The Seven Feasts
It has been said that to understand the seven feasts of the Lord spoken of in Leviticus 23, the seven similitudes of Matthew 13 and the seven letters to the churches in Revelation 23 is to have an outline of the ways of God with man as revealed in the Scriptures. Those who know the Lord Jesus as their Saviour are called His friends (John 15:14), and He makes known His mind and purposes to us in matchless grace. One has sometimes said that the Christian, taught of God, is the only one who has an intelligent outlook on what is going on in the world, for the Lord Jesus said, “All things that I have heard of My Father I have made known unto you” (John 15:15). May we value this blessed intimacy and walk in communion with the Lord day by day!
The seven feasts of the Lord given to Israel in Leviticus 23 are preceded by the Sabbath, a rest on earth, and this will take place in the millennium, the thousand-year reign of Christ (Rev. 20:6). Israel and Jerusalem will be the center of this earthly rest.
The Passover
The seven feasts that follow give us a prophetic outline of the ways of God with that nation, which will finally bring them, and all the nations on earth in association with them, into blessing according to the purposes of God in grace (Gen. 12:23). Therefore the passover comes first: “When I see the blood, I will pass over you” (Ex. 12:13). The children of Israel were sinners like the Egyptians and, if they were to escape the judgment, it was because a lamb had died and its blood had been shed and sprinkled on the lintel and doorposts of their homes beautiful picture of Christ, the Lamb of God, whose precious blood alone can put away sin. Eating the passover in their homes was, so to speak, making it their own. In a coming day, Israel will learn the value of the work of Christ and will be brought into blessing on the earth as promised in Genesis 15:18-21.
The Feast of Unleavened Bread
The next feast was that of unleavened bread. Leaven in the Bible is used as a figure of the working of evil within, like yeast in dough. When Israel has learned the value of the work of Christ, then He will give them a new heart, as we read in Hebrews 8:10, “I will put My laws in their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to Me a people.” Then, so to speak, they will keep the feast of unleavened bread. In a practical way now, those who have learned that “Christ our passover is sacrificed for us” (1 Cor. 5:7) have the desire and the power to walk here as “new creatures” in Christ Jesus, not allowing the activity of sin (leaven) in their lives.
The Feast of Firstfruits
Next comes the waving of the sheaf of firstfruits, a beautiful picture of Christ risen from the dead and become “the firstfruits of them that slept” (1 Cor. 15:20). “Christ died for our sins.... He was buried, and... rose again the third day according to the scriptures” (1 Cor. 15:34). He was “raised again for our justification” (Rom. 4:25). The Israelite could not eat any of the harvest until the sheaf of firstfruits had been waved before the Lord. All blessing to Israel or us is founded on the death and resurrection of Christ. “If Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins” (1 Cor. 15:17).
The Feast of Pentecost
Now we come to the feast of Pentecost, meaning fifty days. It was kept on the morrow after the seventh Sabbath on the first day of the week. This is a remarkable feast, for the way was now opened for the fullest blessing of Israel, and for the Gentile too, because in figure Christ as the passover Lamb has been sacrificed for us (1 Cor. 5:7). He is risen again and is there at the right hand of God for us (Rom. 8:34). All blessing to man is the result of His glorious work. Now we read in Acts 2 about the day of Pentecost and what took place on that day in Jerusalem. It was a new beginning, so to speak.
A large company, about one hundred and twenty believers, was gathered together in one place waiting for the coming of the Holy Spirit, as the Lord had promised (Luke 24:49; Acts 1:4). He came upon them and “they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance” (Acts 2:4). Pentecost was the birthday of the church, although the truth of the church (composed of Jew and Gentile) as the body of Christ was not revealed until after Israel as a nation had rejected the offer of grace that was presented to them in Acts 3:19-21.
In Leviticus 23, the feast of Pentecost is brought before us primarily as it has to do with Israel. This was, so to speak, the beginning of the harvest. However, the purpose of God in regard to the blessing of the Gentiles is typified in the two wave loaves baken with leaven. The two wave loaves are the Jew and the Gentile. They are spoken of as the firstfruits (Lev. 23:17) and we read of this in James 1:18.
They were “baken with leaven” because even though we are new creatures in Christ Jesus, we still have the old nature within us, but it is to be kept in the place of death, just as leaven is not active in baked bread (see Rom. 6:11). The burnt offering, the meat offering, the drink offering, the sin offering and the peace offering show us how all these offerings bring before us the various aspects of the work of Christ, all fulfilled in the one glorious work which He accomplished once for all at Calvary.
G. H. Hayhoe
(to be continued)