Glory and Fire after the Days of Awe
Glory and Fire after the Days of AweKeeping the Feast of Tabernacles
I remember my first time. I walked into the buzz of an arena filled with thousands of people. Sitting down next to my mother, I stretched my hands into the arena as if it were a camp fire on a cool mountain evening. I could feel the fire! The feelings of joy and expectancy were palpable. I knew every person here – perhaps not personally, but with any one of the thousands of people, I could speak about anything. We were like minds, gathering after the conclusion of ימים נוראים, Yamim Noraim, the Days of Awe. It was my first time to the first day of the Feast of Tabernacles.
The Feast of Tabernacles is sometimes called, “God’s favorite Holiday.” YourStudyBibleOnline.org says, “the reason God commanded them to observe Tabernacles, is because He tabernacled with His Dear Ones in the Wilderness, in His Glory. Please try to picture what it must have been like, with the mighty Pillar of the Fire and Light of the Shekinah Glory of God[i].” It seemed like I could almost feel it during the time of the Feast.
The Days of Awe start with the Jewish New Year and end with the Day of Atonement. For us, the Day of Atonement pictured the future removal of Satan just prior to the Millennium. It included sermons on the meaning of Leviticus 16:8,10,26 where it speaks of Azazel[ii]. The fast was to bring us closer to God to be At One with Him. On the Day of Atonement we used to fast from sunset to sunset, but the fast was without both food and water, so it could be rather grueling. But when the sun slid below the horizon at the end of the day, it signaled two things: food was finally at hand, and it was only a few days to the high point of the year, The Feast of Tabernacles.
To make this work, we were supposed to keep a “second tithe.” David Legge of PreachTheWord.com describes the second tithe as a “festival tithe” saying, “there is an additional initial 10 percent, which is a second tithe which was called the 'festival tithe' - you find that in Deuteronomy chapter 12… this second tithe, the festival tithe, was to build religious celebration and mutual community among the Jewish people[iii].” In fact, the second tithe was highly necessary to fund Festivals. For the Feast of Tabernacles, it was common to be away from home (In your Sukkot[iv]) for 10 or 11 days. Often this required taking unpaid vacation, so if you hadn’t kept the 2nd tithe you had very large financial problems brewing.
Communities that hosted such Festival events, coveted the 2nd tithe savings of Feast-goers, bending over backward to garner customers from a temporarily well-heeled crowd. They knew that thousands of visitors had one tenth of their yearly income that they could only spend for Festival expenses. The Feast was a blessing to each hosting community.
The highlight of the Feast of Tabernacles was the “Last Great Day.” This 8th day of the Feast was taken to look forward to the Millennial rule of Christ. That first Tabernacles for me, closed with a rousing sermon where a dynamic orator had almost 10,000 people in the large arena, their voices filling the space to a loud roar, raise their hands as if holding a champagne glass, and shout, “To the Kingdom! To the Kingdom.”
Those days for me have written deep dichotomies in my soul, for though the Feasts built the most wonderful memories, they were kept by a hyper-legalistic, Judaizing, British-Israelist, post-trib, controlling, cultish church. I know the truth of the Bible now. I couldn’t go back to an organization like that. However, after knowing the Holy Days, imbibing of Christmas and Easter is like drinking eggnog mixed with raw sewage. Though I love the celebration of the birth of Christ and the commemoration of His death and resurrection, there are Yule logs floating in my cup of celebration. The birth of Christ is littered with Mistletoe leaves. Saturnalia casts a shadow on the Son[v]. Egg laying bunnies tread all over the Resurrection. The pagan goddess Eostre overshadows the Upper Room[vi].”
Oh for a Festival celebration by Biblical Christians! The Feasts have no pagan baggage. But look as I may, I can find virtually nothing of the sort.
Some days find me trolling the Internet, plying my computer geek skills, spinning carefully phrased search strings in a vain attempt to find a real Christian Tabernacles celebration. A Calvary Chapel or a Khouse-like organization celebrating the Feast – ANY Feast. The search parameters get narrower and narrower and the search strings get longer and longer as I exclude all cults, synagogues, and Jewish Messianic celebrations. I search, always in vain, trying to rekindle the days of Glory and Fire.
[i] http://www.your-study-bible-online.org/tabernacles_1.html
[ii] http://www.christiananswers.net/dictionary/azazel.html
[iii] http://www.preachtheword.co.uk/sermon/gog01.shtml
[iv] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sukkot - in modern times, a hotel.
[v] http://paganwiccan.about.com/cs/aboutyule/a/paganxmas.htm
[vi] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easter
posted by Keloki @ 3:36 PM
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