Jesus Christ and the Holy Days

For those of you tuning on the webcast as well, welcome to you joining with us today, too.

Last Holy Day when we met was about 70 degrees outside. Today it's about 35 degrees, and snowing.

I did get a couple of emails just before I left to come to services from some of our members down in Colorado Springs who said it was snowing quite heavily down there and starting to stick. They were planning to stay home today, so I gave them the webcast information. So those of you who were brave enough to come up from Colorado Springs, we're glad to have you with us.

You may not be able to make it back home, but we'll worry about that later on after we see what happens the rest of the day. So good to see all of you here.

I really appreciated this special music. It was very beautifully done. And thanks to the ensemble again, too. Very, very beautiful accompaniment there. And thanks for improvising as you did and making things work out. So it is certainly a great blessing to be here to celebrate one of God's festivals, the last day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread. And it is truly a blessing to know about God's festivals and about His holy days. They give us so much insight, so much understanding, so much knowledge of what God is doing in carrying out His plan for mankind.

And they also give us a great deal of hope, both individually as well as for all of mankind. And it's a real tragedy that so few people are even aware of the seven holy days or festivals that God mentions in the Bible. And even fewer are aware of the purpose of those holy days, which is to teach us about God's plan for the salvation of mankind. They aren't obsolete, they aren't something that is irrelevant, and that we can ignore because they don't only teach us about God's plan for the salvation of mankind, but they also teach us a great deal about Jesus Christ and about His role in God's plan for the salvation of mankind.

You know, most churches believe and teach that Jesus came to do away with the law, with the Old Testament laws, and these holy days, but they don't seem to stop and realize or to think about the fact that Jesus is actually the God who gave those very laws, who reveal those festivals, and that He is the same yesterday and today and forever. But what is really said is that they fail to understand that the biblical festivals and holy days actually are all about Jesus Christ and about His role in God's plan. So what we'll do in today's sermon, and I'll be projecting the scriptures up here on screen so you can follow these along, and this is the title for today's sermon.

What we'll do today is to go through a particular common thread that we find in all of the biblical festivals, and that is what they teach us about Jesus Christ, about what He has done in the past, about what He is doing now, and what He will yet do in the future in bringing God's plan for the salvation of mankind to pass. How great is Jesus Christ and His role in God's plan? There are many, many scriptures that talk about that, but I'll share just one that conveys some of the greatness of Jesus Christ, and that passage is Colossians 1 verses 16 through 18.

This is one of several passages that tell us that Jesus was the divine being who actually did the creating of the world and the universe that we read about there in Genesis 1 and 2, but it also tells us much more than that. So Colossians 1 and verse 16, Paul writes here, "...for by Him," referring to Jesus, "...by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers, all things were created through Him and for Him." So this tells us that Jesus created not only the physical world, the physical universe that we see around us, but also the spiritual universe that is unseen, that we cannot sense with our human senses of sight and smell and hearing and feeling and touching and that sort of things.

All things were created by Him, visible and invisible. Paul mentions here the dominions or principalities or powers. Those are actually terms that are used in the Bible to refer to specific types of being in the angelic spirit world. So what he's saying here is Christ created all of this, the physical world, the physical universe, as well as the spirit world that we do not directly see and sense.

So all of this, he also says, was created through Him and for Him. He created it and created it for Himself or His part in God's plan. Verse 17, and He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence. So just a huge amount of information that is packed into these few verses here. Just to briefly summarize, this tells us that Jesus Christ is basically at the center of everything that God is doing. He created all things in heaven and earth, physical and spiritual. They were created by Him and for Him, and He is the head of the church. He is the firstborn from the dead. If He's the firstborn, that means obviously there are going to be others who will be born from the dead through the resurrection of the just.

And He is the one who will be preeminent in all things. So how do these things tie in with the Holy Days and this Holy Day that we're celebrating today? Do the Scriptures reveal whether these feasts teach us important truths about Jesus Christ and about His role in God's plan?

Well, the apostle Paul clearly understood that these biblical feasts foretold or foreshadowed what was to come in God's plan for salvation. Let's take a look at Colossians 2, verses 16 and 17.

This is a passage that many people misunderstand quite badly. Here Paul shows that these feasts were shadows of things to come. He says here, let's read it, Colossians 2, verses 16 and 17, so let no one judge, and this word here means to criticize or to condemn. It doesn't mean to judge in our typical sense of the word, but specifically to criticize or condemn you in food or in drink or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths, plural, including in here the Holy Days as well, which are a shadow of things to come. Now most people read this passage, and you'll see it if you go out and look for it, that they think that Paul is saying here there's no need to keep the Holy Days or God's festivals or sabbaths, but that's not really what this is saying at all.

Paul is here warning the members of the church there in Colossae not to be intimidated by some who are criticizing their manner of keeping God's feasts and God's sabbaths, the weekly sabbath, rather. This is actually referring to an early form of Gnosticism.

Mr. Mapes referred to the self-flagellation earlier. It's interesting how some of these practices go back to Gnostic thought that's 2,000 years old, because Gnosticism broke into two strains of thought. One was very ascetic, where anything that if it feels good, don't do it, is their basic philosophy. That's an outgrowth of the self-flagellation type of thing came from that early form of Gnostic thought. Then on the other hand, another strain of thought went in the opposite direction that you can do anything that you want. Both of those threads of thought actually influenced Christianity over the centuries. We actually see that reflected here, where some of those Gnostics were condemning, judging, criticizing the church members for the ways that they were observing. God's feast, God's Sabbath day, because those feasts and weekly Sabbath were feast days, so the church members were enjoying those, understanding the art festive occasion, something to be celebrated there. The Gnostics are criticizing them for that, because the Gnostics believe that, again, if it feels good, if it tastes good, if it feels good, you're not supposed to do that. You're not supposed to enjoy that. It's a very ascetic approach, and that's what is being talked about here. You can find that spelled out in a lot more detail in our Sabbath booklet and the booklet on the Covenants, where there's a whole chapter basically devoted to exploring this passage in great detail. But what I want to draw our attention to here is the last part in verse 17, which is where Paul says that these things are a shadow of things to come.

In other words, they foreshadow coming events in God's plan. Now, if you see a shadow, what does that mean?

What does it mean to see a shadow? What does a shadow do? Well, if you see a shadow that is approaching you and getting bigger and bigger, what does it mean? It means that something is coming.

Something is coming toward you. If you are standing or sitting and you see a shadow on the ground like here where it's getting bigger and bigger, it means that something is coming close to you. Something very real is approaching and it is casting a shadow there. That's not to say that it's totally irrelevant as people read into this verse, but on the other hand, the point that Paul is making here is that the festivals and the Sabbath day are shadows that tell us that something very important is coming. I won't go on and explore that any further, but I just want to make this point that Paul tells us that these festivals, holy days that we keep, are shadows. They foreshadow something. They tell us that something a greater reality is coming. So let's go through in our time today a brief overview of the festivals of the Bible to see what they teach us about what was to come and about what is yet to come and Jesus Christ's role that he plays within that.

So let's go through these seven festivals. The first of those we'll talk about, the first of God's festivals, is obviously the Passover, which we kept a little over a week ago. So this is the first of God's annual feast days mentioned in Scripture. Historically, it commemorates the greatest event in the history of the nation of Israel, and that was their miraculous deliverance from slavery from Egypt. And a large part of the second book of the Bible, the book of Exodus, is dedicated to telling us about this story. But is this feast of Passover only to commemorate those events? What does the Bible fully reveal about the significance of the festival of Passover?

Let's turn over to a scripture, a very familiar one. This is John 1 in verse 29.

And this is when John the Baptizer saw Jesus Christ coming to him to be baptized.

And what was John's reaction? What did he say? He said, as we read here, Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

He's the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

Now in the Bible, the Lamb is a symbol of Passover because a lamb was slain at the beginning of the Passover and was to be eaten that night. And the Israelites knew that the blood of the Lamb had protected them from the death that God had passed over them, from which the name Passover comes. He protected them from the death of their firstborn on that first night there in Egypt. And the Gospels also record just in passing that Jesus kept the Passover, not just the last one that we read about a week ago, but it's scattered throughout the Gospels that he did keep the Passover. The Passover is mentioned there with him and his disciples.

Let's turn over to another passage that we read a week ago, Luke 22 verses 14 through 16, and read about some of the events that took place on that last Passover with Jesus and his disciples.

On the night before his death, Jesus knew that he was fulfilling the symbolism of the Passover Lamb and giving his life for the sins of the entire world. So we read here, Luke 22 verse 14, When the hour or the time had come, he sat down and the twelve apostles with him.

Then he said to them, with fervent desire, I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. For I say to you, I will no longer eat of it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God. Why will he no longer eat of it? Well, because he's returning to the Father in heaven. He will not be there with them. He's leaving them in just a few days.

So Jesus then, to continue the story, instituted the symbols that represent not the sacrifice of a lamb, which was the traditional way of observing the Passover for the last 15 centuries in Israel, but his own much greater sacrifice. The Passover symbols now the bread and the wine would represent Christ's own sacrifice. Through the bread, representing his sinless body, which he gave for us, and the wine signifying the blood that he would shed to wash away our sins.

And the disciples later came to realize that the Passover lamb was only the physical forerunner of that perfect sacrifice for sins, which was Jesus Christ himself. Let's turn over now to 1 Corinthians 5 and verse 7. Another very familiar passage for this time of year. This takes place actually about 25 years later, approximately, when the apostle Paul is instructing the Corinthian congregation, and the church in Corinth was a mixture of both Jews and Gentiles. And what does he say? He starts talking to them about the Passover. So he says, verse 7, again, writing to Gentiles, largely Gentiles, some Jews too, therefore purge out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened. For indeed Christ our Passover was sacrificed for us. So we see here that Paul clearly understood that the Passover's true meaning had been revealed with the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. It was part of God's plan for all mankind that Jesus would come and sacrifice himself for the sins of the entire world. So far from something that is obsolete, something we no longer need to do, the Passover was revealed to have a far deeper, a much greater meaning and symbolism for Christians with Jesus Christ at its center. It wasn't something that was obsolete and done away with. No, it's given a new and transformed meaning through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

Several chapters later, moving from 1 Corinthians 5 to 1 Corinthians 11 and verses 23 through 26, Paul explains this new understanding of the Passover to the Corinthian brethren as he goes through and explains to them how they are to observe it. So he writes here in verse 23, For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus, on the same night in which he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, Take, eat, this is my body which is broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me.

In the same manner, he also took the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, this do as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim, you announce, you might say, the Lord's death till he comes. So he clearly ties in Christ's sacrifice. This is the fulfillment of what the Passover is all about. And of course, we're familiar, we won't go through the Scriptures, but there are a number of requirements about the Passover Lamb that showed that it was a type or a symbol of Jesus Christ's perfect sacrifice. Just to name off a few of them, the Lamb was to be perfect. It was to be without blemish, without fault of any kind. It was not to have a bone broken as it was killed. It was to die at a specific time of day, to be sacrificed at a specific time. So the Passover Lamb, that were slain, the millions of them over the centuries, foreshadowed the blood and the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. And God's other festivals also foreshadow other important parts of God's plan and Jesus Christ's role in their fulfillment.

There's a lot more we could say about this, but this is just an overview of the subject. So we'll move on now to the second of God's festivals, which is the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which we are concluding today. So what about this feast, the next festival of God's festival? Is it also a shadow of things that were to come? Let's turn back to Leviticus 23 verse 6 and read about this instructions for keeping this feast, Leviticus 23 and verse 6.

On the fifteenth day of the same month, the same month as Passover, is the Feast of Unleavened Bread to the Lord. Seven days you must eat unleavened bread. That's what we've been doing for the last seven days here, with some exceptions, like our sermonette speaker there, who appreciate that story there. We could probably all share something like that. But in the Old Testament, the days of Unleavened Bread were understood to be a remembrance of what happened on that first pass overnight, when all the Egyptian firstborn died. The next morning, if we remember the story there, the Israelites packed up their belongings. They were to stay in their homes overnight. Then the next day they packed up their belongings, traveled to a central location, because they're spread out over a number of different towns and villages there in northern Egypt. And they gather on a central point to be ready to leave the next day, which they do that evening. They leave Egypt by night the following evening. But before that evening, because they were in a hurry, they baked unleavened bread, because they didn't have time to wait around for the bread dough to rise.

So under the Old Testament understanding, that's what the Feast of Unleavened Bread was about.

But what about today? What do we understand? What further revelation does God give us about the meaning of these days? And what do they teach us about the role of Jesus Christ in our salvation?

Let's turn over to John 6. This whole chapter has a lot to do with Christ being the bread of life. I gave a sermon on this, basically on this chapter, a couple of feasts ago, which you can find if you want more detail. But I'll just read a few verses out of this, verses 32 through 35 from John 6.

And the setting of this event actually takes place just before the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread. And Jesus, to bring us into the story flow, he miraculously multiplies a boy's lunch of bread and fish to feed thousands of people. And following up on that the next day, there's a discussion that follows about manna and about bread. And they're no doubt thinking about the days of Unleavened Bread, which are quite imminent. And notice what Jesus says about this, verse 32.

So he first says here that it was Moses who gave them the manna, but rather it was God who gave the manna. Points them to God the Father as the one, not Moses. And further he says that the manna was only symbolic of something to come which was much greater and much better, which is the true bread from heaven. That would sustain them forever because it came from God. It was much, much more important, much greater than the manna. And then he says in verse 33, For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. So he's contrasting the manna versus the true bread from heaven. And he says that God is offering something that is far greater, far better than just the manna, the physical manna. That he says that He is going to give the bread of God that gives life to the world. Not just to the Israelites, as the manna was given only to the Israelites, but God is going to give the bread of God to the entire world. So that all may be blessed by that. Verse 34, Then they said to Him, Lord, Give us this bread always. And Jesus said to them, I am the bread of life. He who comes to me shall never hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst. And He speaks here with authority, claiming to be the bread that comes directly from God, from heaven. Notice He uses three different verses right here in this passage, the bread from heaven, the true bread from heaven, the bread of God, the bread of life. So He uses all these different terms to reinforce who He is, to teach about who He is and about His role. And this bread from God would do much more than just satisfy their physical hunger, as He had done through multiplying the loaves and the fishes. It would satisfy a much deeper hunger, and that is the spiritual hunger that exists in all of mankind, our need for something greater than ourselves, something of a greater purpose. I thought I had turned this thing off.

Apparently I turned it on. Connie, would you take this and see? Oh, wait a minute. That's from her. She's telling me to speed it up. Okay. All right. Okay. All right. I'm a man under authority.

So what He's saying here is that just His physical bread was essential for physical life, that He is the bread of God and the bread from heaven, and the bread of life is essential to our spiritual and eternal life. What He's saying is that He is so essential that without Him we do not have and cannot have eternal life. That's what He says very plainly here. So this feast that we are concluding today is the Feast of Unleavened Bread. It's a feast that is about taking in the unleavened bread from heaven, the bread of God, the bread of life. And if we do that, we can fulfill the symbolism of avoiding leavened bread, which is the other aspect. There are two sides of the coin you might see in this feast. One is avoiding leavened bread but taking in of unleavened bread, of purging out the old leaven of malice and wickedness and living a new life based on continually taking in the true unleavened bread of life, Jesus Christ.

The Apostle Paul, writing again to the church in Corinth, talked about Passover earlier, but he also talked about the spiritual symbolism of unleavened bread. And when the church members in Corinth began to accept sin in the congregation, he had to teach them a very important lesson about the meaning of this feast of unleavened bread. And we find that in 1 Corinthians 5 verses 6 through 8. And Paul writes to them here, and he says, Your glorying is not good. Do you not know that a little heaven leavens the whole lump? Therefore purge out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened. For indeed, Christ our Passover was sacrificed for us.

So as Paul states, it is the sacrifice of Jesus Christ that removes our sins. And we then become unleavened in a spiritual sense. So again, who or what is the focus of this feast? This feast of unleavened bread. It is Jesus Christ. It points to what Jesus would do for all of us in cleansing us from sin and helping us to live a life free of sin. And verse 8, continuing on here, Paul told the Corinthians and the brethren that they should continue to keep this feast that follows the Passover. He says, Therefore let us keep the feast.

And it's obvious which feast he is talking about by what he says, Not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

So we see here then the deep meaning of this feast of unleavened bread, that it is revealed, and that its deeper significance wasn't ultimately what had occurred in the Old Testament of the Israelites not having time for their dough to rise there when they left Egypt, but actually its deeper spiritual significance is found in Jesus Christ, the true bread of life, the unleavened and sinless Savior of the world who cleanses us of our sins and gives us the opportunity to be spiritually unleavened before God. So we see here that Jesus Christ is at the center of this second feast as well, and with his help he makes it possible for us to be spiritually unleavened in our lives. And what about the next festival, which is the feast of Pentecost?

Fifty days after the wave sheaf offering and when Jesus Christ was resurrected, the first Christians were celebrating Pentecost at the beginning of the wheat harvest, which is when Pentecost fell. And as recorded in Acts 2, that turned out to be quite an exciting and very interesting day because on that day the members who were gathered there in Jerusalem received a Holy Spirit from God. And suddenly this feast of Pentecost, or weeks, or firstfruits, some of its different names, took on a very new meaning for them. It was no longer about the wheat harvest at that time of year, but now it was all about the harvest of mankind for God's plan. Pentecost would become the anniversary of the founding of the church through the giving of God's Holy Spirit on that day. And Jesus Christ revealed the significance of this feast by sending His Holy Spirit on this very day. Could have done it on any day, but no, He did it on this specific day. He had actually foretold this earlier. We see over in Luke 24 verse 49, He said, Behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you, but tarry, or wait, in the city of Jerusalem, until you are endued with power from on high. So this power would come through the Holy Spirit that He would give. But how would that Spirit come to them? How did that happen?

Let's notice also John 15. This is a verse we read Passover the other night a week ago.

Notice what He tells us here about the Passover in the Holy Spirit. He says, But when the Helper comes, whom or which, as it should be translated, I shall send to you from the Father, so the Father is the greatest, the greater of the beings, the Spirit of truth, who, or again, which, proceeds from the Father, He, or it, will testify of me. So how would they receive that Spirit on Pentecost as He had promised? And how do we receive that Spirit today? Well, as Jesus said here, I will send it to you from the Father. So Jesus Christ has a very important role in giving us the Holy Spirit. It comes ultimately from the Father, but it comes through Jesus Christ. He's the one who gives it to us. We do not receive the Holy Spirit without the involvement of Jesus Christ. And as we know, God's Spirit does play a vital role in the lives of Christians. When a person receives, when we do repent, when we are baptized and have hands laid on us, we receive that Spirit, and that Spirit then begins a process of spiritual transformation in our lives. A transformation that the Bible refers to as conversion. And through this process we shed our old way of thinking, of doing things, and living, and we allow Jesus Christ's attitude and way of life to guide us in everything that we do. How did Paul sum up this change? It's a huge, huge subject, but a verse that I think sums it up very well we find in Galatians 2 and verse 20. And Paul describes this change, this change of thinking and our priorities in everything we do, very simply. This is a very simple formula here. Galatians 2 and verse 20, I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. And the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith, and the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. So we've seen here, that in the last few verses, that Jesus Christ sends the Holy Spirit from the Father. And then through God's Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ can live again within us and empower us to live a truly godly life that is patterned after His life. And the old person, as Paul wrote here, is crucified with Christ. The old person dies in the watery grave of baptism and stays there. And a new person then rises up out of those waters of baptism. A new person led by God's Spirit. A new person with Jesus Christ living again within us. So we see that Jesus Christ is central to this entire process. And it's summed up by, as Paul wrote here, Christ living again within us. So Pentecost, another aspect of this feast, is also called the Feast of First Fruits. Those who are truly God's people in this age are the firstfruits of God's plan of salvation. Notice the Scripture over in Revelation 14 and verse 4, speaking of the 144,000. And it says here, these are the ones who follow the Lamb, Jesus Christ, wherever He goes. These were redeemed from among men, being firstfruits to God and to the Lamb. So the firstfruits again implies that there are many more to follow. And that is indeed the case, as we'll see and as we understand from God's Holy Days.

And who is the first of the firstfruits? Well, we read that in 1 Corinthians 15, verses 20 through 23. And Paul writes here, But now Christ is risen from the dead, and has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since by man came death, by man also came the resurrection of the dead, man being capitalized by the man, the one man. Jesus Christ came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive. But each one in his own order, Christ, the firstfruits, afterward those who are Christ at His coming, the other firstfruits. And later in God's plan, the majority of humankind that will later have their opportunity for salvation again. So what do we see from these passages? We see again that Jesus Christ is at the center of the feast of firstfruits, or Pentecost. He is the first of the firstfruits.

And He also lives, as we saw from Galatians 2.20, lives in the lives of believers through the Holy Spirit, which He sends to us. And yet the ultimate fulfillment of this feast will only be realized after Jesus Christ returns to earth to establish God's kingdom, at which point all of the world will finally have access to God's Spirit. That brings us to the next of God's festivals, which is the Feast of Trumpets. And what does this feast picture with the blowing of trumpets? What is its meaning? Is this also a shadow of the role that Jesus Christ plays in God's plan?

Well, Jesus Himself talks about the symbolism of the blowing of trumpets in a very familiar passage, Matthew 24 verses 30 and 31.

And here He says, Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he will send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together his elect from the four winds from one end of heaven to the other. So Christ Himself ties in His return with this Feast of Trumpets.

And in several other places we find this connection as well.

One of the very familiar ones is 1 Corinthians 15 and verses 51 and 52, which is Paul's description of the resurrection of the dead.

At the time a great trumpet announces Jesus Christ's return.

And Paul writes here, Behold, I tell you a mystery.

We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet.

For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.

In the resurrection our physical bodies changed to immortal and glorified spirit bodies at that time.

We find this again mentioned over in 1 Thessalonians 4 and verse 16, where Paul writes, For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. So Christ we see from these passages will fulfill the symbolism of the blowing of trumpets on the Feast of Trumpets. So He is at the center of this Feast as well. It is all about one thing, it is all about His return to earth and the events that surround that.

And at His second coming the trumpet will sound and announce the arrival of the King of Kings, who will reign on earth. And as Revelation 11 and verse 15 tells us, the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever. So this we see too as a feast that is very much tied in with Jesus Christ at its center. And next we come to another festival, a rather unusual one unlike the others, and that is the Day of Atonement. I would say Feast of Atonement, but we normally don't think of the Day of Atonement as being a feast day, although it is called a festival there. And this day included a very elaborate ceremony ritual, you might say. And we find that described in Leviticus 16. I'll just read two verses out of this to hit the key points verses 15 and 21. And this is talking about what the high priest is to do on the Day of Atonement. It says, Then he, the high priest, shall kill the goat of the sin offering, which is for the people, bring its blood inside the veil of the tabernacle, do with that blood, as he did with the blood of the bull, and sprinkle it on the mercy seat, and before the mercy seat. The mercy seat is the small tabernacle with the carobum over it that represented the throne of God.

So we see here that the high priest was to present two male goats on this day. And the first, which we just read about, is sacrificed for the nation's sins. And then after the sins of the nation are symbolically placed, or after that, after the first goat has been slain, then the sins of the nation are symbolically placed on the second goat. And it is expelled away into the wilderness, as we read in verse 21, which says, Aaron, or the high priest, shall lay both his hands on the head of the live goat, confess over it all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions concerning all their sins, putting them on the head of the goat, and shall send it away into the wilderness by the hand of a suitable man.

So what does this day teach and reveal to us about Jesus Christ's roles? Is he also at the center of this holy day? Well, yes, he is. On the Day of Atonement, we normally or typically focus on the goat that is sent away into the wilderness, the goat that represents the being who is responsible for the sins of mankind. But as we see here, there are two goats. Two goats, two very different fates. The goats represent two very different things. The first goat that is sacrificed as an offering represents Jesus Christ. And he represents the first of the goats that is slain for the sins of the people. Let's take a look now at Hebrews 13 and verses 11 and 12. And this is actually a specific reference to the Day of Atonement and about Christ being symbolic of the male goat and the other animals, the bull that we read that was mentioned earlier, slain on that day as offerings, as sin offerings. And Hebrews 13 verse 11 says here, For the bodies of those animals whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin are burned outside the camp. So this included the goat and the bull. The remains were carried outside the camp of Israel and were burned outside the camp. And this is, I didn't include this in my notes, but Leviticus 16 verse 27 explicitly says this, that the remains of those sacrificed animals were to be taken outside the camp and burned there. So this is specifically talking about the goat that is killed on the Day of Atonement. And then here is the connection with Jesus Christ in verse 12. Therefore Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered outside the gate, or outside the camp, referring to outside the city walls of Jerusalem. As the goat was killed and its remains taken outside and burned outside the camp, the bounds of the camp of Israel, so was Jesus Christ executed, put to death outside the city walls of Jerusalem, outside of the gate, as it's referred to here. So this passage directly links Jesus Christ to that first goat that is slain on the Day of Atonement. So the Day of Atonement is all about mankind becoming reconciled or becoming at one. That's the meaning of atone, at one.

To be reconciled, to become at one with God. But two things are necessary for that to happen.

For us to be reconciled to God. One is that the death penalty has to be paid for our sins which have separated us from God. They've cut us off. And the other, the thing that has to happen, is that the source of sin and spiritual deception has to be removed.

So not only does the Day of Atonement depict Christ's sacrifice for sin and our need for spiritual reconciliation with God, but Jesus Christ is also directly involved in the symbolism of the other goat that is carried away into the desert. The second goat over which the sins, over which the high priest confesses the sins of the Israelites, represents the instigator of those sins, Satan the devil. And at Christ's coming, at his second coming, he will instruct a powerful angel to bind Satan and to put him away in a place of restraint, exiling him from contact with humanity just as the goat in ancient Israel was exiled into the wilderness. So he would no longer have any contact with human beings. And we read about this over in Revelation 20 and verses 1 and 2. Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, having the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. And he laid hold of the dragon, that serpent of old, who is the devil in Satan and bound him for a thousand years. So Christ does play a dual role in the symbolism of the Day of Atonement. He is sacrificed as the first goat was sacrificed for the sins of the people, and also as King of Kings and Lord of Lords, he will be involved in banishing Satan so he will no longer be able to influence and affect human beings, so that the kingdom of God can be established there on earth. And that brings us to the next of God's festivals, which is the Feast of Tabernacles. In the Old Testament, what did the Feast of Tabernacles represent?

It's probably a passage we're familiar with, but probably haven't read it in a while.

But it represented something very different from our understanding. We read about it in Leviticus 23 verses 42 and 43. And here it says, All who are native Israelites shall dwell in booths or tabernacles, that your generations may know that I made the children of Israel dwell in booths or tabernacles when I brought them out of the land of Egypt. So what does the... this was the symbolism of the Feast of Booths before Jesus Christ came. It was a reminder of the time they spent living, dwelling, and temporary dwellings when they came up out of Egypt. So what does it have to do with Jesus Christ then? What does it teach us about His role in the future? Well, let's notice Daniel 7 verses 13 and 14. And here Daniel is describing one of the many unusual mind-blowing visions that he experienced as a prophet of God. And he says, I was watching in the night visions, and behold, one like the Son of Man, coming with the clouds of heaven.

He came to the ancient of days, and they brought him near before him.

Now what do these terms mean? The ancient of days and one like a Son of Man?

Well, we have to understand when Daniel sees this, he sees two different beings, the ancient of days and one like a Son of Man. Why doesn't he call him God the Father and the Son? Well, because that father-son relationship did not exist at the time Daniel saw this vision. Jesus Christ would not come for a number of more centuries to be born as a physical human being and become the Son of God. So they're not in a father-son relationship yet. They're in a God and God relationship, you might say, as we read about in John 1.

So Daniel then uses these terms to describe them, the ancient of days, who's obviously the one we know as God the Father, and one like the Son of Man, the one who would become born a physical human being that we would know as Jesus Christ. So the one like the Son of Man is brought before the ancient of days. And then notice what happens in the next verse, verse 14, Then to him, the one like a Son of Man, was given dominion and glory, and a kingdom that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away, and his kingdom the one which shall not be destroyed. So this is describing God the Father, giving to the one who would become Jesus Christ a kingdom, a very special kingdom, a kingdom very different from any kingdoms of the world. It would be a kingdom in which all peoples, all nations, people of all languages throughout the earth would serve him. And it is an everlasting kingdom which shall never pass away, and never be destroyed. What we see being described here is God the Father giving the kingdom of God to the Son, the kingdom which he will establish on earth at his return. And what will that kingdom be like? We've heard many, many sermons, read many, many passages over it, but I'll just draw our attention to just a few that specifically mention the role of Jesus Christ in that coming kingdom. Familiar passage, Isaiah 2 verses 2-4.

Now it shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the Lord's house, and mountain we know is symbolic of kingdoms or of governments, the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established on the top of the mountains. It will be higher, greater than any other kingdoms or governments of the earth, and shall be exalted above the hills, the smaller governments and kingdoms, and all nations shall flow to it. Many people shall come and say, come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob.

He will teach us his ways, and we shall walk in its paths, for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. So who is the Lord that is being talked about? Here it is none other than Jesus Christ in his glorified form at his return. Continuing with what he will do, verse 4, He shall judge between the nations, and rebuke many people. They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nations shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore. And another prophecy of this time, very familiar, Zechariah 14, and verses 8 and 9, I'll read this from the New Living Translation, On that day life-giving water shall flow out from Jerusalem, half toward the Dead Sea, and half toward the Mediterranean, flowing continuously both in summer and in winter. And the Lord, Jesus Christ, shall be king over all the earth. On that day there shall be one Lord, his name alone will be worshipped. So we see here that he will indeed be king over all the earth.

And no other gods, no other deities, no other imaginary gods will be worshipped. He alone will be worshipped as king over all the earth. And one other passage here. What did Jesus Christ himself say about his role? What he would do when he is king of kings and Lord of lords? We've covered this earlier in our gospel studies, but Luke 4, verses 18 and 19, he describes his mission here. This is when he teaches in the synagogue there at Nazareth, his hometown. And he says, The Spirit of the Eternal is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord. And there will of course be a lot of that that will have to happen at Christ's return, because he will return to a world that is shattered and devastated by the end-time events that we read about in Scripture that are to take place. And he will need to heal the brokenhearted. He will need to free the captives. He will need to preach the good news to an entire world there, and to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord. So although he started that work during his physical ministry two thousand years ago, it is during the time of his kingdom, after his return, that this will truly come to pass, and the whole world will receive that good news and that kind of healing that it needs so desperately. And one other scripture here, Revelation 20 and verse 6 about this, and this describes our role in helping, in assisting Jesus Christ at that time.

So what we see from these passages, and again you could cite many, many more about this, is that Jesus Christ is clearly at the center of the Feast of Tabernacles as well. When as the ruler of the entire earth, he will reign with his saints and teach mankind the way of God for a thousand years.

And that brings us to the last of God's festivals. After the Feast of Tabernacles is a separate feast called the Eighth Day. And what does this feast have to do with Jesus Christ?

Well, it will be a continuation of the Feast of Tabernacles, you might say, in terms of God's government existing on earth, ruling over a number of physical human beings. But there are important distinctions as well that we'll read about here. First in John 7, let's see the meaning of this Eighth Day. And this is an account of Jesus Christ's last Feast of Tabernacles on earth.

And we find him declaring the significance of this day, what it means in God's plan for mankind's salvation. Verse 37, on that last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, If anyone thirst, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water. So he is talking about the time of his return to earth, when he will freely offer for the first time God's Holy Spirit to everyone.

Right now God's Spirit is only given to the firstfruits, those of us called right now in this age.

But eventually the time is coming when all who believe in him will have access. To that Spirit will receive God's gift of repentance and baptism and receiving God's Spirit. Jesus died not just for those called now, but for all mankind, for all of those who will yet live in the future, as well as for those who have died in the past and never had the opportunity to know him and to learn about God's plan and to receive that offer of God's Holy Spirit. So during Jesus Christ's thousand-year rain over the earth, all of mankind will be offered God's Spirit during that time. But then there's all the billions of others who have never had that opportunity. And the Bible reveals that there will come a future time when Christ will offer God's Spirit to those who will rise up in a resurrection of all those who have died in the past over the thousands of years.

And we read about this in Revelation 20 and verses 11 and 12. And this happens after the millennium is completed. John writes here, Then I saw a great white throne, and him who sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away. And it's from this we also call this the great white throne judgment period from this phrase here. And I saw the dead, small and great, standing before God. And books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the book of life.

And the dead were judged, according to their works, by the things which were written in the books.

So this period again is called the great white throne judgment. It is a period of judgment.

But in terms of how this relates to Jesus Christ, who is doing the judgment?

Who is doing the judgment of all of the billions of people who have ever lived during this time? Well, let's look at it. Romans 14 and verse 10.

Paul writes here to the Romans, But why do you judge your brother?

Or why do you show contempt for your brother? For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. We shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. So who is doing the judging?

As it says here, all, we will all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. Let's notice also Jesus Christ's own words in John chapter 5 verses 22 and 26 and 27. We covered this a while back in our gospel studies. And he says here, For the Father judges no one, but has committed or entrusted or given all judgment to the Son. For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself, and has given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man. Because He is the Son of Man. Jesus adds a bit of explanation there as to why God has entrusted given to Him all judgment. So Christ will do the judging because He has lived as a physical human being. And He knows what it's like. He's not some judge who is far removed from the reality of this physical existence. He's lived it. He's walked a mile in our shoes, many miles in our shoes. He's been tempted in every way as we are, yet without ever sinning. And He will be a perfectly fair and honest and wise and understanding judge. Now we understand that this time of the Great White Throne Judgment isn't talking about a time of where people are resurrected and immediately condemned to the Lake of Fire, but is actually a judgment period over time. It is an evaluation period over time. Since the Book of Life is open, meaning what does that mean? It means that the opportunity is opened for people to receive God's Spirit and to have their names written in the Book of Life. The Book of Life isn't sealed and shut. It will be open during this period for other names to be added. So we see that Christ will also carry out a central role in this final feast.

That of lovingly and mercifully offering billions of people an opportunity for salvation and to have their names inscribed in the Book of Life.

So to wrap this up then, we see from this brief outline that the seven feasts of the Bible are indeed a shadow of things to come. And Jesus Christ is at the center of every one of them.

Christ is our Passover. He is our true, unleavened bread, the bread of life who purifies us.

He's the giver of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. He's the coming king whose arrival is announced by the blast of trumpets. He's the one who banishes Satan for a thousand years. He's the one who serves mankind as the King of Kings and Lord of Lords over the entire earth. And finally, He is the judge of all mankind and the judge who will offer the great majority an opportunity to have their names written in the Book of Life. And this is why God's Church keeps these feasts. This is why these holy feasts are still to be kept today to remind us, to reveal to us, to help us to understand God's great plan, as well as the central role of Jesus Christ in carrying out that great plan.

He is the common thread that runs through every one of God's festivals and at the center of them.

He is the one who demonstrates to us that God's great plan will come to pass. And that is something that we can be absolutely sure of.