Let's turn again tonight to the
book of Exodus, and tonight let's look in chapter 23. Exodus chapter
23. Reading verses 14 through 17. Three times thou shalt keep
a feast unto me in the year. Thou shalt keep the feast of
unleavened bread. Thou shalt eat unleavened bread
seven days, as I commanded thee in the time appointed of the
month Abib, for in it thou camest out from Egypt, and none shall
appear before me empty. and the feast of harvest, the
first fruits of thy labors, which thou hast sown in the field,
and the feast of end gathering, which is in the end of the year,
when thou hast gathered in thy labors out of the field. Three
times in the year, all thy males shall appear before the Lord
God. Lord, God delivered the nation
of Israel from Egyptian bondage, and they came to Mount Sinai. And we've been studying through
these last few chapters, beginning with verse 19, when God made
a covenant with the nation of Israel. A covenant law was given
unto them. And that law we have seen is
comprised of three parts, that is the moral, that was the first
part in chapter 20 that was given, what we call the Ten Commandments,
and that was the covenant. Remember the Ark of the Covenant?
And what was put in that ark? The tables where the Ten Commandments
were written. But this covenant law had more
than just the moral part, it also had civil and ceremonial. And we've looked at last time
the civil, an example, I think two times of civil, the Hebrew
servant we looked at, and then the cities of refuge. And tonight,
these verses I've just read, they're going to have to be part
of the ceremonial part of the law. Because here we read that
there were three feasts, you notice, three feasts to be kept
in which all, A-L-L, all the males of Israel were to appear
before the Lord God. Now we saw last time in looking
at the law concerning the cities of refuge that God revealed the
truth about those cities progressively. We read just a hint of that actually
here in Exodus and then we saw more in Leviticus and more in
Deuteronomy. And the same thing is true here
concerning these three feasts. In Leviticus chapter 23, in the
book of Leviticus, that is the book for the priests, the Levites,
that's where most of the ceremonial law is found. But in chapter 23 of Leviticus,
there's seven of these feasts, seven of these feasts that are
named each year. But only three of them are mentioned
here, and only three of them require that every male attend
before the Lord or appear before the Lord while they were in the
wilderness, of course, that was at the tabernacle. But when they
came into the land, God would choose a place and we know it
was Jerusalem. And every male had to appear
before the Lord there at that place where he put his name.
There were other feasts besides these three here, but it was
only these three to which all the males were commanded to appear
before the Lord each year, and none were to appear before him
empty. I've always found that interesting.
None were to come before the Lord empty. In other words, they
all were to bring an offering unto the Lord of some kind. Matthew Henry commented about
these feasts. He said, never let religion be
called a melancholy thing when its solemn services were solemn
feasts. The three feasts that are mentioned
here are, first of all, the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Feast
of Harvest, as it says here, and the Feast of In-Gathering. Notice that, if you will. In
verse 15, the first feast, thou shalt keep the Feast of Unleavened
Bread, and then in verse 16, the other two, and the Feast
of Harvest, the first fruits of thy labors which thou hast
sown in the field, and The Feast of Engathering, which is in the
end of the year. Now, these last two feasts also
have other names. They have other names. For instance,
the Feast of Harvest is called the Feast of Firstfruits. It's
called the Feast of Weeks. And in the New Testament, it
is the Feast of Pentecost. And then the last feast that's
mentioned here, the Feast of In-Gathering, it's also called
the Feast of Booths, B-O-O-T-H-S, Booths, and the Feast of Tabernacles. Now the first feast of these
three, the first feast was in the spring of the year, the second
in the summer, and the third in the fall. And again, Matthew
Henry said, not in the winter, when traveling was then uncomfortable,
not in the midst of harvest, because then they were otherwise
employed, so that none had reason to say that he was made to serve
with an offering or wearied them with incense. But tonight, I
want us to look at these three feasts briefly and how that they
might apply to us, what they might teach us. The first feast,
the Feast of Unleavened Bread. Now, this feast also sometimes
is called the Feast of Passover. And the reason is because the
Passover was on the 14th day of the month Abib, or Nisan,
the 14th day of that month. Now remember, The days for the
Jewish people, first the evening and then the day. Our Lord was
crucified between the evenings, three o'clock on the Passover
day, the 14th day of the month. And he was buried before the
sun went down because it would be the Sabbath when the sun went
down. And he was buried on that Friday
before the sun went down, but just as soon as the sun goes
down, we've got the 15th day of the month, and this begins
the Feast of Unleavened Bread. And it runs for seven days, and
the first day is like a Sabbath and the seventh day is like a
Sabbath in the sense that they were to do no servile work on
those two days. Now they could cook, according
to John Gill at least, on a regular Sabbath. They couldn't light
a fire in their house or in their residence. They couldn't cook
on that day. But during this feast, they could
cook, but they could not do any servile work. They couldn't work
out in the field or anything like that. The feast of unleavened
bread. And during this feast, unleavened
bread, they could eat no bread with leaven. But not only that,
they had to search their houses. They had to take a broom and
go into every little nook and cranny in their house and sweep
it out and make sure there was no leaven in their houses. And of course, that happened,
remember, on the Passover, the first Passover, when the Lord
passed over Israel, they ate the Passover lamb, with no leaven,
with unleavened bread. They had to move out of Egypt
immediately and there wasn't time for their bread to leaven. It wasn't time for the bread
to rise, so they were eating unleavened bread. But once they
get out of Egypt, now here in the wilderness, and later when
they come into the land of Canaan, it was very strict to make sure
there was no leaven in their house. Seven days, they would
eat unleavened bread. I want you to turn with me, if
you will, to 1 Corinthians. First Corinthians chapter five. Verse six, first Corinthians
chapter five, verse six. Paul is telling the church here
at Corinth because there was a man in this church who was
living with his father's wife, his stepmother. He was living
with her, and they didn't do anything. The church didn't.
In fact, some people believed that they were so proud of the
fact that they believed in grace, salvation is all of grace, that
they just let this man continue to do what he was doing. And Paul said something like
this was not even named among the Gentiles. It was well known. And notice in verse six, your
glory is not good. Know you not that a little leaven
leaveneth a whole lump? Before we read the next verse,
let me say this. Leaven in the Bible, with one
exception, As far as I know, with one exception, leaven, and
the Bible always refers to sin, to evil. That one exception is
in Matthew 13, one of the parables of our Lord, he speaks of the
gospel or the kingdom of God being like a woman who puts leaven
in three parts of flour. And, of course, the picture is,
beautiful picture, isn't it, how the gospel, how the kingdom
of God from its very small beginning, when the Lord was crucified,
what, 120 there in the Book of Acts on the day of Pentecost,
and just a few years it had spread. And that's the way leaven does,
it spreads. Yeast, as we would say today,
it spreads among the flier. And Paul, know you not that a
little leaven doesn't take a whole lot? Just a little leaven? Leaveneth
the whole lump? Purge out therefore the old leaven,
that you may be a new lump, as you are unleavened. For even
Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed for us. Therefore, let us keep
the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice
and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity
and truth. Leaven, as I said, it pictures
evil or sin. The Lord Jesus Christ, he warned
against the leaven, first of all, of the Pharisees and the
Sadducees. He warned his disciples, beware
of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees. What was
the leaven of the Pharisees? It was hypocrisy. It was hypocrisy. Outwardly, they appeared unto
man to be very sincere and very godly people. That's the way
they wanted to appear. At one time, the Lord said, you're
like whited sepulchres. And when I read that, I always
think of those pictures I've seen of the cemetery over there
in France, World War II cemeteries, where they have all those white
crosses and white star of David's, that cemetery over there. It's
so beautiful, isn't it? It's so beautiful. But on the
inside, full of bones. And that's what the Lord said
about the Pharisees. That's the way they were. They
loved to pray standing on the corner so everyone would see
them. They had a ritual. They prayed so many times a day.
And I've heard that they would arrange their schedule so they'd
always be in a very prominent place at a certain time when
it was prayer time. So everyone would see them. Everyone
would hear them. And our Lord said, beware, beware
of the leaven of the Pharisees. And he also said of the Sadducees. The leaven of the Sadducees evidently
was because we know that they denied angels, spirits, and they
denied the resurrection. And so we would say that the
leaven of the Sadducees is they denied the power of God. They
denied the supernatural power of God. Beware of that. God is able. God is able. And God works powerfully. And
God is not divorced from his creation. I feel like myself
that we many times live among people and live in a world that
people think that God's way off somewhere and has nothing to
do with what's going on today in this world. That's not true.
That's not true. There's nothing that takes place
in his world that he has not purposed and ordained from before
the foundation of the world, that he is king and reigns and
rules over all. They denied the power of God.
Do you know, Paul tells the church at Ephesus, he prayed for them,
believers, that they might know the power to raise a sinner,
a man who's dead in trespasses and sins, and we all were and
may still be someone here tonight, that the same power that raised
Jesus, the body of Jesus from the grave, that same power has
to be put forth in saving a sinner. That's right. People say, I'd
like to see a miracle. Every child of God here tonight
is a miracle. If you're a child of God, look
in the mirror, because you are a miracle. God didn't leave you
in darkness. He translated you, and it was
with power he did that. Many deny the power of God. So beware of the leaven of the
Pharisees' hypocrisy. I read this many years ago, see
if I can still recall it. But in plays, like the Greeks,
they were known, I think, for putting on plays. And one man
might play several different characters, but he would have
a mask for each character. He'd pull up that mask if he
was this man, you know, and when he finished with that part, he'd
put that mask down and put on another mask. And that's what
our Lord is warning about the leaven of the Pharisees, of just
putting on a mask. And then there is the leaven
of immorality. That was the leaven in this church
at Corinth, the leaven of immorality. The leaven in the churches of
Galatia was legalism. And we know that this is the
way I look at this because it was a feast for seven days, and
the number seven in the scripture means complete. Complete. And when we think about how this
feast, yes, may apply to us, is our whole life, as Paul says
here in verse seven, purge out therefore the old leaven. Purge
out. And that's what we're to do.
And we're not to give up on it. And we're not to come to a place,
as long as we're in this life, when we will say, I have arrived. No. We're to purge. That word
purge means to cleanse, doesn't it? To cleanse. And thank God
we know that God's opened a fountain. He's opened a fountain that is
freed all. Freed all. We read that in the
psalm a little while ago. He's ready, the scripture says
there. He's a God ready to pardon. And he's opened a fountain filled
with blood. And we need to purge out. And every day, yes, before God,
our sins are forgiven and forgotten. But our fellowship, our communion
with the Lord, that's what we must continually be thinking
about and concerned about. That's why that's the lesson. of the Lord washing his disciples'
feet. That's the whole lesson, isn't
it? He said, you're clean everywhere, but not all, because Judas was
there. But their feet needed washing.
And as we go through this world, yes, if we say we have no sin,
we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. But if we
confess our sins, he's faithful and just to forgive us our sins
and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. That's the way I look at this
feast as it applies unto us. All right, let's go back to our
text in Leviticus chapter 23. I'm sorry, Exodus chapter 23. The second feast is the Feast
of Harvest, as it is called here. But I've also said that it's
called the Feast of First Fruits, and it's called the Feast of
Weeks. Now these names come from the fact that this feast came
seven weeks, or 50 days, after the first sheath was presented
to the priest. Now, the day of the atonement,
the Passover, that's the 14th. The 15th is the Sabbath. Our Lord was crucified on Friday
and buried stayed in the grave on the Sabbath. On the Sunday,
that's the first day after the Sabbath, that's the day that
a man was to bring a sheaf, part of his crop out there, of barley
at that time. The first was a barley crop. And they would bring a sheaf,
a part of it, and they'd bring it to the priest and one, and
they were to waive it. Wave it. And one writer said,
the way they did this, the priest would take the sheaf and he'd
wave it to and fro, backwards and forwards, upwards and downwards,
to make an acknowledgement to the Lord of heaven and earth
that the fruits of the earth and the plentiful harvest were
of him, and to give him praise and glory for it. But you and
I know it pictured the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, the
first fruit. Let's go back to 1 Corinthians,
this time to chapter 15. And our Lord came out of the
grave on the day after the Sabbath, just like it was pictured here
with this feast. Now the 50, they would count
50, that was the first fruit of the barley harvest, but then
50 days would transpire and it would be the harvest of the wheat. And that's where we get the 50,
the Pentecost, the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. It has five
sides, right? Pentagon, Pentecost, 50 days
after the first sheaf was waived is the time of Pentecost. Well,
here in 1 Corinthians 15 and verse 20, the apostle said, but
now is Christ risen from the dead and become the first fruits
of them that slept. I pictured the Lord Jesus Christ,
his resurrection, The sheaf that the priest waved before the Lord
testified that this sheaf was just the first. Think about it. When that man took that sheaf
to the priest, he had a whole, whole acreage back there at his
farm, you know, where the, where the crop was still out there
in the field. And that first sheaf, sheaf testified
there's more, more to come. And when the Lord Jesus Christ
came out of the tomb, raised from the dead, he's the firstfruits,
but there's more to follow. He's the forerunner, as the scripture
says in Hebrews chapter six. He's the forerunner. But look
here in 1 Corinthians 15, down just a couple of verses from
there. But now as Christ risen from the dead and become the
firstfruits of them that slept, And verse 22, for as in Adam
all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive, but every
man in his own order. God's a God of order. Did you
know that? I know you do. When our Lord
fed those 5,000 people, he had them sat down by 50s, didn't
he? Have you ever seen on the news
those people trying to feed hungry people over there in Gaza. There's no order. God's a God
of order. And the apostle tells us there's
an order for the resurrection. Christ was first, yes. But every man, he says, but every
man in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, afterwards,
They that are Christ that is coming. When Christ comes again,
and he's coming, then all of those who have trusted in him,
they are with the Lord. They're gonna come with him.
But their bodies are going to be raised from the tomb. And it's going to be a glorified
body. And their body and soul be reunited to be with the Lord
forever. And Paul said, comfort ye with
these words. What a wonderful comfort that
is, right? You've lost family. You've lost
brothers and sisters in Christ. Don't you look forward. for that
great getting up morning, as a spiritualist, great getting
up morning. Yeah, when Christ comes again. But there's an ardor, and this
was pictured in this second feast. He rose victorious over the grave,
we too, if he doesn't come in our lifetime and our bodies have
turned back to the dust, we too. will come out of the grave victorious
and we will be like him, be glorified like he is of his image and we'll
be with him and with him where the scripture says there's fullness
of joy, fullness of joy. Now this third feast, if you
go back once again to Exodus, The Feast of End Gathering or
Booths. And let's just read, I said let's
go back to Exodus, but let's turn to Leviticus chapter 23. Here we are given these feasts. There's seven of them in this
chapter, chapter 23 of Leviticus, but as I said, there's only three
where all the males were commanded to appear before the Lord. And
here in Leviticus 23, beginning with verse 39, let's just read
about this last feast, the Feast of Booths. Also in the 15th day
of the seventh month, when you have gathered in the fruit of
the land, you shall keep a feast unto the Lord seven days. On
the first day shall be a Sabbath, and on the eighth day shall be
a Sabbath. And you shall take you on the
first First day, the boughs of goodly trees, branches of palm
trees, and boughs of thick trees, and willows of the brook. And
you shall rejoice before the Lord your God seven days. And
you shall keep it a feast unto the Lord seven days in the year. It shall be a statute forever
in your generations. You shall celebrate it in the
seventh month. You shall dwell in booths seven
days. All that are Israelites born
shall dwell in booths that your generations may know that I made
the children of Israel to dwell in booths when I brought them
out of the land of Egypt. I am the Lord, your God. You
notice that last verse, that your generations may know. This
was a teaching feast. It was a teaching feast. And
what would be included here that your generations may know? Well,
they would know, first of all, that God brought them out of
Egypt by blood. Blood. Blood of the Passover
lamb. If there was no blood on the
doorpost, then death entered that house. They were delivered. They were brought out, first
of all, because of blood. And we know the only way that
any of us are saved and redeemed is by blood, by the blood of
Christ. And they would know also that
God was a God who brought them out by power. When they came
out to the Red Sea, God opened up the sea for them. And then
they would know that God sustained them all those years in the wilderness. They never planted a seed. They never harvested a crop. And yet they were fed 40 years. They will know. And as I thought
about this last feast, I thought about the feast that the Lord
has given us to observe, the Lord's Supper, the Lord's Table. And God willing, we will observe
that this coming Sunday evening. And what do we see? What do we
know? We know that Christ died to redeem
us. The blood is represented by the
wine, and the flesh that was broken is represented by the
bread that is broken. And we eat it. We must eat Christ. We must feast on Christ. Not
enough just to know about him, think about him, but we must
know him. We must, as you eat a piece of bread, It becomes
yours, right? There's no separating once you
eat that bread. There's a union. And we feed
upon Christ, feast upon him. He said, except a man eat my
flesh and drink my blood, he hath no life in him. Thank God
that's pictured to us in the feast that we observe. I pray
the Lord would bless his word to each one of us here tonight.