A sermon preached at Grace Community Church on 2nd Jan 2005
Reading: Lev 2323-44
Prayer:
Lord, may your Word awaken us
May your Spirit lead us into all truth
May your light reveal your purpose
And may your salvation enable us to start again. Amen.
Each New Year is an opportunity
to review the past and set goals for the future.
It is a time to ask how can we start again?
You may have thought the reading from Leviticus 23 a surprising choice.
But it is God's directive for the New Year.
Leviticus 23 and Num 29 outline the feasts of Israel.
1st a brief word about why the Jewish New Year is in Sept., their
7th month.
The Jewish calendar has always started in the Autumn; in Sept.
But when the Lord God delivered Israel from the slavery
of Egypt,
He instructed them to celebrate Passover in the month
of Nisan,
which was thereafter to be
considered as the first month.
So their New Year - Rosh Hashana - starts in the 7th month.
The first New Year feast, The Feast of Trumpets
lasts for 10 days.
This isn't 10 days of 'Christmas' meals,
ending with Jews flocking to weight-watchers!
On the first day, the Ram's horn is blown loud and clear.
But what does it signify?
First it is God's serious call to repent.
In reviewing the past year we need to put right what
was wrong.
Sin cannot be just ignored.
The blighted relationship,
the greed, the lust, the gossip, the envy,
the cheated shopkeeper ...
or whatever it may be.
If the sin is public then we probably need to repent
publically.
If the sin is against an individual we need to seek
his/her forgiveness.
If the sin is private, public or individual we need
to seek God's mercy.
How different from remorse which makes endless excuses
and merely tries to escape
the consequences of sin.
But repentance pleads with
God and men for their forgiveness,
and it intensely desires
God's gift of a new nature that hates the sin.
So Jews and Christians do well to heed this 10 days of warning trumpet calls of God.
How sensitive is my conscience?
Am I responsive or stubborn?
Or maybe I am just indifferent?
The Trumpet call to repent echos in their ears for 9 days.
Our most gracious God knows that we are often a little
slow to obey.
Secondly
The ram's horn reminds the Jews of events in their history. i.e.
The substitute Ram that Abraham offered in place
of his son Isaac.
It reminds us of the Lamb
of God, who was our substitute.
How
Jesus took upon himself the punishment that we deserve.
As the old hymn says,
For
God the just was satisfied to look on him and pardon me.
But for Jesus there was no
substitute; he was the substitute!
The trumpet blast is also a reminder of Jericho.
You know the story of when
Joshua meets a man with a drawn sword.
He boldly asks him, "Are
you for us or our enemies?"
"Neither," he replies,
"but as Commander of the army of the Lord I have now come." Joshua 513,14
The Lord of Hosts then gives
Joshua his marching orders.
They must walk around the
city each day blowing the ram's horn.
He
obeys. And on the 7th day the walls of Jericho fell.
With a trumpet blast, the
'Commander' had come to fight for Israel.
God's
enemies in that evil city were totally destroyed.
As Peter says, resist
the devil and he will flee from you.
Blow
the trumpet, summon help, seek God, obey him.
Today Jesus comes as 'Commander'
to drive out all wickedness.
Remember
he is not a baby child, or a cuddly little lamb -
He
is the mighty Lord of Hosts.
The warning Trumpets cause memories to abound -
And responsive men become very conscious of the mercy
of God.
The trumpets are also to warn us that one day it
will be too late.
Have you heard a definition
of the Cornish expression "D'reckly"?
It is Manyana; without the
sense of urgency!!
This feast of Trumpets is to rouse the Jews and the
Cornish,
those at home here and visitors.
To rouse us all to deal with sin.
The 10th day of this New Year feast is Yom Kippur. The
Day of Atonement.
The 9 days of heart searching and repentance ends with God assuring
the repentant believer of his full and eternal
forgiveness.
What better way to start again than to have Jesus remove from our hearts
the heavy burden of a guilty conscience?
How many others ways have you tried?
Have you tried to ignore it? Made excuses? Blamed
someone else?
All other ways fail - each are like a mirage in the
desert that lead only
to repeated disillusionment
and despair.
Lev 16 gives us the detail of this most holy Day of Atonement.
The High Priest laid his hands upon the heads of two goats.
He confessed the sin of the people and transferred
it onto the goats.
The first goat was sacrificed.
The High Priest took the blood and entered alone
into the Holy of Holies.
There he sprinkled it upon
the Mercy Seat and pleaded with God.
Outside, the people waited anxiously - Would God
forgive them?
Would the offering be accepted?
Would the High Priest return alive?
Jesus, our Great High Priest was very publically crucified and buried.
For 3 days he remained 'hidden'. Then he rose. He
was alive.
He appeared to Mary and the Apostles.
The sacrifice to end all sacrifices for sin had been
accepted.
The Temple veil was torn in two from top to bottom.
Jew and Gentile could now
approach the Mercy Seat - and not die!
There is no day in the whole year like the day of Atonement.
No mere man could achieve this.
My father was a farmer and a pilot. In 1941 he was shot down and killed.
With many others he died for our freedom.
But their sacrifice can never give us freedom from sin.
Only Jesus our great Redeemer and Advocate can secure for us
God's forgiveness.
As Isaac Watts wrote:
Not all the blood of bulls
and goats on Jewish altars slain,
Could give the guilty
conscience peace, or wash away it's stain.
But Christ, the heavenly
Lamb, takes all our sins away;
A sacrifice of nobler
name, and richer blood than they.
On this great day of Atonement, what happened to the 2nd goat?
Was there something else that God wanted to reveal to us? Yes!
Lev 16 tells us that the scapegoat was taken a long
way out
into the desert and left
there. Why?
Because God desires us to be certain of what the
Psalmist wrote:
So far as the east is
from the west,
so far has he removed
our transgressions from us. Ps 10312
And as Jeremiah proclaimed:
"They will all know me from the least of them to the
greatest,"
declares the Lord. "For
I will forgive their wickedness
and will remember their
sins no more." Jer 3134
Unlike us, the Lord Almighty is able to both forgive and forget all our sins.
His desire on this day is that we should be assured of his forgiveness.
In Jn 832 Jesus reveals that his truth would set us free from
sin.
Can there be a better way to enter the New Year
than being certain that God always keeps his Word?
That he has come to wipe the slate clean; to set
us free to start again.
And by the way - do you know what book the Jews read on this great day?
It's the book of Jonah!
It is a reminder that no man can run away from God for ever.
Also that God was quick to forgive even the sinful Gentile city of Nineveh,
when they were willing to repent.
History has so much to teach us.
In God's New Year instructions there follows 5 days of beautiful reflection
before the Feast of Tabernacles.
Many see this as being harvest thanksgiving; it is. But it's also much more.
In this joyful 7 day feast, God commands the Jews to dwell in booths,
where they are reminded of 4 major aspects of God's
kindness:
Tabernacles reminds us of:
1) God's merciful deliverance from Egyptian slavery
and false gods.
God's
continual desire is to deliver us from sin.
Tabernacles reminds us of:
2) God's power that saved them from Egyptian army
at the Red Sea,
from the Amalekites, the
Edomites and the Moabites ...
That he continues to save
his children from all men and demons.
As
Wesley's hymn says:
Jesus
the name high over all, in hell or earth or sky,
Angels
and men before it fall, and devils fear and fly.
3) God's faithful provision during 40 long years
in Sinai.
Water, manna, quail, clothes,
shoes.
God still provides for all
our needs.
He reveals truth, light and
kindness in a dark, uncertain, cruel world.
4) God's leading in the pillar of fire and cloud,
and
the glory of his presence in the Tabernacle.
At the last supper Jesus
promised not to leave us alone,
he
would send us the Comforter, the Spirit of truth.
God
has kept his promise.
God dwelling with men always
brings rejoicing.
At Tabernacles God commands us to bring the produce of the land.
None are to come empty handed or ungrateful
for the rich grace of God
received in the past year. Deut 1616-
The booths are decorated inside with fruit and with
thanksgiving.
Is my life so clothed?
We are also instructed to include the poor and the
needy.
The Booths are to have flimsy walls -
This is a reminder of Sinai and the 40 year nomadic
journey.
As it says in Heb 11 we too are "A Pilgrim People".
This earth is not our home;
heaven is.
The roof branches are enough to give shade by day,
but with space enough to
see the stars by night.
This is to remind us of Abraham; when God showed
him the night sky.
He told him that his descendants would be numbered
as the stars.
And Abraham believed God
for all his descendants. Gen 155
The 7th Day of Tabernacles is called Hoshana Rabba -
the day of great salvation.
Water from Siloam in a golden jug, together with wine from a golden jug
were poured into a basin that was then emptied into
the Kidron valley.
Jesus is that pure golden jug, from whose side flowed blood and water.
Jesus is the one who so effectively washes away our
sin.
The blood and water would become the river of life
and healing.
God showed the exiled prophet Ezekiel this beautiful
river. Ezek 479-12
Swarms of living creatures
will live wherever the river flows ...
Fruit trees of all kinds
will grow on both banks of the river ...
Their fruit will serve
for food and their leaves for healing.
And in Rev 22 John writes: Then the angel showed
me the river,
clear as crystal, flowing
from the throne of God and of the Lamb.
On each side of the river
stood the tree of life ...
yielding
its fruit every month.
And the leaves of the
tree are for the healing of the nations ...
Whoever is thirsty, let
him come,
and
whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life.
No wonder this 7th day is called the day of great salvation.
In Jn 737-39 we read:
On the last and greatest day of the feast, (this 7th day of
Tabernacles)
Jesus stood and said in a loud voice,
'If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and
drink.
Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said,
streams of living water will flow from within
him'.
And that is not all.
During this feast worshippers also brought lights to illuminate the Temple.
The great golden candle sticks were lit to represent
the Shekinah Glory;
the very Presence of God was there among
them.
When Jesus spoke again to the people he said, 'I am the light of the
world.
Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness,
but will have the light of life'. Jn
812
He would be to us the pillar of cloud by day and fire by night,
to guide us safely and with purpose though the maze
of life.
The essence of God's New Year feast of Tabernacles is thus:
Jesus, the Light of the world dwelling with men.
Jesus, bringing living water to all who are thirsty.
This was always the purpose of God,
who told Moses,
Let them make for me a sanctuary that I may dwell
in their midst.
Or as John says, The Word became flesh and
'tabernacled' among us.
And again in Rev, Now the dwelling of God
is with men.
How wonderfully has our Lord Jesus fulfilled this and all the feasts of Israel.
And how accurately they each portray the purpose of God.
So these New Year feasts draw to a close.
In the feast of Trumpets we obey God and repent.
On the Day of Atonement God completely forgives our
sin.
And at Tabernacles God comes to dwell with his holy
Bride.
Has Christ changed our hearts and given us a new start?
I hope so; for now is the day of opportunity.
Procrastination is deadly dangerous.
And by the way, this 'new start' is not restricted
to the New Year!
A brief footnote:
For many centuries Jews have also celebrated an 8th day of
Tabernacles.
No one really knows how the tradition started.
When asked, one rabbi said,
"God is like a King, who
at the end of the feast said,
'stay
with me but another day, for I hate to see you go'."