It has been seen that a new era distinctly marked the ways of God in the blowing of Trumpets which led to the unique and eventful Day of Atonement: a time which not only contemplates those concerned being in Jerusalem, but that their mourning and bitterness is associated with the return of their Messiah from heaven to the very spot and place from which He ascended. The final Feast of Tabernacles is evidently dependent upon Christ Himself coming to introduce and establish the day of glory; then this closing Feast will be truly kept and continued from year to year at Jerusalem, the divinely appointed metropolis of the whole earth, the city of the King of kings, and Lord of lords. He it is Who will sit between the cherubim, and, as the Royal Priest in true Melchizedek power and glory, will establish and bless in righteousness and peace.
This blessed time, the theme of Psalms and Prophets, will be known by Israel, when after beholding the wounds of their pierced Messiah, they will be brought under the value of the blood of atonement, and what is written of the Feast of Tabernacles (Lev. 23) will be accomplished, incomparably beyond the typical language thus stated. “Seven days ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto Jehovah, on the eighth day shall be an holy convocation unto you, and ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto Jehovah; it is a solemn assembly and ye shall do no servile work therein.” Then follows the special feature of the feast. “Also in the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when ye have gathered in the fruit of the land, ye shall keep a feast unto Jehovah seven days: on the first day shall be a sabbath and on the eighth day shall be a sabbath. And ye shall take you on the first day, the boughs of goodly trees, branches of palm trees, and the boughs of thick trees, and willows of the brook, and ye shall rejoice before Jehovah your God seven days,.... Ye shall dwell in booths seven days... that your generations may know that I made the children of Israel to dwell in booths.” This joyful assembly should begin and end on the sabbath, with the addition of an eighth day. But it begins after the vintage and ingathering of the harvest; which implies that the land and people had been cleansed, not only by discriminating, but also by utterly unsparing, judgment when the bad will have been removed and the good grain gathered in, as to which the prophetic Jewish scripture of Matt. 24 is instructive. At the appearance of the Son of man the tribes shall mourn, when they shall see Him coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. “And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.”
Clearly the elect of God's earthly people is here meant to be gathered to celebrate the harvest feast on the first sabbath. It is a statement distinctly Jewish, denoting the renewal of the Jewish feasts and sabbaths in their own land: a fact not true since the scattering, after crucifying their Messiah.
Strange as it may seem to the Christian who is enjoined (as being dead and risen with Christ) against having to do with holy days, new moons and sabbaths; yet Israel will again keep her sabbaths and feasts. Indeed both the Passover and Feast of Tabernacles will be obediently observed as well as the revived sacrifices and priesthood. Not as once pointing on to the Antitype, but in the instructive retrospect of His having come, and made good for them in manifest glory all that Jehovah shadowed forth, as His sovereign intention of grace for the nation, for whom their Messiah died. Not only was the blood of the everlasting covenant shed by Him Who is raised and glorified, but in due course its application to Israel of Abraham's unconditional promises (as yet unfulfilled) will be made good, with all their glorious accompaniments. Many Old Testament scriptures testify to Israel's coming glorious kingdom; but Ezekiel gives a striking order from chap. 36 to the end of the book, where the future is set forth as to the land, people, city and temple, with its restored ritual, crowned with the closing words, “Jehovah is there.”
Chap. 36. deals with Israel's uncleanness when Jehovah their God will give them a new heart and spirit. “And ye shall dwell in the land which I gave unto your fathers, and ye shall be My people and I will be your God.” When cleansed from all their iniquities, and dwelling in their cities, they shall say, “This land that was desolate is become like the garden of Eden.” Moreover the remarkable vision of the figure of dry bones, giving the present state of Israel dead and buried among the nations, declares their restoration and union as one people under the antitypical David, their king. Wholly lost, and unknown to man as the ten tribes are, Ezek. 37 shows them definitely gathered back to their land at the appointed time, as well as united to Judah as “one stick,” which has never been the case since the days of Solomon. “Neither shall they be divided into two kingdoms any more.” Jehovah also declares, “My sanctuary shall be in the midst of them for evermore.” Such holy and blessed statements may well be followed by the description of the coming glory of the temple and city, with the appointed sacrifices, sabbaths, and feasts, leading to the celebration of the passover before their temple with its returned glory. Then assuredly they will read their glory, blessing, and redemption, in the light of the Cross, which the Passover and the varied sacrifices will declare beyond all typical days. Thus, when reaping the full harvest of the precious fruit of the death of their Messiah, they as a united blessed nation will be fitted to keep the Feast of Tabernacles.
The remembrance of their long history will heighten the value of the death of Christ, which secured everything and righteously laid the basis of the new covenant. Nor this only, for their booths on their houses will recall the wilderness life and path, when they dwelt in tents with the given shade, tears, and overcomings, which the thick trees, willows, and palm branches may severally signify, as doubtless will be the lesson learned to call forth their joyful praise and worship, as they appear before Jehovah of hosts in His sanctuary. That this Feast will be held when the Messiah, the King of glory, is in His temple, is clear from Zech. 14.
Moreover, it will be kept year by year, at the time when the representatives of the nations of the earth go up to Jerusalem to worship the King, Jehovah of Hosts, adding, “And to keep the feast of tabernacles.” Then the precious things recorded in Isa. 60 about the future sanctuary of Jehovah and His people will be realized, when He will make the place of His feet glorious, and Jehovah shall be unto them their everlasting light, and “thy God, thy glory; and the days of thy mourning shall be ended; and they shall inherit the land forever.” When the glory of Jehovah is then risen and shining upon the land, and peoples, Gentiles and their kings will minister to them, like the queen of Sheba, beholding with wonder, and bringing glory and riches in homage to the true Solomon, the King of glory, Israel's reigning Messiah. Such will be the sabbath and complete circle of the seven days' joy and glory, the last and final Feast of Tabernacles to continue surely through the full and perfect reign of Jesus, the King of the Jews, and King of the whole earth.
Moreover, does not the eighth day imply going on to the skirts of eternal rest and glory, when dispensations will close, and millennial glory will be merged or established in that period when God will be all in all? Then will the fruit of redemption in the eternal blessedness of God's own rest be fully realized in the stability of the new heaven and the new earth. Surely in the retrospect it only remains for those having part in it to bow in lowly worship at the little seen and touched upon of the marvelous wisdom in the ways of God, past, present, and future. Above all we bless His Son Who, by His death as the one and only effectual sacrifice, so glorified God, as to secure these precious results both for the heaven and the earth; for the church above and Israel below. Both await the coming of the Savior. The heavenly saints meet Him in the air, to go into heaven for the marriage of the Lamb; and Israel, when for them His precious feet shall again touch Mount Olivet, shall have the earthly kingdom and glory.
Till then may the teaching and lessons in the wonderful ways of God be better known in sanctified grace and power, make the word of God a deeper reality, and beget an intelligent holy walk, till our Lord and Savior make good His word, “Surely I come quickly.”
What Israel will presently learn of the mind of the Lord and His marvelous ways, the heavenly people are now privileged by the Spirit of God to know still better, and can already exclaim:
“O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God, how unsearchable are His judgments, and His ways past finding out... For of Him, and through Him, and to Him, are all things, to Whom be glory forever. Amen.” G. G.