Time Travelers of the Moedim
How was your Sukkot?
Are you a beginner to the feast?
Are you “seasoned” in the feast?
Did you literally travel to Jerusalem, or did you travel to Jerusalem in your sukkah?
Our Sukkot trip to Israel was, as usual, filled with “kisses on our cheeks” from the Holy One, especially a visit from the ushpizin! I’m sure, however, that your Sukkot was filled with joy and wonder as well, whether it was in your backyard sukkah, on the apartment balcony, or camping with like-minded believers. While I would have loved to spend an evening with each one of you during Sukkot, reflecting on how our last several newsletter lessons from the Song of Songs was preparation for our “coming up and out of the wilderness” celebration, we’ll have to settle for a review via email. Next year…in Jerusalem!
In Song of Songs 3:6, we looked at who was coming up from the wilderness to inherit the Land of Israel? The description was of the Mishkan, or Tabernacle, representing the Divine Presence abiding among the Children of Israel as they emerged from the wilderness and staged to cross the Jordan:
- “Behold, it is the traveling couch of Solomon; sixty warriors around it, of the warriors of Israel. All of them are wielders of the sword, expert in war; each man has his sword at his side, guarding against the terrors of the night.” (So 3:7-8)
The Children of Israel learned something in the wilderness. They learned how to wield the Sword of the Word through various tests. A new generation will follow Yehoshua into the Land with the sword. This generation accepted the safety of iron:
Don’t worship idols. Yeah, Adonai is serious about that. Educated.
Keep the Shabbat. Yeah, Adonai is serious about that. Duly informed.
Honor your father and mother (and appointed leaders & judges). Yeah, Adonai is serious about that. Point taken.
Do not blaspheme the Name. Yeah, Adonai is serious about that. Got it.
Don’t complain and gossip. Yeah, Adonai is serious about that. Biting my tongue as necessary.
- “The godly ones shall be jubilant in glory; they shall sing for joy on their beds. The high praises of God shall be in their mouths, and a two-edged sword in their hands, to execute vengeance on the nations, and punishment on the peoples, to bind their kings with chains, and their dignitaries with shackles of iron, to execute against them the judgment written. This is an honor for all His godly ones. Praise the LORD!” (Ps 149:5-9)
“Learned in warfare suggests becoming learned in the Torah because Torah study is sometimes referred to as ‘war,’ as in the verse, the Book of the Wars of HASHEM (Numbers 21:14; Bamidbar Rabbah 11§3).” (ibid)
How will “the godly ones” bind the nations with shackles of iron? As Yeshua appoints and invests, those who love the Word will be given authority to judge the Word along with Yeshua. They will shatter misconceptions about the Word with the rod of iron and sword of truth. Even in the wilderness, those who wield the sword "rejoice on their beds, couches," for the Word is coming alive in the barren, sleepy places.
- Nevertheless, what you have, hold firmly until I come. The one who overcomes, and the one who keeps My deeds until the end, I will give him authority over the nations;AND HE SHALL RULE THEM WITH A ROD OF IRON, AS THE VESSELS OF THE POTTER ARE SHATTERED, as I also have received authority from My Father; (Rev 2:25-27)
- And she gave birth to a Son, a male, who is going to rule all the nations with a rod of iron; and her Child was caught up to God and to His throne. (Re 12:5)
- From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. (Re 19:15)
- I will also break down your pride of power; and I will make your sky like iron and your earth like bronze. (Le 26:19)
Iron does not bend. This reinforces how Jacob prevailed over Esau, just by not letting go, holding on until the dawn broke, ending his descendants’ night of exile among the nations.
The rod is a unit of measure, middah. When the overcomers, Jacob’s descendants, rule with King Messiah, they will impose the commandments like iron, unbendable, supporting the nations with the mitzvot like steel supports structures, and breaking pride against the Holy One.
With iron as the “rod,” we can see the two types of reactions to the commandments of Adonai. One kind of person sees them as restricting, cold, stifling, and opposed to grace-which means that the quality of grace is likely misunderstood.
The other reaction is positive. The iron structure supports a Building, a House of Prayer for all nations. Its laws, ordinances, statutes, stories, and prophecies become a support to keep the House upright and safe. Yes, this strength of the Word IS grace!
- “For the word of God is living and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, even penetrating as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” (He 4:12)
The rumors of the Torah’s death have been greatly deceiving to many, but Yeshua will come and demonstrate that it always has been, is, and always will be ALIVE! As he did in the gospels, Yeshua will teach the nations with the living Word, showing us how to live in it instead of die in it. How to respect its sharpness and power instead of disrespecting it with sin and a feeble, misinformed excuse of “The Lord knows my heart.” Yes, He does. He most certainly does. And if we use that as a defense, then we’d better be prepared to have that heart judged by the Word!
The iron rod of the judge will be a relief to many who really DO want to know the teachings of the Torah because the Lord knows their hearts. Others will be dismayed because they never wanted to be judged by the Word and rejected its everlasting structure and ability to know the difference between a rebel and one simply unlearned. They hid behind grace because they never intended to become a DISCIPLE of Yeshua, Salvation, only to benefit from Salvation without discipleship.
Let us not judge those who died in ignorance of the Torah. Those who are simply unlearned will rejoice at finding the sword that helps them discern between their appetite, emotion, desire, and intellect (soul), and the Holy Spirit. A disciple desires to discipline “I think, I feel, I want like an untrained animal soul” with the truth of Spirit: “It is written, THEREFORE, I think, feel, and want what the Spirit of Truth wants. I no longer worship the beast within. I am a disciple of Yeshua, the Living Word.”
The Living Word breaks the pride of man when his “beast” soul rules him:
- I will also break down your pride of power; and I will make your sky like iron and your earth like bronze. (Le 26:19)
- “...And take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.” (Eph 6:17)
If the picture of Israel coming up from the wilderness to cross into her inheritance is of the tribes, then those tribes are guarded and surrounded by those among them who can expertly wield the Word of Adonai, full of the Spirit and flowing with its Rivers as promised by Yeshua during the Feast of Sukkot (Jn 7:38). Even in the “terrors of the night,” the exile, these warriors commit themselves to protecting against the flood of evil that threatens the holiness of the House of Israel.
“The sixty mighty men-these are the sixty myriads (600,000) that came out of Egypt from the age of twenty years and above/below.” 3§14
- “Now the sons of Israel journeyed from Rameses to Succoth, about six hundred thousand men on foot, aside from children.” (Ex 12:37)
- “But Moses said, “The people, among whom I am, are 600,000 on foot; yet You have said, ‘I will give them meat, so that they may eat for a whole month.’” (Nu 11:21)
- “...even all the numbered men were 603,550.” (Nu 1:46)
- “...a beka a head (that is, half a shekel according to the shekel of the sanctuary), for each one who passed over to those who were numbered, from twenty years old and upward, for 603,550 men.” (Ex 38:26)
Why the disparity in the Midrash? Is it sixty myriads of mighty men above the age of 20 or below?
The Midrash points back to the exact wording of the text from Song of Songs 3:7:
“...sixty warriors around it, of the warriors of Israel.”
הִנֵּה מִטָּתוֹ שֶׁלִּשְׁלֹמֹה שִׁשִּׁים גִּבֹּרִים סָבִיב לָהּ מִגִּבֹּרֵי יִשְׂרָאֵֽל
The repetition in the verse describes sixty warriors from the warriors of Israel. The Hebrew preposition and prefix mem is read as “from,” so “from the mighty warriors of Israel.”
If there were sixty myriads in the wilderness 1) at the time of the Exodus, then the prophetic implication is that at the time of 2) the greater Exodus, there will be sixty myriads of mighty warriors descended from the original sixty myriads of the twelve tribes. As the verse could also describe 600,000 immediate descendants under the age of twenty, children from the original 600,000, so it could describe descendants of Abraham and Jacob who would also become sixty myriads of mighty warriors surrounding those traveling to the Promised Land.
- “I will bring you out from the peoples and gather you from the lands where you are scattered, with a mighty hand and with an outstretched arm and with wrath poured out; and I will bring you into the wilderness of the peoples, and there I will enter into judgment with you face to face. Just as I entered into judgment with your fathers in the wilderness of the land of Egypt, so I will enter into judgment with you,” declares the Lord GOD...and I will purge from you the rebels and those who revolt against Me; I will bring them out of the land where they reside, but they will not enter the land of Israel. So you will know that I am the LORD.” (Ezek 20:34-36; 38)
Although many have been instructed in the Word, a day of judgment is coming for mankind. Either we will accept the measures of the Word in the wilderness of the peoples, or we will rebel against them, just as many Israelites did in the wilderness. Those who “come up” from the wilderness to reign with King Messiah will be those who accept the Word and agree to remediate any misunderstandings or gaps in understanding so that they may be faithful judges with King Messiah. From the Creation, the appointed times were set as measures of iron so that mankind could thrive on earth.
This helps us to draw an inference pertaining to the Creation Week.
On the First Day, Light was separated from darkness, and the earth had light, but not dependent upon sun or moon. Plants grew in the Light on the Third Day. In Revelation, plants once again grow in this supernal Light. (Re 21:23-26; 22:2; Ezek 47:12)
On the Fourth Day, the sun, moon, planets, and stars were put in place “for the sake of the moedim.” This proto-prophecy alerts us to the fact that there would be exiles of the night in which we would no longer spiritually discern the appointed times as in the Kingdom of Heaven, but would instead depend upon signs in the night. The shomrim (guards of the Torah and especially Shabbat) and sovevim (night watchmen) know the night watches.
This significant day of Creation was emplaced within a Creation that already had Light!
In CG Workbook One, you learned of the play-on word of moed, “from eternity.”
The moedim are spiritually-discerned times, discernible from the Beginning, and discernible at the End, without the need of the natural substance of the heavenly bodies.
Although they were put as signs in the heavens, placing too much emphasis on the minutiae could lead one to forget that strife over such things may lead him/her AWAY from the goal of developing the spiritual perception of what time and times actually are: openings for obedience that stands eternally. In the reign of King Messiah Yeshua, mankind will regain the wisdom of the stork, who knows her “moed.”
- Even the stork in the sky knows her seasons [מֽוֹעֲדֶיהָ]; and the turtledove, the swallow, and the crane keep to the time of their migration; but My people do not know the judgment of the LORD. (Je 8:7)
What we learn of the moedim in natural time, we simply transfer into the realm of supernatural time, which does not depend upon the physical signs of sun, moon, or stars. It is spiritually discerned:
- I saw no temple in it, for the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. And the city has no need of the sun or of the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God has illuminated it, and its lamp is the Lamb. The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it. In the daytime (for there will be no night there) its gates will never be closed; and they will bring the glory and the honor of the nations into it; and nothing unclean, and no one who practices abomination and lying, shall ever come into it, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life. (Re 21:22-27)
There will be no “night” there, which means the inhabitants are no longer subject to the nights of exile from the Holy City Jerusalem.
- And he showed me a river of the water of life, clear as crystal, coming from the throne of God and of the Lamb, in the middle of its street. On either side of the river was the tree of life, bearing twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. There will no longer be any curse; and the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and His bond-servants will serve Him; they will see His face, and His name will be on their foreheads. And there will no longer be any night; and they will not have need of the light of a lamp nor the light of the sun, because the Lord God will illuminate them; and they will reign forever and ever. (Re 22:1-5)
The fruit will still be borne according to “time,” the months, yet a perception of the month beyond the physical world is granted to those who eat of the tree of life and are healed by it.
So is the Torah a Tree of Life or a Sword? Is the Word a rod of iron or an ageless support of Truth?
Yes.
It’s never been a matter of whether the Torah was life and instructions in godliness. It’s only ever been a matter of how mankind perceived its seasons and brought forth its fruits. As we come up from the wilderness of the peoples, we travel in Clouds of Glory, or as the rabbis call them, Sukkot of Glory. We learn the Torah of Moses. We bring forth fruit with the Spirit promised by Yeshua at Sukkot. We aren't just marking time in the wilderness of the peoples; we are dwelling in Sukkot, a privilege we celebrate as the seventh moed, a number of completeness.
Each Sukkot, the ushpizin, or
Seven Shepherds and the Eighth Prince ask, "How have you dwelled in Sukkot of Glory?" Have you dwelled in what masquerades as reality, the natural world, or have you dwelled in the Spirit of Glory, using the natural world as a mere vessel and glimpse of that Kingdom for which you prepare each day?
We learn what time is outside of time by walking within the appointed times.
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Shabbat Shalom!
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