Message 179
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Scripture Reading: Exo. 34
Verses 18 through 35 of Exodus 34 cover three important matters: God’s charge to His people to feast and rest with Him, five conditions for enjoying the Lord, and God’s infusion into Moses. In this message we shall consider the charge related to feasting and resting with the Lord.
In verse 18 the Lord says, “You shall keep the feast of unleavened bread: seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, as I commanded you, at the appointed time of the month of Abib; for in the month of Abib you came out of Egypt.” Then in verses 21 and 22 He goes on to speak of keeping the Sabbath and observing the feast of weeks and the feast of ingathering. In these verses God commanded the people to feast with Him and rest with Him. If I had been Moses, I might have said, “Lord, when You called me to come to the mountaintop, You told me to bring two tablets. You promised to rewrite the Ten Commandments on these tablets. But now You wouldn’t say a word about these commandments. Instead, You are telling me that we should feast with You and rest with You.”
It was not God’s intention that His people would try to keep the Ten Commandments. God’s intention was to command His people to enjoy Him — to feast with Him and rest in Him. This is contrary to our natural desire to want always to do something for God.
Consider the parable of the prodigal son in Luke 15. When the prodigal son came back to his father, he said to the father, “Make me as one of your hired servants” (Luke 15:19). This indicates that the returned prodigal wanted to do something for his father. The father, however, did not have the heart to listen to that kind of talk. Immediately he said to the servants, “Bring the fattened calf; slaughter it, and let us eat and be merry” (v. 23). The father’s desire was that they all would have a feast. In feasting together they would have enjoyment and rest.
Moses did not know that it was not God’s intention to charge His people to keep His commandments. The keeping of the commandments must be secondary; it must be the issue of feasting with the Lord and resting with Him. If the children of Israel would feast with the Lord properly and rest with Him continually, they would not have a problem in keeping the Ten Commandments.
This principle also applies to us today. If we feast with the Lord every day and rest with Him during the day, everything will be all right in our daily living. However, a brother may endeavor to be a good husband without feasting with the Lord and resting in Him. Likewise, a sister may try to be a good wife without this feasting and resting. But if we do not feast with the Lord and rest in Him, we shall be a poor husband or wife. Instead of trying to fulfill Ephesians 5, we should simply feast with the Lord a number of times during the day. In the morning we should enjoy the feast of unleavened bread; during the day, the feast of Pentecost; and in the evening, the feast of tabernacles. The children of Israel enjoyed these feasts yearly, but we should enjoy them daily. Furthermore, we should rest with the Lord many times throughout the day. The children of Israel had a Sabbath once a week, but we should have a Sabbath rest many times during the day. Actually, every hour, we should rest with the Lord. If we feast with the Lord and rest in Him in this way, we shall surely experience Ephesians 5.
According to the Old Testament, God had ordained that seven feasts be observed annually by the children of Israel: the Passover, the feast of unleavened bread, the feast of firstfruit, the feast of weeks (Pentecost), the feast of trumpets, the feast of atonement, and the feast of tabernacles (also called the feast of ingathering or harvest). The feast of unleavened bread was held immediately after the feast of Passover in the month of Abib, at the beginning of the year. Abib, the first month of the year, indicates a new beginning. The word Abib means a tender sprout. In a very real sense, the feast of the Passover and the feast of unleavened bread were one feast. We may say that the first day was the feast of Passover and the following days were the feast of unleavened bread. This indicates that immediately after we enjoy the Passover, we need to cleanse ourselves of all leaven in order to keep the feast of unleavened bread. For us today to keep the feast of unleavened bread means that we live a clean life, a life without sin, without leaven.
The feast of firstfruit issues in the feast of Pentecost. Between the feasts of unleavened bread and of ingathering, there is some enjoyment of the produce of the good land during the feast of firstfruit. Toward the end of the year, at the feast of ingathering, God’s people had the full enjoyment of the produce of the good land.
The feasts in Exodus 34 are all for enjoyment. At the beginning we may say that we have sowing and farming, and then we start to enjoy the produce. But at the end we have the full harvest for our full enjoyment. The feasts that were observed in the intervals were not as crucial as far as the enjoyment of the good land was concerned. The important point here is that the record in Exodus 34 indicates that God wanted His people to have the full enjoyment of the good land.
In addition to the feasts, the children of Israel were to keep the Sabbath every week. No matter how busy they were, they had to take one day a week to stop work and rest with the Lord.
In these verses in Exodus 34 we have feasting and resting. These are two matters for us to enjoy today. Every day we need to feast and rest. It is not possible for us to feast all day long. However, we can enjoy a feast three times a day, at morning, at noon, and in the evening. Moreover, we need to rest with the Lord many times during the day. At least three times a day we should feast with the Lord, and many times a day we should rest with Him. Again and again we should take a break to remember the Lord and rest with Him. Suppose we took a break every twenty minutes to enjoy a rest with the Lord. If we deduct eight hours spent in sleeping, this would allow us to rest with the Lord at least forty-eight times during the day. How good it would be to have a Sabbath every twenty minutes!
The significance of the Sabbath is that it is a time to remember the Lord, a time to remember our Creator. If we do not take the time for a Sabbath rest, this means that we forget the Lord. But whenever we have a Sabbath, we remember Him. Certainly it is not too much for us to remember the Lord every fifteen or twenty minutes. Let us practice to remember the Lord and rest in Him time after time during the day.
As we have pointed out, 34:18 does not mention the feast of Passover, but the feast of unleavened bread. The reason is that the concern here is not salvation; it is our fellowship with God. We have already been saved, but what is the situation with respect to our fellowship with the Lord? If we desire to maintain fellowship with God, we need to clear away all the leaven from our lives. This is to keep the feast of unleavened bread.
The second feast spoken of in chapter thirty-four is the feast of weeks, which came in between the feast of unleavened bread and the feast of ingathering. The feast of weeks or Pentecost is the full issue of resurrection life. We know that the feast of weeks is observed seven weeks after the feast of firstfruit. This is my reason for saying that the feast of Pentecost is the full issue of the feast of firstfruit. Firstfruit produces Pentecost. This is true both in the type in the Old Testament and in the fulfillment of the type in the New Testament.
The firstfruit signifies the resurrected Christ. Christ was the first one raised from among the dead as the firstfruit of resurrection (1 Cor. 15:20). This was typified by the firstfruits in Leviticus 23:10-11 offered to God on the day after the Sabbath, the day of resurrection (Matt. 28:1).
From the day of Christ’s resurrection to the day of Pentecost was exactly fifty days. After His resurrection, the Lord Jesus stayed with the disciples for forty days. Then He left them and ascended to the heavens. Following that, the dis-ciples prayed for ten days. Then on the day of Pentecost (Pentecost means fifty), fifty days after the resurrection of Christ, there was the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. The outpouring of the Holy Spirit was the full issue of the resurrected Christ. The resurrected Christ was the firstfruit, the barley sheaf, on the day of resurrection. Then this resurrected Christ had a full issue manifested on the day of Pentecost. This means that the resurrected Christ became the Spirit poured out upon His believers for their full enjoyment.
As I consider the feasts in the Old Testament and their fulfillment in the New, I am convinced once again that the Bible is the Word of God. The Bible is not a book written according to the human mentality. No, the Bible truly is the divine revelation. Augustine once said that the New Testament is concealed in the Old and that the Old is expressed in the New. This understanding is correct. Regarding the types of the feasts and their fulfillment, we see that the New Testament and the Old Testament correspond to each other.
We need to clear all the leaven, all the sinful things, out of our daily life so that we may have the enjoyment of Christ. This means that if we have the feast of unleavened bread, we shall also have the feast of Pentecost for the enjoyment of Christ. We have seen that daily we need to take Christ as the sin offering and the trespass offering. If we apply Christ in this way every morning, we shall clear away the leaven from our daily life. This will lead us to a daily Pentecost, to the daily enjoyment of Christ. Then at the end of the day we shall have a time of ingathering, a time of harvest. Ingathering means to gather in the full harvest of produce in order to have a full enjoyment. To experience the feast of ingathering is to dwell with God in the full enjoyment of Christ. How marvelous it would be to have a feast of ingathering every evening! To end the day with a feast of ingathering is to enjoy the Lord in a full way as we dwell with God. This is the real feast of tabernacles.
However, many saints do not have the feast of unleavened bread in the morning. Neither do they enjoy the feast of Pentecost during the day. As a result, at the end of the day there is no feast of ingathering, no feast of tabernacles. Often our situation has been like this. But now we see that daily we need to feast with the Lord and rest with Him. Daily we should enjoy Christ as the feast of unleavened bread, the feast of weeks, and the feast of ingathering, and daily we should have many Sabbaths to remember the Lord and rest in Him.
Let us now go on to consider 34:23 and 24: “Three times in the year every male shall appear before the Lord Jehovah, the God of Israel. For I will dispossess the nations from before you and enlarge your borders, and no one shall covet your land when you go up to appear before Jehovah your God three times in the year.” In these verses we have a very crucial matter indicated by the word “for” at the beginning of verse 24. This word indicates the reason we need to enjoy the Lord as the feast of unleavened bread, the feast of weeks, and the feast of ingathering. According to verses 23 and 24, every male was to appear before the Lord three times a year, for the Lord would dispossess the nations and enlarge the borders for the children of Israel. The nations had been possessing the land. But the Lord promised that He would dispossess them, that He would drive them away. Furthermore, the Lord promised to enlarge the borders for the children of Israel. This signifies the enlargement of our capacity to enjoy Christ.
Perhaps some of the children of Israel said to themselves, “If we spend seven days at the feast of unleavened bread, none of the males will be available to stand guard against the enemy. Suppose the Philistines attack our land during the feast? How would we be able to defend ourselves?” Here the Lord seems to be saying, “You may all be at peace. If you go up to feast with Me three times a year, this feasting will keep away the covetous enemy from your land.”
The principle here is very significant. The Lord’s word about dispossessing the nations and enlarging the borders indicates that if we do not care for the enjoyment of the Lord, the enemies will come to attack us. For example, if you do not enjoy the Lord daily, you may be attacked and overcome by your temper. Furthermore, many other things will come in to take you over. However, if you take care of the enjoyment of the Lord, this enjoyment will keep the evil ones away from you.
I would call your attention to the word “covet” in verse 24. Many negative things covet us and desire to take us over. However, because of our lack of understanding, we may still expect the enemies to be kept away from us even when we do not enjoy the Lord. But from experience we know that if we do not enjoy the Lord, many “germs” will attack us. We may use our physical body as an illustration. If you want to have a healthy body, you need to eat properly and have a sound diet. If you eat healthy food, many “bugs” will be killed, and many germs will be kept away from you. This is an illustration of the fact that the best way to fight against the enemy is to enjoy the Lord.
I can testify that the enjoying of the Lord is the real fighting against the enemy. We fight by feasting. Every day I fight against disease germs by eating healthy food. I do not know how many germs have been defeated through my daily diet of healthy food. In the same principle, we need to enjoy the Lord daily by feasting with Him. If we care for the enjoyment of the Lord, the enemies will be kept away from us. This is marvelous!
We should not fear that the enemy will come in to attack us while we are taking the time to enjoy the Lord. According to the Lord’s promise in 34:23 and 24, we may be at peace. If we take care of feasting with the Lord, He will take care of the covetous enemy. Actually, our enjoyment of the Lord will keep the enemy away.
The Lord has promised to dispossess the nations, enlarge the borders of the good land, and keep away the coveting enemies from the good land. This means that He will demolish all our preoccupations and usurpations, enlarge the borders of Christ, and guard the enjoyment of Christ.
