The Torah portion Noach teaches yet another prophetic time-cycle. If you're new to the Biblical calendar, it may feel mind-boggling, but it's easy to understand if you let the calendar speak to you each year in individual Torah portions. This week you have the opportunity to learn the significance of the Seventh and Eighth Months to prophecy, both of destruction and salvation. The Good News is that Noah "the Eighth" (1 Pe 2:5) found favor (chen) in the worst destruction the world has known.
The Hebrew word for flood is mabul. In fact, we are approaching the Eighth Month rapidly, which is called the month of Bul (1 Ki 6:38). It is the month when the mabul began in the days of Noach. Yeshua even hinted to the seriousness of the approaching Eighth Month of Bul when he cautioned, "And just as it happened in the days of Noah, so it will be also in the days of the Son of Man." (Lk 17:26)
The Seventh Month, which contains three vitally important festivals, also has another name, Etanim: “All the men of Israel assembled themselves to King Solomon at the feast, in the month Etanim, which is the seventh month.” (1 Ki 8:2)
Ethanim means "ever-flowing streams." It is followed by the strong movement of water in Bul. The flood begins in Bul.
There is a flood coming. Not a flood of water, but a flood of fire.
The flood began in the Eighth Month, Bul, and the strong waters erupted for forty days and forty nights. Afterward, there are five approximate months in which the waters swelled; in short, they were tempestuous, driven by the winds. The stormy tumult would have ended around the time of Shavuot, which commemorates the giving of the Torah in the Third Month of Sivan.
This five-month period of danger is mirrored by the five-month period of torment on the wicked by the fiery tzirah from the Abyss (Re 9:5,10). What was accomplished with water in the days of Noah will be accomplished by fire in the future flood. Fire will be called down from Heaven and the smoke of the Abyss will spring up from below, just as the rain and springs in the days of Noah.
In the days of Noah, salvation was found in immersion. Immersion unto salvation. John the Baptist, or Yochanan the Immerser, also was secluded from a tumultuous world even while in his mother Elishevet's (Elizabeth) womb. During her pregnancy, Elishevet entered into a five-month seclusion. In regard to her five-month seclusion, Elishevet says, “This is the way the Lord has dealt with me in the days when He looked with favor upon me, to take away my disgrace among men.” (Lk 1:25)
We are not told exactly when she went into seclusion. If she hid herself after three months’ pregnancy, or when she began showing, she would have hidden herself in the Eighth month of Bul until just before Passover in the First Month when Yochanan (John) is believed to have been born. His ministry heralded the coming Mashiach, the Prophet like Moses. The name Yochanan is a permanent construct of the favor, chen, that Noach found.
When Miriam visited Elishevet to tell her the news of the Mashiach in her own womb, Yochanan leaps, a witness to the favor both women have received. Miriam was told in the sixth month of Elishevet’s pregnancy that she also would have a child because she had found favor. The Hebrew cognate of the Greek word charis is chen חֵן (Thayer’s), the same kind of favor that Noach found (Ge 6:8)!
This places Yeshua’s birth likely in the month of Tishrei, the gently flowing streams of Etanim, the Seventh Month. Yeshua, whose name means Salvation, identifies himself with the gently flowing streams of the water-pouring ceremony, where water and wine are poured out together. Likewise, Noah plants a vineyard when the bulish waters return to their state of gently-flowing streams in the earth.
Yeshua points out the dual nature of his and Yochanan's complementary ministries. Yochanan is known for immersion and warning of "the wrath to come." Yochanan does not drink wine, for he is the herald like Noah. Yeshua comes "eating and drinking," for he brings salvation signified by his birth in the Seventh Month, the month of the water-and-wine-pouring ceremony in the Temple. Yeshua stands up at the ceremony on the last Great Day of the feast of Sukkot and identifies himself with the living waters of the Garden of Eden. In fact, tradition tells us that one of the rivers of Eden flows with wine!
Yochanan warned of the waters; Yeshua WALKS on the waters.
The message from the days of Noah is that even in the running of the strong mabul of the Eighth Month, the righteous find favor in the midst of the water and fire. The same Spirit that hovered over the surface of the waters in Genesis 1:1 is the same Spirit by which Yeshua will hover with his righteous ones over the fires. The righteous go through water and do not drown; they walk through fire and are not burned. They find favor in the eyes of YHVH.
Perhaps coincidentally, this year the United States presidential election will be held on the 17th of the Eighth Month, November 4. Be prepared for some strongly-flowing rivers of fires. Intercede for those who are lost to flee from the wrath to come. Pray they will seek Salvation, Yeshua.
And may you find FAVOR in the eyes of the Lord!
