the Feast of Unleavened Bread was a seven-day feast that immediately followed the Passover. And so the Passover was on the 14th. Then the 15th began this feast. And this one was seven days long. So you do the Passover celebration. You sacrifice the lamb. And then the next day begins this new seven-day feast of unleavened bread. And they were

you know, pretty much messed together and celebrated together. And so many times Passover and unleavened bread, they're interchangeable terms as it, you know, is recording different events throughout the rest of the scriptures. But it was distinct in that God had this specific purpose for this time.

There was something specific for them to have in mind. There was some practices that they were to incorporate. There were some activities that they were supposed to do in this particular time related to this idea of leaven. In Exodus 12, verse 15, as God is establishing the feast of unleavened bread, he says, "'Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread. "'On the first day, you shall remove leaven from your house.'

For whoever eats leavened bread from the first day until the seventh day, that person shall be cut off from Israel. As they were on their way out of Egypt, God said, don't leaven your bread. There's no time to leaven the bread and to let it rise. There's no time for that. So prepare unleavened bread. And that was what they were to have as they journeyed out of Egypt. And then God said, okay, so now every year after that,

From now on, for the nation of Israel, you're to have this designated time. The rest of the year, you can eat leaven. But for this week, this week you're to treat differently. And this week you're to fast from leaven. Not only are you to fast from leaven, but you're to remove it from your house. So don't, not just don't include it in your food, but actually like go through your house and get all the leaven and take it out. Get rid of it. Remove it. Purge it from your house.

Leaven, throughout the scriptures, is used as a picture of sin for a lot of reasons, which I won't get into, but you'll understand the picture here where God is saying you need to take this time to have a designated time and to do some purging. This whole idea of spring cleaning,

Well, this is a springtime feast, right? This is that kind of timeframe. This is where that idea comes from. And they developed a whole practice, you know, of cleaning out the house in search of leaven. You know, maybe some leaven fell behind the counter or fell under the table or behind the dresser or inside the drawers. And so there would be this removing of everything, this turning over of everything, this cleaning out of everything to make sure there was no leaven in the home.

And it provides a great visual for us, a great picture for us of, well, these kinds of meetings that God desires to have with us, where we take some time and allow him to do some examination, where there's some soul searching, where there's some invitation on our part, where there's a, Lord, come on in, move the furniture, turn things upside down. Is there anything in me that

That is not what you desire. Is there anything in me that is sin, that is not appropriate for me? That there would be these times in our lives where we would give this opportunity, that this period of time is designated for this purpose. There was a lot of freedom in this feast. The first day and the last day, God said, these are holy convocations, these are special meetings, and then in between, there's some freedom, but it's still part of the feast.

So it's not that, you know, you have to spend seven days in fasting and, you know, don't smile and, you know, just be sorrowful and whip yourself and stuff. No, no, that's not at all what God is saying. But that there was this designated time, that there was this set apart time where God says, you need to meet with me and let's do some house cleaning.

For me personally, this often takes place in my life in the transition from the old year into the new year. I like to take the time at the end of the year to stop and reflect and to give God some time. And you'll notice the difference between the Passover, it's one day, and then the Feast of Unleavened Bread is seven days because, well...

Allowing the Lord to search your heart and life, there's going to be some time that is required for us to recognize and absorb and to be able to catch. It's not like, okay, Lord, show me. Okay, good. Okay, okay. The Lord didn't show me anything, so let's move on. Next thing, you know, move on to the next agenda. No, no. Like, you need to give some time to this and spend a week just seeking the Lord specifically for this.

Lord, is there anything in my life that you need to purge out? Any leaven that's there, anything that you want to just wash away, anything that needs to be taken care of, habits, behaviors, attitudes, you know, things that are going on in my heart, things that are going on in my life that need to change. And this isn't gonna happen automatically. This is, well, we need to have a specific designated time with the Lord. What does that look like in your calendar, in your schedule? When is God appointed for you?

to spend some time with him for this specific purpose of unleavening the heart in the house. Paul the Apostle, addressing a sin issue in the Church of Corinth in 1 Corinthians 5, he tells them, "'Therefore, purge out the old leaven, "'that you may be a new lump, "'since you truly are unleavened. "'For indeed, Christ our Passover was sacrificed for us. "'Therefore, let us keep the feast.'"

Paul says, look, the feasts, there is an application. We don't follow them in the legalistic sense, in the sense that, you know, the exact details and you have to offer the same sacrifices and it has to be on these dates of the year. We're not talking about the feasts in that way. But the concept, oh, that applies, right?

Paul says, let's celebrate the feast. But in doing that, we need to purge out the old leaven. We need to address the sin that is going on within the home, within the heart, within the church. We need to address those things and purge out that sin. And notice he attaches it, for Christ, our Passover was sacrificed for us. The Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread, these are attached together because of the deliverance that Christ has brought us

Let's purge out that leaven. Because the reality is we are unleavened. That's the work of Christ in us. We need to purge out that leaven. Let us keep the feast, he says. And so God wants to meet with you for this specific purpose. And I would ask you to consider your schedule, your calendar. What does that look like? When do you have that time with the Lord where you're specifically asking him, seeking him, praying, talking to God about the leaven in your life?

It's not going to happen automatically. But the Lord has a set time. The Lord has some ideas about this. And so my exhortation is to you to connect with the Lord. When does God want to meet with you about these things on an ongoing, regular, and consistent basis for your life? Moving on to the next feast, we're going to look at actually two feasts in verses 9 through 22. Here we get the next kind of appointment that God wants to have with us. And that is a time to thank God in faith.

God wants to have some times that are designated to you that are set apart for the specific purpose of thanking God for the things that are to come. We find that in the Feast of Firstfruits. We're going to just jump into verse 10 and 11 here. It says, speak to the children of Israel and say to them, when you come into the land which I give to you and reap its harvest, then you shall bring a sheaf of the firstfruits of your harvest to the priest.

He shall wave the sheaf before the Lord to be accepted on your behalf. On the day after the Sabbath, the priest shall wave it. Here we find there is this call to bring the first fruit to the Lord as a wave offering. Now, this was, the timing would be the first fruit of the barley harvest. And so the idea was this. You've planted barley, it's grown.

It's just about ready to be harvested at the time of the Feast of Passover and Unleavened Bread. And so when you come to celebrate the Feast of Passover and Unleavened Bread, you bring one sheaf. We'll just call it one branch. Just bring one piece, not a bucket, not a barrel, not a wheelbarrow, you know, but just one piece, one sheaf you bring with you and you come and you offer that to the Lord on this particular day as a first fruit.

It's a thanking God for the harvest that is to come. I'm going to go back and there's going to be all this crop to bring in. Thank you, God, for providing all of this crop back home that I get to go and harvest that after this celebration and after this feast. And so it's a time to thank God and to rejoice in his provision, even though it hasn't fully come in yet. It's a first fruit. Then you have the Feast of Weeks.

Following that, and we're just going to jump into verses 15 through 17, but it's a similar type of feast. Verse 15, it says, and you shall count for yourselves from the day after the Sabbath, from the day that you brought the sheaf of the wave offering, seven Sabbaths shall be completed. Count 50 days to the day after the seventh Sabbath, and then you shall offer a new grain offering to the Lord.

So we have the firstfruits that happens with the Feast of Firstfruits, but then there's another firstfruits with the Feast of Weeks. And that is because it happens a little bit later. So just looking on the calendar real quick. Now, the Feast of Firstfruits...

this year, fell on April 1st. And then the Feast of Weeks, also known as the Day of Pentecost, happens on May the 20th. And so there's this time period. And so here's what would happen. The first fruits, that was the first fruits of the barley harvest. The weeks, or Pentecost, that was the first fruits of the wheat harvest. And so you would

participate in the Feast of Weeks by bringing in some bread that you made from that first of the wheat. So you haven't harvested your whole field, but you've just harvested enough to make a couple loaves of bread. And you do that, and you bring that to the Lord, and you offer it to the Lord to celebrate, to practice the Feast of Weeks.

And so here we have these two feasts that are of the first fruits, that are time to say, thanks God for what I know you're going to bring. I know what you have done. I haven't received all of it yet, but just thank you. Here's a little token of that. Man, we've just got a piece of what you have promised to do. And we want to stop and say thank you for that. Now there's some really cool, significant things that are attached to these feasts and things that we could consider.

What is the Sunday after Passover called today? Anybody know on our calendar? What do we call the Sunday after Passover? Easter. What happened on Easter? Jesus rose from the dead. The feast of firstfruits always fell on the Sunday following Passover. The first Sunday after Passover was the feast of firstfruits.

God set in place many years before Christ rose from the dead, the fact that Jesus was going to rise from the dead. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 15 that Christ is the first fruits, that he is the resurrection fruit,

And his resurrection is the promise and guarantee of the harvest that is to come for all those who believe in him, right? That barley leaf that's, you know, waved before the Lord, that's Jesus, you know, saying, look, there's much more to come. I've got a whole crop of those who will believe in me who will be resurrected also and have everlasting life with the Father. There's this great symbolism and meaning behind this.

feast of first fruits that God established there for the nation of Israel and said, I want you to always do this and remember and reflect and thank God. We have just a piece. We have just a taste of what is to come. But even if we have nothing else to thank God for, so if we don't have a field ready to harvest, you don't have a couple dollars in your hand in token for all the money that's going to come in, right? You don't have that same kind of thanksgiving perhaps that the Israelites might have.

But we have Jesus Christ. And regardless of whatever else is happening in our lives, we have reason to thank God in faith because we have this promise of resurrection. We have this promise of life with the Father through the Son. And a similar thing happens with the Feast of Weeks. Now, I kind of gave it away because I put the title Pentecost on there. I'm just hoping you don't know what Pentecost is. No, actually, I'm not. Acts chapter two, what happened on the day of Pentecost? That's when the Holy Spirit came

came down upon the disciples there in the upper room. And the church was established there in the Holy Spirit after Christ resurrected and the Holy Spirit was given. For all believers following that, there was a change and transformation that took place. So much so that Paul explains it this way in 2 Corinthians 5. He who has prepared us, this very thing is God, talking about our eternity, our eternal body, the resurrected body, who has also given us the Spirit as a guarantee.

The way Paul describes it, look, the Holy Spirit was given to you by God. It's a first fruit. There's much more to come. There's much more that God has promised. There's a whole harvest for you and in your life that you haven't even begun to see yet. But here's just a taste. You get the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, the empowering of the Holy Spirit. That's just a taste of the rest that God has for you. And so we can celebrate these feasts today.

By taking time to thank God in faith. Again, that might be difficult regarding our actual, you know, current circumstances. There might not be much to be thankful for. There might be some challenging things in our lives. But even if everything else is a mess, we have much to thank God for in the receiving of Jesus and the promise of life and the receiving of the Holy Spirit and the promise of so much more that is yet to come.

There needs to be these times. God wants to have times where we meet with him specifically for the designated purpose of just thanking God for his work in our lives, for his promises of the things that are not yet fulfilled, but we've just begun to see a little bit. We've just begun to see a little bit of what it is that God wants to do. What does your calendar look like?

It's so important for us to have these kinds of things. Now, for us as a nation here, we have Thanksgiving, which originally was about thanking God, and hopefully it still is for us. But boy, there's that tendency for it to not be about that, you know, for us to be busy and active and caught up in other things. And God says, look, I want to take some time to meet with you. And again, God gets to set the agenda.

This time is not for you to list your laundry of complaints about what you need to fix or what needs to be fixed in the world around you or in your life or whatever. No, this is a time for you to just stop and say, thanks, God. To wave a little piece of his promise and say, oh, look at what you're doing. And I know there's so much more that you've established. Thank you. A time of gratitude. It's a day that belongs to the Lord.

Moving along to the next feast, we're going to look now at verses 23 through 32. Here we have the day of atonement as well as the feast of trumpets. We see this fifth type of appointment that God wants to have with you. God wants to have some times that are set aside for you to consider the seriousness of sin. And this is the solemn one of the bunch.

There's a lot of celebrations and feasting and, you know, sacrificing huge animals that, you know, one family would consume. I mean, it was all you can eat to the very literal, you know, idea of that. There was great feasts and celebrations, but also it is appropriate, it is necessary in our lives to have times of reflection, to remember that sin is a real issue and it has devastating effects and there's great cost to it.

We'll begin looking at the Feast of Trumpets here in verse 23. It says, Now there's some interesting things that go on with the Feast of Trumpets. You'll notice that

The feasts that we've been talking about so far, they all happen in the spring, March, April, May. In that timeframe, that's Passover, Unleavened Bread, First Fruits, Pentecost. All that happens in that spring time. Now we're looking at the fall.

And there's a separation, there's a gap of time between the first feast and the second group of feasts. And there is some prophetic aspects to that in that the first set of feasts have been fulfilled by Christ, the first coming of Jesus. The second set of feasts will be fulfilled at the second coming of Jesus. And so there's some concepts there that you can play with and understand and just be fascinated at the wisdom of God in these things. The Feast of Trumpets, now it was the first day of the seventh month.

And now they were to sound these trumpets. There was to be a holy day. Now they would sound the trumpets and there were certain sacrifices that they would offer on the first day of every month. But God calls out the seventh month and says, this is unique. This is a different day. This is a special day. But what's interesting about it is then he doesn't give a specific reason why. He doesn't give them, you know, a whole lot of detail on here's what you are to do on this special day of this month. You're to sound the trumpet. And then there's

I'm going to use the word mystery because there's some connections that you might consider in your own mind and heart about the mystery of the trumpet that is going to sound and the work that God is going to do in the future in connection with the second coming of Jesus. There's a trumpet that will sound. Hopefully you get where I'm going. If not, that's something for you to have some fun with and dig into.

For the nation of Israel, it became though a sound of a trumpet to remind them the day of atonement is coming and they would begin to prepare their hearts for the day of atonement, which was a serious day for them. Let's jump into that in verse 26 through 28. It says, and the Lord spoke to Moses saying, also the 10th day of the seventh month shall be the day of atonement. It shall be a holy convocation for you. You shall afflict your souls and offer an offering made by fire to the Lord.

And you shall do no work on that same day for it is the day of atonement to make atonement for you before the Lord your God.

So on the first day you sound the trumpets, on the 10th day, this is the day of atonement. Now the sacrifices that we talked about earlier in Leviticus, those, there were sacrifices for sin, but there was limitations on what sin those sacrifices were for. The day of atonement is for everything else. It was the day that God would wipe away and wash away all of the sin of all of the nation of Israel.

And so there was this great sense of freedom and this relief of guilt as God took care of the sin issue on the day of atonement. But in addressing that, God wanted them to not just take it carelessly, but to take it seriously and to approach it with a seriousness and a solemnness and understanding the gravity of sin. And so he tells them on this day, again, God gets to set the agenda. On this day, you're to afflict your soul.

Now, he was not telling them to, you know, beat themselves or to beat themselves up emotionally or, you know what I mean? Like he wasn't to afflict your soul. He was talking about that there should be a solemn time of fasting, that there would be this solemn self-reflection, this solemn time to consider the issue of sin.

And God was serious about this. He goes on in these other verses that we're not reading, but here in chapter 23, regarding the day of atonement, verses 29 through 32, like you are commanded to afflict your soul. And if you don't afflict your soul, you're gonna be cut off from the nation of Israel. I mean, God was serious about this. You need to have times where you consider the seriousness of sin. Now you can look at this prophetically and see this connect to and relate to the tribulation period.

where the wrath of God will be poured out upon the world because of sin. And you know, some people have a really hard time with that idea, that concept of the wrath of God. And you know why? It's because, well, they haven't taken time to meet with God personally to consider the seriousness of sin.

There's a disconnect. And there needs to be. It's easy for us to lose perspective and to lose grasp of the reality of sin, especially as we see it watered down and played down in the world around us. It's easy to kind of become lax. And God has built into the Israelite calendar, hey, every year you need to be reminded that

Don't forget, because it's going to be easy for you to relax on the subject of sin and to kind of get kind of lazy on it and to not think of it in what it is in reality. It's going to be easy for you to slip into that, to slide away from an accurate understanding of sin. But God built into their calendar this reminder every year that they would have a day designated every

to be reminded of how serious sin is. What does your calendar with God look like? Is there a time set? Is there a schedule that he's called you to set aside some time to just stop and remember, to stop and think and reflect on the devastation and the gravity, on the seriousness of sin? Again, these things don't happen automatically. We need to allow the Lord to set our schedule, to set a time on the books, to set a time in the year, to set a time in the month to say,

Let's set this part, let's set this time aside. Let's set this apart for this specific purpose where God gets to set the agenda. He gets to set the goal. And the goal is understand and remember how serious sin is. Well, the final thing that we see here in chapter 23, the final feast is the feast of tabernacles or feast of booths. And that's found in verses 33 through 44.

Here we get to see the final type of appointment, at least the final type of appointment that we'll look at today that God wants to have with us. And that is time to rejoice in God's work.

God wants to have time with you where you simply celebrate and rejoice in the work that God has done. Verse 33, Then jump to verse 39. Also on the 15th day,

Verse 1.

Verse 41. Verse 41.

Now, if you remember the other feasts, we're talking about the first fruits. They're about to go back and to harvest the rest. But now, in the seventh month, God says...

You're going to now celebrate the harvest that has come in. After it's all been harvested, you've received the benefits. Now come back and meet with me with the main purpose, the primary thing, he says in verse 40, you shall rejoice before the Lord your God for seven days. The primary thing God says, here's my agenda for this time. I want you to stop after you've worked hard and brought in the harvest, you've done a good job. Okay, now just enjoy that. Take some time.

to rejoice and celebrate and enjoy the work that you have done and the work that God has provided. In this seven-day period, God also built in something else. He said, I want you to move out of your house for those seven days. Go camping. Harvey said, yes. They would build booths either right alongside their house or they would actually go to Jerusalem and build booths there in front of the tabernacle or the temple later on. They would build these booths to remind them of how God provided for them in the wilderness.

And they would live in the booths for seven days, decorated with these beautiful bows. And, you know, they were called to just like stop their normal routine, do something special, do something beautiful, do something neat, and just enjoy and rejoice over what God has done.

God's not a mean ogre, you know, who just wants to make us miserable. He wants to do great things. And there is appropriate times for us to have some serious and solemn reflection on the gravity of sin and what our sin costs. And at the same time, God wants those days, those weeks. I mean, think about that. The day of atonement is a day. And then God has soon after that, just a few days later, okay, good job. You remembered the issue of sin. Good job. Now, just enjoy that.

the work that God has done, the provision that he has given. Take some time and rejoice in God's work. What does your calendar with God look like? Where's this week? Where's this time in your schedule? Where do you have time to just stop and rejoice in the work that God has done? Again, these things don't just happen automatically.

The nation of Israel, when they actually entered into the promised land, very quickly, they began to move away from this idea of the Sabbath day and the Sabbath year and the things that God established because, well, there was more work to do. There was more things to do. There was money to make. There was grain to harvest. And there was a moving away from these things. And it's such an easy tendency upon us as well for us to get caught up in life.

to get swayed by the world around us, to allow our schedule to be influenced by what others say and demands that are placed upon us from the outside. But the most important person in regards to your appointments is God. He needs to come first. He needs to get the first say of what goes on your calendar, what goes on your schedule. And God wants to designate some times to meet with you in a variety of different ways. He wants to set aside some days that are just time to rest, right?

Time to break from the schedule. And as the Lord speaks to you, you need to let him do that and let him set the agenda and say, no, I'm going to want to do other things on that day besides what God wants. But this is the Lord's day. And so I'm going to do what the Lord wants. And today that means I'm going to rest. I'm going to break from my normal activities. I'm going to not do the customary work. I'm going to do what the Lord wants. Maybe your work's going to kind of go, hmm, we don't like this idea. And there's going to be some tension. But

The Lord needs to come first. There's gonna be some demands from your family. Hey, we need you to do this on this day. And perhaps it's gonna be appropriate for you to say, you know, this is the Lord's day and the Lord's told me to do this. This is what the Lord has on this agenda for today. And I need to be about the Lord's business.

Not in a legalistic way, not in a, you know, God's going to strike you if you don't kind of, no, no, no. But just in a relationship with God. As you're connecting with God, God has these kinds of meetings for you. But understand that there's going to be some opposition and competition for the schedule that God has. And so we need to let the Lord lead and be committed to the Lord as he speaks to us. Where perhaps there's a day he wants you to celebrate his deliverance and just to stop and reflect and think about God.

and enjoy the deliverance that he has brought. Maybe there's a time period that God says, I need you to set aside this week and you need to be specifically praying. Maybe some fasting is involved. Maybe there's some other activities involved and you need to be really seeking me about your life and your heart and allowing me to just pull out and show you any areas of sin or issues that need to be addressed in your life. Maybe God wants to

Call you to set aside some time to just say thanks. And there's a way for you to wave an offering before the Lord and say, God, I'm just so blessed at what you're about to do. It's easy for us to celebrate after the miracle has taken place, right? But to celebrate in faith and rejoice in faith and thank God in faith for what he is going to do in eternity, but also in those promises that he's given to us. Maybe we need time to consider the seriousness of sin.

Maybe it's time to take a day to afflict the soul and to fast and to be reminded, you know, sin is a real thing and it's an issue. And Satan wants to take down me. He wants to take down families. He wants to destroy people. And there needs to be an appreciation for the severity of wickedness in our own hearts and lives. But there also is those times to rejoice in God's work. And so God has set these times. He's established them.

For the nation of Israel, they were very specific, very literal. This day, do exactly this, follow this procedure. For us as believers, we need to connect with the Lord. When does God want you to celebrate these things? And how does he want you to celebrate these things? That's up to you and the Lord. Let each one be persuaded in his own mind. But the heart of God is that each and every one of us would have these kinds of meetings with God. And if you will allow him to, he will set these schedules. He will show you. He will speak to you about times, events,

to meet with him in all of these ways. Now we get to partake in one of those this morning as we end the service with a time of communion. And I'll invite Ronnie up to close us in a song. And as he gets ready, I would remind you of what Paul teaches us in 1 Corinthians 11. The Lord's Supper communion, it's attached to the Passover feast.

It's the reminder of our deliverance. It's the reminder of what God has done in sending his son to die upon the cross for our sin. And on that day, Jesus gave us the bread and the cup as reminders. He gave us the bread and said, this is my body, which is broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me. And so now God sets the agenda. He's making the appointment. This is an appointed time of the Lord. He says, here's what I want you to do during this time. Remember that my body was broken for you. And he gave us the cup.

which represents the blood that was shed for our sins. It's a new covenant that's in his blood. And Jesus said, do this in remembrance of me. And so we partake of the cup this morning because, well, Jesus told us, here's the agenda. Here's what I want you to do. Stop, take a bite, take a drink, and remember that I died upon the cross for you. Paul goes on in 1 Corinthians chapter 11 to say, as often as you do this, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.

So part of the purpose, part of what God wants to do in the time of communion is for us to stop and remember. Part of what he wants us to do though is as we partake, it's a proclamation. It's a, I believe that Jesus Christ is coming again. And so stop and remember that as you partake. But then finishing it up, Paul goes on in 1 Corinthians 11 to say, if you eat this bread or drink this cup in an unworthy manner, you're guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord. He says, but let a man examine himself.

and then eat of the bread and drink of the cup. And so there's three purposes that God has established for this appointed time, and that is for us to examine ourselves. If there's anything that the Lord wants to address, now's the time to address it. Not that we don't partake of communion, but so that we partake of communion with a heart that's right with God as we repent of any issues that God wants to address. And then we take the time to remember what Christ has done for us and to look forward to his soon return.

So they're going to lead us in this song, and I would encourage you. This is what God has established. So let that be what's on your heart and what's in your mind as we worship the Lord. Remember Christ, proclaim his death, and examine your heart as you spend this time with the Lord. They're going to pass out the bread and the cup, and at any time, as you're connecting and communicating with the Lord, you can partake between you and the Lord. If you don't at the end, Ronnie will give you opportunity to partake. But let's worship the Lord and connect with him according to the agenda that he has set for our time this morning.

We pray you have been blessed by this Bible teaching. The power of God to change a life is found in the daily reading of His Word. Visit ferventword.com to find more teachings and Bible study resources.