Feast of Booths

Well, good morning again, brethren. Obviously good to hear all of you singing. And I know I forgot to mention that Hank was not here because of a health issue or a back issue that he's laboring with right now, so I ask that you be praying about him. I know I don't see Karen or Cindy, so I don't know if there's health issues there, but I do ask that you pray for Hank and ask that God would relieve him of the suffering that he's going through right now.

As we all know, the Holy Days here in the fall are rapidly approaching. We mentioned Trumpets being this next week on Thursday, a time when two weeks from today and a feast of tabernacles beginning less than three weeks, or in less than three weeks from today. And of course, we all look forward to that time. We look forward to the time of the fall Holy Days. They actually are grouped together in a little larger grouping than you find even in the spring. It's a little bit longer, I guess about the same time when you count the Passover with the Days of Unleavened Bread.

But we are in the fall keeping a couple of Holy Days even before the feast that as to, in a sense, the excitement. And it should be an exciting time as we prepare for what God can teach us about his coming kingdom. And that's clearly the focus of the Feast of Tabernacles. It's the focus of what our lives need to be in direct connection with. And of course, the Feast of Tabernacles itself is called the Feast of Tabernacles. It's called the Feast of Booths.

And I want to focus on that today because whenever we go to the Feast and whenever we leave our home and we reside in a temporary dwelling, there's a direct reason why God has us do that. There are lessons that he wants us to learn. And so I want to go through several verses today. Again, I know that most of these are familiar. And yet, why should they not be familiar? If we go over them year after year after year, why would we not always remember every single one of them? Well, you know, we're still human. And ultimately, we will have a blessing of being able to remember everything.

But I certainly know that I don't. If I haven't read something recently, then I you know may not exactly remember what it is. But I'd like for us to turn to Deuteronomy 16. You have numerous chapters. And I think it's good as we celebrate the Holy Days, which we often are familiar with. And we do as a matter of a pattern in our lives.

We also know what they mean, what they picture, at least what we have come to understand, that they picture about God's Great Plan. But here, Deuteronomy 16 is one of the places that you would go to find a lot of information about the Holy Days. You find the Passover and the Days of Unleavened Bread and the Feast of Pentecost, mentioned there early. And in verse 13, it talks about the Feast of Tabernacles. It doesn't even directly mention trumpets or atonement.

But here in verse 13, it says, you shall keep the festival of booths. Festival of booths for seven days when you have gathered in your produce from the threshing floor and your wine pressed. And so this would obviously be in the fall. This would be after mostly the harvest season of the later spring and the summer. And in verse 14, it says, we appear before God to rejoice. Rejoice during your festival, you and your sons and your daughters, your male and female servants, as well as the widow, or excuse me, as well as the Levites, the strangers, the orphans, and the widows resident in your town.

And so there's a grouping, many different types of individuals who are grouping together and we are attending with, but we are to be rejoicing with our spiritual family. Verse 15, seven days you shall keep this festival for the Lord your God at the place that the Lord shall choose. And so again, there's a certain designation that God makes.

He did that in different places in the past. Today, you know, we have festival sites with the United Church of God in numerous locations here in the United States and actually around the world, which again, we hope to go to one of those in England. That's a plan, anyway. And so, you know, and yet we're thinking of it in the way, and I know this used to be a major focus of mind's mind whenever many years ago when we lived on a feast site up in Lake of the Ozarks.

We lived in a house right there on the grounds, but we always thought of the grounds. We thought of that location because clearly, you know, God had placed his name there, and he had chosen that particular site for a number of different years. We thought of that in a very special way. I remember even before we lived there driving into that location and just being delighted, excited, and appreciative of the fact that God would make something like this possible. And of course, at different times, we'd have thousands of people coming to the feast, but as you live there, you also find you get ready all year long for this onslaught that's going to happen that we know, you know, would happen in the fall.

But here it says, we keep the festival at the place that the Lord shall choose, for the Lord your God will bless you in all your produce, and all your undertaking, and you shall surely celebrate. See, when we attend the feast, it's to be a time of rejoicing, but it should be a time of asking God for his blessing, thanking God for his blessing, thanking him for his supervision in our lives.

If we back up a couple of pages here, one page in my Bible, to Deuteronomy 14, you see, you know, a guide that God gives us here, starting in verse 22. Of course, this is talking about a festival tithe, a tithe that we should use in being able to serve God and honor God as we go to a festival. He says in verse 22, Set apart a tithe of all the yield of your seed that is brought in yearly from the field, in the presence of the Lord your God, in the place that he shall choose as a dwelling for his name.

You're supposed to eat that tithe. So that's obviously not talking about a what we would call first tithe that we use or give to God, return to God in respect for his law and respect in doing the work that he has given us to do. But here's a tithe that we eat. You shall eat the tithe of your grain and wine and oil, as well as firstlings and herd and flocks, so that you may learn to fear the Lord your God always. And so again, you know, in ancient Israel, this was done in order to try to get people's minds on God. I don't know, it didn't appear to be terribly successful. You know, whenever you study the history of Israel, you know, they didn't seem to pay much attention. Many times they wouldn't even be observing these very valuable days.

And yet, clearly today, you know, we want to observe these and we want to learn the lessons that God wants us to learn. Verse 24, but if when the Lord your God has blessed you in the distance is so great that you're unable to transport it because the place where God has chosen to set his name is too far away from you, then you may turn it into money. And with the money secure in hand, go to the place that the Lord will choose and spend the money for whatever you wish oxen, sheep, wine, strong drink, or whatever you desire. And you shall eat there in the presence of the Lord your God, you and your household rejoicing together. And of course, that certainly gives us a wonderful, say, physical time to look forward to. It is not talking about an excess in any one of those. I will just mention that because, unfortunately, at times, I know that the Feast of Tabernacles has been represented as the Feast of Boos instead of the Feast of Booths. And I hope that that is, you know, not the way it would be seen today. But again, you know, that's what we are told that, you know, we can take this tithe and go before God and truly celebrate and rejoice.

And in verse 27, for the Levite, resident in your town, do not neglect them because they have no allotment or inheritance with you. There's a lot of instruction there that I'm not trying to go over as far as what is, you know, directly dealing with this. But, you know, these are our verses that I think we all would be familiar with if we go back to Leviticus 23. That would be another chapter that, again, all of us surely would remind ourselves that that's where you find a listing of all of the Holy Days. You see atonement in it. Trumpet's listed here in Leviticus 23.

But I want to start down in verse 33-34. Speak to the people of Israel on the 15th day of the seventh month, lasting seven days there shall be a festival of booths, of tabernacles to the Lord.

And the first day will be a holy convocation. You shall not work at your occupation. Seven days you shall present the Lord's offerings. In verse 37, these, and this is talking about all of these that are mentioned here in the chapter, these are the appointed festivals of the Lord, which you shall celebrate at times as times of holy convocation. And in verse 39, the 15th day of the seventh month, when you're gathered in the produce land, you shall keep the festival to the Lord, lasting seven days. A complete rest on the first day and then a complete rest on the eighth day. So we've got obviously two different annual Sabbaths described at the beginning and then at the end or on the eighth day during that time of the Feast of Tabernacles. And yet it says here in verse 40, and this is what I want us to focus on, in verse 40 it says, on the first day you shall take the fruit of majestic trees, branches of palm trees, boughs of leafy trees, and willows of the brook, and you shall rejoice before the Lord your God for seven days. So here they're taking branches to make some type of a shelter, some type of a covering. And in verse 41, you shall keep it as a festival to the Lord seven days in the year. You shall keep it in the seventh month as a statute forever throughout your generations. You shall live in booths. You shall live in booths for seven days, and all that are citizens of Israel shall live in booths. Now verse 42 is one that I want to remind us of. As we are going to go to the Feast of Tabernacles, almost in every case, we're going to be living in some type of a temporary dwelling. Now whether you're planning to camp, or whether you're planning to be in a hotel, or a cabin, or a condominium, it's going to be a temporary dwelling. It's not going to be where you normally live. And many times, we may overlook the value or the significance of living in a temporary dwelling. Now it's not near as easy. In some ways, we may go to very nice places. We may have a setting that is quite opulent, actually, here in the United States at least. And yet, we need to be mindful that God says to keep the Feast of Tabernacles in a temporary dwelling, because that's what it says here in verse 42, for those seven days you shall live in booths. And it goes on in verse 43 to say what?

So that your generations may know that I made the people of Israel live in booths when I brought them out of the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God.

See, God brought Israel out of Egypt. He had allowed them to get in there. He allowed them to be captive and enslaved to Egypt. And he miraculously brought them out through the Red Sea and told them, you know, I want to give you the Promised Land. I want to give you the land of Canaan. And yet, of course, because they resisted and refused, because they were a lack of cooperation, I guess, they were somewhat stubborn. They were resistive. They rebelled. Says, okay, you know, we will wander in the wilderness and you will wander in temporary dwellings for 40 years. That's ultimately how long they would wander before they would ever then approach the Promised Land.

And so living in booths is a description, kind of being a sojourner, being a wanderer, and in a sense, kind of going through a process and living through that process with a purpose in mind, a purpose from God, and a purpose that we all want to identify with. You know, wandering in the wilderness for the children of Israel prior to entering the Promised Land was actually used by God to teach them some lessons, or at least to teach a pattern of what we would maybe more importantly come to learn, because we all need to learn lessons as well. I know as you think, perhaps, think back of keeping the feast, I know some of you have kept the feast all of your life. Some of you have kept the feast for decades. You know, I find it hard to believe that I've kept it for almost 50 years. I certainly can think back to initially keeping the feast of tabernacles and then knowing absolutely nothing about what it was about, what it meant, what it pictured. Zero. I kept the feast of tabernacles for the first time in 1967. I'd been at Ambassador College in Big Sandy for about a month. I'd never gone to church before I went to college, and neither had my wife. And yet, a month in, you know, this huge gathering of people in Big Sandy, Texas, and this huge tent, this huge tabernacle, and all these people camping, including my parents who came down from Oklahoma. They were camping. You know, I have a lot of, I guess I have some remembrance of that. I know that that's what we did. I also know that on the campus there in Big Sandy, there were what we call Booth City. You know, there were little bitty tin booths built in rows, and these ultimately, they initially, I guess, were built so that people could live in them during the Feast of Tabernacles. And again, it was a temporary dwelling if they were maybe not wishing to camp, which many people did. Many people had elaborate, I don't know if you'd say so elaborate back then. Any more people camp in quite a, you know, a luxurious situation often, because they've got trailers and campers and all kinds of stuff back then. Most people had a tent.

And, you know, the sand around, because this was Big Sandy, the ground around these piney wood forest, because that's what were planted in there, was pine trees. And the whole camp, you know, had a certain, it kind of had an aura. Sometimes it had an aroma, because people are all camping. There were restroom buildings throughout the, and sometimes there were aromas from that, as well, because it didn't always work exactly like you would wish. I mentioned the booths. Those booths that were built there, some people lived in them, I think, initially. After a while, you know, they were used more for student housing. And I spent several years living in those little booths, even during the latter years of college. And yet, you know, there were things that were being learned, being in a temporary dwelling, certainly camping. And I know I mentioned, too, you living on the feast side in Lake Ozark. And I, in some ways, even felt guilty, because some of you, possibly, were out there walking back and forth from the parking lot, you know, trying to find your car, or trying to get out to the furthest reaches of the parking lot to be able to get in your car and eat lunch, because you knew you weren't going to be able to get out of there in the next hour or two. And I could just walk over to the house and eat the lunch. I felt bad about that sometimes. Not too bad, but, you know, my dad actually really liked that. You know, he would come and stay with us, and that was much better for him. He didn't like to go out and sit in the back of the parking lot. And yet, I also recall putting up a tent in the front yard. And we had a brown tent. It was a, kind of, a bigger family tent. And the boys wanted to play in the tent. And I don't know if they slept out there very often. I don't recall sleeping out there, but at least we had the tent to remind ourselves. I remember it being a brown tent. And because our dog ended up chewing a hole in one of the corners, we have an orange patch over the tent. I'm not sure where that tent went. I think one of the boys probably got it, and it's gone. But, you know, there should be things that we remember. And I think of other temporary dwellings that we were in during the, through the years, over the last many years, of keeping the feast. And even if you're going to, you know, what is a very stable setting with a motel or cabin of some type, you know, some of those are very nice. And yet, everything is not in its place. It's all scattered. It's somewhat jumbled if you're in a motel room.

You know, you've got clothes everywhere, especially, you know, they don't always have people there in dress clothes for eight days. They don't put big closets in hotel rooms. I usually have a little closet behind the door, and that's about it. And yet, you still have stuff all over. You've got ice chests. You've got all kinds of things that you need to have to be able to eat there some of the time. It's just not as convenient as being at home and being able to have a place for things and be able to have a lot more room. So why? Why does God have us live in temporary dwellings? He calls us the Feast of Booths. What should we learn? Well, let's go to Deuteronomy 8, because here in Deuteronomy, you see some lessons that are outlined here about the children of Israel wandering. Wandering in the wilderness.

Wandering until some of the older ones died off. Wandering until the younger generations grew up, perhaps because of the instruction they were being given, looking forward to the Promised Land.

Certainly Joshua and Caleb were. Moses understood what was going to happen, I guess to a degree. I don't know if he fully understood that he might not get into the Promised Land. God might restrict that. But see, they were in a temporary dwelling, and we are as well here as we go to the Feast. It says in verse 1 of Deuteronomy 8, this entire commandment I command you today, you must diligently observe so you may live and increase and go in and occupy the land that the Lord promised by oath to your ancestors. Remember in verse 2, the long way that the Lord your God led you 40 years in the wilderness. And of course, Joshua, or excuse me, Moses was writing this after basically going through it. He was writing this as they were approaching. The book of Deuteronomy is written as they were approaching the Promised Land, approaching what they needed to know before they would go into the Promised Land.

But he says you need to remember that God was leading you through those years. And see, that has a significance. It should have significance to us.

That God was leading them through the wilderness. And he goes on to say here in the latter part of verse 2, he was leading you through the wilderness in order to humble you. That's the first point.

God wants us. He allows us to live in temporary dwellings. He allows us even to view our physical life as a temporary transient existence. You know, our citizenship is to be in heaven. Our citizenship is to be in the kingdom that God is going to bring to this earth. And so we are truly to be looking toward that time. But he says regardless of the Israelites, I allowed you or led you through the wilderness in order to humble you. That was the first step. Secondly, he says, I was testing you to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commandments. And so not only was wandering in a temporary dwellings around through different sections of a desert area, was that to be humbling as it was. You know, they actually needed to be fed. They needed to be given water. There were things that God had to do for them.

But a part of that was to help them see their dependence, to be reminded of their dependence upon God and to test you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. Now, part of that was even regarding man. If you go out and pick man on Sabbath, you don't get anything. You're still hungry till Sunday, I guess. I don't know what happened. But that was, you know, a part of the directions that they were given. And so there was a humility. There was a testing or trying to see if we will actually obey or follow God. And he says in verse four, or excuse me, verse three, He humbled you by letting you hunger, then by feeding you with manna, that with which neither you nor your ancestors were acquainted in order to make you understand that one does not live by bread alone, but you live by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

Now that, again, of course, directly applies to us. It was to help us see our need for the bread of life, help us see the need for living by the entire word of God. He says, the clothes on your bag didn't wear out, your feet didn't swell those 40 years. Sometimes, you know, we even need that kind of help today. You know, there have been times I know that people have lived through, and it seems like their clothing just didn't seem to wear out. Other times, you know, stuff just falls apart. You know, however God was doing that, and of course, He was having them march around or at least wander around. So maybe their foot gear wouldn't be, you know, exactly the type that maybe we have today that's pretty sturdy, probably wore out, but it says their feet didn't swell.

But He goes on to say in verse 5, Know in your heart that as a parent disciplines a child, so the Lord your God disciplines you. This was another point that He was making.

It says, I want to humble you. I want to test you. And I want you to recognize that as a loving parent, I am disciplining you for your good. That's what He was telling the Israelites. That's what Moses was telling them as they've kind of been through the last 40 years. They were yet to go into the Promised Land. And yet those are the instructions that are in connection with living in booths and wandering around for 40 years. And you see that elaborated more here in this particular chapter. He says, I want to be you to remind yourself from verse 11, take care that you don't forget the Lord your God by failing to keep His commandments. He was saying that as you did receive relief, as you did go into the land. And He said, even in verse 14, don't exalt yourself.

Forgetting the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, who led you through the great and terrible wilderness, and arid wasteland, the poisonous snakes and scorpions, He made water flow out of the flint rock, and He led you. Led you. He led you. Or fed you, I guess is what it says. Fed you in the wilderness with manna. Your ancestors didn't even know that. But again, He repeats why He did it. To humble you, and to test you, and in the end, to do you good. Verse 16 is what I really focus on. Whenever I read through this chapter, it summarizes why it is that temporary dwellings were used during that wandering in the wilderness. And He says, don't say to yourself, my power and my might, might of my own hand has gotten me this wealth. But remember the Lord your God, for it is He who gives you power to get wealth, so that He may confirm His covenant that He swore your ancestors as He is doing today. And so here He was, giving a reminder to them, a reminder that clearly pointed out some of the lessons of living in a temporary dwelling. And of course, primarily, as we see here in verse 16, that was to humble us and to help us to understand the value of trials, and then to request the discipline of the Lord, not to resist that or to refuse that.

See, that's a part of what we want to keep in mind as we keep the Feast of Tabernacles, again, something many of us have done for decades of years. It doesn't change what we're supposed to learn. Any of us have a corner on the market of humility. Well, then, you know, we're the finished product because we don't. You know, we're affected by a anything but humble attitude that is projected by the prince of the power of the air. He loves to just saturate us with pride and arrogance and independence and doing it my way completely opposite to what humility that Jesus exemplified and that God the Father says we should be learning. And certainly, you know, understanding that trials and tests are a part of our Christian life. I don't know that any of us like trials and tests. We don't want to be sick. We don't want to have difficulty with this or that.

But we need to accept the fact that God allows that for a reason. He wants us in this life to endure those tests to show that we will be loyal. We will be faithful to Him and to His Son for all eternity. And then finally, as the third thing that's mentioned, that God is working with us for our group. He actually disciplines us. We may miss out a lot on that discipline. If we're not reading the Word of God to see it, you can read the Word of God and not be disciplined at all.

You can read the Word of God and say, I read 30 minutes today. That's about all it did. But if you read desiring that God would direct and correct what He tells us about, I've given the Word of God, I've given the inspired Word of God so you can be corrected and directed and rebuked, and so you have instruction in righteousness. If we're seeking the discipline of God, then it'll come through this Word. It'll come through the Word of God. Here in Hebrews 11, a couple of verses that I want to focus on here in Hebrews. Hebrews 11, these tie together again with the fact that we know that we are looking toward the Promised Land. We're looking toward the Kingdom of God. We're looking toward Jesus returning, and that will be a time of great joy, great happiness.

And yet here in chapter 11 of Hebrews, you find many examples of faith that are described, and attestations to faith of Abel and Noah, Abraham. And we get down to verse 13. You find numerous others mentioned in the rest of the chapter, but in verse 13, it says all of these died in faith without having received the promise. But from a distance they saw and they greeted the promises. They confessed that they were strangers and foreigners on the earth.

See, this is a mindset of those who are listed as the paragons of faith. They recognized that I'm just in a temporary dwelling here on earth. My physical life has a greater purpose than just putting in my 60 or 80 years. My purpose is revealed through the Word of God. My purpose, as far as what I'm seeking, what I want is guided by a vision.

Where he says they confess that they were strangers and foreigners on the earth.

For people who speak in this way make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. And if they had been thinking of the land that they had left behind, then they would not.

Or they would have had opportunity to return if the Israelites were, and even some of them initially said, oh, let's go back to Egypt. It's better than it is out here in this desert. Better than out here under this direction for God. That's a little different concept than, you know, we're out here, we're being protected by God. We're being worked with by God. And they weren't looking at it. They were wanting to go back to Egypt and see all of us had been, you know, drawn out of the world. And we don't want to go back. We don't want to think about how badly that was, that we miss whatever we left. We want to keep our eyes on the future, eyes on the promise that God gives us of the kingdom of God. It says in verse 16, but as it is, they desire a better country. They desire a better country. A heavenly one. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God. And indeed, He has prepared a city for them. He's prepared what's going to happen. We read about it. We can understand it as we study the Word of God and as we drink in of the testimony of Jesus, which is even about understanding the plan and understanding what God prophetically says. He says, I'm going to bring a conclusion to this age. I'm going to bring a judgment upon the people. I'm going to turn them around and head them in the right direction. I'm going to remove Satan, and we're going to have a completely different world. That country, that homeland, that kingdom is what we have to be envisioning. And whenever Jesus said, pray thy kingdom come. Pray for the institution of a kingdom that will work, a government that will work, a kingdom that will last. Pray for that. That's what you have to focus on. And of course, here in Hebrews 11, it talks about these people realizing that I'm living a temporary life.

I want a permanent life. We're going to be given permanent life. Whenever we talk about eternal life, permanent life, everlasting life, however we want to describe it, that's far different than what we have. What we have is a temporary physical existence. And living in a temporary dwelling helps us be mindful that we are yearning for the kingdom to come. And of course, we want to be so very thankful for that. In chapter 12, you see this as he finishes this chapter about those of faith. He says in verse 1, since we're surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight in the sin that clings so closely to us. Let us run with perseverance the race that set before us, looking to Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith.

See here, he tells them, well, this is what you need to do. You know, people of faith are going to have to have their vision of the future, vision of the kingdom of God firmly in mind.

It deals with stability, it deals with security, it deals with permanence. That's what for us, as we're given eternal life, is we're changed if we're alive and if we're resurrected and transformed. Well, that'll be wonderful too. But that's what we have to have a focus on. And we can be reminded of that even as we live in a temporary dwelling. He says in verse 5, he points out how it is that we shouldn't lose heart. He says, you've forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as children. We need to be reminded that we're the children of God. God absolutely knows what is best for us. He knows what is best for each one of us. Now, what we go through, what we deal with, the trials or tests or even the difficulties that we struggle with, they vary. And we don't all have the same thing. We don't all have the same situation or the same health.

We all have the same goal. We all have the same father. We all have the one who is so lovingly concerned about us that he wants to humble us and try us and even discipline us for our good. That's what he told the Israelites. And so he said in verse 5, you've forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as children. My child, don't regard lightly the discipline of the Lord or lose heart when you're punished by him, but the Lord disciplines those he loves and he chastens every child that he accepts. Thankfully, God knows far better than I do what I need. And I've got to get used to that. I've got to become a believer in that he is preparing me for something that I don't even understand. I can envision it. I can kind of know. I can certainly see what the word of God says, and that is, as our sermonette pointed out, absolute clear what God is going to do. It is absolutely stable. We don't have to worry about what God is going to do. God is going to do it.

And we are simply the objects of his mercy. We've mercifully been given that information, and we have been dealt with by God, and we can be very thankful for that. He says in verse 7, endure trials for the sake of discipline. God is treating you as children. And what child is there that a parent doesn't discipline? You don't have the discipline in which your children share, then you are illegitimate, not as children. Moreover, we have had parents who discipline us, and we respected them. Should we not even more be subject to the father of spirits? For they, our parents disciplined us for a short time to what seemed best to them.

But he disciplines us for our good in order that we may share in his holy.

That he wants to be able to produce in us, you know, a wonderful, wonderful development of his divine nature. And whether we fully understand it or not, we can understand the descriptions. But we have to participate. We have to be a willing participant. And I'll conclude what I'm going to say here today by just pointing out, you know, we go to the feast, we live in a temporary dwelling, we want to be mindful of God working with us toward the kingdom. And we want to be what the primary, I guess you could say, a primary summary statement to each of the churches listed in Revelation 2 and 3. We want to be overcoming. We want to be subject to the discipline of the Lord. We want to be humbled before him. And we want to be enduring trials, knowing that God is with us even through those trials. Whatever they are, you know, he is always going to be there and always going to be available to us. And as I mentioned, Revelation 2 and 3 list seven churches, messages to churches, and each of those messages are somewhat different, but all of them kind of end up in a similar concluding statement, to he that endures or to him that overcomes, you shall be given. And then he gives numerous different descriptions, but ultimately it's the promise of the kingdom of God. It's the promise of eternal life. It's the promise of not being harmed by the second death, of not having our name blotted out of the book of life, of being a pillar in the temple of our God. See, that's exciting to think about what he's going to do, but he says, I'm going to give that to those who overcome. To those who are overcoming sin, the society that we live in that is so temporary and transient and actually confused and deceived, and not only sin and society, but just simply ourselves, our nature that needs to be transformed. So thankfully, God gives us a reminder every year, and he tells us that I want you to go and I want you to keep the feast of temporary dwellings. I want you to keep the feast of booths, and I want you to learn the lessons that I desire for my children to learn.