6# The Feasts Of The LORD (Lev. 23:4-22) (THE FEASTS ARE WITNESSES & POINTERS’) (5-22-21)

(THE FEASTS ARE GOD’S TIMING: ‘YOU KNEW NOT THE TIME OF YOUR VISITATION’!)

The 4 Spring Feasts are summed up in only 19 verses of Scripture (Leviticus 23:4–22).

God commanded His people: Have a Feast! Take a Break! He made Festivals part of The Torah, codifying The Commandments to stop for a while and Celebrate a few times a year.

Today, as people are beginning to think more about the second coming of Jesus, it’s worth remembering that the feasts not only speak of Jesus’ 1st Coming, but also His Return. It’s a great time to look again at the information God has given us inThe Biblical Calendar He set for His people, both Jew and Gentile.

The first thing to talk about is the word for Feast used in Hebrew. The word for “FEAST” is MOED (מועד).This word is based on a very important root word, יעד (YAAD). In general, we say that ‘MOED’ means ‘APPOINTED TIME’, or ‘SET FEAST’. But there is more to it. There is certainly a sense of destiny associated with the word, but the word is also used to talk about time: ‘EVERLASTING’, like ‘EVERLASTING FATHER’ (Isaiah 9:6). The word can also mean: ‘UNTIL’. There’s another associated meaning in the root of the word: ‘יעד (YAAD)’: עד (ED) is the Hebrew word for ‘WITNESS’. In court, a ‘WITNESS’ gives testimony to what they have seen and heard, telling something to the people listening about something they have not experienced. The ‘WITNESS’ testifies and points to something that isn’t present, but has to be explained. So all together, the word for ‘FEAST (MOED)’, means: ‘A FIXED APPOINTED TIME OF DESTINY’, which testifies and points to something that goes backwards and forwards through eternity. Isn’t that a perfect description of what God gives us in The Biblical Feasts?!

Now you might ask, with all these amazing signs that point so clearly to Jesus, why don’t Jewish people believe in Him? A large part of the answer is that the Jewish picture of the Messiah is very different to the Lamb of God, the Suffering Servant who came 2000 years ago. They were expecting ‘A CONQUERING KING, A VICTORIOUS WARRIOR’, who would usher in a Messianic age of perfection. Why did they think that? Because that is what is described over and over again in the Hebrew Scriptures, and those thing has and will happen! But many Christians don’t seem to know this side of our Messiah very well either. They might know what Revelation says about the end of time, but aren’t so familiar with the hundreds of details about the Messiah’s glorious coming given to us in The Hebrew Scriptures.

In the same way that the Jewish people missed the time of His visitation in The 1st Century because they were expecting something very different, Christians will be in for a big shock when He comes again in Glory! When most will be expecting ‘A GENTLE SHEPHERD INSTEAD OF A CONQUERING KING!...

(THE FEASTS ARE GOD’S TIMING: ‘YOU KNEW NOT THE TIME OF YOUR VISITATION’!)