WE NOW come to this wonderful chapter which sets forth “the feasts of the LORD,” and here we have a marvelous unfolding of the ways and purposes of God. James tells us in Acts 15:1818Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world. (Acts 15:18), “Known unto God are all His works from the beginning of the world.”
These feasts strikingly set forth the purpose of God to establish a rest for Himself and to gather around Himself a people who would share that rest with Him. It is evident that that rest is still future, and those who are to share that rest are not yet gathered in. Israel, God’s earthly people, are scattered over the face of the earth, but we believe the day is drawing near when God will gather them all back to their long promised land, when Christ shall come whose right it is to reign, and they shall enter in and enjoy the millennial rest of their blessed God. For us as believers now, our rest is in heaven from whence also we look for the Saviour to come and take us there. Then God shall rest in His love and we shall rest with Him.
That rest secure from ill
No cloud of grief e’er stains;
Unfailing praise each heart doth fill
And love eternal reigns.
After having brought us into all this grace, this place of beloved children, and sons, God calls us now to know His thoughts and purposes for everything. He supposes that we are interested in what occupies Him. What occupies God first of all is not our salvation; that is a settled thing, but He calls us now to enter into all His thoughts and purposes for His own glory, for the glory of His dear Son, and for our joy and blessing. Is it not mere selfishness just to be content to know that we are saved? What about the One who has saved us? Are we not indebted to Him for our salvation? Indeed we are.
In these feasts God has made known unto us, His people in relationship, all His ways from the binning to the end. There are seven “feasts of the Lord,” and He calls them “My feasts.” He calls His people to share His feasts and His offerings, but they are His, and it is His own glory He has before Him in them.
These feasts are types of better things to come, but already the anti-type of some of them has been reached; with the rest these must be looked for as yet to come. In all they give a complete history of the ways of God. They also make known the Person and work of His beloved Son and of His redeemed associated with Him. In them we have a striking view of a whole period of time, even to that bright and glorious future, the eternal Sabbath, or rest, of our ever-gracious God.
There are seven of these feasts—eight in one way. Israel were told to keep one weekly celebration—the Sabbath. This was not part of the yearly feasts that follow, but the Lord intended that it should have its own preeminent place. It speaks of His rest after His labor. In Genesis 2, after the six days work of making creation ready for man, we read: “God rested on the seventh day from all His work.... And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it.” vv. 2,3. But it was not for long, for that rest was broken by the sin of Adam and Eve. The ground was cursed for man’s sake and himself turned out of Paradise. All was ruined. God has never rested since. The Lord Jesus said, “My Father worketh hitherto [up to this time] and I work.” John 5: 17. God has been at work to undo the ruin, not simply to undo it and restore the happiness lost, but to bring in something infinitely better, better for Himself, and better for His creature? It is a new kind of rest, a rest founded on redemption, and all the redeemed will share it with Him, some in heaven, and some on earth. The foundation of that rest is the work of God’s beloved Son upon the cross.
ML-08/06/1972