Deuteronomy chapter number 16, the Bible reads in verse number 1,
Observe the month of Abib and keep the Passover unto the Lord thy God.
For in the month of Abib the Lord thy God brought thee forth out of Egypt by night.
That so therefore sacrificed the Passover unto the Lord thy God of the flock and the herd
in the place which the Lord shall choose to place his name there.
Now in this passage we have just a really brief overview of some of these holidays
that are part of the Old Testament calendar and it just barely touches on these.
Like you'll get more detail on these in another chapter like for example Leviticus 23.
And there's a lot more detail on the Passover in the book of Exodus.
It's just a very brief mention of each of these because the important point that's being made
is that these feasts, these celebrations need to take place in the specific location
that God will choose and what's being emphasized is the place which the Lord shall choose
and the fact that the Levite is involved and don't forsake the Levite and he's going to eat of the sacrifices.
Don't do it in your own country. Bring it together.
Centralized worship is the idea here in Deuteronomy chapter 16.
Now when we talk about the Old Testament feasts and in particular this chapter is talking about the Passover
and then it's talking about the Feast of Weeks also known as Pentecost and the Feast of Tabernacles.
When we talk about these Old Testament feasts we need to understand that these are not something
that we should be observing in the New Testament.
So we are not supposed to actually observe this calendar as the Judaizers would have us to believe.
But rather the right way to interpret this passage as a New Testament Christian is to look for
the figurative meanings that would point us to the Lord Jesus Christ, the symbolism and so forth
because the Bible talks about how these holy days and carnal ordinances of the Old Testament
were actually shadows of things to come because they were shadows of the Lord Jesus Christ and the gospel.
And so when we look at the Passover we should be thinking about Christ our Passover who is sacrificed for us.
Or when we look at the Feast of Weeks we could think about the pouring out of God's spirit on the day of Pentecost
that this is foreshadowing and then we could think about of course the millennial reign of Christ
and we can connect that with the Feast of Tabernacles and so forth.
But we don't want to get sucked into this idea that somehow we should be observing these things in the New Testament.
Now I'm done with my Galatians series. It's over.
And hopefully in all those sermons on Galatians this came through for you.
But let's just go to Galatians real quick for a minute anyway. Just for a minute.
And then we're done. I promise there won't be any full Galatian sermons for a while.
But Galatians is just such a great book. It's hard not to just keep going back there because it's such a powerful book.
And it's so relevant today in the Judaizing times that we live in.
And probably with the warfare that's going on in the Middle East probably the Judaizers are getting all energized and excited.
And probably we're going to see even more of an upsurge in all kinds of erroneous teachings and Judaizing and eating kosher food and getting circumcised.
You know it's kind of amazing to me how the majority of Christian men in the United States are circumcised.
Even though the New Testament explicitly teaches that that is not a Christian practice.
But here we are, right? These type of things creep in and that's why this preaching is important.
But the specific part of Galatians I want to touch on is in chapter 4 where it says in verse 9,
But now after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage?
Ye observe days and months and times and years. We're in Galatians 4-11.
I am afraid of you lest I have bestowed upon you labor in vain.
I mean when the Apostle Paul brings up the fact that they are observing days, months, times, and years, he says,
I'm afraid of you. I feel like I might have just wasted my whole time on you guys because are you even saved?
I mean if you're doing this stuff, it's tantamount.
And you might think that Paul's being a little extreme to flip out about this, but you know this is inspired scripture.
And so this is not just Paul in a weird mood just getting mad at the Judaizers and going a little overboard.
No, this is the Word of God. This is inspired scripture.
And to go back to the Mosaic law, to submit to the carnal ordinances, to go back and do things like circumcision and the dietary laws,
and following the Jewish calendar, blowing a trumpet in the new moon, and these type of things is tantamount in the book of Galatians
to denying that Christ has come and fulfilled these things.
And so it's quite horrifying to the Apostle Paul.
Now sometimes you've got to wonder, what do the Judaizers do with the book of Galatians when the book of Galatians is just so clear about so many things
and yet they will find a way somehow to explain this?
And what's funny is to hear them explain this, here's what they'll say.
They'll say that this portion here talking about turning to the weak and beggarly elements and observing days, months, times, and years,
that this has nothing to do with the Jewish calendar.
But they would claim that this has to do with a reversion to paganism and I don't know if they're checking their horoscope
or just following some kind of a pagan calendar.
But the thing that's so absurd about that is the context of the whole rest of the book.
The entire book is clearly talking about Judaizers and about the law and how we're not under the law and how Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law.
And then to just turn around and just throw in two verses about paganism is truly a joke.
But yet there are so many people who believe in this Hebrew roots garbage and that's what they'll say because I've confronted many of them about this exact passage and that's what they all say.
Oh, they were going back to their pagan Greek ways.
Look what the Bible says in chapter 5 verse 1.
The bondage is clearly being under the law. It's being circumcised. That's what the Bible says.
At the end of chapter 4 we have the Mount Sinai covenant. Look at verse 24 of chapter 4.
So clearly the bondage is Mount Sinai. It is being under the law.
And so when he says here, you're desiring again to be in bondage, ye observe days, months, times and years.
Why would he suddenly be talking about something different when chapter 3 was all about the Judaizers, chapter 2 was all about the Judaizers, chapter 4 and 5 back at it, same subject.
And so people who just don't want to believe the truth are willing to just twist scripture, take it out of context and do whatever.
But any sensible person must realize that the observation of days, months, times and years is a Jewish context here.
And so why should we be observing Jewish days, months, times and years? Why do we want the Apostle Paul to be afraid of us?
You know, if the Apostle Paul were alive today, would we want him to be flipping out and wondering if we're even saved?
And you know what, if I saw some Christian getting off into this Hebrew roots mumbo jumbo and going out and getting circumcised as an adult.
And look, those of you that are circumcised when you're a baby, you have no control over that.
I was circumcised as a baby, you know. Nobody asked my opinion about it. I cried and they did it anyway.
And so obviously that's not what we're talking about. But we're talking about people who are going out and getting circumcised as adults, they're buying the shofar, they're eating kosher food, they're abstaining from pork, they're doing all these things.
You know, when I hear about people going down that road, I immediately doubt that they're saved too.
Not because those things necessarily would directly impact someone's salvation. And I definitely believe that a saved person could get mixed up in that stuff. No question about it.
But it makes me doubt their salvation because of the fact that I know what a dark path that is and the Holy Spirit is not the one leading them down that path.
That's why the Apostle Paul said, this persuasion cometh not of him that calleth you. You are not getting this from God. The Holy Spirit is not leading you in this way. This is something else.
And so that's why we get scared, we get nervous, as Paul said here, when we see people going down that road.
We don't observe the Jewish calendar, we don't observe the law. To move backwards in that way is to basically tantamount deny that Christ has come and fulfilled these things.
And so we're going to retrograde back to the Old Testament. And make no mistake about it, we're not retrograding back to these things in the future either.
Because a lot of the dispensationists will believe like, well yeah, that was Old Testament stuff. Now we're in the age of grace, we're in the New Testament.
But then, you know, when Christ returns we're going to go back. And they literally believe that we're going to go back to having a temple and animal sacrifices.
If you can imagine that. But I'm telling you, independent fundamentalist Baptists who bought into this dispensational teaching will claim we're going to go back and have animal sacrifices, we're going to have a temple, we're going to have the Levitical priesthood.
Folks, God's plan is moving forward and it's not moving backward. The Old Testament's done. Put a fork in it, it's done. And it's not coming back, it's over.
We're in the New Testament and the New Testament is eternal. So let's go back to Deuteronomy. I just wanted to get that out there. It's such an important subject in our day.
Beware of the Judaizers. Do not get sucked into this whole Jewish calendar thing and following these Old Testament ordinances. It is not of God. It is sacrilege. It is blasphemy. It is false doctrine.
So when we read Deuteronomy 16, we're not reading this and saying, oh, you know, I'm going to go out and do these things. Why? Because we're not going to bring a sacrifice. Look at verse 2.
Are we going to bring a sacrifice from the flock unto the place which the Lord shall choose to put His name in? No, because Christ is the Lamb who's already slain to take away the sin of the world.
And so we don't need to bring another animal sacrifice. That was then, this is now. But what we should do is look at this passage and see Christ in the passage, right?
Because the Bible still, all scripture, Old Testament included, is given by inspiration of God so it's profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.
But we need to be looking for the New Testament relevance here with the Passover. So he starts out here, he says, thou shalt therefore sacrifice the Passover unto the Lord thy God in the place which the Lord shall choose to place His name there.
Now that place is ultimately going to be Jerusalem. When Moses is saying these things in the Book of Deuteronomy, that place has not yet been revealed.
Because not until David's time is that place now the headquarters of worshiping the Lord. That doesn't come until King David which is, you know, approximately 500 years later.
And so just as the Passover had to be sacrificed in Jerusalem, that's where Jesus had to die on the cross.
And if you remember in the four gospels, especially in the Book of Luke, Jesus is just heading for Jerusalem, heading for Jerusalem, heading for Jerusalem.
And it's so important that he gets there and that he be there at that right time because it's not possible that a prophet should perish outside of Jerusalem.
And Jesus knew that he should fulfill this scripture about the Passover being sacrificed in the place where the Lord would choose.
And so Jesus Christ is killed in Jerusalem. It says in verse 3, thou shalt eat no leavened bread with it, seven days shalt thou eat unleavened bread therewith, even the bread of affliction, for thou camest forth out of the land of Egypt in haste.
Now, the idea here is that, oh, we don't have time to really bake up the bread with the leaven and so forth. We're leaving in a hurry. And so unleavened bread, it's a quick food.
But the symbolism, again, is about Jesus, okay? Because remember, when Jesus Christ is about to be crucified, he said this is my body which is broken for you when he broke the unleavened bread.
And so the idea there is that the unleavened bread represents the body of Jesus that was broken on the cross.
And the Bible uses the concept of leaven often to represent sin. And so unleavened bread here represents the sinlessness of Jesus Christ, okay?
And so just as his body was broken for us, also his blood was shed for us. And so Jesus Christ, at the Last Supper, he also drinks of the fruit of the vine.
And he said this cup is the New Testament in my blood which is shed for you. Now, what's absurd is that you have people teaching today that that's an alcoholic beverage at the Last Supper.
And I constantly see people making fun of Baptists, you know, thinking that at the Last Supper, you know, they were drinking grape juice.
You know what it reminds me of? It reminds me of some big, dumb animal drinker making fun of people who don't drink.
Right? Just some loud-mouthed jock with a six-pack making fun of people who don't drink.
That's the level of maturity and stupidity coming from these people that make fun...
You think Jesus made grape juice at the wedding and Katie, you think that was the miracle, he turned water into grape juice?
Laugh it up, buddy. But you know what is more stupid and asinine is to actually believe that the blood of Jesus Christ is represented by an alcoholic beverage.
That's really dumb. When the Bible says that you're to use unleavened bread and the fruit of the vine, but then to say that the wine is leavened?
Because guess what? The same process that leavens bread is the same process that ferments wine. Same process.
So if you're not supposed to have any leaven in your dwellings, oh yeah, but you're supposed to have this leavened beverage.
Right? You're supposed to have wine fermented with yeast. But don't do any leavened bread. That doesn't make any sense.
But here's the other thing that makes truly no sense is that these people will just gaslight you that somehow the Bible said that they drank wine at the Last Supper when it doesn't even use the word wine.
And it's like people just keep repeating this over and over again. You know, oh yeah, the Baptist, you know, they're real literal about the Bible until they get to the word wine. Now all of a sudden it's not literal.
And I'm just wondering what Bible are these people reading? Because the Bible doesn't say wine with respect to the Last Supper. What does it actually say? It literally says the fruit of the vine.
So these people think wine is grape juice. Is the fruit of the vine grape juice? Now does God not know the word wine? Because God uses the word wine in other parts of the Bible.
Did the biblical authors not have this word in their vocabulary? Yet specifically, whether we're reading Matthew or Mark or Luke or John, no mention of wine at the Last Supper, yet everybody just keeps wine, wine, wine, wine, wine.
It's not there. Show me in the Bible. It says fruit of the vine. Is it fermented? No, because that wouldn't make any sense to have unleavened bread and an alcoholic beverage.
Why would the sinless perfect blood of Christ be represented by an intoxicating beverage that is a curse unto those who drink it? That doesn't make any sense, my friend.
But it's just so funny how the Catholics and Protestants, they just get an idea in their head and it's like they just can't let it go. That it's just got to be alcohol. Maybe they just like to drink or something. I don't know.
But it represents the sinlessness of Christ, right? The unleavened bread, his body and his blood that's sinless, shed for us and so forth. It's the fruit of the vine.
And you know, it's so funny, this overly literal interpretation is wrong anyway, because lots of things in the Bible don't mean the same thing as they do in our modern world.
You know, what about when the Bible says in Song of Solomon 2, the voice of the turtle is heard in our land? You know, I mean, maybe you can have a good time with your toddler. Like, hey, what does the dog say? What does the cat say? What does the turtle say?
And everybody's just kind of like, I don't know. The voice of the turtle. Oh, you know, when the Bible says turtle, I say it means turtle. Wine means wine. Turtle means turtle.
No, it just doesn't though. Okay, because in that verse when it says turtle, it's talking about a turtle dove. It's talking about a kind of bird.
And so sometimes you have to understand that words change in meaning over time. And so you've got to compare scripture with scripture. You've got to use a little common sense.
And if you use common sense and compare scripture with scripture, you'll find that a lot of verses that use the word wine will talk about wine being in the cluster of a grape.
Is that an alcoholic beverage? Am I going to be carted when I go to the grocery store and try to buy a bunch of grapes? No.
So that's clearly not. The Bible talks about new wine, right? And so obviously it's not always an alcoholic beverage, but then the irony is that it doesn't even use the word wine at the Last Supper anyway.
So that's really just a wrong argument anyway, because it just says fruit of the vine. And I don't know what universe grape juice is not the fruit of the vine, but you can ask your Presbyterian friends and they can explain it to you.
But it says there shall be no leavened, verse four, there should be no leavened bread seen with thee in all thy coast seven days.
Neither shall there anything of the flesh which thou sacrifices the first day it even remain all night until the morning.
Thou mayest not sacrifice the Passover within any of thy gates, which the Lord thy God giveth thee, but at the place which the Lord thy God shall choose to place his name in.
There thou shalt sacrifice the Passover at even, at the going down of the sun, at the season that thou camest forth out of Egypt.
So again, I want to emphasize he's not giving all the details about these holidays. He's really just hammering the fact that they need to do it at Jerusalem.
They need to go to the place which the Lord chooses and not do it in all their coasts. That's why he repeated it both in verse two he said it, and then he said it again in verse six.
And then it says that the Passover is sacrificed at even in verse six, okay?
Even would be what we would call evening, and what it really means is just sundown, dusk, twilight, even, evening. That's what we're talking about.
And so that's the time that they were to kill the Passover, and of course we read the scripture, that's when Jesus died on the cross, right?
He died on the cross in the evening, he's hanging on the cross throughout the day, and then he dies on the cross in the evening, or at even.
And then it says that, you know, they're supposed to eat all of it and not let any of it remain until the morning.
It says in verse number seven, and thou shalt roast and eat it in the place which the Lord thy God shall choose, and thou shalt turn in the morning and go unto thy tents.
Now, when the Bible talks about the Passover being roast with fire, this is a foreshadowing of Christ's descent into hell, okay?
Now, it's always amazing to me how many people deny this doctrine.
It's funny, we were just out soul winning this afternoon though, and we were talking to some guys and walked up to them and asked them,
and there were three that were already saved, and then one of them got saved. The one that was not saved got saved, so praise God for that.
But there were three that were already saved. And so, as Brother Timothy was going through the gospel with these guys, he asked the one guy, you know,
well, when Jesus died on the cross, do you know where his soul went for three days and three nights?
And this guy just didn't even miss a beat. He said, yup, you know, he descended down into hell for three days and three nights.
Like, this guy knew that answer. He had it right. And a lot of people understand this, but unfortunately a lot of our independent fundamentalist Baptist brethren don't understand this.
And I always find it funny that whenever we have these fake friends, like, turn on us and become like a vindictive ex-girlfriend or something, and go all sycophant on us,
this is like one of the first doctrines that goes out the window, is they're like, you know, all of a sudden they don't believe that Jesus went to hell anymore for three days and three nights.
You know, I've noticed that. But what's funny about this is that it's just explicitly stated in the Bible.
And really the only way around this is if you were to believe that the King James Bible is not translated correctly.
Because if you're reading a King James, it's crystal clear. Because it just literally says, this spake key of the resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not left in hell.
Neither did his flesh seek corruption. Jesus said, thou wilt not leave my soul in hell. Neither wilt thou suffer thy holy one to seek corruption.
And so it just flat out says that the resurrection means that he wasn't left in hell. Right? He was loosed from the pangs of death and hell and so forth.
But yet a lot of people struggle with this. And they would claim that Jesus did not go to hell for three days and three nights, that he went somewhere else.
Now, there's a lot of biblical evidence. I'm not going to re-preach an entire sermon on that. I did do a sermon on it a while back called Jesus Descended Into Hell.
And you can look up that sermon and I spent an hour giving all the proof and showing a whole bunch of different ways that this is what the Bible teaches.
That Christ descended into the lower parts of the earth, as it says in Ephesians chapter 4.
And it makes perfect sense because Jesus died for all the sins of mankind and so he became sin for us, the Bible says.
He who knew no sin became sin for us that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.
And so he was made a curse for us and he experienced the wrath of God. And he was punished for our sins. He took the punishment for our sins.
And of course you'll have these people come along and say, oh well you're saying that the cross isn't enough.
You're saying that his death on the cross isn't enough. But forcing us to choose between these various parts of God's redemptive plan is so misguided anyway because it's all part of the plan.
Oh, so you're saying it wasn't finished when he said it is finished? I'm saying that salvation was not finished because he hadn't risen from the dead yet.
And that's the most important part. Everything that you need for salvation was done when he said it is finished.
Really? Because he didn't rise again for three more days. No, he still had to die on the cross, then he had to descend into hell, then he had to resurrect from the dead,
then he had to ascend into heaven, and then he had to sprinkle his blood on the mercy seat in heaven and now he ever liveth to make intercession for us.
You know, which part of that isn't important or isn't part of our salvation? It's all part of it, right?
Jesus Christ also had to come to this earth, be born of a virgin, live a perfect life that none of us could live.
He had to go about doing good. It's all the gospel. It's all important. It's all part of it.
So, making us choose between Christ's death on the cross and him descending into hell, that's foolish because it's just another step in the process of what Christ did for us.
And, you know, I feel strongly about this doctrine. And I know there are probably people in our church who disagree and don't believe that Jesus went to hell for three days and three nights.
But, I mean, you're wrong, but there are people who believe that and that's fine. You know, I don't expect everybody to agree with me on everything or, you know, and some people have said,
oh, if you don't believe this, you're not saved. I don't believe that. Of course, people that are saved have different beliefs about this, okay?
But this doctrine is very clear, I believe in scripture, aside from just explicit verses saying that Jesus Christ was in hell during that time.
You know, you also have all kinds of imagery about this because you just have all of these hundreds and hundreds of burnt sacrifices in the Old Testament.
Why is it always a burnt sacrifice? Why does that picture Jesus? Why does the Passover have to be roast with fire?
You can't boil it. You can't eat it any other way. It's got to be roasted with fire.
Why is there so much burning of sacrifices and burning on the altar? It's a picture of Christ is going to one day die on the cross, descend into hell, and rise again the third day.
That's what the Bible teaches. And really, this other way of looking at it where he doesn't go to hell doesn't make any sense because Jesus said, I'm he that liveth and was dead.
And behold, I'm alive forevermore. Amen. And I have the keys of hell and of death. Why? Because he conquered hell and death.
You know, he was loosed from the power of hell. Hell did not claim the victory over him. He resurrected from hell, okay?
And the thing about that is that if he was dead, he said, I was dead and now I'm alive.
You know, I believe that Jesus Christ truly died for our sins and not just only his physical body died, but that Jesus died.
Okay? Now, here's the thing. Old Testament saints like Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, you know, when they physically died, they weren't really dead though, were they?
Because they had eternal life. I mean, when Abraham died, that's just his physical body that died, but he didn't really die. He had eternal life.
Okay? And so, that's why Jesus said, Abraham rejoiced to see my day and was glad. You know?
And didn't Jesus say that God is the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, and God's not the God of the dead but of the living?
So wherever Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were, when Jesus said that, they're alive.
He said, God's not the God of the dead but of the living, they're alive. Abraham's alive, Isaac's alive, Jacob's alive.
So why would I believe what a lot of independent fundamental Baptists believe, that Jesus, for three days and three nights, went to a place where he's alive?
Because if he went with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, then he's alive. I believe he was dead.
Now, obviously, he was conscious, but guess what? Every dead person is conscious.
I mean, you think dead people are just sleeping right now? They wish they were sleeping.
I mean, if an unsaved person dies tomorrow, you think that they're unconscious?
Because I think that they're conscious in hell right now. But you know what they're called? They're called dead.
And the Bible says that hell will someday deliver up the dead that are in it, and the dead will stand before God and be judged by their works.
They're still conscious, they're still functioning, but hell is a place of death.
And the people that are in hell are classified as dead. The people that are in heaven are classified as alive.
Old Testament saints, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, they're alive.
I believe Jesus was actually dead for three days and three nights, and that he rose again from the dead, not just a physical body that resuscitated, like, say, Lazarus or something,
but that he really was dead, and that he actually conquered death and hell, that he paid for our sins.
I think that Jonah 2 is a powerful foreshadowing of Christ being in hell when it talks about how, as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly,
so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
So Jesus flat out said he's going to be in the heart of the earth. That's not where heaven is.
It's magma. He said, as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly, so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
And then go back and read the book of Jonah, and you know what Jonah says?
Out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice.
So Jonah's prophesying that Jesus is going to be in hell for three days and three nights.
That's why Jonah says, I went down to the bottoms of the mountains. The earth with her bars was about me forever.
That didn't really happen to Jonah. Jonah was in a whale's belly. The earth with her bars was not around him, and it certainly wasn't forever, right?
But Jesus Christ went to a place of eternal damnation. He went to hell, and he defeated hell and death and rose again from the dead.
You know, I believe that he probably somehow suffered an eternal, you know, because God's an eternal being.
You know, perhaps the reason why Jonah words it that way is because he somehow suffered all of that punishment in a finite period of time, in three days and three nights, and then rose again from the dead.
But there's just, there's so many Bible verses, and typically when I was growing up, a lot of people acknowledged that Jesus went to hell for three days and three nights.
There's a lot of preaching like that, and typically any time I ever heard anybody say that he didn't, it's because they just would correct, they'd say, well, you know, if you go back to the Greek, it's Hades, and it's just the unseen world, and blah, blah, blah.
But at the end of the day, if we're going to believe that the King James Bible is our authority, then we would have to believe that hell means hell.
And you can look at it as many times as you want, and it's never a good place.
And you can go back to the Greek and look at it, and it's still not a good place in Greek either.
Whether you're looking at it in English or in Greek, it's never a good place.
It's always a bad place, right?
There's not a good side, or a cool side, or a pleasant side of hell.
It's just, hell is always bad.
Okay, and you don't want to go there, and Christ went there so that you wouldn't have to go there.
Christ already paid for that.
And so, I don't have any doubt about that.
I know there are people who disagree on that.
You know, if you're one of them, I would encourage you to listen to my sermon.
If not, then if you still don't get it, well, we'll just have to agree to disagree.
But I think it's pretty clear that the roasting with fire represents the fact that after Christ died, just as after the lamb died, it gets roasted with fire.
You know, Christ descended into the lower parts of the earth.
He descended into hell.
He actually was dead.
You know, it wasn't just the human part that died.
You know, he actually died and rose again from the dead.
Okay.
Now, the other thing it says is that after it's roasted with fire, they're supposed to eat the Passover.
And again, this is pictured by the Lord Jesus Christ because Jesus Christ said that he is going to give his flesh for the life of the world.
And in John chapter 6, he says, he that eateth me shall live by me.
Right?
And of course, in the end, he explains this parable is referring to the word of God because he said, the flesh profit of nothing, the words that I say unto you, they are spirit and they are life.
It's the spirit that quickeneth, the flesh profit of nothing.
It's the word of God.
And so obviously, we don't literally eat Jesus.
But figuratively speaking, when we actually hear the word of God, when we hear the gospel and the word of God preach, you know, that is figuratively eating the word of God.
Because like, for example, the Bible says in Jeremiah, thy words were found and I did eat them.
Or in the book of Job, I've esteemed the words of thy mouth more than my necessary food.
Or man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.
So you have all of these instances of eating the scripture, eating the word of God.
But all throughout the book of John, unsaved people take Christ's parables too literally.
Right?
So Christ says, hey, you got to be born again.
And Nicodemus is like, oh, do I need to enter into my mother's womb and be born a second time?
Little bit literal there, buddy.
Right?
Next chapter, chapter 4, he says to the woman at the well, hey, if you drink of the water that I give you,
you'll never thirst again.
Lord, give me this water so I never have to come back to this well and draw any more water.
I'm sick of coming out here every day and drawing water.
She doesn't get it, does she?
Whoop!
Too literal.
Okay?
And then when we get to John chapter 6, Jesus says, except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood,
you have no life in you.
And then you got a bunch of unsaved Roman Catholics saying, oh, you know, we really have to eat his flesh.
And we actually have to eat and drink his literal blood.
They're making the same mistake Nicodemus made.
They're making the same mistake that the woman at the well made.
This is why context matters and why the Book of John, you got to see there's this series of illustrations
with unsaved people, misunderstanding them by considering them too literal.
Being too literal and not having a spiritual understanding, they're having a carnal understanding of these things.
And so, you know, they think it's literal water, literal.
And here's what's so foolish about this, is that if they're going to take that literally, you know,
and say, yeah, it's the literal eating of his flesh and drinking of his blood, then they should never be hungry again.
Because he says in John chapter 6 that if they eat of that bread of life, then they'll never hunger.
So that means that they should go to Catholic mass and eat that way for one time and never be hungry again.
But make no mistake about it, the Roman Catholics and also the Lutherans,
literally believe that they're eating the literal body and blood of Jesus when they go to mass.
How many of you realize that? Like you already knew that.
I mean, they literally, they go down there and they literally believe that when the priest says the magic words,
that that bread literally becomes the body of Jesus.
And I mean, this is just so absurd, where do I even begin?
And, you know, Martin Luther famously, when he was arguing with another theologian at the time, Zwingli,
you know, and Zwingli was trying to say, hey, it's figurative, you know, it's symbolic of the body of Christ.
He just kept just pointing it up here, this is my body, this is my body, right?
I mean, that'd be like the stupidity of saying that over and over again.
It'd be like just saying, you know, hey, Jesus isn't a literal door, you know, that's just a symbol.
When Jesus said, I'm the door, you know, I am the door.
No, Martin Luther, he's not a literal door, I'm the door.
Right? I mean, think about it.
You know, no, he's not a literal vine either.
Jesus is not a literal vine, it's a symbol, it's symbolic.
Because Jesus said, I'm the true vine, I am the true vine.
He said he's a vine, that's what he is.
But the thing that I just can't even wrap my mind around, maybe I'm missing something,
but here's what I can't wrap my mind around.
Jesus is literally sitting at the table with his disciples,
holding out a piece of bread saying, this is my body.
If that's his body, who's holding it?
Do you see what I'm saying?
Like, I'm just trying to wrap my mind around how anybody can not get this.
But then I realize that unsaved people can't understand spiritual things.
And then it makes perfect sense that the natural man receiving not the things of the Spirit of God,
they're foolish, neither can he know them because they're spiritually discerned.
And that's why these things, these obvious things, isn't it amazing how millions and millions and millions
of Evangelical Christians and Baptists all over the world, they all understand this.
Right? Just millions of Baptists, millions of Evangelical Christians, they all say, well of course it's symbolic.
Of course it's not the literal body of Christ.
He's the one holding it.
The literal body is who's breaking the bread.
And it's called a metaphor, right?
This is my body which is broken for you.
It wasn't his, he wasn't actually breaking his actual body.
Okay?
It seems silly to even say that.
And here's what I want to know.
Why do millions of Evangelicals and Baptists all get it right and then a billion Catholics get it wrong?
And you know, it's so funny when there are certain false doctrines that no saved people believe in.
Shouldn't that give you a little pause when just saved people just don't believe in it?
It's not just me, this isn't just my opinion.
This is like literally just all of Evangelical Christianity and Baptists that get this.
And then you have the cult of Rome with their cannibalistic bizarre doctrine because they're taking the Bible overly literally as unsaved people often do.
They can't see the spiritual side of things.
And so the bread and the, it was just a picture.
How did I get off on that?
Well yeah, that's what we've been talking about all evening but is that really how I got off on that?
Oh, you have to eat it.
There we go.
Okay.
Yeah, you know, he that eateth me shall live by me, right?
So the Passover is killed at even.
That's what happened to Jesus, right?
He dies on the cross in the evening time roughly.
Where did he die?
At the place which the Lord would choose, Jerusalem.
What happened afterward?
He's roast with fire in the sense that he descended into hell for three days and three nights.
And then there to eat him which obviously that's a picture of the fact that we hear the word of God.
The word of God quickens us just as food, when we eat food it gives us life and allows us to sustain life.
The word of God sustains life spiritually and initially how do we get life?
Well David said thy word has quickened me, right?
Your word has given me life.
It's the spirit that quickeneth and Jesus said the words that I say unto you they are spirit in their life.
And so Christ died on the cross and metaphorically speaking he gave us his flesh to eat and his blood to drink.
But not literally because that's just really out there to believe that that's literal.
All right, let's get back on track here.
And so it says in verse number 8, six days thou shalt eat unleavened bread and on the seventh day shall be a solemn assembly to the Lord thy God, thou shalt do no work therein.
Okay, now what's the meaning here of the no work?
It's the fact that when it comes to salvation, no works.
You know and so when you have this idea of hey the Passover is being killed, the blood is being shed, the blood is being applied to the doorpost.
Don't do any work during that celebration because we don't want to mix what Christ is doing on the cross with our works.
And so while Christ was dead for three days and three nights conquering hell and death, guess what?
People weren't supposed to be working during that time.
They're supposed to be resting as a picture of the fact that Christ is doing everything for our salvation.
We don't work to earn our salvation.
There are no works involved. Thou shalt do no work therein.
That's why there's such a strict punishment in the book of Numbers.
Some guy's gathering his sticks on the Sabbath day and he's put to death.
It seems extreme.
But you know when we try to bring our works into God's Sabbath of salvation, when we try to mix our works with Christ's sacrifice, then it's death.
Because it's hell if you're not saved, right?
Go back to Galatians. No, don't actually go to Galatians.
But in Galatians he said, hey, if you're circumcised, Christ will profit you nothing.
Because if you're circumcised, you're a debtor to do the whole law.
And he's saying don't mix keeping of the law, getting circumcised, following a calendar.
Don't mix that because he said if you do, Christ will profit you nothing.
If you're trying to mix Jesus plus works, you're not going.
It's got to be all Jesus without works.
It's got to be all by faith and not of works.
You've got to fully trust what Jesus did on the cross without trying to mix in your own works.
Or you're going to end up like that guy who gathered sticks on the Sabbath day except permanently.
And so then we move on to the next feast.
I've got to hurry. I spent a lot of time on that.
So verses 1 through 8, we talked about the Passover.
Verse 9, it says, seven weeks thou shalt number unto thee.
Begin to number the seven weeks from such time as thou beginnest to put the sickle to the corn.
And thou shalt keep the feast of weeks unto the Lord thy God with a tribute of a free will offering of thine hand,
which thou shalt give unto the Lord thy God according as the Lord thy God hath blessed thee.
And just quickly, this represents or foreshadows among other things the day of Pentecost.
Now the word Pentecost literally means 50.
It's just the Greek word for 50 transliterated over into English.
And so Pentecost is talking about 50 days after the Passover takes place.
Because if you think about it, seven weeks is 49 days.
Next day, boom, that's the 50th day.
And so you have the day of Pentecost, which is 50 days after.
And that is of course where you have that wonderful event in Acts chapter 2 where God fills them with the Holy Spirit.
And they're preaching the Gospel in various foreign languages.
It lists those foreign languages.
It's not any kind of gibberish or ecstatic utterances.
But rather they all are hearing in their own tongue wherein they were born.
And so that's what tongues is referring to in the Bible.
And it doesn't just suddenly change meanings when we get to 1 Corinthians 14 and start meaning something totally different.
OK, so in Acts chapter 2, we have that powerful event.
And what is the significance of that event?
Is that it's a great harvest or ingathering of souls for Christ.
Because you have 3,000 people that are gladly receiving Christ's word and being baptized and added to the church and so forth.
And so that's a great harvest or ingathering.
And so in a sense, it's a kind of first fruits, right?
And so, you know, that's what this is referring to.
And then let's just jump down for sake of time.
I've got to hurry.
But in verse 13 it says,
Thou shalt observe the feast of tabernacles seven days after that thou hast gathered in thy corn and thy wine.
And thou shalt rejoice in thy feast.
Thou and thy son and thy daughter and thy manservant and thy maidservant and the Levite, the stranger and the fatherless and the widow that are within thy gates.
Seven days shalt thou keep a solemn feast unto the Lord thy God in the place which the Lord shall choose.
Because the Lord thy God shall bless thee in all thine increase and in all the works of thine hands.
Therefore thou shalt rejoice.
Now, everybody agrees that the Passover is Jesus.
And, you know, it flat out says in 1 Corinthians chapter 5, Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us.
So it's pretty easy to understand the symbolism of the Passover representing Jesus.
Everybody agrees and understands that the Day of Pentecost has to do with the Feast of Weeks here.
There's a clear connection there.
But the Feast of Tabernacles is not quite as clear.
It's a little bit harder to pinpoint what exactly does this represent.
I don't really have time to fully develop this in this sermon.
But I believe from my study of Revelation and end times prophecy that this seems to correspond with the millennial reign of Christ.
And that, you know, as far as the timeline and symbolism, that seems to be what it's pointing us to.
The second coming of Christ.
The millennial reign of Christ.
And, you know, I say that for a few reasons.
One thing that we could see just right in this passage as being a good symbol of that is that it talks about rejoicing at the end of verse 15.
In all the works of thine hands, therefore, thou shalt surely rejoice.
And if you think about it, the millennium is a time when we are rewarded for our works.
Because Christ says, Behold, I come quickly and my reward is with me to give every man according as his work shall be.
And when Christ sets up his kingdom on this earth and rules and reigns for a thousand years, he is going to give us authority.
And he's going to give us rewards based upon our works.
He's going to reward us according to our works.
And so we'll be able to rejoice in the works of our hands.
It'll be a time of peace and prosperity and rejoicing in the works of our hands.
Also, if you think about it, Christ will be dwelling among us bodily, literally, on this earth during the millennium.
And, of course, in the book of Revelation, it says, you know, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men after the millennium.
Even God the Father himself will rule over us and dwell among us.
Whereas during the millennium, it's the son that is ruling and reigning is Jesus Christ who will be making his tabernacle or his dwelling among us.
And so, again, that's not really as clear.
It's a little bit harder to be sure about that kind of symbolism.
But that seems to be the best fit for the Feast of Tabernacles.
Something about the second coming of Christ and specifically the millennium seems to fit well.
And if we looked at things in Leviticus 23, we could find a lot more parallels with Revelation and so forth.
But anyway, moving along quickly, I've just got a few minutes to finish here.
After we go through these three specific feasts, he says in verse 16, three times in a year shall all thy males appear before the Lord thy God in the place which he shall choose in the Feast of Unleavened Bread, that's the Passover,
in the Feast of Weeks, and in the Feast of Tabernacles, and they shall not appear empty before the Lord.
Every man shall give as he is able according to the blessing of the Lord thy God which he hath given thee.
So again, the emphasis here, it's not giving every detail of these holidays.
It's very abbreviated.
The emphasis is bring it to Jerusalem, bring it to the place that God will choose, and make sure that the Levite gets what's coming to him.
Make sure that the Tabernacle is supported and that the poor and so forth, that basically that this goes to the house of God.
That's the main emphasis.
And of course, in the New Testament, we should bring our tithes and offerings.
In the New Testament, we should bring them to the house of God.
You know, and by the way, when people ask me for donations out there in the world, I typically say what my dad said growing up.
My dad would, my whole life, this is what my dad would say.
I do all of my giving through my local church.
That's what my dad would always say to these people when they're trying to, you know, get a donation for this or that or the other.
So if you ever need a good cop out for the Salvation Army or something, now you got a good one.
Okay.
I do my giving through the local church.
You know, we should give to the local church, but here's the thing about that is that, you know, in our day, the local church doesn't really have much of a role,
at least not in the United States, of taking care of the poor simply because we live in something of a welfare state and there's all these other programs and government things going on.
But there still are some things for the poor and programs that are done through the local church.
And our church has helped out poor people over the years as well.
But obviously, this is not as big of a thing in 2023 America for a couple reasons.
Number one, we live in the most prosperous country in the world.
So, hmm, that is something to think about.
You know, it's like, you know, why isn't the church doing more for the poor?
I don't know.
Maybe because we are like in the top bracket of prosperity for the planet.
I mean, think about it.
There's like eight billion people in the world.
There are only 340 million of them in the United States.
So, roughly, that's like one out of 24 people, roughly, living in the U.S.
That means 23 out of 24 live somewhere else.
Now, let's think about, say, India.
You know, what percentage of the world's population lives in Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh?
You know, South Asia, we're talking about a fifth of the world's, but one out of five people in the world are living there.
You think there's a lot of poor people there?
Absolutely.
Think about China, over a billion people, right?
That's a very significant part of the world's population.
What about Africa, right?
What about the Middle East?
You know, you've got all of these places, and a lot of these places have a lot of poverty and a lot of problems.
We live in one of the most prosperous countries in the world,
and I would say we live in the number one country for opportunity, for anybody to make money.
To start at the bottom and climb up, I mean, we've got so much opportunity.
We've got jobs, we've got educational opportunities, we can gain skills.
We are truly blessed.
And so, obviously, taking care of the poor is not really a huge thing when you're living in the most prosperous country in the world.
Well, you know, it's not as big of a thing as if you were, say, in South Africa.
You know, you see Pastor Bogart, who's going to be preaching for us during the missions conference.
You see Pastor Bogart in Cape Town, South Africa.
Yeah, he ends up doing stuff to feed the poor because, I mean, he's surrounded by a lot of really actually struggling people there.
And not only that, but, of course, the government today, ever since the 1970s, has all kinds of programs and all kinds of free food and helping with lodging and helping with this, that, and the other.
And so they've already kind of got it covered.
But, you know, if it all went through the local church, I have a feeling that it would probably be better regulated than doing it through the government.
You know, there'd probably be some expectation that, yeah, we'll feed you, you know, but you're going to sit out and listen to this sermon and, you know, we're going to help you get a job and we're expecting you not to come in here high on drugs and whatever.
Because what does the Bible say if a man will not work, neither should he eat?
That's the kind of thing that a church would bring up when they're doing social programs.
So, obviously, tithes and offerings go to the church.
It supports the function of the church, the employees of the church, the program of the church, mission trips to Nigeria and unto the outermost part of the earth, almost weekly trips to the Native Americans, soul winning on the Navajo reservation and elsewhere.
You name it, you know, all the things that it goes toward.
And also it goes toward events where we all eat together and rejoice in the spirit of Deuteronomy where the Levite and the people and everybody's eating and rejoicing together.
So that's the main emphasis of the chapter.
That's why we just have this really abbreviated mention of these holidays because it's really about bringing the offerings and bringing them to the right place and not having a scattered religion all over the place.
God's plan was that Jerusalem was the place where men were supposed to worship and it was supposed to be centralized.
And, of course, Jesus talks to the woman at the well about this.
She says, well, our Father's worshiped in this mountain, but you say that Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship.
And Jesus pretty much tells her, well, we're right, salvation's of the Jews and you worship, you know not what.
That's pretty much what he tells her.
And then lastly, we just have a few verses at the end here.
Verse 18, judges and officers shalt thou make thee in all thy gates which the Lord thy God giveth thee throughout thy tribes and they shall judge the people with just judgment.
Thou shall not rest judgment.
Rest means to twist, right?
Thou shall not respect persons, neither take a gift for a gift to blind the eyes of the wise and pervert the words of the righteous.
That which is altogether just shalt thou follow that thou mayest live and inherit the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.
So notice that the government is not necessarily centralized.
The justice system is not necessarily centralized, but religion is centralized, right?
They must worship in Jerusalem, but they're to have judges throughout the land, administrating justice locally.
Verse 21, thou shalt not plant thee a grove of any trees near unto the altar of the Lord thy God which thou shalt make thee, neither shalt thou set thee up any image which the Lord thy God hateth.
God hates idolatry.
He hates images that are supposedly of the Lord because there is no legitimate image of the Lord.
None whatsoever.
And so we're not to have any kind of graven image or molten image.
We're not to bow down ourselves or worship any kind of an icon or image or anything like that.
And why does he not want a grove of trees?
What's the problem there?
The problem there is because this is a heathen practice and he just doesn't want the worship of the Israelites to resemble that of the heathen.
The heathen would worship in groves.
The heathen would worship in the high places.
And so therefore God does not want true biblical religion to be confused with false religion.
And that's kind of a whole sermon in and of itself.
But we should not pattern our worship after pagans and heathens and borrow their forms of worship because all throughout the Old Testament that's a big no-no.
And God is constantly telling them not to learn the way of the heathen, not to pattern the altars after their altars.
And so a grove seems harmless.
You know, in and of itself there's nothing wrong with a grove.
He's just saying just don't put a grove next to the altar because that looks too much like people worshipping Satan.
That's what they're into.
That's what they do.
And you know what cracks me up?
There's literally a church in our city called the grove.
I was literally out soul winning like less than two weeks ago.
And what church do you go to?
Oh, I go to the grove.
I'm like, so you're worshipping Satan over there?
No, I didn't say that.
But again, it's kind of just a face palm.
Like, really?
Really?
Like, you're going to call your church the grove when God says, like, don't, you know, don't build the altar next to the grove.
It's an abomination to me and all this stuff.
And so, hey, let's call the church the grove.
Yeah, you know.
Have you read the Bible at all?
Like, that just kind of cracks me up.
But it's probably, I don't know if it's just because they don't have a King James Bible and it just doesn't say this in the modern versions or something like that.
But you think that somebody would have spoken up at that meeting when they're coming up with the name and like, excuse me, you know, at least Google it or something.
You know?
And you know what?
I just, I'm sorry.
I have a really hard time believing that the Lord is pleased with that church.
You know, I just do.
Now, I don't, you know, I've met some people from there and I've met unsaved people from there.
I went on their website and, you know, was trying to figure out what they believe, but it was, you know, it's kind of hard sometimes to find that on these websites.
But what kind of a name is that?
I'd be shocked if they have a King James Bible.
They probably have the Devil's Bible.
Right?
The new Illuminati version is probably what they're reading from.
Right?
The NIV.
And they're doing it in the grove.
But anyway, and if anybody is upset at me calling out the grove for their stupid name, if they don't preach out of a King James Bible, then they're not a legitimate church anyway, because they don't even have the word of God.
They have a corrupt, counterfeit Bible.
There, I said it.
All right.
Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for your word, Lord, and we thank you so much for the book of Deuteronomy specifically.
And Lord God, I just pray that you would help us all to follow you this week and to read our Bibles every day.
And Lord God, I pray that you just bless every person who has come out on a Wednesday night to hear your word preached and made it a priority to be here in the middle of the week.
Give us safety as we go our separate ways.
Keep everyone healthy.
And Lord, help our church to just continue serving you, bearing fruit.
And thank you for our soul winners in Nigeria, Lord.
Bring them home safely.
And thank you for three back-to-back successful mission trips.
And we give you all the honor and glory.
And it's in Christ's name we pray.
Amen.