Now, what I'm going to try to
do, if you'll turn in your Bibles to Leviticus chapter 23, I've
been preaching through the book of Leviticus on Wednesday nights
up in Ashland and sort of taking my time. Whenever I go into a
book like that, I really didn't intend to go verse by verse.
But as you begin to read, you see so many of the great truths
of the gospel of God's grace in Christ illustrated that you
just have to stop and and think about them for a while and deal
with them. And Leviticus chapter 23 is the feast days or the feast
times of Israel that God gave through Moses to the children
of Israel. And in this chapter, there are
seven feasts plus the Sabbath is mentioned. And so I call this
series of messages God's appointed time. God has an appointed time
for all things that he will accomplish in his purpose of grace. God
himself is not a creature, and he's not limited to time. He's
eternal. We can't really explain or grasp
that, but it's so. But God created. The first word
in the Bible is beginning, in beginning. It's a word of time. And then when we speak of the
scriptures, we see the development of time. And so we know that
God is working all things after the counsel of his own will and
all things in his time. And of course, the greatest of
all times is the fullness of the time that is spoken of in
the book of Galatians chapter four, where God sent forth his
son made of a woman made under the law to redeem them that were
under the law. And that's speaking of the time
of the cross. That is the center of all redemptive
history. And that's when all the work
of redemption and justification for God's people before a holy
God was accomplished and finished. Christ, when he finished the
work, that's what he said. It is finished. He used a word
of time. And then he was buried and arose
again the third day, which was appointed of God. And he's now
seated at the right hand of the Father, ever living to make intercession
for us. So time is important. Ecclesiastes
chapter three speaks of that. It says to every season, to every
purpose under heaven, there is a time. And that God has set
eternity in the hearts of men to find out God, to seek the
Lord. And of course, we know man by
nature won't do that, but that is the responsibility and the
accountability that he's held to under God's commands. Now, in Leviticus chapter 23,
we learn the importance of God's appointed times. You'll see the
word feast and we talk about the feast day. It says in verse
one and the Lord spake unto Moses saying speak unto the children
of Israel and say unto them concerning the feast of the Lord which you
shall proclaim to be in holy convocations even these are my
feast. Now the actual word the actual
Hebrew word for feast what we would say feast has translated
that way several times throughout Leviticus 23. But the actual
word for feast is only used twice. The other words that are sometimes
translated feast throughout Leviticus 23 is just times, appointed times. And the reason that's significant
is when you hear the word feast, you think about people sitting
down eating, or you think about having a party, or having a happy
time. And of course, these times are
happy times, or they should be. These appointed feast days are
appointed times. But don't think of them as somebody
sitting down eating or somebody having a party. That's not what
the feast days were. These were holy convocations. You see that term there in verse
2. Now what that means is a gathering for worship. That's what this
is. God appointed these times for
the nation Israel to gather to worship. And that's what it means. Holy meaning set apart. There's
nothing holy about a day. Inherently, if you're talking
about morality or purity, for example, many things are called
holy in the scripture that are just things. The vessels of the
tabernacle, the office of priesthood, and then these holy times. The
word holy there means set apart. And what he's saying is that
this particular time was to be set apart To worship God and
to learn and understand and re-emphasize the spiritual truths of each
day. Now what I've been doing up in Ashland is basically taking
each one of these and preaching a message on that one. But I
don't have time to do that today. So what I'm going to do is kind
of whirlwind this through Leviticus 23 and give you these feast days
and the significance of each one. Now what they do. is they
really give you the history of redemption. These feast days,
as you go through, the progressive revelation and the experience
of a justified sinner. One who's justified in Christ.
This is the type, this is the picture that's given here. And
I want you to look at verse 3. He introduces seven feast days. Now, seven, as you know in the
Bible, is the number of completeness. The number of perfection. So
these seven feast days represent the whole complete redemptive
history of a sinner saved by the grace of God in the Lord
Jesus Christ. And it begins with the Sabbath
day, the weekly Sabbath. Verse three, he introduces the
seven feast day with the weekly Sabbath. And it says in verse
three, six days shall work be done. But the seventh day is
the Sabbath for rest and holy convocation. You shall do no
work therein. It is the Sabbath of the Lord
in all your dwellings." Now, you know what the Sabbath represents.
That Sabbath day that was given at a point in time, a weekly
Sabbath. There was even a Sabbath year
later on, but this weekly Sabbath was given as a picture and a
type of a sinner's resting by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Not resting in the sinner's own works. but resting in the finished
work of Christ. Now that's what the Sabbath is
all about. Hebrews chapter 4 speaks of that plainly. The best commentary
on the Sabbath you'll ever buy is Hebrews chapter 4. And that
speaks of the Sabbath rest. Christ finished the work of redemption
by his blood. He paid the price in full. He
justified his people based on the righteousness that he established
in the cross, imputed it to them, gave it to them, And before a
holy God, our standing in the eyes of God's law and justice
was completely settled in the finished work of Christ on the
cross. And what this is showing is that before you ever see anything
about grace, before you see anything about obedience or experience,
there's got to be rest in Christ. Rest in what He accomplished.
And that goes all the way through these feast days. And each feast
day, the Sabbath, it's brought up again. And you also see that
burnt offerings are brought up again. That's in commemoration
of the wrath of God which fell upon our Savior based on our
sins laid to His charge. That's what that is, the burnt
offering, the wave offering. You'll see that, son. That's
the sinner thanking God for what Christ accomplished on Calvary.
So it begins with rest. And then in verse 4, We begin
with the first feast, it was a one day feast, it was the feast
that changed their calendar. You can read about it over in
Exodus chapter 12, it's the Passover. A one day feast, look at verse
4, or verse 4 and 5. These are the feasts of the Lord
and even holy convocations, gatherings, which you shall proclaim in their
seasons, in their appointed times, in the 14th day of the first
month, as even is the Lord's Passover. Now that's the first
one. That's what changed their calendar. This was the beginning of the
Jewish year. And what we see in time, you
know what the Passover is all about. We won't go back over
to Exodus chapter 12, we don't have time. But you know what
happened when the 10 plagues of Egypt, the 10th one, God said
that he was going to come through and slay all the firstborn. His
wrath was going to fall upon all the firstborn of Egypt. except
where those who got the blood of a lamb, a lamb of one year
old, without spot and without blemish, that's a picture of
Christ, that lamb had to be slaughtered and the blood had to be caught
and they had to take that blood and they had to put that blood
over their door, you know the story, over the sides and over
the lentil, and God said, when I see the blood, I will pass
over you. And that changed their whole
calendar. That was the day of Israel's liberation and redemption
as a nation, because it was after that that they were set free
out of the bondage of Egypt. Now that's a great picture of
our liberation, our redemption, our justification before God
at the cross. When God saw the blood of his
son on the cross, he passed over us. And that's what that, that's
the spiritual lesson. And I'll tell you what, that
changed our calendar, didn't it? You know, literally it changed
our calendar because they used to, Used to, they would measure
time as B.C. and A.D. B.C. meaning before Christ, A.D. meaning the Latin Anno Domini
in the year of our Lord. And so the time was measured
by the coming of Christ. Now they're trying to take that
out. You'll see B.C.E. That means the Common Era or
A.C.E. After the Common Era. So it means,
really means nothing to most people. But to a justified sinner,
what does it mean? Paul said, God forbid that I
should glory save in what? The cross of the Lord Jesus Christ
and what he accomplished at Calvary. Because I'm going to tell you
something, that's when God saw the blood and passed over me.
That's when the wrath of God was removed from me. That's when
my condemnation in Adam was totally taken care of and removed. That's
when I was justified before a holy God, even before I was born.
That's when all of God's elect were redeemed by the blood of
Christ. So that's the first feast, you
see. That's the main issue here. And then connected with that
is the second. It's called the Feast of Unleavened
Bread. Look at verse 6. He says, And
on the fifteenth day of the same month is the Feast of Unleavened
Bread. The day after now, under the Lord. Seven days you must
eat unleavened bread. And then he goes on and gives
some of the, I don't have time to read all
these scriptures. You go back over and read them. But the Feast
of Unleavened Bread, what it represents is the sinner who
has come to Christ for salvation. That represents our experience
of what Christ accomplished at Calvary in the new birth. And
what we do is we feast on Christ, who is our unleavened bread.
Now unleavened bread, you remember, is representative of the person
of Christ, the sinless Savior, the sinless Redeemer. He had
no sin. He knew no sin. He was never
contaminated with our sin. In all of his experience, he
remained sinlessly perfect in himself as unleavened bread.
He said that when he instituted the Lord's Supper. He said, this
is my body. This unleavened bread represents
my body. Take and eat, he said. This was
broken for you. We were redeemed not with corruptible
things, Peter wrote, but with incorruptible, the precious blood
of Christ as of a lamb without spot and without blemish. And
so we feast upon Christ, the bread of life. So as a result
of what Christ finished at the cross, Passover, life is given
to his people to see him, rest in him and feed upon him as the
bread of life, feast of unleavened bread. So you see there, we see
the ground of our salvation in the Passover. And then we see
the fruit and result of our salvation in the feast of unleavened bread.
See how it progresses there. The only reason we have life
is because Christ died on the cross and was buried and rose
again the third day. The next one over in verse 9
of Leviticus chapter 23 is called the Feast of Firstfruits. Look
at verse 9. It says, And the Lord spake unto
Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto
them, When ye be come into the land which I give unto you, and
shall reap the harvest thereof, Then you shall bring a sheaf
of the first fruit. It's a handful. They go out in
the field and they gather a handful. This is a barley harvest, is
what it was. And they gather one handful,
that barley harvest, and they take it to the priest. And the
priest would wave it before the Lord. He said, bring a sheaf
of the first fruits of your harvest unto the priest, and he shall
wave the sheaf before the Lord to be accepted for you. Now,
all through these feasts, you see the gospel principles of
representation. We can't go to God on our own.
We need a representative. We need a high priest who can
stand in our place. We need a substitute. Not only
do we need one who can represent us, we need one who can actually
get in our place and take our place, you see. And then that priest He must,
that substitute, he must take our sins upon himself, just like
the scapegoat, just like the innocent lamb. Sin must be charged
to him. He must be made sin, the scripture
says. And then he must satisfy God's
law and justice. He must pay the penalty in full. As Daniel said in Daniel chapter
9, he's got to finish the transgression, make an end of sin, and bring
in everlasting righteousness. That's what he's got to do. So
this sheaf of the way, this one sheaf of the barley harvest was
weighed before the Lord by the priest. And it says in verse
11, to be accepted for you. Now, what do you suppose that
represents? That's Christ in whom we are accepted in the beloved,
the scripture says. How are you accepted before God?
You say, well, I had a good day yesterday. Well, big deal. I hope you did. Don't get me
wrong. But that's not your acceptance before God. What's going to happen
when you have a bad day? See, it doesn't depend on you
or me. It depends totally upon Christ, who is the firstfruits. And what this firstfruits is,
it says, on the morrow after the Sabbath, the priest shall
waive it. This firstfruits represents the resurrection of Christ. Now,
turn over to 1 Corinthians 15. I want you to see the connection
here. Don't miss this. Now, back in the Old Testament,
It was usually, the Jews would usually say, they'd look at it
this way. If the first fruits, when they
went out and they planted in the spring, and they watched
their crops, and then in the fall they would come in and they'd
bring in the first fruits. Well, they would always say,
if the first fruits are good, the whole crop will be good.
That's the way they looked at it. And that was a pretty safe
way to look at it. Well, who is the first fruits?
Well, who is the first one to be resurrected from the dead
as the firstfruits? Now, not the first one to be
raised from the dead, but the one to be resurrected from the
dead as the firstfruits. Well, look at 1 Corinthians 15
and verse 20. He says, But now is Christ risen
from the dead and become the firstfruits of them that slept. For since by man came death,
that's Adam. By man came also the resurrection
of the dead, that's Christ. For as in Adam all die, all whom
Adam represented died in Adam. Even so in Christ shall all be
made alive, all whom Christ represented shall be made alive. But every
man in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, afterward they
that are Christ at his coming. So Christ, the feast of firstfruits,
is a commemoration of the resurrection of the coming Messiah. Now that
I've heard I've heard preachers say that the resurrection was
not preached in the Old Testament. Oh, yes, it was these two first
phrase. It was preached before then when
it was preached the first time the gospel was ever recorded
in Genesis chapter 315, when it said that that the seed of
woman was going to bruise Satan's head. That's the death, though
Satan was going to bruise his heel. That's a way of stating,
yes, he was going to be wounded for our transgressions and he
was going to die. He's not going to stay dead.
Job said in Job 19, he said, I know my Redeemer what? Liveth
and shall stand on the earth in the last day, and I'll see
him in my flesh. Job said that. They say Job's
the oldest book in the Bible. That may be true. So even Job
looked for a resurrected Redeemer. Not one who was going to have
a tomb that we could go and bow to or commemorate, but one who
is risen from the dead. And that's what Christ the firstfruits
represents. He lived, obeyed the law, died,
was buried, and raised again the third day as a representative.
He's the firstfruits. And if the firstfruits are good,
the whole crop's going to follow. There's not going to be one sinner
in hell for whom Christ died. Not one. Because His blood and
His righteousness demand the life of everyone whom He represented. He's the firstfruits. And if
you say anybody is in hell for whom he died, then you don't
believe in Christ as the firstfruits. You see, the first fruit is the
guarantee of the whole crop. Everybody's going to find. Now,
Christ himself said that. He said, he told his disciples
in John chapter 12, he said, except a corn or a seed of wheat
fall into the ground and die, it won't bring forth any fruit.
But if it died, it'll bring forth much fruit. He said that in John
chapter 6. He said in verse 37, All that
the Father giveth me shall come to me, and him that cometh to
me I will in no wise cast out. And this is the Father's will
that sent me, that of all which he hath given me shall come to
me, and I'll raise him up at the last day. You see, His righteousness
demands our life. That's what first proof is all
about. Now you might notice, if you do go back in your own
study and read chapter 23, You might notice when it's mentioning
the Sabbath, which is a continual commemoration of our rest in
Christ. It'll also say this, it'll say
there's no servile work to be done. Look back up at verse 8
when it mentions the Feast of Unleavened Bread. It says, but
you shall offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord seven days. Each day during the Feast of
Unleavened Bread was a seven day feast. Now Passover was a
one day. You see, it only took Christ
one time to finish the work, but the Feast of Unleavened Bread
is seven days. And what that means, that's completion
now. That's perfection. That means
all of our redemptive, regenerated lives, we do what? We feast on
Christ. We never stop that. We never
cease to feast on Him and look to Him and rest in Him. He's
our whole life and in eternity. That's the way it'll be. Worthy is the Lamb, that was
slain. And then it says, in the seventh day, and it's a holy
convocation, you shall do no servile work therein. Servile
work represents the legal bondage of works, religion, the law. What other kind of serving is
there? Well, there's the service of
a bond slave who's been set free by the master, who serves his
master. Why? Because he loves him. And
that's the difference. So you might notice that. So
there you have the first three. Now look at verse 15. Now the
next one is called the Feast of Weeks by the Jews. We call it the Feast of Pentecost.
It begins in verse 15. He says, You shall count unto
you from the morrow after the Sabbath, from the day that you
brought the sheep of the way of offering, seven Sabbaths shall
be complete. That's seven weeks. plus one
day, even unto the morrow after the seventh sabbath shall you
number fifty days." That's what the word Pentecost means. You've
heard that term, Pentecost. It means fifty days. That's what
it means. Seven weeks, forty-nine days,
plus one. Fifty days. And he says, you
shall offer a new meat offering. Now that word meat there is,
we would say that as meal. Whenever a Hebrew sat down to
eat, he may have a whole plate of vegetables, but that was his
meat. That's the way he referred to it, but that's not a piece
of meat there. That's a meal offering. The difference was
an animal offering was offered for sacrifice, representing our
Lord taking the wrath of God upon himself for us. A meal offering
was a grain offering from the field, which represented the
believer's thankfulness to God. That's the difference. And what
this is, this is the Feast of Pentecost, 50 days. He says in verse 17, you shall
bring out your habitations two wave loaves of two-tenths this. So there's two wave loaves, two
loaves here that are to be waved. That's the reason they call those
wave offerings, because that's the way they did it. They waved
them before the Lord. And that was a sign that they
were offering these in thanksgiving to God. See, they belong to God. They don't belong to me. And
that's what they did, they waved them before the Lord. And then
it says, they shall be a fine flour. But look here, it says,
they shall, verse 17, they shall be bacon with leaven. Now, these
loaves had leaven in them. Now, you know, leaven is a type
of sin. You know that. Unleavened means sinlessness.
And you know, leaven is a good type of sin, too. It's a good
picture of sin, because, you know, if you take a lump of dough
and you put a little leaven in it, what happens to that dough?
It swells up, doesn't it? And that's a good picture of
man there. One physician said that the human
anatomy is really strange. He said, when you pat it on the
back, the head swells. And that's a good picture of
leaven. It makes a man swell. And it spreads all the way throughout.
I mean, there's no part of that dough that the leaven doesn't
reach. That's sin in us, you see. So what does this represent? Well, the Feast of Pentecost,
as you know, The Feast of Weeks, because it's seven weeks plus
one day, 50 days, represents a harvest. Sometimes it's called
the Feast of In-Gathering. And you know, while we look at
Pentecost, what happened at Pentecost back in Acts chapter 2? What
happened there? The Holy Spirit descended in
His special way in that New Testament, which I believe is the baptism
of the Holy Spirit. When Peter preached that message
at Pentecost, and that was a fulfillment of what the Feast of Pentecost
pictured, it was a fulfillment of the prophecy of the prophet
Joel in Joel chapter 2. And what he's talking about is
the great in-gathering of God's people from all over the world,
the Feast of Pentecost. Christ died not just for the
Jews, There's two loaves here. One represents God's elect among
the Jews. The other one represents God's
elect among the Gentiles. The gospel was preached to the
Jew first, but also to the Greek or the Gentile. Greek was the
way they referred to all Gentiles back then because it was a Greek
culture. And so the Jew first and to the Gentiles. God has
a people out of every tribe, kindred, tongue, and nation.
They are the firstfruits. Christ is the firstfruits, and
the whole crop's going to follow the Pentecost. And so God saves
all of his people. And the reason that it's made
with leaven is because they're sinners saved by the grace of
God. Unleavened bread represents Christ, the sinless Savior. Leavened
bread represents you and me. What are we? We're sinners saved
by the grace of God. We're made with fine flour. What
does that mean? In Christ, we're perfect. Right
now. Right now, in Christ, I'm as
holy as I'll ever be. Right now, in Christ, I'm as
righteous as I'll ever be. But in myself, I'm still a wretched
man that I am. In myself, I'm the chief of sinners. One day, I'll be perfect in myself. That's another feast. Let's go
on. I'm going to run out of time here. There's the feast of Pentecost.
You can read about that, though, in Acts chapter 2. But look at
verse 23. Go down to verse 23. Yeah, Pentecost
goes from verse 15 to verse 22. And then verse 23 is what we
call the Feast of Trumpets. It says, And the Lord spake unto
Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, In
the seventh month, in the first day of the month, shall you have
a Sabbath, a memorial, a blowing of trumpets, and holy convocation. Now anytime you see a trumpet
blown, it's supposed to send a message. Sometimes it sends
a message for people to come and gather in. Sometimes it sends
a message, wake up, sleepy head, wake up. Sometimes it sends a
message, time to go to sleep. Sometimes it'll send a message,
the enemy's coming, you better brace yourself. Sometimes it'll
send a message, charge. But it always sends a message.
What is the Feast of Trumpets representing? It is the trumpeting
of the gospel throughout the world. The proclamation, the
power of God unto salvation. Paul said, I'm not ashamed of
the gospel, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone
that believe it, to the Jew first, to the Greek also, for therein
is the righteousness of God revealed, for it is written as it is written
that just shall live by faith. Preaching the gospel. We have
a message that needs to be trumpeted all over the world. It's a message
of grace. It's a message of Christ. It's
a message of redemption and justification accomplished by the blood and
righteousness of our Savior. And every sinner needs it. No
sinner by nature wants it, but every sinner needs it. And if
God ever brings you to want it, you can thank Him. That's what
the Feast of Trumpets represents. It's not to be hidden. It's not
to be concealed. It's not just for one particular
elite group. It's for anybody who wants it. That's right. And it's to be
trumpeted out all over the world to every tribe, kindred, tongue
and nation. And that's what the Feast of Trumpets. Look at verse
26. Now here's the next one. It's
the Feast of Atonement. And that word atonement, look
at verse 26, it says, And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
And also on the tenth day, this seventh month, there shall be
a day of atonement. That should be plural, atonement. It shall be in holy convocation
unto you, and you shall afflict your souls. Now, anytime you
see that, it means repentance. Afflict your soul. That doesn't
mean go out here and get a whip and whip yourself like the Catholic
Church preaches. You know, you see them, how they
have to do penance. They'll sometimes beat themselves. You know, I've
seen that in different historical settings, you know, as you read.
But that's not what it's talking about. It's talking about repentance.
The affliction of the soul. And then it says, an offering
made by fire unto the Lord. This is an offering by fire.
That means the wrath of God descending. And you shall do no work in that
same day, for it is a day of atonement to make atonement for
you before the Lord your God. He's talking about what we call
expiation, talking about God being satisfied. Now, this was
Israel's national day of cleansing. And upon this day, the priest
would go into the holiest of all with the blood of the sacrifice. And then he would come out and
the whole nation ceremonially, civilly, would be cleansed. Now, back in Leviticus 16, this
is all drawn out, what the priest would do, what he would wear,
how he would go in and all that. But this annual Feast of Atonement
represents our experience of the benefit of what was accomplished
by Christ on the cross. And it was a yearly reminder
for the whole nation, looking back at that priest and what
he would do in that Holy of All when he would go behind the veil
and come out. God had accepted the sacrifice,
and that's a picture of us continually looking back at the cross. Again,
what Paul said, God forbid that I should glory in the cross.
And then here's the last one. Here's the seventh one, verse
33. It's called the Feast of Tabernacles or the Feast of Booths. And a booth was just a little
tent. It says in verse 33, goes to the end of the chapter, the
Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel,
saying, The 15th day of the seventh month shall be the Feast of Tabernacles.
for seven days unto the Lord. And on that day, Israel was to
remember their time of wandering in the wilderness and be appreciative
of the time that God brought them into the promised land for
a permanent dwelling. And so that represents resurrection
glory for the sinner saved by the grace of God. Right now,
we're Wandering through the wilderness, you say, but there's going to
come a time when Christ will come back. And he's going to
gather us into final glory, and we're going to dwell with him
forever while on earth here, we're in a tent. That's what
the body of the Bible speaks of this body as being a tent,
a tabernacle. We think about Christ who came
and tabernacled among us, and he went to his father to make
intercession for us. He tabernacled among us, but
he's coming again and he's going to take us out of these tents,
this corruptible, and he's going to give us a new body, a new
tent to live in forever with no sorrow, no death, no pain. That's what the Feast of Tabernacles
represented.