Upcoming Holy Days

[CoreIssue]

I've talked with Messianics on this before, and almost to a man they all said that keeping the Holy days was not contingent on salvation, if that's what you were concerned about, CoreIssue. I know that's what it seems like, because until more recently that would have been the way I took it. But that's not how they view things. They do regard them as commands still to be kept, but not to the extent of regarding those who do not do so as not being saved.

Besides salvation there's the issue of sanctification. Legalism hinders growth and understanding.

 

[Hidden In Him]

Besides salvation there's the issue of sanctification. Legalism hinders growth and understanding.

Not the way he and I see it. It's actually a manifestation of growth for me. Up until more recently in my Christian walk, I couldn't have cared less about the Jewish holy days. I viewed them as simply Jewish laws. But through my own studies and with no one but the Holy Spirit revealing it to me, He began to show me the prophetic and spiritual meanings behind EVERYTHING He was commanding them to do back then, from observing circumcision to not eating unclean foods and dead things, to the holy days.

Anyway, I understand your perspective because I walked in it for almost 30 years. But I have reached a place where I see more now than I did before, and how the Feast days have spiritual and prophetic meanings that can increase one's faith, and understanding of how amazingly wise our God truly is.

Not a big deal worth arguing over. Just thought I'd throw it out there.
Blessings.

 

[CoreIssue]

Not the way he and I see it. It's actually a manifestation of growth for me. Up until more recently in my Christian walk, I couldn't have cared less about the Jewish holy days. I viewed them as simply Jewish laws. But through my own studies and with no one but the Holy Spirit revealing it to me, He began to show me the prophetic and spiritual meanings behind EVERYTHING He was commanding them to do back then, from observing circumcision to not eating unclean foods and dead things, to the holy days.

Anyway, I understand your perspective because I walked in it for almost 30 years. But I have reached a place where I see more now than I did before, and how the Feast days have spiritual and prophetic meanings that can increases one's faith, and understanding of how amazingly wise our God truly is.

Not a big deal worth arguing over. Just thought I'd throw it out there.
Blessings.

Prophetic meaning contributes to sanctification.

I'm just saying don't elevate it to law.

 

[gadar perets]

In the Lord's timing, I would love to discuss how each of them relates then. I'm still trying to grow accustomed to keeping Shabbat (in my own way) but the time will come when I start adopting new moons and then the Holy days. As I do I'll want to be looking more into their meanings and prophetic foreshadowings.


I would think this would be the proper way to symbolically celebrate the spiritual aspects and commemorate the prophetic foreshadowings, yes. Though for a non-Jew without a community to help me observe things with, feasibility becomes an issue, LoL. But I rest in God about it. With wisdom comes motivation.

Have you checked the Fellowship Finders here and here?

As for discussing each of them, where would you like to begin?

 

[gadar perets]

I'm just saying don't elevate it to law.

They are already laws in both covenants. What you really mean is, "Don't keep them elevated as law".

 

[gadar perets]

Besides salvation there's the issue of sanctification. Legalism hinders growth and understanding.

What is your definition of "legalism"? Obeying the law?

 

[Hidden In Him]

Have you checked the Fellowship Finders here and here?

No. Not ready for that step yet. But I appreciate it. When the time comes that I express interest, remind me.

As for discussing each of them, where would you like to begin?

When I'm ready, bud. Like I was telling CoreIssue, I came to my current understanding entirely on my own through the instruction of the Holy Spirit, and would prefer to let Him teach me on all things first directly before I got into much discussion with anyone on it. I'm sure I will benefit from the things you have to say, but I have been doing things this way for at least two decades now, and I prefer to let Him teach me on all subjects first. I had to separate myself from church attendance completely for the better part of twenty years (aside from when I was helping a church build a worship team), because it was extremely important to me not to learn bad doctrines and teachings and then have to Unlearn them because they turned out to be highly flawed (which was something I was encountering a lot, and still would).

Anyway, as the Spirit leads. You can rest assured I will be looking forward to it.
Pray for me. That might help things along.

Blessings in Christ, and thanks for the help.

 

[Pilgrimer]

I have no idea how Rabbinic Judaism views the feasts. I don't study their writings.

I have studied them, especially as they existed during 2nd Temple period, and your views are very much more in line with theirs than with Christianity. Odd that you could come to such similar views on your own. Do you perhaps attend a Messianic congregation?

It is the reality that casts the shadow. The shadow does not foreshadow the reality.

Of course a shadow can foreshadow a reality that has not yet come, that's what fulfilling a shadow means. In Colossians 2 Paul says the holydays (that would include the feasts) and new moons and sabbath were all shadows. And again in Hebrews 8:5 he says the priests in the Temple and their ministry were shadows and examples of heavenly things, and in Hebrews 10:1 he says the Law had a shadow of good things to come, but not the substance. So yes, a shadow can foreshadow some future thing or event and according to these verses all the holydays were shadows, the Levitical ordinances were all shadows, and in fact the Law itself had a shadow of good things that were yet to come.

The only question is what did all those shadows foreshadow?

For example, Yeshua was the lamb slain from the foundation of the world. He existed in YHWH's plan of salvation long before the feasts were given. It is the reality of Yeshua that prompted YHWH to give us the Passover lamb as a shadow of His coming Son Yeshua.

I agree. In fact, if you recall what Paul teaches in Hebrew 8:5: “Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things, as Moses was admonished of God when he was about to make the tabernacle: for, See, saith he, that thou make all things according to the pattern shewed to thee in the mount.”

Whatever it was Moses was shown, whatever that pattern was he was told to copy when he made the tabernacle and all the earthly things that pertained to worship under the Old Covenant, they were so glorious that just seeing them made his face to shine. What else could they have been but the heavenly things that the Law was patterned after?

And allow me to digress for a second: Paul also teaches us in 2 Corinthians 3 that the reason so many Jews have missed seeing that Jesus is the Messiah is that they are blinded by the glory of the letter of the law (those glorious old earthly things) so that they cannot see the even more glorious spiritual things that the earthly things were patterned after. I find that is true for many who set the Law as the goal and purpose, it blinds them like a veil over their faces so that they can't see into that spiritual realm where the things are that cast all these earthly shadows.

You claim multiple fulfillments of Yom Teruah.

I claimed one fulfillment … the voice of God. That voice in the wilderness, that called men to come up to the mount and receive the Word, that was God. The Gospel going forth into all the world and gathering in the good seed? God. The Holy Spirit speaking to the saints directing our journeying through the wilderness of this old world? God. The warning that echoed in the streets and highways of the doomed city of Jerusalem that war and destruction was coming? Yes, that was God too.

Trumpets were shadows of the voice of God.

He did NOT fulfill the anti-typical Jubilee trumpet heralding the ultimate year of Jubilee.

Jubilee is some of the most beautiful shadows of redemption. It’s not about people getting their land back, it’s about the day when His people are restored to their heavenly home, and to the family of God.

Are you a Preterist?

No, the preterists hold to a hyper-spiritual view of Scripture. But then I don’t agree with the Rabbinic hyper-literal view either. I tend to see those as two extremes that ignore an important truth, that the Bible is about both spiritual and earthly things, not just one or the other.


In Christ,
Pilgrimer

 

[Pilgrimer]

You assume it refers to the Roman army, but there is nothing in the text to suggest that. If I was to assume it was fulfilled, it would be by the Babylonians and Assyrians.

Sigh~ really? I think we both agree that this is talking about an event that would be associated with the coming of Jesus, you just believe it’s the second, I believe it’s the first. But you know full well there is no sense in which the Babylonian or Assyrian wars could be associated with Messianic prophecy.

However, it may yet have a future fulfillment.

Or … it was fulfilled in the days of the first coming of Jesus, when the nation of Israel and everything that pertained to Old Covenant worship was destroyed, exactly the way it is described in Joel and in the Revelation and in Matthew and in Leviticus and in Deuteronomy and in Daniel and in every other prophet and every Gospel and Epistle throughout the whole Bible.

A 7-year war that saw millions of Jews killed and the city and the sanctuary completely desolated, the sacrifice and oblation ceased, the beautiful Edenic land left a smoking ruin, and all at the beginning of Jesus’ kingdom.

A war, no less, that was started by false messiahs and lawless murderers trying to establish by the sword an earthly Messianic kingdom of their own strongly deluded imagination.

In Christ,
Pilgrimer

 

[Pilgrimer]

It is the reality that casts the shadow.

How did the "lamb slain from the foundation of the world" cast a shadow before it existed?
In Christ,
Pilgrimer

 

[gadar perets]

I have studied them, especially as they existed during 2nd Temple period, and your views are very much more in line with theirs than with Christianity. Odd that you could come to such similar views on your own. Do you perhaps attend a Messianic congregation?

I used to, but they rarely taught about the feasts and didn’t keep them holy. We have a home fellowship.

Of course a shadow can foreshadow a reality that has not yet come, that's what fulfilling a shadow means. In Colossians 2 Paul says the holydays (that would include the feasts) and new moons and sabbath were all shadows. And again in Hebrews 8:5 he says the priests in the Temple and their ministry were shadows and examples of heavenly things, and in Hebrews 10:1 he says the Law had a shadow of good things to come, but not the substance. So yes, a shadow can foreshadow some future thing or event and according to these verses all the holydays were shadows, the Levitical ordinances were all shadows, and in fact the Law itself had a shadow of good things that were yet to come.

Of course they are shadows. What I meant was the shadow is cast by the reality and not vice versa. The shadows were not created to bring about the reality. The reality was created to cast a shadow.

And allow me to digress for a second: Paul also teaches us in 2 Corinthians 3 that the reason so many Jews have missed seeing that Jesus is the Messiah is that they are blinded by the glory of the letter of the law (those glorious old earthly things) so that they cannot see the even more glorious spiritual things that the earthly things were patterned after. I find that is true for many who set the Law as the goal and purpose, it blinds them like a veil over their faces so that they can't see into that spiritual realm where the things are that cast all these earthly shadows.

I do not set the Law as the goal and purpose. Nor do I keep the Law to be justified or saved. Those are all false accusations by people who fight against obeying YHWH’s laws.

I claimed one fulfillment … the voice of God. That voice in the wilderness, that called men to come up to the mount and receive the Word, that was God. The Gospel going forth into all the world and gathering in the good seed? God. The Holy Spirit speaking to the saints directing our journeying through the wilderness of this old world? God. The warning that echoed in the streets and highways of the doomed city of Jerusalem that war and destruction was coming? Yes, that was God too.

Trumpets were shadows of the voice of God.

Trumpets were the prelude to the voice of God. First they were blown to herald Him and His message, then He spoke. There was no trumpet associated with the Gospel first being preached or speaking to the saints on our wilderness journey or for the destruction of Jerusalem. There is a trumpet that will signal the resurrection of the dead, but that is not God’s voice either, but the 7th trumpet of Revelation blown by an angel.

Jubilee is some of the most beautiful shadows of redemption. It’s not about people getting their land back, it’s about the day when His people are restored to their heavenly home, and to the family of God.

That will become a literal reality at our resurrection when we enter the true promised land and are reunited with our entire family.

 

[gadar perets]

Sigh~ really? I think we both agree that this is talking about an event that would be associated with the coming of Jesus, you just believe it’s the second, I believe it’s the first. But you know full well there is no sense in which the Babylonian or Assyrian wars could be associated with Messianic prophecy.

The sun being darkened and the moon turning to blood will occur shortly before Yeshua’s second coming.

Or … it was fulfilled in the days of the first coming of Jesus, when the nation of Israel and everything that pertained to Old Covenant worship was destroyed, exactly the way it is described in Joel and in the Revelation and in Matthew and in Leviticus and in Deuteronomy and in Daniel and in every other prophet and every Gospel and Epistle throughout the whole Bible.

That took place about 40 years after Yeshua ascended and about 70 years after his first coming. If anything, Joel prophesied about a time in our future.

 

[Pilgrimer]

I used to, but they rarely taught about the feasts and didn’t keep them holy.

That’s because the feasts cannot be kept “holy” if by “holy” you mean observed according to the commandments of the Law. And the reason is obvious, because they were given to be shadows to point to Jesus, and now that Jesus has come and shed the light of the knowledge of God, the shadows have passed away.

Of course they are shadows. What I meant was the shadow is cast by the reality and not vice versa. The shadows were not created to bring about the reality. The reality was created to cast a shadow.

So how did Jesus the reality cast the passover lamb shadow before he existed? I do recall you arguing earlier that Jesus Christ did not exist in any way, shape, or form before his incarnation in 5 B.C. so both these things cannot be true.

I do not set the Law as the goal and purpose.

Sure you do: “… the law has led us to Messiah and liberty. Once we are free from sin, Messiah then drives us back to obedience to the law through faith.” Shadows and Realities

So by your own words quoted above, the end goal is obedience to the Law.

Paul said our faith establishes the Law, he did not say our obedience establishes the Law. And that word “establish,” means literally “to stand” and means to “stand by” or “uphold” something. We who are of the faith stand by and uphold the Law of God in that we testify by our faith in Jesus that the Law is holy and righteous and by the law we are all sinners who are guilty before God and deserve to die but by faith in His mercy we are saved through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. And we tell people that they too, by the Law, are guilty and they too need the forgiveness of sin that is found in faith in Jesus. So Paul’s point is that our faith doesn’t make the Law of God useless, it makes the point that without faith in Jesus a man is doomed by the Law to die a sinner! So we are standing by and upholding the Law of God, not as a means of being obedient to God, but as a means of condemnation to drive us to saving faith in Jesus.

Bottom line, if everything you are studying and learning from the Law is not giving you a better understanding of and bringing you closer to Jesus, then you are missing the point, and missing the blessing.

There was no trumpet associated with the Gospel first being preached …

You really don’t think that the sound of the trumpet that called the people to come up to the mount and receive the Word of God could have just possibly been a shadow of the Gospel call to the people to come to Jesus and receive the Word made flesh? You really don’t see even a dim shadow in those former things? Because I see the shadow of the Gospel of Jesus stamped all over it all.

… or speaking to the saints on our wilderness journey…

Again, you don’t see the sound of trumpets directing the camp of the saints on when and where to march in any way as symbolic of God’s voice today in directing His church in when and where to go? Do you look for any shadows in the Old Testament beyond the few that the end-time doctrines teach?

or for the destruction of Jerusalem.

“Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain; let all the inhabitants of the land tremble …”

If I recall, Zion is in Jerusalem yet you say a trumpet sounding an alarm as a shadow of God sounding a warning (“Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto you … behold, your house is left unto you desolate!” ~Jesus) has nothing to do with the destruction of Jerusalem?

There is a trumpet that will signal the resurrection of the dead

My friend, I give you actual Biblical examples of how trumpets were actually used in the Old Testament as shadows of how they might have been fulfilled in the New Testament and you reject it all. And yet you turn around and give me an example of how a trumpet might be fulfilled (without a single actual Biblical example of a trumpet being used for that purpose) and insist that is what trumpets foreshadow? And you don’t have a problem with that?

That will become a literal reality at our resurrection when we enter the true promised land and are reunited with our entire family.

So you think prophecy was about us being reunited with our earthly families and not about being joined with the household of faith in Christ’s house?

The sun being darkened and the moon turning to blood will occur shortly before Yeshua’s second coming.

So you expect the moon to be literally turned to blood? Any chance that could be apocalyptic language that symbolized something? Kinda like a red dragon falling to earth is probably not speaking of something literal either, or a beast with 7 heads and 10 horns is probably not speaking of a literal animal.

That’s the problem with Biblical apocalyptic language, people take things to be literal rather than trying to understand what earthly entities these spiritual images might be referring to.

That took place about 40 years after Yeshua ascended and about 70 years after his first coming. If anything, Joel prophesied about a time in our future.

That depends entirely on how well and truly you understand the Gospel and apply it to eschatology. If the Kingdom of Jesus Christ is in fact God’s Kingdom of Heaven with Christ seated on the throne and given power and authority until he has subdued all his enemies including death, then that would put all these things in a very different light, wouldn’t it?

In Christ,
Pilgrimer

 

[gadar perets]

So how did Jesus the reality cast the passover lamb shadow before he existed? I do recall you arguing earlier that Jesus Christ did not exist in any way, shape, or form before his incarnation in 5 B.C. so both these things cannot be true.

The same way it was said of him that he was the lamb slain before the foundation of the world before he existed as the true Passover Lamb (the sacrificed human). He was a slain lamb in YHWH's plan of salvation (in YHWH's mind).

Sure you do: “… the law has led us to Messiah and liberty. Once we are free from sin, Messiah then drives us back to obedience to the law through faith.” Shadows and Realities

So by your own words quoted above, the end goal is obedience to the Law.

The end goal is to live as Yeshua lived, sinlessly doing the will of His Father. That is accomplished by obeying the law through the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit.

Paul said our faith establishes the Law, he did not say our obedience establishes the Law. And that word “establish,” means literally “to stand” and means to “stand by” or “uphold” something. We who are of the faith stand by and uphold the Law of God in that we testify by our faith in Jesus that the Law is holy and righteous and by the law we are all sinners who are guilty before God and deserve to die but by faith in His mercy we are saved through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. And we tell people that they too, by the Law, are guilty and they too need the forgiveness of sin that is found in faith in Jesus. So Paul’s point is that our faith doesn’t make the Law of God useless, it makes the point that without faith in Jesus a man is doomed by the Law to die a sinner! So we are standing by and upholding the Law of God, not as a means of being obedient to God, but as a means of condemnation to drive us to saving faith in Jesus.

Yeshua told us to go and sin no more. That means go and do not break the law any more (1 John 3:4). You cannot possibly avoid sin by breaking the law. We avoid sin by obeying the law. If all you see in the law is condemnation, how sad.

Bottom line, if everything you are studying and learning from the Law is not giving you a better understanding of and bringing you closer to Jesus, then you are missing the point, and missing the blessing.

I agree.

You really don’t think that the sound of the trumpet that called the people to come up to the mount and receive the Word of God could have just possibly been a shadow of the Gospel call to the people to come to Jesus and receive the Word made flesh? You really don’t see even a dim shadow in those former things? Because I see the shadow of the Gospel of Jesus stamped all over it all.

When the people came to the mount, they were already saved out of Egypt. The Gospel is equivalent to us hearing the Word of YHWH and coming out of the Egypt of sin. Once we are out, then we come to hear the Word of YHWH throughout our lives and grow thereby.

Again, you don’t see the sound of trumpets directing the camp of the saints on when and where to march in any way as symbolic of God’s voice today in directing His church in when and where to go? Do you look for any shadows in the Old Testament beyond the few that the end-time doctrines teach?

YHWH's voice directed Israel where to go as well. That was in addition to the trumpet calls.

“Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain; let all the inhabitants of the land tremble …”

If I recall, Zion is in Jerusalem yet you say a trumpet sounding an alarm as a shadow of God sounding a warning (“Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto you … behold, your house is left unto you desolate!” ~Jesus) has nothing to do with the destruction of Jerusalem?

It depends on how one interprets Joel, past or future.

My friend, I give you actual Biblical examples of how trumpets were actually used in the Old Testament as shadows of how they might have been fulfilled in the New Testament and you reject it all. And yet you turn around and give me an example of how a trumpet might be fulfilled (without a single actual Biblical example of a trumpet being used for that purpose) and insist that is what trumpets foreshadow? And you don’t have a problem with that?

I gave you Leviticus 25. The anti-typical Jubilee trumpet sets the captives of death free. That trumpet is the "last trump" Paul referred to in 1 Corinthians 15. There are no more trumpets blown after the ultimate Jubilee trumpet.

So you think prophecy was about us being reunited with our earthly families and not about being joined with the household of faith in Christ’s house?

No. Those are your words. When I wrote, "our entire family", I was referring to YHWH, Yeshua, and all our brothers and sisters in Messiah who are resurrected unto eternal life.

So you expect the moon to be literally turned to blood? Any chance that could be apocalyptic language that symbolized something? Kinda like a red dragon falling to earth is probably not speaking of something literal either, or a beast with 7 heads and 10 horns is probably not speaking of a literal animal.

That’s the problem with Biblical apocalyptic language, people take things to be literal rather than trying to understand what earthly entities these spiritual images might be referring to.

No. Again those are your words. I never said the moon will literally turn to blood. I simply quoted part of the verse.

 

[Pilgrimer]

The same way it was said of him that he was the lamb slain before the foundation of the world before he existed as the true Passover Lamb (the sacrificed human). He was a slain lamb in YHWH's plan of salvation (in YHWH's mind).

So "the shadow is cast by the reality and not vice versa, and the shadows were not created to bring about the reality, but the reality was created to cast the shadow" … except when it comes to Jesus. In his case, the shadow existed before the reality was created to cast a shadow. Confusing and contradictory.

The end goal is to live as Yeshua lived, sinlessly doing the will of His Father. That is accomplished by obeying the law through the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit.

But Jesus was born under and lived in the days of the Old Covenant, before there was a New Covenant. He lived by every commandment of the Law. He celebrated the feasts in Jerusalem according to the commandments. He went up to the Temple and appeared before the Door of the Lord’s House according to the commandments. He made sacrifices and offerings according to the commandments. He ate of those sacrifices and offerings according to the commandments. How can you possibly say we are supposed to live as he did? How can you ignore that it is impossible to live as he did?

The whole point of his life and his perfect obedience to the Law wasn’t to show us how to do it, he lived a life of perfect obedience to every jot and tittle of the law in order to be an acceptable sacrifice, a lamb without spot or blemish, a perfect, sinless offering so that his life might be a ransom for our lives.

And once the perfect lamb had fulfilled all the law of God exactly as it was commanded, his right-standing with God is imputed to those of us who put our faith in him to cleanse us from sinful, selfish desires and longings even without statutes and ordinances and commandments.

Yeshua told us to go and sin no more. That means go and do not break the law any more (1 John 3:4). You cannot possibly avoid sin by breaking the law. We avoid sin by obeying the law. If all you see in the law is condemnation, how sad.

You keep repeating that. You equate not following the law to breaking the law. And yet, you freely admit you don’t follow the law when it comes to some things, and yet you don’t consider that breaking the law. Why the double standard?

There is a way to avoid sin without trying to follow the Law. You can always follow the Law Giver. He won’t lead you into sin. You can sit at his feet and learn from Him what is right and good and what His will is for you, in your life, where you live, far removed from the world in which Jesus walked and lived out his life. You can spend time in His presence, and it will change you. You can take Him your cares and worries, and struggles and failures, and He will comfort you and give you peace, he will strengthen you and give you victory, even over the most plaguing sin in your life. You can obey his promptings and stirrings, and live a life of obedience, even without commandments and statutes and ordinances. It is much harder, but it is really the only way.

When the people came to the mount, they were already saved out of Egypt.

True, they had been delivered from Egypt but they had not yet received the Word of God. In the same way, when we accept Jesus as our savior we are delivered from our bondage to sin. But it isn’t until we receive the Holy Spirit that we receive the Word of God. Some say that happens simultaneously at conversion, for me it was two years after I confessed Jesus and was baptized. I think perhaps it’s different for everyone, it’s a personal and intimate relationship between us and God and since we are not all the same, He works with us each of us as we are, where we are. But being delivered from bondage and receiving the Word of God were two separate events in the Old Testament, and for at least some people they are separate events in the New, such as when the Samaritans had heard the Gospel and believed but had not yet had hands laid on them and received the Holy Ghost (Acts 8:12-17).

The Gospel is equivalent to us hearing the Word of YHWH and coming out of the Egypt of sin. Once we are out, then we come to hear the Word of YHWH throughout our lives and grow thereby.

Now that I agree with wholeheartedly.

YHWH's voice directed Israel where to go as well. That was in addition to the trumpet calls.

The point is that God ordained trumpets be used for certain purposes, as well as the sound of trumpets being the signal to the people to come to the mount and receive the Word in the wilderness, which I still think is a beautiful shadow of that firey Baptist, that “voice in the wilderness,” calling the people to come to Jesus, the Word made flesh. What other meaning can be attached to the Scripture calling John “a voice crying in the wilderness,” if this beginning of the New Covenant doesn’t harken back to the institution of the Old Covenant.

It depends on how one interprets Joel, past or future.

I agree. Joel was foretelling the end of national Israel and the Old Covenant which took place in the generation of Jesus’ first coming. But the premillennial view seems to be blind to that devastating 7-year period or just treats it as if it somehow doesn’t mean anything in terms of prophecy. I realize the use of so much apocalyptic language makes things a little more difficult, but it shouldn’t be such a stumbling block. This thread of blessings/curses goes back to the very beginning and can be traced throughout the entire Bible.

I gave you Leviticus 25. The anti-typical Jubilee trumpet sets the captives of death free.

But during Jubilee years slaves were set free. No one was resurrected. There is no Scriptural association between the feast of Trumpets or the Jubilee and resurrection, either spiritual resurrection (regeneration, new birth) or physical resurrection. And the only association Paul makes is that the general resurrection will occur at the last trump, the last and final call of the Gospel. After that, there will be no more time, the day of judgment will have come and men’s fates will be set. That resurrection is also mentioned in Revelation 20:13 when death and hell will give up all the dead in them and death and hell will be cast into the lake of fire. Then those who have refused the call of the Gospel and rejected Jesus will be cast into the lake of fire while the redeemed will enter into eternity in a new heavens and earth with new, glorified, immortal bodies.

No. Those are your words. When I wrote, "our entire family", I was referring to YHWH, Yeshua, and all our brothers and sisters in Messiah who are resurrected unto eternal life.

So what about the spiritual resurrection, or regeneration, or new birth that believers take part in when their old dead man is raised up to new life in Christ? (“Awake thou that sleepest, arise from the dead, and Christ will give thee light … you who were dead in your trespasses and sins … we have been “raised up” and “made alive” and “quickened”) Where does that answer to the call of the Gospel and being raised to new life in Christ fit into all this in your view?

No. Again those are your words. I never said the moon will literally turn to blood. I simply quoted part of the verse.

So if you accept that the Scriptures use apocalyptic language and we really should look to Biblical uses of those symbols to understand what it’s saying, what about going back to Joseph’s dream where he sees the sun and moon and the stars bowing down to him and his father Jacob interprets that to mean that his mother and father and brothers would bow down to him? Certainly there are numerous times God said he would make the descendants of Abraham “as the stars of the heavens for multitude.” And certainly it was the nation of Jews who gave birth to Jesus and is portrayed as the “sun-clothed” woman of the Revelation. So there is ample ground for interpreting these things as references to the people of Israel.

Might not this prophecy about the sun being darkened and the moon turned to blood and the stars falling from heaven be apocalyptic language for the fall and ruin of the nation of Israel? That occurred in the last days of the Old Covenant, and was in fact the destruction of the Old Covenant land and city and temple and people. I actually think that would be a common theme of Old Testament prophecy, and certainly with it being something that would occur in that generation it would also be a common theme in the New Testament.

Why does all this have to be shifted millennia into the future as if the fall and ruination of the nation of Israel and everything that pertained to Old Covenant worship, as if the end of those things somehow didn’t have anything to do with prophecy? At least, that’s what premillennialism does, rather ignores probably the second most important event in both prophecy and history.

In Christ,
Pilgrimer

 

[gadar perets]

So "the shadow is cast by the reality and not vice versa, and the shadows were not created to bring about the reality, but the reality was created to cast the shadow" … except when it comes to Jesus. In his case, the shadow existed before the reality was created to cast a shadow. Confusing and contradictory.

Everything in YHWH's plan of salvation was a reality to Him even though they were not yet created.

But Jesus was born under and lived in the days of the Old Covenant, before there was a New Covenant. He lived by every commandment of the Law. He celebrated the feasts in Jerusalem according to the commandments. He went up to the Temple and appeared before the Door of the Lord’s House according to the commandments. He made sacrifices and offerings according to the commandments. He ate of those sacrifices and offerings according to the commandments. How can you possibly say we are supposed to live as he did? How can you ignore that it is impossible to live as he did?[/QUOTED]
We are to live sinlessly as Yeshua did by obeying the laws that apply to us. Temple laws no longer apply to us.

The whole point of his life and his perfect obedience to the Law wasn’t to show us how to do it, he lived a life of perfect obedience to every jot and tittle of the law in order to be an acceptable sacrifice, a lamb without spot or blemish, a perfect, sinless offering so that his life might be a ransom for our lives.

And once the perfect lamb had fulfilled all the law of God exactly as it was commanded, his right-standing with God is imputed to those of us who put our faith in him to cleanse us from sinful, selfish desires and longings even without statutes and ordinances and commandments.

I agree.

You keep repeating that. You equate not following the law to breaking the law. And yet, you freely admit you don’t follow the law when it comes to some things, and yet you don’t consider that breaking the law. Why the double standard?

There is a way to avoid sin without trying to follow the Law. You can always follow the Law Giver. He won’t lead you into sin. You can sit at his feet and learn from Him what is right and good and what His will is for you, in your life, where you live, far removed from the world in which Jesus walked and lived out his life. You can spend time in His presence, and it will change you. You can take Him your cares and worries, and struggles and failures, and He will comfort you and give you peace, he will strengthen you and give you victory, even over the most plaguing sin in your life. You can obey his promptings and stirrings, and live a life of obedience, even without commandments and statutes and ordinances. It is much harder, but it is really the only way.

No double standard. I obey what applies to me as best I can. The Law Giver (Yeshua's Father YHWH) made His will known in His Law (Torah). He then wrote that same Torah on hearts and minds on NC believers (unless they rebel against having them written there). Neither YHWH nor Yeshua will ever lead me to eat swine's flesh, mice, roaches, etc. They will not lead me to pollute the Sabbath.

But during Jubilee years slaves were set free. No one was resurrected. There is no Scriptural association between the feast of Trumpets or the Jubilee and resurrection, either spiritual resurrection (regeneration, new birth) or physical resurrection.

Of course no one was resurrected. If they had been, then the Jubilee would no longer be a shadow.

I did not say the Jubilee is associated with the Feast of Trumpets. It is associated with the Day of Atonement. That is when the resurrection will take place at the 7th trumpet of Revelation (the anti-typical Jubilee trumpet).

So what about the spiritual resurrection, or regeneration, or new birth that believers take part in when their old dead man is raised up to new life in Christ? (“Awake thou that sleepest, arise from the dead, and Christ will give thee light … you who were dead in your trespasses and sins … we have been “raised up” and “made alive” and “quickened”) Where does that answer to the call of the Gospel and being raised to new life in Christ fit into all this in your view?

All that we have now is by faith. Our faith will one day become reality. We were figuratively resurrected from the dead. At the appointed time it will become literal. We are figuratively speaking "new creatures", but we will one day literally become new creatures.

So if you accept that the Scriptures use apocalyptic language and we really should look to Biblical uses of those symbols to understand what it’s saying, what about going back to Joseph’s dream where he sees the sun and moon and the stars bowing down to him and his father Jacob interprets that to mean that his mother and father and brothers would bow down to him? Certainly there are numerous times God said he would make the descendants of Abraham “as the stars of the heavens for multitude.” And certainly it was the nation of Jews who gave birth to Jesus and is portrayed as the “sun-clothed” woman of the Revelation. So there is ample ground for interpreting these things as references to the people of Israel.

Might not this prophecy about the sun being darkened and the moon turned to blood and the stars falling from heaven be apocalyptic language for the fall and ruin of the nation of Israel? That occurred in the last days of the Old Covenant, and was in fact the destruction of the Old Covenant land and city and temple and people. I actually think that would be a common theme of Old Testament prophecy, and certainly with it being something that would occur in that generation it would also be a common theme in the New Testament.

Why does all this have to be shifted millennia into the future as if the fall and ruination of the nation of Israel and everything that pertained to Old Covenant worship, as if the end of those things somehow didn’t have anything to do with prophecy? At least, that’s what premillennialism does, rather ignores probably the second most important event in both prophecy and history.

The heavenly signs of the 6th Seal cannot refer to the events of 70 CE unless the book of Revelation was written prior to 70. The evidence suggests it was written after 70 which means those signs were to occur after 70 CE. I believe it could be apocalyptic language, but of a future
destruction of YHWH's people.

You seem to support Preterism by believing Revelation is about the events of 70 CE. Are you a Preterist?

 

[Pilgrimer]

Everything in YHWH's plan of salvation was a reality to Him even though they were not yet created.

I hope you’re not serious. I’ve seen this kind of word games before. The Watchtower teaches that they believe in the resurrection of Jesus. But then they redefine “resurrection” so that it doesn’t mean something that was dead being raised back to life, but instead they redefine it as a memory of Jesus in the mind of God which God then used to recreate an exact replica of Jesus’ body, nail scars and all. Of course, that’s not at all what resurrection means so they don’t actually believe Jesus was resurrected, they actually believe in some kind of recreation, not the dead Jesus being resurrected back to life. But ask the Watchtower followers and they will insist they believe in the resurrection.

I don’t agree with your rule in the first place but if you’re going to make up a rule be consistent in applying it. Personally, I think you should chuck your man-made rule. There are numerous Old Testament shadows of things and events that did not exist or occur until much later, just one obvious example being the High Priest entering into the Holiest with the blood of the “goat for Jehovah” to make atonement for sin being a shadow of the atoning work of Jesus that did not become a reality until after his resurrection thousands of years after the institution of what foreshadowed it.

We can just as easily use the words “type” or “figure” or “symbol” for all these Old Testament things and it means the same thing, that the things and events in the Old Testament prefigured or symbolized or were types and examples of things that would come to pass in the Messianic days.

No double standard. I obey what applies to me as best I can.

That’s not good enough. And if you are counting on obeying what you think applies to you as best you can to satisfy a holy God that you are being “obedient,” you are standing on very dangerous ground.

They will not lead me to pollute the Sabbath.

And yet, if what Paul wrote is true, that the sabbath was a shadow that pointed to a day God had ordained when His people through faith would enter into rest from works of the Law, but some refuse to believe and enter in, then in an effort to not pollute the shadow, they are polluting the reality. It doesn’t take much to realize which will bear the sorer punishment.

Of course no one was resurrected. If they had been, then the Jubilee would no longer be a shadow.

For the Jubilee to be a shadow of resurrection, it had to have something to do with resurrection. Just like for the Passover lamb to be a shadow of the sacrifice of Jesus, it had to have something to do with actual sacrifice. Otherwise it wasn’t a shadow of the sacrifice of Jesus at all. This is not that hard. For something to foreshadow something else, it has to have some association with it. Otherwise, people can just make things up and you have nothing in Scripture to test their interpretations against.

I did not say the Jubilee is associated with the Feast of Trumpets. It is associated with the Day of Atonement. That is when the resurrection will take place at the 7th trumpet of Revelation (the anti-typical Jubilee trumpet).

You do realize that the New Year, Sabbatical, and Jubilee years began on the day of Trumpets on Tishri 1? And that the purpose of sounding the trumpets and the horns from morning till evening was to call the people to repentance in preparation for atonement? Again, a foreshadowing of the Gospel call to the people to repent and receive Jesus for atonement of sin, after which those “good seed” whose sins were atoned were "gathered in" to God’s storehouse even while dwelling in temporary tabernacles while journeying through the wilderness of this old world on our journey home to the promised land.

All that we have now is by faith. Our faith will one day become reality.

Certainly I agree that everything we have, we have through faith, but those things we have through faith are very real. They’re not some “pie in the sky” wishful thinking or something that “one day” we will receive. The blessings of faith in Jesus are all the riches of heaven, and we have those riches now.

I don’t think it’s our faith that will one day become reality, either our faith is real now or it isn’t. What will one day become reality is the physical manifestation of all these spiritual blessings we have been blessed with. And the only reason that hasn’t happened is that for this physical world to fully manifest all the glory of God will mean the physical world being purged by fire of all the corruption it became subject to at the fall. When God’s presence is fully manifested in this world, the whole cosmos will become a firey lake that will burn away and purge sin and even those of us who are saved will not be exempt. We too will pass through that fire. But while that fire will destroy whatsoever is sinful and corrupt, it will also purge us of the sinful nature of our flesh and we will come through like purified gold, shining and bright and reflecting the glory of God ... immortals who will outshine the stars!

But God is in no hurry to bring that day to pass. It’s been 1988 years now and counting, but God is in no hurry to destroy this old world because all the sinners will be destroyed with it. He is merciful and wants to save men, not destroy them. And so times goes on …

We were figuratively resurrected from the dead. At the appointed time it will become literal. We are figuratively speaking "new creatures", but we will one day literally become new creatures.

Well now that’s the problem I have with premillennialism. It denies the spiritual realities that we have already been blessed with as if the only blessings we will ever receive or that count are the physical blessings. And since we have not yet received those, literally everything gets pushed off into the future. On the other hand, I’m not preterist because that view sees everything as spiritual realities only and denies any future physical blessings. And therefore literally everything gets pushed off into the past and there is nothing left to be blessed with.

I think that is a false choice of two opposite extremes. We don’t have to choose between either physical OR spiritual. The truth is there are both spiritual realities that we are blessed with now and physical realities that we will one day also be blessed with. So I fall in between these two extremes and believe in both spiritual AND physical implications to everything in the Bible. God is spirit and His kingdom is spiritual, but we are flesh and our world is physical. And I thank God that His plan provides blessings for us in both His kingdom of heaven and in our world on earth.

Paul didn’t say we will one day “become new creatures,” when we are physically resurrected/changed, he said “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” That is speaking present tense. We are already new creatures, we are already God’s “workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works.” That’s not some future blessing, it’s a present reality. Yes, our present blessings are spiritual, yes the eternal life we have already been given is spiritual life, but that doesn’t make these blessings any less real, nor does it mean that there will be no future physical eternal life. Both are part of God’s plan.

The heavenly signs of the 6th Seal cannot refer to the events of 70 CE unless the book of Revelation was written prior to 70. The evidence suggests it was written after 70 which means those signs were to occur after 70 CE. I believe it could be apocalyptic language, but of a future destruction of YHWH's people.

Surely you are aware that the dating of the Revelation is a matter of some controversy. Those who hold to the late date do so on rather shaky grounds, and only by ignoring another mention by Iranaeus that referred to copies of the Revelation he had seen as being “ancient,” which means his previous reference to something seen “almost in his own time” (ergo 90 – 95 A.D.) could not have been referring to the Revelation itself but rather to the name of the Anti-Christ which is what he was talking about.

The Revelation itself, which is a far more reliable witness, mentioned the temple and city of Jerusalem as still standing but that it was soon to be destroyed, which would date the vision to a date shortly before that destruction in 70 A.D.

You seem to support Preterism by believing Revelation is about the events of 70 CE. Are you a Preterist?

No, I don’t hold with the preterist view, it’s a hyper-spiritual view that denies any physical blessings of salvation or future redemption of the fallen cosmos. I have until recently identified as partial preterist, but the term preterist has come to be so strictly identified with the hyper-preterist view that it doesn’t accurately reflect my views. I am amillennial.

In Christ,
Pilgrimer

 

[Hidden In Him]

It is associated with the Day of Atonement. That is when the resurrection will take place at the 7th trumpet of Revelation (the anti-typical Jubilee trumpet).

Gadar perets, in the midst of this debate I don't think you've ever laid out your full case for how the Day of Atonement foreshadows the resurrection. I also haven't found yet where you lay out all your proofs for how Booths is a foreshadowing of the millennium (if that's what your position was, which I think I recall reading somewhere).

If you could, think you cold post it here or possibly in a new thread? I would like to read and consider it.

Blessings in Christ,
Hidden

 

[gadar perets]

I don’t agree with your rule in the first place but if you’re going to make up a rule be consistent in applying it. Personally, I think you should chuck your man-made rule. There are numerous Old Testament shadows of things and events that did not exist or occur until much later, just one obvious example being the High Priest entering into the Holiest with the blood of the “goat for Jehovah” to make atonement for sin being a shadow of the atoning work of Jesus that did not become a reality until after his resurrection thousands of years after the institution of what foreshadowed it.

Which rule are you referring to? I am not understanding your point. Are you trying to say shadows come first, then the realities? That is simply not true. A shadow is "a dark area or shape produced by a body coming between rays of light and a surface." YHWH is the source of light that shines on the reality which then casts a shadow or obscure image. YHWH knew His Son would die as the Passover Lamb long before the world was created. Yeshua was a reality in YHWH's mind. He then created a shadow that would represent His future Son's death. He did not create the shadow first and then create a reality to match it.

We can just as easily use the words “type” or “figure” or “symbol” for all these Old Testament things and it means the same thing, that the things and events in the Old Testament prefigured or symbolized or were types and examples of things that would come to pass in the Messianic days.

I don't care what words you use regarding shadows as long as you understand they DO NOT come first.

That’s not good enough. And if you are counting on obeying what you think applies to you as best you can to satisfy a holy God that you are being “obedient,” you are standing on very dangerous ground.

My firm foundation is Yeshua, not my obedience or lack of it. To turn your statement around, "If you are counting on not being judged for not obeying what you think does not apply to you, then you are standing on very dangerous ground."

And yet, if what Paul wrote is true, that the sabbath was a shadow that pointed to a day God had ordained when His people through faith would enter into rest from works of the Law, but some refuse to believe and enter in, then in an effort to not pollute the shadow, they are polluting the reality. It doesn’t take much to realize which will bear the sorer punishment.

Sabbath keepers rest in the work of Yeshua and we rest from seeking to be justified by the Law. However, we know full well that Yeshua DOSE NOT provide us with a physical rest for our bodies or the bodies of animals used by us for work. Only the Sabbath rest can do that.

For the Jubilee to be a shadow of resurrection, it had to have something to do with resurrection. Just like for the Passover lamb to be a shadow of the sacrifice of Jesus, it had to have something to do with actual sacrifice. Otherwise it wasn’t a shadow of the sacrifice of Jesus at all. This is not that hard. For something to foreshadow something else, it has to have some association with it. Otherwise, people can just make things up and you have nothing in Scripture to test their interpretations against.

If you choose to reject the concept of the resurrection being the reality of the Jubilee, then view the resurrection as the means to attain the reality of the Jubilee. If that doesn't work for you either, then state your case for what the reality is.

You do realize that the New Year, Sabbatical, and Jubilee years began on the day of Trumpets on Tishri 1? And that the purpose of sounding the trumpets and the horns from morning till evening was to call the people to repentance in preparation for atonement? Again, a foreshadowing of the Gospel call to the people to repent and receive Jesus for atonement of sin, after which those “good seed” whose sins were atoned were "gathered in" to God’s storehouse even while dwelling in temporary tabernacles while journeying through the wilderness of this old world on our journey home to the promised land.

The "good seed" are not gathered into the storehouse until the time of the harvest and after the tares are taken first (Matthew 13).

Certainly I agree that everything we have, we have through faith, but those things we have through faith are very real. They’re not some “pie in the sky” wishful thinking or something that “one day” we will receive. The blessings of faith in Jesus are all the riches of heaven, and we have those riches now.

Then why do believers still literally die?

Well now that’s the problem I have with premillennialism. It denies the spiritual realities that we have already been blessed with as if the only blessings we will ever receive or that count are the physical blessings. And since we have not yet received those, literally everything gets pushed off into the future. On the other hand, I’m not preterist because that view sees everything as spiritual realities only and denies any future physical blessings. And therefore literally everything gets pushed off into the past and there is nothing left to be blessed with.

I think that is a false choice of two opposite extremes. We don’t have to choose between either physical OR spiritual. The truth is there are both spiritual realities that we are blessed with now and physical realities that we will one day also be blessed with. So I fall in between these two extremes and believe in both spiritual AND physical implications to everything in the Bible. God is spirit and His kingdom is spiritual, but we are flesh and our world is physical. And I thank God that His plan provides blessings for us in both His kingdom of heaven and in our world on earth.

I believe in spiritual and physical realities as well. A spiritual blessing is being spiritually resurrected unto a new man. A physical blessing is literally being resurrected unto a new glorified man.

Paul didn’t say we will one day “become new creatures,” when we are physically resurrected/changed, he said “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” That is speaking present tense. We are already new creatures, we are already God’s “workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works.” That’s not some future blessing, it’s a present reality. Yes, our present blessings are spiritual, yes the eternal life we have already been given is spiritual life, but that doesn’t make these blessings any less real, nor does it mean that there will be no future physical eternal life. Both are part of God’s plan.

We are spiritually new creatures in that we have died to our old man and spiritually resurrected unto a new man. We will literally become new creatures when we are literally resurrected as heavenly beings that cannot die.

Surely you are aware that the dating of the Revelation is a matter of some controversy. Those who hold to the late date do so on rather shaky grounds, and only by ignoring another mention by Iranaeus that referred to copies of the Revelation he had seen as being “ancient,” which means his previous reference to something seen “almost in his own time” (ergo 90 – 95 A.D.) could not have been referring to the Revelation itself but rather to the name of the Anti-Christ which is what he was talking about.

Reference please.

The Revelation itself, which is a far more reliable witness, mentioned the temple and city of Jerusalem as still standing but that it was soon to be destroyed, which would date the vision to a date shortly before that destruction in 70 A.D.

If you are referring to Revelation 11:1-2, it is not clear if that is the literal temple in Jerusalem prior to 70 or a temple in the latter days.

No, I don’t hold with the preterist view, it’s a hyper-spiritual view that denies any physical blessings of salvation or future redemption of the fallen cosmos. I have until recently identified as partial preterist, but the term preterist has come to be so strictly identified with the hyper-preterist view that it doesn’t accurately reflect my views. I am amillennial.

I am neither. I hate man made boxes.

 

[Pilgrimer]

Which rule are you referring to? I am not understanding your point. Are you trying to say shadows come first, then the realities? That is simply not true. A shadow is "a dark area or shape produced by a body coming between rays of light and a surface” … I don't care what words you use regarding shadows as long as you understand they DO NOT come first.

Yes, that rule. I think you are taking the Old Testament things being shadows too literally. The temple and its furnishings and ministry were not actual shadows in the sense of being a dark area that the light is blocked from shining on. That would rob the Law of the light it provided to God’s people, as you said, the Law was a light to their path, the only light they had, a dim and shadowy light in comparison to the True Light, but the only light the people of God had at the time. In Hebrews 10:1 Paul said the Law had a shadow of good things to come, so to insist that this means the Law was a dark area the light was blocked from cannot be correct. The things of the Law weren’t shadows in that literal sense, they were shadows (skia 4639) in the sense that they were an “adumbration,” something represented only in outline, thus a vague or shadowy symbol or outline that foreshadowed (predicted) future things or events.

So if these things were not “shadows” in the literal sense, then it’s simply not true that the things and events they represented had to already exist, which is rather self-evident as so many of them spoke of things that didn’t in fact exist or come to pass until thousands of years later. I mean, I believe that Christ pre-existed his incarnation, but I also agree that this physical body and blood which is our Passover did not come into existence until his incarnation. And the fact that God foreknew he would have a flesh and blood body did not mean they already existed, foreknowledge does not equate to pre-existence, I see that same mistake made by those who hold to a predestination vs. free will doctrine.

In Hebrews 9:9 Paul also calls these Old Testament types “figures,” (parabole 3850) the root of which (paraballo 3826) literally means to throw alongside for comparison and can refer to a symbol or a parabolic story.

In Hebrews 9:24 Paul calls these earthly things “figures of the true” (antitupos 499), something that corresponds to an anti-type, a representative, a counterpart.

And in Hebrews 9:23 Paul calls these earthly things “patterns of things in the heavens” (hupodeigma 5262), which means an exhibit for imitation or warning, and figuratively means a specimen or, again, adumbration-something represented only in outline.

In 1 Corinthians 10:1-11 Paul also calls the history of Israel’s deliverance and wilderness journeying an “example,” (tupos 5179) in the sense that it was a sample or model or figure or pattern for warning to us upon whom the ends of the world have come. (1 Corinthians 10:1-11)

I generally don’t like parsing Hebrew and Greek words, people often get so caught up in the literal meanings, the letter, that they miss the message that the words were intended to convey. Or in contemporary vernacular, can’t see the forest for the trees. You might say the trees are the Law, but the forest is the Gospel.

But the point is that making a rule out of a particular, literal definition of a single word can create far more problems than it solves.

Sabbath keepers rest in the work of Yeshua and we rest from seeking to be justified by the Law.

I have to disagree. Every Sabbath keeper I have ever spoken with says that, but then turns around and claims that, because they obey the Sabbath commandment, they are therefore obedient to God and not guilty of breaking the Sabbath commandment. That is what justified by the works of the Law means, that you are just and innocent before God because you obey the commandments. What you are really saying is you rest in Jesus from some works of the Law (sacrificial ordinances), but other works of the Law you obey yourself.

However, we know full well that Yeshua DOSE NOT provide us with a physical rest for our bodies or the bodies of animals used by us for work. Only the Sabbath rest can do that.

I believe you are a brother in Christ, so I would like to speak very plainly. The purpose of the Sabbath was not to provide physical rest for our weary bodies or that of our animals. God provided that to us on a daily basis, that's what sleep is for. The Sabbath is God’s rest. In six days God created the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested. God did not rest because he was weary. God rested on the seventh day because His work was finished.

You do realize that there are actually ten different Sabbaths in the Scriptures that were all types and figures that teach us different aspects of our salvation. And in some ways the most important is the seventh day sabbath, because it teaches us about God finishing his work and resting and allowing His people to join Him in His rest. That was a type of Jesus and his work, his perfect obedience to every jot and tittle of God’s law to be that perfect, sinless, acceptable sacrifice. That’s why, before he commended his spirit to the Father and died, Jesus’ last words were, “It is finished.” The impossibly heavy yoke of living up to the righteousness required by the Law was fulfilled, perfectly. He was obedient, even to the death. And when his work was finished, he laid down his life.

And those of us who are in Christ, we have entered into and joined him in His rest, because the works are finished, all the works are finished, not some of the works and the rest of the works we have to do.

There is more, much, much more that can be said about God’s sabbaths and what they teach us about the blessings we have through faith, but I think perhaps this is the most important. Trying to rest in Christ for some commandments and at the same time trying to do the works of the law according to other commandments is like trying to take the seventh day off work and yet go out and plow a field. Either you work, or you rest. You can’t do both.

And let me say this, just because we are free from the works of the Law, does not mean we can therefore live without restraint. We are only free from the law because we are joined with Christ and only to the degree that we follow Him and submit ourselves to his spirit, in like measure will our lives bear the fruit of His presence; love, joy, peace … and for people who live such spiritual lives, no law is necessary.

If you choose to reject the concept of the resurrection being the reality of the Jubilee, then view the resurrection as the means to attain the reality of the Jubilee. If that doesn't work for you either, then state your case for what the reality is.

I reject the concept that the physical resurrection is the reality of the Jubilee and that therefore since that resurrection hasn’t come to pass then the Jubilee hasn’t been fulfilled.

And I will have to take a break, but will try to respond to the rest of your post if I can slip away tonight. I dearly love the times and seasons of the Holy Land and all the harvest types and figures and parables, so I don’t want to hurry a response but look forward to talking it over with you.

In Christ,
Pilgrimer