THROUGH THE BIBLE - Leviticu..

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com. That's cornerstonerbc.com. Leviticus chapter 23, and I'm going to be reading from the English Standard Version of the Bible. So, Beloved of Christ, brothers and sisters and friends, which much reverence and paying attention to each one of the words.

Let's read the life-giving, soul-saving word of our Savior, Jesus Christ. This is Leviticus chapter 23. The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, These are the appointed feasts of the Lord that you shall proclaim as holy convocations. They are my appointed feasts. Let me read that again.

Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, These are the appointed feasts of the Lord that you should proclaim as holy convocations. These are my appointed feasts. Six days shall work be done, but on the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy convocation. You shall do no work. It is a Sabbath to the Lord in all your dwelling places.

These are the appointed feasts of the Lord, the holy convocations, which you shall proclaim at the time appointed for them. In the first month, on the 14th day of the month, at twilight, is the Lord's Passover. And on the 15th day of the same month, it is the feast of unleavened bread to the Lord. For seven days, you shall eat unleavened bread. On the first day, you shall have a holy convocation.

You shall not do any ordinary work, but you shall present a food offering to the Lord for seven days. On the seventh day is a holy convocation. You shall not do any ordinary work. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, When you come into the land that I give you and reap its harvest, you shall bring the firstfruits of your harvest to the priest, and he shall weigh the sheep before the Lord, so that you may be accepted. On the day after the Sabbath, the priest shall wave it.

And on the day when you wave the sheave, you shall offer a male lamb a year old without blemish as a burnt offering to the Lord. And the grain offering with it shall be two tins of an ephah of flying flower mixed with oil, a food offering to the Lord with a pleasing aroma, and the drink offering with it shall be of wine, a fort of a hymn. And you shall eat neither bread nor grain, parched or fresh until this same day, until you have brought the offering of your God. It is a statue forever throughout your generations, in all your dwellings. And you shall count seven full weeks from the day after the Sabbath, from the day that you brought the sheaf of the wave offering.

You shall count 50 days to the day after the seventh Sabbath. Then you shall present a grain offering of new grain to the Lord. You shall bring from your dwelling places two loaves of bread to be waved, made of two tenths of an ephah. They shall be of flame flower, and they shall be baked with leaven as first fruits to the Lord. And you shall present with the bread seven lambs a year old without blemish, and one bull from the herd and two rams.

They shall be a burnt offering to the Lord, with their grain offering and their drink offering a food offering with a pleasing aroma to the Lord. And you shall offer one male goat for a sin offering, and two male lambs a year old as a sacrifice of peace offering. And the priest shall wave them with the bread of the firstfruits as a wave offering before the Lord with the two lambs. They shall be holy to the Lord for the priest. And you shall make a proclamation on the same day.

You shall hold a holy convocation. You shall not do any ordinary work. It is a statue forever in all your dwelling places throughout your generations. And when you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap your field right up to its age, nor shall you gather the gleanings after your harvest. You shall leave them for the poor and for the sojourner.

I am the Lord your God. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to the people of Israel, saying, In the seventh month, on the first day of the month, you shall observe a day of solemn rest, a memorial proclaimed with blasts of trumpets, a holy convocation. You shall not do any ordinary work, and you shall present a food offering to the Lord. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, Now on the tenth day of the seventh month is the day of atonement. It shall be for you a time of holy convocation, and you shall afflict yourselves and present a food offering to the Lord.

And you shall not do any work on that very day, for it is a day of atonement to make atonement for you before the Lord your God. For whoever is not afflicted on that very day shall be cut off from his people. And whoever does any work on that very day, that person I will destroy from among his people. You shall not do any work. It is a statue forever throughout your generations, in all your dwelling places.

It shall be to you a Sabbath of solemn rest, and you shall afflict yourselves. On the ninth day of the month, beginning at the evening, from evening to evening, shall you keep your Sabbath. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to the people of Israel, saying, On the fifteenth day of this seven month, and for seven days, is the Feast of Boots to the Lord. On the first day shall be a holy convocation. You shall not do any ordinary work.

For seven days you shall present food offerings to the Lord. On the eighth day you shall hold a holy convocation and present a food offering to the Lord. It is a solemn assembly. You shall not do any ordinary work. These are the appointed feasts of the Lord, which you shall proclaim as times of holy convocation for presenting to the Lord food offerings, burnt offerings, and grain offerings.

sacrifices and drink offerings each on its proper day, besides the Lord's Sabbath and besides your gifts and besides all your vow offerings and besides all your free will offerings which you give to the Lord. On the 15th day of the seven month, when you have gathered in the produce of the land, you shall celebrate the Feast of the Lord seven days. On the first day shall be a solemn rest. On the eighth day shall be a solemn rest. And you shall take on the first day the fruit of the splendid trees, branches of palm trees, and boughs of leafy trees, and willows of the brook.

And you shall rejoice before the Lord your God seven days. You shall celebrate it as a feast to the Lord for seven days in the year. It is a statue forever throughout your generations. You shall celebrate it in the seventh month. You shall dwell in booths for seven days.

All native Israelites shall dwell in booths that your generations may know that I made the people of Israel dwell in booths when I brought them out of the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God. Thus Moses declared to the people of Israel the appointed feasts of the Lord." Amen. That is the Word of God.

I'm just going to take this. Very good, brothers and sisters. Now we are arriving, as I said last week, we're reaching the end of the book. And we are in a very important section in which the Lord has given instructions of practical holiness to the people of Israel. They have been set apart as the people of God, and now God has given them practical instructions for how they were supposed to live as the set apart people of God.

Now, in Chapter 23, as you can see very clearly, we have this which is called the Feast of the Lord, or perhaps an easier word for me to pronounce, the Festivals. of the Lord, we're going to be given seven different festivals of the Lord to the people of Israel. But perhaps it is important for us to have a category in our mind before we get into trying to understand the different festivals of the Lord as they are given to us here in chapter 23. And this is to understand the covenantal identity of the people of Israel. the covenantal identity of the people of Israel.

You see, when a person belonged to the people of Israel, that person was relating to God in at least three different ways. A person was an Israelite as an individual. That is their identity or their covenantal identity as the people of God. They were an individual. But that person also belonged to a specific tribe.

You remember that Israel was divided in 12 different tribes. So the covenantal identity of this person was not only as an Israelite, as an individual, but also as a member of one of the 12 tribes of Israel. And beyond that, that person who as an individual was a member of the people of God, and also as a member of a particular tribe, that person was also belonging to the nation of Israel as the people of God. So that means that under the old covenant, in a sense, also under the new covenant, the identity of the people was divided in at least these three categories. There's like four, but at least three categories.

The individual Israelite as the member of the people of God, but also as a member of a particular tribe. And you remember the 12 tribes or as a member of the nation of Israel. Now, brothers and sisters, this is very important because the blessings of the old covenant or the blessings of the Mosaic covenant depended on obedience at these three levels, the individual level, the tribal level and the national level. So there's going to be laws that will be given for the person, the individual, and whatever role that person played, but also role and a specific task given to different tribes, and also specific commandments or requirements given to the nation. So that it is that righteousness under the old covenant, if it wanted to be accomplished as a whole covenant, and if the blessings of the covenant that God had promised were going to be given to the people of Israel, then obedience at the national level was required, obedience and following the commandments of the Lord at the tribal level was required, and then obedience at the individual level.

This is very important because it plays a little bit of burden on a person. If a person was righteous in what they were supposed to do at the individual level, that person would have said, okay, I deserve the blessing of the Lord under this covenant. But if the nation was in general in sin or the tribe that that person belonged to was not following the requirements for the specific tribe, then the blessings of the covenant will not come to the people of Israel. That's why when you go through the old covenant of the Old Testament, you will see that the people of Israel sometimes will pay the judgment because of the sin of a king, for instance, right? Or you will see that a tribe will pay because of the sin of a particular person.

Even that person was removed from the midst of the tribe or the midst of the people. Why? Because there was an interconnection of accountability. If you understand what I mean now, this is very important because now these feast of the Lord, beloved of Christ, are not going to be requirements of God to the people of Israel as a nation. Now, if we were going to define them, this feast here that we have in Chapter 23, we could say that these festivals, if you allow me to use this word, which is easier for me to pronounce, these festivals of the Lord, beloved of Christ, are just simply set apart times that God has defined so that the people of Israel as a nation will come together to celebrate something.

So just pay attention to each one of the elements of my definition. It is a set apart portion of time by the Lord in which the whole people of Israel will come together to celebrate something. I'm taking this from the word that he says, it's an appointed feast. The author of Leviticus says it is a fixed period of time of the Lord. He's the one that sets this portion of time apart.

And this is for a holy convocation. This is for the people of Israel to come together and to celebrate something. So now the question that follows is, what is that something that the people of Israel come to celebrate in those feasts, which is not an individual or tribal requirement, but a national requirement? Now, what they're going to celebrate are things or aspects that are derived from the freedom from the bandage of Egypt. So that means, in other and perhaps easier words, that every time that the nation of Israel will come together to celebrate one of those feasts, they will be celebrating something that will tell them something of their freedom from their bondage under the nation of Egypt.

You know what I mean, right? So every time they come together and they celebrate something, and it will be pointing them to this freedom from the land of Egypt and the bondage that they had there. Now, taking that into account, we can even see it very clearly in the text, because the times of those feasts are defined by the time when they left Egypt. So it says the first month, it says, for instance, in the first feast, which is the Passover, it says in the first month, which first month? Well, the first month in relation to their freedom from the land of Egypt.

Right. And it says the seventh month is speaking of other festivals, other feasts. What? Seven months in relation to their freedom of their coming from the land of Egypt. Now, if we have these categories now clear in our mind, let me just get into these festivals.

We have seven festivals, okay, seven feasts. Now, this is going to be very important because we have through the text, I try to, a kind of a inclination or is pointing us to this sense of completion, the number seven. So we have, for instance, seven feasts and each one of those seven feasts is going to have a component of a Sabbath rest, which is the seventh day of the week. And there's going to be in total during the year, seven Sabbaths that belong are connected to those seven feasts. This is going to be very important because this speaks of the completed work, if you want, of redemption of God to the people of Israel, bringing them out of the bondage, which is a very important word, bondage to the people of Egypt.

Now, these festivals are going to be divided into two categories, two categories. The first category that is going to happen in the first month in relation to the freedom from Egypt. That is the first one. And the second one on the seventh month after in relation to the freedom from Egypt. In the festivals that are connected or attached to the first month, then we have the ones that we know, for instance, the Passover, right?

We celebrate the communion because it's somehow connected to the Passover given to Israel. The Passover was the salvation of the people of Israel through the execution of the judgment to the firstborn. to the Egyptians. You remember that? I don't have to elaborate much on that.

That is the Passover. So the judgment of God will pass over the people of Israel, and that is the way that they're going to be liberated and brought into freedom. That is on Nisan 14, or the day 14 on the first month. The next day starts the second festival, if you want, which is Unleavened Bread. And this unleavened bread is going to go for seven days, we are told here in the text.

And people were not supposed to eat bread that had leaven. Now, that was because the exile or the removing or the going out of Egypt was actually very quick and there was not much time for the leaven actually to leaven the bread. But also because there's this symbolism, right, of sin that is attached to the leaven. That's why the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians chapter 5 says, Jesus Christ is your Passover. Therefore, as a result that Jesus Christ is your lamb that has given you freedom, therefore cleanse yourself from leaven, which is sin inside.

So that will be the second festival. We have the Passover. We have the unleavened bread. And then in that same period of time, we're going to have something that is called the first fruits. which will be after the Sabbath of that week.

We will have the first fruit will be a type of dedication. Now the Lord has saved us. He has redeemed us from the bondage that we were in Egypt, so therefore we are to put to death the sinful behaviors that we have almost naturally inherited from Egypt, and we are to dedicate that which the Lord blesses with. This is going to be the first fruit in that first month if you want festivals. This first fruits festival, please be with me.

I know that there's a lot of detail, but please be with me. I'm just going to go quickly through this. This first fruit festival of the first month somehow is connected to the festival, the other festival that is called the festival of the weeks that perhaps It's easier for us to use the word Pentecost, right? Because Pentecost is something that is more clear to our minds from Acts chapter two. This is going to be connected.

These first fruits would happen on the day after the Sabbath, 50 days after that or seven full weeks or seven Sabbaths, the day after seven Sabbaths. The chapter that we have just read says that it is that day of the harvest, also first fruits, but it is more called the festival or the feast of the weeks, which is this provision of God that is somehow connected to the first fruits. Those are beloved of Christ. And I hope that your minds are with me. These are the festivals of this first month.

One of them is a little bit separated by 50 days. Then we move on to the festivals of the feast of the seventh month. I said the first one is on the first month and the second one is on the seventh month. On the seventh month, we are going to have another three. I said that there are seven, four in the first month, and there's going to be three on the seventh month.

On the first day of the seventh month, there is going to be a holy convocation or a Sabbath or a feast. And this is what is known as the Feast of the Trumpets. Now, the Feast of the Trumpets will be that which goes before the Day of Atonement, which is going to happen 10 days after that. The Day of Atonement would be the shedding of blood, as we have already explained, by the high priest going into the Holy of Holies and then just atoning for the sins of the nation. And after that, we're going to have 5 days after that, we're going to have the Feast of the Boots.

I'm going to give you my current understanding of the symbolism of those three festivals. When the Lord was going to give the law on Mount Sinai, if you remember in Exodus 20, In Exodus 19, the Lord is going to speak to Moses just before the law is going to be given to them on chapter 20. And he says that you are to come with me. You are to come to me with Aaron and with the priest. And the people are not supposed to enter or to touch the edges of the mountain because they will die.

You remember that, right? And when the Lord came upon the mountain in Exodus chapter 19, there was a mighty sound of a trumpet. And this trumpet sound, a blast of a trumpet, was announcing that Moses with Aaron were the ones that needed to approach the presence of the Lord to receive the law with the priest. But the people were not supposed to go or approach any closer the presence of the Lord because they would have died. After this trumpet announces the entrance of Moses and Aaron into the holy presence of God, Moses particularly, and he receives the law, which is the commandments of God, which is the means by which sharing of the blood is sprinkled over the covenant or the book of the covenant.

The law was the means by which the people of Israel could have fellowship with God. Right. This is what we have been saying for the last month. That is that if the people of Israel wanted to have fellowship and communion, ongoing communion with the Lord, then they were supposed to follow the stipulations and instructions of the law. Then on the Trumpet Feast, there is an announcement that the Day of Atonement is coming 10 days afterwards, because when there is a Day of Atonement, this is a symbolism that the sins of the people and of the priests are forgiven and the relationship can continue between Israel and God.

After that, there is the Feast of the Boots, which our brother is now addressing in John chapter 7. And this is just simply a reminder to the people of Israel that when they were in the wilderness, they were actually living in tabernacles or the festival of the tabernacle. This is speaking of the provision of God to the people of Israel that once He liberated them from the bondage under Egypt, and he gave them the law that allowed them to have a relationship with him. He was the sustainer and the keeper until he fulfilled the promise given to Moses, which was, I will bring you into the promised land. Now, brothers and sisters, I know that I'm just giving you so much information.

I'm trying to do this under 15 minutes. Now, beloved of Christ, the person of Israel, and then if you did not pay attention to any of what I said before, pay attention to this place. The person under the old covenant, the person under the old covenant was under the law of God, just as they were in bondage to Egypt. The Israelites were in bondage to the people of Egypt. They were prisoners and they were serving the Egyptians for hundreds of years.

And they had to do what Pharaoh or the king of Egypt said, according to whatever they wanted to do. The Lord liberated them from the bandage that they were under Egypt to bring them under the bandage of a Mosaic covenant. Now, the law of the Lord is perfect. The law of the Lord is good. And the law of the Lord, it is from the Lord.

So it's righteous and holy. But the people came to be under the bandage of that particular covenant. So under Egypt, they were supposed to labor, and labor, and labor, and labor, and labor, and labor, and labor. Under the Mosaic covenant, they were supposed to labor for six days under the requirements of the covenant. And on the Sabbath day, they will enter into a rest that they never had under the bondage with Egypt.

But they enter into this rest on the seventh day, the Sabbath, rest from the bandage, if you want, that they had to the law. Now, the bandage that they had to the law did not produce the blessings that God wanted to give to the people, not because God is not good or righteous, but because of the sinful, unable nature of the members of the Mosaic Covenant. It was so strict for the individual, for the tribe, and for the nation, that it was impossible for them to receive the fullness of the blessing under the old covenant. So the old covenant became just simply a reminder of their inability at the individual, tribal, and nation level that they will never fulfill the requirements of this covenant. So they were in bondage to this.

Six days they will work. That word in Exodus chapter 20 is exactly the same word of the bondage and service that the people had under Egypt. So six days they will work and be in this bondage under the law. And the Lord will give them one day of rest, the seventh day, which will be a type and a shadow of the rest that they will never obtain through that particular covenant, because At the individual, at the tribal, and at the national level, all of them were types of a greater one. A greater one whose name is sweet and precious, and his name is Jesus Christ.

The unrighteous individual under the old covenant was a type of the righteous one that was going to come to fulfill that covenant. The tribe, like the Levites or the priests, were the shadow of the type of the high priest. And the Levites, the one that is a priest, are a different order. And Israel, as a nation, the firstborn, as Moses says in Exodus chapter 4, verse 20 or 22, the firstborn of God or the begotten of God. Israel, as a nation, was a type of Jesus Christ, who is the beloved and the begotten of the Father.

Now pay attention to this. Jesus Christ comes and fulfills the requirements fully and completely under the individual, tribal, and national level. And therefore, because he fulfills entirely all the requirements and he's, of course, the fulfillment and the substance of the Sabbath and the feast and all of the regulations of the old covenant, when he fulfills that, he fulfills in relation to the many obligations. Terrible way to explain it. Let me explain it again.

There were many regulations under the old covenant for the individual, for the tribe and for the nation. All of these many are fulfilled in the one, Jesus Christ. And because the one fulfills all of these many, the many under Jesus Christ are never again under the requirements of that which was the shadow for eternal life. Because Jesus Christ is the one that has come and fulfilled all of the requirements of what Moses had given to the people of Israel. So the Apostle Paul, with absolute certainty, beloved of Christ, can say that no one will judge you according to Sabbaths or moons or festivals or one of those things because They were the shadows and Jesus Christ is the substance of it.

And the righteousness of Christ is that righteousness that depends on God himself. The Israelite, the good Israelite, like, let's say, like Paul under the Old Covenant or Saul under the Old Covenant, he could have been a good and righteous person following the requirements of the law. But if there was national sin under the whole framework of the Old Covenant, there would not have been blessing for the people. We can rest that when we are under the new covenant, my righteousness does not depend on you. I like you and I love you, but I don't want my righteousness to depend on you.

And you don't want your righteousness to depend on me. I don't want my righteousness to depend on this church. My righteousness... depends on Jesus Christ that is eternal. He does not change and he's victorious.

So he takes us under the bandage of the law. to bring us to be slaves, as you have told me many times, to be slaves and under bondage of Christ, which is unto life and is glorious, because there's no better thing to be under the king of kings the Lord of Lords, the lover of our souls. And we can just be following Him as the standard, the perfect standard of righteousness. Jesus Christ is our Passover. Jesus Christ is our unleavened bread.

He's the one that is removing everything from us. He's the first fruits. so that we will be the first fruit among many brothers. He is the one that promised that in the last day there's going to be a trumpet that is going to announce our entrance into glory. Why entrance into glory?

Because there was a day upon a cross in which the Savior cried, It is finished. He's the one that provides so life to our souls. He's the fountain of water. Just as in Eden, there was a river that broke into four different rivers to provide life unto the nations. Jesus Christ is the fountain of living water through the Holy Spirit that provides life to the nations through the church, because in us, the provider of life has given us the spirit that we will be fountains of life unto the nations.

Amen.