Now that we have finished celebrating the four Spring Feasts, you might be wondering what is the next SET TIME in the Hebrew Calendar? We have honored Christ these past few months in what He has already done in fulfilling the purpose of the Spring Feasts. But up ahead, it’s all about what Christ is going to accomplish when He returns as our King.
The Fall Feasts are a blueprint of God’s SET TIMES when Jesus will establish His Dominion (Kingdom) here on the earth as it is in heaven (Matt 6:6-9). This redemption plan will be executed through Christ and His remnant through the Millennium reign (Rev.5:9,10). The nations accepting or rejecting the Kingship of Christ in the earth during the Millennium are differentiated in the Bible between the “sheep and the goats.”
“When the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the holy angels with Him, then He will sit on the throne of His glory. All the nations will be gathered before Him, and He will separate them one from another, as a shepherd divides his sheep from the goats. And He will set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on the left”(Matt. 25:31-33).
The fulfillment of the Fall Feasts is a fulfillment of God’s plan and covenant promise that is corporate in nature. God even uses the “Feasts of Tabernacles” as a SIGN to distinguish those nations in the Millennium that are with him and those who aren’t:
“And it shall come to pass that everyone who is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the Feast of Tabernacles. And it shall be that whichever of the families of the earth do not come up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, on them there will be no rain. If the family of Egypt will not come up and enter in, they shall have no rain; they shall receive the plague with which the Lord strikes the nations who do not come up to keep the Feast of Tabernacles. This will be the punishment of Egypt and the punishment of all the nations that do not come up to keep the Feast of Tabernacles” (Zech. 14:16-19).
Egypt in the Bible is symbolic of the world, or “anti-Christ” government and idolatry that opposes the Lord and His ways (Heb. 11:26). When the Lord delivered the Israelites out of Egypt and brought them to Mt. Sinai, God offered the nation a “proposal of marriage” that they accepted (Ex. 19). By honoring God’s Covenant, they were supposed to be SIGN to the other nations of the one true God, and to show them His ways.
“Speak also to the children of Israel, saying: ‘Surely My Sabbaths (weekly and yearly Feasts “holy days”) you shall keep, for it is a SIGN between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the Lord who sanctifies you” (Ex. 31:13).
Honoring the FEASTS was a SIGN, but it also was a blueprint to unify the nation three times a year.
“For I will cast out the nations before you and enlarge your borders; neither will any man covet your land when you go up to appear before the Lord your God three times in the year” (Ex. 34:24).
Unfortunately, the Israelites failed to keep their promise to God, and it didn’t take much time until they did not reflect God’s sign at all. It would take God Himself to keep His promise to the nation regardless of their shortcomings. And so….Christ came… fulfilled the Spring Feasts, redeemed the Covenant, and made way for the SEAL/SIGN once again.
Christ will comes again….fullfill the Fall Feasts, judge the nations with His remnant at His side, establish righteousness in the earth, and then the nations who are with Him will be HIS CORPORATE SEAL/SIGN.
Now you are probably asking, “Well, that is great to know for what is up ahead, but what about now? And the answer comes with the understanding this “pregnant” period” between the Spring and Fall Feasts. These next three summertime months where there are no Feasts indicates the time it will take between the fulfillment of the Spring and Fall Feasts.
In order to understand the purpose of this “pregnant period,” let’s go back to history to the last Spring Feast Jesus fulfilled to gain some perspective.
Once the Holy Spirit (the SEAL/SIGN) filled the disciples with God’s power in the Upper Room at Pentecost, the disciples dispersed and multiplied the message of Christ our Savior to the nations. The gospel has spread to the ends of the earth, and those who have faith that Jesus is Lord have been “justified in Christ.”
In the process of multiplying believers, God has determined the exact number of “body parts” He will use in forming the “body of Christ.”
“For as the body is one and has many members, but all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ” (1 Cor. 12:12).
This process has taken so far about 2,000 years, and we are approaching it’s completion, marked by many earthly signs. One of the signs that will indicate the completion of this “pregnant period” will be the exposure and demise of the “Mystery of Babylon.”
“After these things I saw another angel coming down from heaven, having great authority, and the earth was illuminated with his glory. And he cried mightily with a loud voice, saying, ‘Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and has become a dwelling place of demons, a prison for every found spirit, and a cage for every unclean and hated bird! For all the nations have drunk of her wine of wrath of her fornication, the kings of the earth have omitted fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth have become rich though the abundance of her luxury” (Rev. 18:1-3).
Another sign will be when the nations come against Jerusalem.
“For I will gather all the nations to battle against Jerusalem; The city shall be taken, The houses rifled, And the women ravished. Half of the city shall go into captivity, But the remnant of the people shall not be cut off from the city” (Zech. 14:2).
A significant last sign will be the sound of the “trumpet,” which will announce the completion of this “pregnant period,” as well as welcome the coming King.
“And He will send HIs angels with a great sound of a trumpet and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of the heaven to the other” (Matt. 24:31).
God said he would also give us signs through the sun, moon, and stars to indicate the end of this period (Gen. 1:14; Matt. 24:29).
“Immediately, after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven and the powers of the heavens will be shaken” (Matt. 24:29).
We have had plenty of signs in the sky these past few years. Since the Hebrew calendar is established according to the moon, the moon in particular will give us God’s signs of fulfilling His Covenant Promises.
“He appointed the moon for seasons” (Psalm 104:19).
Recall the “blood” moons that occurred two years in a row falling on Feast Days in 2014, 2015. Then we had the epic 2017 Total Solar Eclipse when the sun, moon and earth line up with each other on the NEW MOON. In January of 2018, we had a “Super Blue Moon.” And this August, on Firstfruits (New Moon), we will have another partial solar eclipse, followed by one of the most intense annual meteor showers, known as “The Perseids.” This metro shower will produce up to 60 shooting stars an hour at their peak.
This “pregnant period” between the Spring and Fall Feasts is the time God allotted for the “birthing of body parts” to find their identity, purpose, submission, and connection to the “HEAD.”
During the “pregnant period,” we cannot SEE the bigger picture of how God will take these body parts and form them into ONE, just as we cannot SEE a mother’s baby in her womb. The corporate birth will happen when the Lord returns.
“Now you are the body of Christ, and members individually” (1 Cor.12:27).
The Bible states that Jesus is the HEAD and we who have been saved by grace are HIS BODY. But if you look around today, we have many so called “bodies of Christ” which are distinguished by denominations and doctrines, so we have obviously not connected together into ONE. For many of us who have been to so many different denominations and have seen good and bad, this is somewhat of a relief.
“Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you may be married to another—to Him who was raised from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God”(Rom. 7:4).
The process the body of Christ is in right now is the Lord’s “sanctification process.” Each “body part” of Christ is wrestling to conform to the image of Christ so it can follow the HEAD; CHRIST! Our spirit is holy and “turned on” as believers, but our soul (mind, will and emotions) must go through a process of transformation to become like our “Father in heaven.” Jesus did only what the Father said and did. We too must become like Christ. This transformation comes with a wrestling with our old nature that gravitates toward sin and the desires of the flesh that crave control.
As I have mentioned in previous blogs, the “firstfruits” offering of Pentecost is the ONLY offering that allowed leaven (Lev. 23:17). This was forbidden in all other offerings, as it represented sin. But it was a blueprint that foreshadowed us as believers in this “pregnant period!”
God accepts us as righteous before Him through Christ, even though we are still wrestling with our sinful natures that still need crucifying. It’s not until Jesus returns that we can abide fully in His nature in our new glorified bodies. And so the Pentecost “firstfruits” offering shows us that we are acceptable to the Lord in this present state we are in because of His righteousness imputed upon us UNTIL Christ returns (Rom. 4:23,24).
Sanctification is the ONLY process that requires our partnership with the Lord. Being justified in Christ comes free through His grace and what Christ already did. Getting glorified bodies is also promised regardless of our obedience (1 Cor. 15:54). But the sanctification process requires our willingness to humble ourselves and allow God to make us disciples, which is a complete surrender that will produce rewards. The greatest of these rewards will be to reign with Christ in the Millennium.
“That each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor”(1 Thes. 4:4).
The summer months between the Spring and Fall Feasts are there to build our character, our faith, and our trust in the Lord. The summer months reveal what is inside of us all in our sinful nature that needs to be sanctified. The summer months are full of tests given to see if we are ready for the outflow of God’s blessing and promises. Through the tests and trials of the sanctification process, the reward of increased “REST” in knowing who God is grows in our hearts. This prepares our hearts for the fulfillment of the Fall Feasts up ahead.
In the book of Revelation, the writer John uses a bride and a wedding celebration to describe what it will be like to finally be “ONE” body/nation with the Lord at the fulfillment of the “Feast of Tabernacles,”
“Let us be glad and rejoice and give Him glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His wife has made herself ready. And to her it was granted to be arrayed in fine linen, clean and bright, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints” (Rev. 19:7-9).
Christians today all have in them individually the hope of eternal life with the Lord. We all are awaiting for our bodies to become gloried and somehow all become ONE with the LORD. But we cannot attain that complete transformation until Jesus returns to fulfill the Fall Feasts.
Mo'Manna 