Month: September 2021

Last week, we talked about the time between Yom Teruah (Day of Trumpets) and Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) as a traditional time of return and repentance. Now with Yom Kippur behind us and Sukkot (the Feast of Tabernacles) fast approaching ,we turn to a new theme: rejoicing.

Yom Kippur is widely considered the most solemn holy day by Jews and by Christians who observe God’s holy days. It’s a time of fasting, of strictly observed rest from labor, of prayer, and reminders of Christ’s work atoning for our sins as we look forward to His return and to Satan being locked away. It is followed just five days later by the most joyful of God’s festivals. While the first and last day of Sukkot are sabbaths of “solemn rest,” they’re accompanied by the command, “you shall rejoice before Yahweh your god seven days” (Lev. 23:39-40, WEB).

Why joy? We know joy is a fruit of God’s spirit–it’s something that should be part of our developing spiritual character all year-round. We talk about joy as something which God gives us that cannot be shaken by trials or external circumstances (Gal. 5:22; James 1:2; 1 Pet. 1:8; 4:13). But why the specific command to rejoice during Sukkot right after the solemnity of Yom Kippur?

Rejoice for Redemption

Jesus revealed Himself as God who heals sorrow, binds up wounds, and comforts the lost (Luke 4:17-21). This role connects with prophesies in Isaiah which speak of a Messiah who will come and do great things for His people. Part of these hopeful, joyful prophecies were fulfilled in Jesus’s first coming, and we still wait for others.

Then Yahweh’s ransomed ones will return,
and come with singing to Zion;
and everlasting joy will be on their heads.
They will obtain gladness and joy,
and sorrow and sighing will flee away.”

Isiah 35:10, WEB

Christians who keep Sukkot connect it to the Millennial reign of Jesus Christ pictured in Revelation 20:1-6. Isiah 35 is one of the millennial passages that hints at what that time will be like (see also Is. 11:1-16; 65:11-25; 51:11-12; 52:7-9). Even before that time arrives, though, we have reason for great joy (Is. 51:11-12; 52:7-9).

I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, your transgressions,
and, as a cloud, your sins.
Return to me, for I have redeemed you.

Sing, you heavens, for Yahweh has done it!
Shout, you lower parts of the earth!
Break out into singing, you mountains, O forest, all of your trees,
for Yahweh has redeemed Jacob,
and will glorify himself in Israel.

Isaiah 44:22-23, WEB

Realizing how great Jesus’s sacrifice is and what He gave up to redeem us should leave us in awe, humbled by His goodness and selflessness. We should also respond with great joy, particularly after our return and repentence . He loves us, redeems us, and wants us to thrive. How could that not turn our “mourning into joy”? (Jer. 31:11-14).

Turn Mourning into Joyful Dance

We don’t have to wait for Christ’s second coming to experience the joy of knowing God, being loved by Him, and having Him save us. For example, in Psalm 30 David recounts the work of God in his life, singing “at the dedication of the temple” (v. 1) about the ways God responded to his calls for aid.

Weeping may stay for the night,
but joy comes in the morning. …

You have turned my mourning into dancing for me.
You have removed my sackcloth, and clothed me with gladness,
to the end that my heart may sing praise to you, and not be silent.
Yahweh my God, I will give thanks to you forever!

Psalm 30:5, 11-12, WEB

New Testament writers also assure us that we can have joy. In John’s gospel, Jesus shares that He’s leaving His joy with His followers so that their “joy may be made full” (John 15:11; 17:23). He also assures them that even though they “will weep and lament” because of His death, their “sorrow will be turned to joy” that no one can take away because of His resurrection (John 16:20-22).

We also know the resurrected Messiah and have access to a joy that no one can take away. He still works with us today, giving us His joy as we increase “in the knowledge of God, strengthened with all power, according to the might of his glory, for all endurance and perseverance with joy” (Col. 1:9-10). And when we walk with Him, we also align ourselves toward future joy the same way He did when He walked on this earth (Heb. 12:1-2).

Joy in Returning

Just as the trumpet call of Yom Teruah reminds us to repent and turn to the Lord, humbling ourselves and accepting Jesus’s atoning sacrifice pictured in Yom Kippur, so our “godly sorrow produces repentance to salvation” today (2 Cor. 7:9-10). That is something to rejoice about! Over and over, the prophets record that God’s people follow a pattern of wandering from God, repenting with sorry, then being filled with joy and gladness as they reconnect with God. That cycle is pictured in these fall holy days, both on an individual level and looking forward into the future of all humanity.

One of the truths I’ve been meditating on and marveling at this past week is that God works with an ever expanding number of people. He created two–Adam and Eve. Then He saved Noah and his family–eight people–in the flood and made a covenant with Noah. Then He worked with Abraham and his descendants to make him into a great nation we call ancient Israel–one precious people that God later made a covenant with at Mount Sinai after rescuing them from Egypt. People outside Israel could join themselves to that covenant, but for the most part God worked with just one nation. Then Jesus came and entrusted His followers with the message that salvation is open to everyone in the world, regardless of their background. Today, God is working with a group of people called out from among all the nations of the world. And in the future, He will show the entire world who He is, resurrect those who died without knowing Him, and give all an opportunity to choose life with Him (see “Rethinking Heaven: Capturing A Vision Of The Resurrection” and “Rethinking Hell: A Clearer View of God’s Judgement“).

“Yet even now,” says Yahweh, “turn to me with all your heart,
and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning.”
Tear your heart, and not your garments,
and turn to Yahweh, your God;
for he is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness,
and relents from sending calamity. …
Blow the trumpet in Zion!
Sanctify a fast.
Call a solemn assembly. …

Be glad and rejoice, for Yahweh has done great things. …
Be glad then, you children of Zion,
and rejoice in Yahweh, your God;
for he gives you the early rain in just measure,
and he causes the rain to come down for you,
the early rain and the latter rain,
as before.

Joel 2:12-13, 15, 22-23, WEB

God has great joy in seeing people turn from their wickedness and choose life (Eze. 18:23; Luke 15:7,10). The Bible represents this change in our way of life as a return to the Lord, and when we repent and turn to Him with sincerity there is great joy for us as well. Interestingly, at least one prophet connects that joy with coming back to keeping the feasts of the Lord (Zech. 1:3-4; 8:3, 19; 10:7-9; 14:8-9, 16-20). Let’s rejoice in these days and in the knowledge that the Lord loves us. He redeems us, welcomes us into His family, and promises to share His everlasting life and joy with us if only we’ll return to Him.

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Featured image by Pearl from Lightstock

On the Hebrew calendar, today is Shabbat Shuvah–the Sabbath of return. That’s the name for the weekly Sabbath that falls during the 10 Days of Awe between Yom Teruah (Day of Trumpets) and Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement). Traditionally, it’s a time for reflection and prayer, particularly on the concept of repentance.

On the Gregorian calendar, today is September 11 and this year marks 20 years since the attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. I was 12 years old, and one thing I remember from the aftermath of that attack is how many people turned to God for comfort and answers. Churches filled, Christians talked about revival, but it all petered out pretty quickly. Life went back to something like normal; it was easy to forget the United States was fighting a war unless someone you knew was involved, or to overlook the extra security measures unless you had to fly on a plane. It must have seemed similarly easy to forget how much people felt they needed God and continue a trend (particularly among young people) of leaving churches and abandoning belief in a single faith.

Ancient Israel followed a similar pattern in the stories recorded for us in the Bible. They started out as a godly nation, then strayed from God, came back when things got bad, and then forsook God again. I don’t want to spend too much time drawing parallels with any modern nation, though. The New Testament characterizes the Christian community (not a nation like the United States) as “spiritual Israel;” people who are citizens of God’s heavenly country and who live as foreigners among the nations of the world (Phil. 3:20; Heb. 11:13-16). We’re the ones that Paul is talking to when he writes about Ancient Israel and says, “These things happened to them as examples and were written for our instruction, on whom the ends of the ages have come” (1 Cor. 10:1-12, NET). We don’t know when this “age” will end, exactly, but we do know that we’re now closer to the time of Jesus’s return than Paul was when he wrote his letter to the Corinthians. If they needed to learn from stories of Israel as “the end of the ages” drew near, so do we.

(Re)Turning to God

In modern Hebrew, teshuvah is the word for repentance. It’s root is shuva or shub–a verb used “over 1050 times” in the Old Testament. Of those, the word is used “in a covenantal context” 164 times (TWOT entry 2340). Though this word for “return” is used in a variety of ways, the most theologically significant meaning is as a repentance idiom. In other words, when we repent we return to God (and our covenant with Him) and turn away from sin.

To be sure, there is no systematic spelling out of the doctrine of repentance in the OT. It is illustrated (Ps 51) more than anything else. Yet the fact that people are called “to turn” either “to” or “away from” implies that sin is not an ineradicable stain, but by turning, a God-given power, a sinner can redirect his destiny. There are two sides to understanding conversion, the free sovereign act of God’s mercy and man’s going beyond contrition and sorrow to a conscious decision of turning to God. The latter includes repudiation for all sin and affirmation of God’s total will for one’s life.

Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament, entry 2340

Themes of return and repentance, as spoken of here in this dictionary entry, figure prominently in the prophets’ writings. Hosea, for example, says, “Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God, for your sin has been your downfall! Return to the Lord and repent!” (Hos. 14:1-2, NET). You’ll find similar calls in other prophets’ writings as they share God’s call for His people to come back to Him after they’ve forgotten Him and been unfaithful. Hosea even gives guidelines for how to do this: “But you must return to your God, by maintaining love and justice and by waiting for your God to return to you” (Hos. 12:6, NET). A key way we can return to God is by prioritizing love and justice (which puts me in mind of Mic. 6:8 and Luke 11:42). Then, all we have to do is wait on the Lord. God is faithful, and when we turn to Him He will turn to us as well.

A Warning Shout

As we approach Yom Kippur, many believers will read Isaiah 58, which is a passage about genuine fasting. This passaged begins the same way that the fall holy day season did with Yom Teruah on the first day of this Hebrew month–with shouts and trumpet blasting.

“Shout loudly! Don’t be quiet!
Yell as loudly as a trumpet!
Confront my people with their rebellious deeds;
confront Jacob’s family with their sin.
They seek me day after day;
they want to know my requirements,
like a nation that does what is right
and does not reject the law of their God.

Isaiah 58:1-2, NET

God instructs Isaiah to use his voice as a teruah–a loud shout or trumpet blast–to deliver a warning. These people said they wanted to know God, but they didn’t actually listen to Him. He’s calling them to turn away from wickedness and toward Him with genuine fasting and respect for God’s holy times (Is. 58:3-14). That sort of thing isn’t just in the Old Testament. Jesus speaks of dealing with similar people who “have shut their eyes, so that they would not see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them” (Matt. 13:14-15, NET).

We don’t want to be like that. We need to “turn around and become like little children” (Matt. 18:1-3, NET), who “turn back” to faith after we make mistakes (Luke 22:31-34, NET), and who “turn to the Lord” to have the “veil” removed so we can understand God’s word and His glory (2 Cor. 3:15-18, NET). When we repent, we confess “the name of the Lord” and “turn away from evil” (2 Tim. 2:19, NET). The process of repentance is more clearly articulated in the New Testament, but it’s essentially the same that it has always been. Repenting involves turning a way from one thing (sin) and turning to another (God).

Let’s use the Days of Awe this year to take a close look at ourselves. I think we can all find ways that we haven’t walked perfectly with God over this past year. Thankfully, God holds open the possibility for return. While we can repent and return to God any time of the year, this season we’re in now is particularly focused on reminding us to do that. Let’s remember God, return to Him, and commit to remaining faithful.

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Featured image by reenablack from Pixabay

In just a few days, we’re observing Yom Teruah–the Day of Trumpets (you may also know this day as Rosh Hashanah). As the earliest New Testament believers did, Messianic Jews and many other Christians today will gather to blow shofars and celebrate a day that God describes as holy to Him. We’ll do this because we want to honor God and show our love for Him by obeying His commands, yet we don’t know very much about this day or why God wants us to mark it. The most detailed description we have is this:

Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to the children of Israel, saying, ‘In the seventh month, on the first day of the month, there shall be a solemn rest for you, a memorial of blowing of trumpets, a holy convocation. You shall do no regular work. You shall offer an offering made by fire to Yahweh.’”

Leviticus 23:23-25, WEB

There are many theories about this day. Some say it pictures the time when “the Lord himself will come back from heaven with a shout of command, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet of God” (1 Thes. 4:16, NET), like a Jewish bridegroom arriving to marry his betrothed. Others say its a day picturing freedom, release from debts, and joyful shouts. Or perhaps it’s simply a call to prepare for Yom Kippur (JewishLink.com). Some teach that it marks the sixth day of creation and is intended to wake us up, reminding us to turn to the Lord and pray we be inscribed in the Lamb’s book of life (Hebrew4Christians.com).

First and Second Creation

This idea of a connection between Yom Teruah and the sixth day of creation comes from Jewish mishnah writings rather than scripture, but if that tradition is true it would connect neatly with the second coming. As the author of Hebrew4Christians points out, this reading would mean Yom Teruah “commemorates both the creation of the universe by Adonai as well as the ‘calling up’ of the new creation at the behest of Yeshua, when the sound of the heavenly shofar inaugurates the anticipated End of Days.”

Paul also draws a link between Adam–the first human being God created–and Jesus Christ–the first person raised from the dead in a spirit body. There’s an orderliness to this comparison, “for just as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ, the firstfruits; then when Christ comes, those who belong to him” (1 Cor. 15:20-25, NET). We’ve born the image of the man made of dust, created by God on the sixth day in Genesis 1, and we will “also bear the image of the man of heaven” (1 Cor. 15:42-53, NET).

Something marvelous is going to happen in the future. We, who are fleshy like the first created man, will change. We’ll become spirit, like the Firstfruit from the Dead, Jesus Christ who lived as a human being, died, and then rose a spirit being. And that will happen “in a moment, in the blinking of an eye, at the last trumpet” (1 Cor. 15:52). We can debate the exact timing of that change (and many have), but it doesn’t seem much of a stretch to associate it, or at least a blasted reminder that this change is coming, with Yom Teruah.

The King is Coming!

The connection between trumpets and Jesus’s second coming is perhaps the simplest explanation for this day’s meaning that we can offer. The spring holy days (Passover, Unleavened Bread, and Pentecost) pointed toward and now call us to remember Jesus’s first coming. The fall holy days point to a time in the future when God Himself will dwell with people; when Jesus Himself will return with the sound of trumpets, shofar blasts, and shouts.

The trumpets and shofars used to make the “alarm, signal,” “shout,” or “blast” that’s described by the word teruah figure prominently in scripture (H8643, BDB definition). Often, this word refers to the sound made by a shofar, or ram’s horn (TWOT entry 2449c). The shofar was used when Israel met with God at Mount Sinai (Ex. 19:16-20). It’s what the priest blew when Jericho fell and Gideon went up against Midian (Josh. 6:4-20; Judg. 7:16-22). The shofar was used for signals in battle and to sound an alarm, and it’s often used figuratively as well as literally (Judg. 3:27; 2 Sam. 18:16; 20:1; Neh. 4:20; Is. 58:1; Jer. 4:19, 21; 6:1, 17; Ezk. 33:3-6; Hos. 5:8; 8:1; Joel 2:1; Amos 3:6). Israel also used shofars when anointing a new king (1 Kings 1:34, 39; 2 Kings 9:13), and it played a key role in praise and covenant making with God (2 Chron. 15:13-14; Ps. 81:3; 98:6; 150:3; Joel 2:15).

Shofar blasts are connected to kingship, to warnings for Israel to return to God, and to proper expression of joy after returning. They serve as a warning and reminder as well as a tool for worship. So let’s keep this holy day with all those meanings in mind. Let the Day of Trumpets wake us up from spiritual sleep, renewing our commitment to wait faithfully for the Bridegroom. Let that day remind us to prepare and use the days between now and Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement) wisely. And let’s also celebrate joyfully, remembering the goodness of God in creating us and promising to recreate us in His spiritual likeness. This world which is so full of frightening and wicked things will not last forever. Someday, our Lord will return with trumpet blasts and we will be changed, fully born into His spiritual family. And that gives us great reason for joy as we begin another fall holy day season.

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Featured image by Ri Butov from Pixabay