Dive deep into an exploration of Jesus’ life and traditions, where we unravel the undeniable Jewish heritage of Jesus and its profound implications on Christianity today. In this episode, Ronald Dart guides us through the customs observed by Jesus, emphasizing the significance of the Sabbath and the Feast of Tabernacles. These customs, once unmistakably linked to Jewish tradition, are brought into a new light, offering Christians a richer understanding of their faith. As the podcast progresses, we are introduced to the fascinating prophecy from the book of Zechariah, shedding light on the end times and the pivotal role Jerusalem
The CEM Network is pleased to present Ronald L. Dart and Born to Win.
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There are some things about Jesus that are bound to be troubling to a Christian reading the New Testament. That is, if you’re reading the New Testament carefully and thinking about what you read. It’s a testimony to the hateful anti-Semitism that still exists, that some people get real uncomfortable when I remind them that Jesus was, after all, a Jew. Jesus was observing the Sabbath day every week of his life. Oh, sure, he rejected the Pharisees’ interpretation of Sabbath observance, but he was in the synagogue every Sabbath day. It was his custom, and he observed the Sabbath by abstaining from ordinary labor. He also observed all the religious festivals of the Jews. Every year of his life, he made the pilgrimage to Jerusalem to keep the Feast of Tabernacles. To have failed to do so would have been to break the written law of God, something that Jesus never did. In John 7, verse 2, now the Jews’ Feast of Tabernacles was at hand, and his brethren, now we’re talking at this point about Jesus’ real brothers. I hate to disillusion anyone, but Mary had other sons after Jesus, and they were his brothers. And they said to him, Now depart hence and go on into Judea, that your disciples may see the works that you do. Because no man does this kind of thing in secret. You’ve got to be known openly. If you do these things, go show yourself to the world. And John makes the comment, for neither did his brethren believe in him. And I suppose that’s inevitable, you know, that your own brothers would give you a bad time about this and would not believe it. Jesus said to them, well, my time has not come, but your time is always ready. The world cannot hate you, but me it hates, because I testify of it that the works are evil. And I guess that’s true. You get out there and you start telling the world that their works are evil in the sight of God, and they are not going to be happy with what you have to say. And the truth is that Jesus was under, if not verbal assault, attempted literal assault, much of the time during his ministry. So he had to be careful. He told his brothers, you go on up to the feast. I’m not quite ready yet. And when he had said these things, he stayed in Galilee. And after they had already gone up, he went up also to the feast, not openly, but as it were, in secret. It may seem strange that Jesus could go up in secret. You realize what the man had been doing. But you have to remember, this was an age without television, without newspapers, and no pictures. Relatively few people would recognize him, although nearly everyone had heard of him. And Jerusalem was thronged at the Feast of Tabernacles with hundreds of thousands of people. Now, there’s a peculiar Christian conceit that dismisses all things Jewish as though it were another religion and another god. And because of this, we sometimes fail to recognize things that are vitally important. We fail to pay attention to things like the Feast of Tabernacles. It’s a strange festival. It’s a festival of the Jews. It doesn’t apply to us. All that law was done away with, we think. Well, not all of us think that. As far as we know, the original command to keep the Feast of Tabernacles is found in Leviticus 23, chapter 23, and verse 34. God spoke to Moses and said this. He said, And no, that’s not July 15th. Israel used a different calendar. Their calendar actually began in the spring, just a little while before Easter. The 15th day of the 7th month is, in most years, going to be somewhere in early October. But it moves, moves around on the calendar that we use. The 15th day of the seventh month shall be the Feast of Tabernacles for seven days to the Lord. On the first day, there’s to be a holy convocation. A holy convocation is a commanded assembly. It’s, I guess you’d say for Israel, it was the equivalent of you’re going to church. They gathered themselves up, they went to assembly point, and they worshipped God there on that occasion. In other words, the first day of the feast was a rest day or Sabbath, a day to go to church, as it were. God continues speaking and says, “…seven days you will offer an offering made by fire to the Lord, and then the eighth day shall be a holy convocation to you. Once again you make an offering by fire to God.” It’s a solemn assembly. Ah, now we’re going to church again. “…and you shall do no servile work therein.” Ah, it’s a day of rest. The distinction, by the way, of servile work allows for the preparation of food. It just means you don’t do your work in the fields, the normal hard work that you do six days a week. So this was an eight-day festival with the first and last days being holy days or Sabbath days. There was a weekly Sabbath, and there were annual Sabbaths or holy days in Israel’s calendar. Now he goes on and explains further about this Feast of Tabernacles, and here’s where the name actually comes from. “…in the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when you have gathered in the fruit of the land.” Oops, got to pause for a moment. There were two major harvests in Palestine at that time. This spring harvest was the grain harvest. It generally started at Passover and was over by Pentecost. The harvest in the autumn was the fruit harvest primarily. And so he says in this 15th day of the seventh month, when you have gathered in the fruit of the land, you shall keep a feast of the Lord seven days. On the first day is a Sabbath, and the eighth day shall be a Sabbath. And he shall take to you on the first day of the boughs of goodly trees, branches of palm trees, the boughs of thick trees, willows of the brook, and you shall rejoice before the Lord your God seven days. Now, what in the world are you supposed to do with all these tree branches? Well, he’s going to explain that. You shall keep it a feast to the Lord seven days in the year. It shall be a statute forever in your generations. You shall celebrate it in the seventh month. You shall dwell in booths, that’s another word for tabernacle, and a tabernacle is just a temporary shelter. You shall dwell in booths seven days. All that are Israelites born shall dwell in booths, that your generation may know that I made the children of Israel to dwell in booths when I brought them out of the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God. Okay, so now we understand where the Feast of Tabernacles originated, what it was all about. It had to do with a reminder to Israel that they wandered around 40 years in the desert, living in tents, living under shelters. It was kind of a brush arbor thing for all those years. I can’t help but wonder sometimes if the old-fashioned southern brush arbor revival meeting comes from this, that you build yourself a tabernacle out of branches of trees. I remember when I was just a boy attending one of these things, not all that far from my grandfather’s farm. It was a very emotional time because this particular branch of religion was a very emotional group of people. They met under this brush arbor. They sang songs. They prayed. It was one of those where they all knelt down and everybody prayed aloud at the same time and sang different things. It was quite a thing for a young boy to watch. It was, however, a kind of tabernacle. Now, you would think, in reading this passage, that this is strictly an Israelite festival. It is connected to an important event in their history. Here in the United States, we celebrate our independence on July 4th. But the British, from whom we declared our independence, don’t even notice July 4th. Christians now who are not Jews feel justified in ignoring the day, even though Jesus and the apostles observed it. After all, they were Jews, weren’t they? Well, there is a problem with this. I’ll explain what that problem is when I come back after this message.
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When was Christ born? Everyone thinks it was December 25th, but was it really? The Bible tells us more about the birth of Christ than you think. To find out more, write for a free copy of the program titled The Birth of Christ. Write to Born to Win, Post Office Box 560, White House, Texas 75791. Or call toll free 1-888-BIBLE44.
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In the next to the last book in the Old Testament, the book of Zechariah, there’s a fascinating prophecy of the end time. In chapter 14 and verse 1, Zechariah first of all establishes the time he’s talking about. He says, “…behold, the day of the Lord comes, and your spoils shall be divided in the midst of you.” For the time being, I’m going to ask you to take my word for it that the day of the Lord is talking about the end time. He says, I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle. The city shall be taken, the houses rifled, the women ravished, and half the city shall go into captivity. The rest of the people will not be cut off from the city. Now, Zechariah, along with other prophets, foretells a yet future captivity for the city of Jerusalem. Then he says the Lord will go forth, and he’ll fight against those nations as he fought in the day of battle. His feet shall stand in that day upon the Mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east, and the Mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof toward the east and toward the west. And there’ll be a very great valley, and half the mountain shall remove to the north and half of it toward the south. Man, it’s like the Mount of Olives gets split really four ways in a giant earthquake. Now, this hasn’t happened yet. It’s still sitting there, and it’s all intact. It’s out there in the future someplace. It involves the return of Christ, who will put his feet on the Mount of Olives in a great battle being fought, the battle we call Armageddon. Later, in verse 12, he says, Now, if you wonder where they got the idea in Raiders of the Lost Ark for those effects, when they opened the Ark at the end of the movie, it comes from something like what we read just here. In verse 13, it shall come to pass in that day that a great tumult from the Lord shall be among them, and they’ll lay hold, everyone, on the hand of his neighbor, and his hand shall rise up against the hand of his neighbor. Great confusion. Everybody’s going to be fighting against everybody else. And Judah also shall fight at Jerusalem, and the wealth of all the heathen round about shall be gathered together, gold, silver, and apparel in great abundance. And God’s going to destroy them. Now, in verse 16, this is where it starts getting interesting. You’ve got the pattern, got the picture. We’re at the end time, the battle of the great day of God Almighty called Armageddon and so forth. And it shall come to pass after this great battle is over that everyone that is left of all the nations that came against Jerusalem shall even go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the Feast of Tabernacles. Now, isn’t that odd? If this were nothing but a Jewish festival, if it had nothing to do with anything except a reminder to the Jews of the years they dwelt in tents on their way out of Egypt going to the Promised Land, if that was all that we’re all about, why on earth are the Gentiles, because that’s what the word nations means, why on earth are the Gentiles going to be keeping the Feast of Tabernacles? You can understand why God would require them to come to Jerusalem to worship and do obeisance to Him, but why keep the Feast? Now, mind you, the commandment to all who were Israelite-born was to keep the Feast of Booths by dwelling in booths because of their wilderness wanderings. Those not Israelite-born obviously didn’t need to build booths for that reason, but they’re still going to be required to keep the Feast of Tabernacles. Now, apparently, and this is my conclusion from this combination of things, this festival has one meaning for the Jews— and another meaning for mankind in general. But, according to Zechariah, all men must keep the feast. In fact, they are severely sanctioned if they don’t. In verse 17 we read, And it shall be that whosoever will not come up of all the families of the earth unto Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, even upon them there shall be no rain.” But, of course, then there’s Egypt that doesn’t get rain anyway. If the family of Egypt go not or come not up that have no rain, then there shall be the plague wherewith the Lord will smite the heathen that come not up to keep the feast of tabernacles. This shall be the punishment of Egypt and all the nations that come not up to keep the feast of tabernacles. He really grinds that in, doesn’t he? It’s over and over and over again. At the end time, the nations are required to come up and to keep the Feast of Tabernacles. Now, what are you and I to make of all this here down in the 20th century, looking ahead to this time and wondering what that means? Well, the first thing we should get straight is, is that the Feast of Tabernacles is not merely a feast of the Jews. If we had any question about that, that ought to be resolved right now. In fact, we don’t have any way of knowing whether the Feast of Tabernacles really originated with Leviticus 23, when God explained it to them, or whether it was one of God’s appointed times even before that, and that the meaning that was attached to it for Israel was dwelling in tabernacles. We don’t know one way or the other. But we really need to understand one statement that is made in Leviticus 23, verse 2. God said, Speak to the children of Israel and say unto them, Concerning the feasts of the Lord, which you shall proclaim to be holy convocations, even these are my feasts. Whose? God’s feasts. Actually, the Hebrew word for this is that these are the appointed times of God. They are not Jewish holidays. Now, they became Israelite as historical events were connected to them, but that’s not all there is to them. One of the most fundamental illustrations of this is the Passover. For Jews, the Passover is inexorably and forever tied to the exodus from Egypt, right? There’s no way they could think of it in other terms. It’s a festival of freedom, of being released from slavery. For the Christian, it’s inexorably tied to the death of Jesus. Is it just possible that both of these meanings of the Passover were within the scope of God’s plan from the beginning? Listen to how Paul approaches this subject with a Gentile church. Remember now, the Days of Unleavened Bread and the Passover are in the spring. They are in the first month of the Hebrew calendar, which basically turns out to be sometime usually in April in our calendar. Passover is oftentimes very close to Easter. Paul writes to the Corinthians at this time of year and says, It’s reported commonly that there is fornication among you and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles that one should have his father’s wife. And you are puffed up and have not rather mourned that he that has done this deed might be taken away from you. Now that’s a real funny thing for Paul to say, you are puffed up. I mean, there are a lot of things he might have said, but why in the world would he have chosen that analogy? Well, the reason is simple. It’s because these were being written at the time of the Passover and the Days of Unleavened Bread when the bread was not puffed up. And it’s a deliberate illusion on his part. Commentators see this pretty clearly, I think. You are puffed up. And I verily as absent in body but present in spirit have judged already as though I were present concerning him that has done this deed. In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when you are gathered together in my spirit with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. Okay? We’re going to basically excommunicate this poor guy is what he’s talking about. Then he says, Your glorying is not good. Don’t you know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump? Now, just a little historical reference here. The leavening that was used by these people in this time was basically sourdough. In other words, you would keep a little lump from your last loaf of bread somewhere in a cool place. When you got ready to make a new one, you would take your lump of starter, and you would work it into the new dough, and you would set it aside and allow it to rise. A little small lump. of leavening, eventually leavens a large lump of dough. Paul says, concerning this man who was among them, who was a kind of leavening in the church, he was corrupting the entire church by his presence. He says in verse 7, purge out therefore the old leaven. In other words, get this man out of the church. That you may be a new lump of In other words, if you take a new batch of dough and you work it in together into a nice lump of dough, it’s brand new, but it has no leavening in it. Purge out the leaven that you may be a new lump as you are unleavened. Now, let’s double talk. Why do you tell someone to get the leavening out so you can be a new lump as you are unleavened? If they are unleavened, what are you doing putting leavening out? Well, Coney Barron Housen, who are two authorities on the epistles of Paul, long ago made the statement that it’s clear from this that this was written during the days of unleavened bread and that the church in Corinth, the Gentile church in Corinth, was going right along with their Jewish brethren and putting leavening out of their houses. He is saying, purge out this old leaven, this metaphorical leaven, that you may be a new lump in the metaphorical sense that you may be unleavened, even as you are literally unleavened. For even Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed for us. Now to the Jews, the Passover lamb was killed on the 14th day of the first month. And then they entered into the Passover service that night and on through seven days of unleavened bread. Paul says, Christ is Passover to Christians. Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed for us. Therefore, Paul continues, let us keep the feast. Good grief. What feast? Here’s the Apostle Paul writing to a Gentile church 30 years, no, 25 years after the death of Jesus and his ascension to heaven. And he’s writing to them saying, let’s keep the feast. What feast? Well, listen. Let’s keep the feast. Not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. So here was a New Testament church observing the Passover and the days of unleavened bread. And why not? The symbolism of the Passover is rich in the symbolism of the ministry and the works of Jesus Christ. Passover, the days of unleavened bread, are loaded with all the typology of Christianity. And it’s odd, in a way, that we abandon all that and go for all the symbolism that surrounds Easter with rabbits and eggs and all that sort of thing. And some people think that unleavened bread looks silly. But the truth is that all those things have every bit as much meaning for Christians as they do for Jews, perhaps more. It really is astonishing in a way that Christians don’t keep the days of unleavened bread, isn’t it? I’ll be back in a moment and we’ll talk some more about this.
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For a free copy of this radio program that you can share with friends and others, write or call this week only and request the program titled The Words of Jesus, number 26. Write to Born to Win, Post Office Box 560, White House, Texas 75791. Or call toll-free 1-888-BIBLE-44 and tell us the call letters of this radio station. Pentecost is the next great feast of the Jews.
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Actually, they call it the Feast of Firstfruits. They celebrate it primarily as the day of the giving of the Torah. It later on seems to take on the meaning of Feast of Firstfruits to them. But when you come to the second chapter of Acts, you find all the disciples of Jesus gathered together in one place with one accord, observing the Feast of Pentecost, and that’s the day the Holy Spirit fell on the church. And in fact, a lot of Christian churches observe Pentecost. In England, the Church of England calls it Whitsunday, which is White Sunday for the white that all the baptismal candidates wear on that day. It’s a very important day. Catholics and Church of England and some others as well celebrate Pentecost, and you would think so because that’s the day the Church was empowered with the Holy Spirit. Some call it the birthday of the New Testament Church. You know, this duality of meaning between what these days mean to the Jews and what they mean to Christians extends all the way to the Sabbath itself. The Sabbath was made at creation on the seventh day when God rested. The Sabbath, according to Jesus, it was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. Now, some people have noticed that in the two different major places where the Ten Commandments are listed, that there’s a difference in the reason why the Sabbath day was given in both places. In Exodus 20, for example, it says in verse 8, Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days shall you labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it… You shall not do any work. And then it goes on to say that not only you, but none of the people who are responsible to you have to work either. And then it gives the reason. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and everything that in them is, and rested the seventh day. So the Lord blessed the seventh day and hallowed it. When? Well, at creation. How did he hallow it? Well, to hallow is to set it apart. He set it apart from the other days by working on six days and resting, setting it apart, the seventh day. So you can see how the Sabbath is connected to creation and consequently to all men who have come on this earth from Adam. But listen to how it’s worded in the fifth chapter of Deuteronomy where the Ten Commandments are once again listed. In verse 12, Keep the Sabbath day to sanctify it as the Lord your God has commanded you. Six days shall you labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall not do any work, neither you nor your son and so forth, none of the people who are responsible to you. And then in verse 15 he says this, And remember that you were a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand, a stretched out arm. Therefore, the Lord your God commands you to keep the Sabbath day. Interesting, isn’t it? To the Jews, he says, I brought you out of Egypt. Therefore, I command you to keep the Sabbath day. Now, the emphasis on the Jews is one thing. But if you put the emphasis on the therefore, it says something a little different. Therefore, that’s the reason I’m commanding you to keep the Sabbath day. But in Exodus 12, he has a much more universal commandment regarding it. Now, there’s nothing inconsistent about God giving Israel a second reason to keep the Sabbath day beyond that which he gives to the rest of the world. I have said all that to underline the fact that there is a Jewish meaning to the Feast of Tabernacles and a Christian meaning for the Feast of Tabernacles. a fact that seems to have gotten lost in all the haste to get rid of things Jewish from Christianity. But, of course, if you’re going to get rid of everything Jewish out of Christianity, you have to get rid of Jesus as well. But throughout the Bible, including the New Testament, the tabernacle or tent is used to emphasize the temporary nature of things. Paul is at some pains to emphasize that our human body is a tabernacle and that we dwell in it temporarily, looking forward to our permanent body in the resurrection. The Feast of Tabernacles, then, is a confession that we are strangers here, pilgrims, that this world is not our home, that we look for a kingdom to come. But there’s more. John, chapter 1, verse 1. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him. Now, Christian scholars universally recognize this is talking about Jesus. And later it says in verse 14, And the Word was made flesh and tabernacled among us. Those Christians who observe the Feast of Tabernacles do so as a confession that there are strangers here, that they look for a kingdom. They do so to celebrate the coming of the Messiah in the flesh. For many of us, the Feast of Tabernacles is a Christian celebration, and it far transcends the meaning of Israel wandering around in the wilderness. It helps us look forward to the kingdom of God. I think it’s strange that Christians ignore the festivals of God. They are so rich with Christian symbolism. That really shouldn’t be a great surprise. Jesus, after all, did not come to bring a new religion. He came to restore the true worship of God.
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Until next time, this is Ronald Dart. The Born to Win radio program with Ronald L. Dart is sponsored by Christian Educational Ministries and made possible by donations from listeners like you. If you can help, please send your donation to Born to Win, Post Office Box 560 White House, Texas 75791. You may call us at 1
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