Shavuot: the Foot Festival of Straying or Sealing
It doesn't take long to learn about Passover and Sukkot, but Shavuot? What, exactly, are we supposed to do? There is a lot of celebration, storytelling, camping, and general hilarity during our bookend feasts of Passover and Sukkot, but I've had more than one email or student question concerning Shavuot and what to "do." Just eat dairy products? Just stay up all night reading Torah? That's it?
No, no, that's not it. Shavuot forms the axis of the foot festivals. They are called foot festivals because these are the feasts that Israel was expected to walk to three times per year. The more fortunate could ride donkeys. As we listen for the footsteps of Messiah, then where else should we listen the most closely? Yes, the foot festivals.
Two most important themes of Shavuot are the bringing of the firstfruits of the wheat and commemorating the giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai.
Our working text in the Footsteps of Messiah comes from Song of Songs Chapter 4:1-5. In past newsletters, we related these two symbols, a flock of goats and clean sheep as the nation of Israel come up from her two washings, the crossing of the Reed Sea and the three-day washing to prepare for the visitation at Mount Sinai to receive the Torah. The goats represent the Israelites descending from "Mount Gilead," or the "Mount of Witness," symbolizing Sinai, where they witnessed the Words in fire, smoke, hail, and rain:
- How beautiful you are, my darling, how beautiful you are!Your eyes are like doves behind your veil; your hair is like a flock of goats that have descended from Mount Gilead. Your teeth are like a flock of newly shorn sheep which have come up from their washing, all of which bear twins, and not one among them has lost her young. Your lips are like a scarlet (shani) thread, and your mouth is beautiful. Your temples are like a slice of a pomegranate behind your veil. Your neck is like the tower of David, built with layers of stones on which are hung a thousand shields, all the round shields of the warriors.Your two breasts are like two fawns, twins of a gazelle that graze among the lilies.
The goat's hair formed a covering for the Tabernacle: "All the skilled women spun with their hands, and brought what they had spun, in blue and purple and scarlet material and in fine linen. All the women whose heart stirred with a skill spun the goats’ hair." (Ex 35:25-26)
After the “mount of Witness,” the Israelites begin to work under the inspiration of the Ruach HaKodesh with Betzalel and Oholiav. As an aside, it is a given within the ancient Jewish way of viewing the Revelation at Sinai, that the offer of the Torah was made to the other 70 nations on earth as well as to Israel. Out of those 70, there was a remnant who desired the Torah, yet only one nation that unanimously, and with ONE VOICE replied, “We will do and we will hear.”
In Acts Two, proselytes from the nations, who would be the “best” or “firstfruits” of their nations seeking the Elohim of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, had assembled at the foot festival of Shavuot. The Ruach falls, and once again, the nations are given a chance to “do and hear” the Word. These proselytes spoke the languages of their native lands, and they could return and proclaim the message of Yeshua as the Living Word. Before we pursue that idea further, let’s think about this comment concerning Shavuot by the sages based on how two contexts diverge. They notice there is different wording in Numbers and Leviticus concerning the mussaf, or extra offering, required at Shavuot:
- “With regard to all the mussaf offerings it is written, ‘And one male of the goats for a sin-offering (Nu 28:15 et al); or, ‘And one he-goat for a sin offering’ (ibid, v 22 et al), but regarding the mussaf offerings brought on Shavuot, the term sin-offering is not written. This is intended to teach you that on Shavuot, when the people of Israel received the Torah, they possessed no sin or iniquity.” (Midrash Rabbah to Shir HaShirim 4§4)
While Leviticus acknowledges the Israelites still sinned and needed the goat as a sin offering, Numbers sets the offering, but not as sin, only as an atonement, or covering. In other words, we might know the sin is there, yet it is covered over as if it weren’t there. This is consistent with the teachings of the apostles concerning a saved person’s “righteousness credits.” If our Father Abraham was credited with righteousness he had yet to learn or to walk in obedience, then certainly his children were awarded those same “righteousness credits” into their accounts. They would not be penalized as they walked and learned to pray and obey.
In Jewish tradition, the "sinless" righteous are sealed at Shavuot, and they walk in that righteousness until Rosh HaShanah (Feast of Trumpets), marking the day of the awakening blast when the dead will arise. It is only the “lukewarm” or “intermediates” who have strayed off the path who are questionable, needing to repent before the conclusion of Yom HaKippurim.
Although saved and working hard in the wheat fields, sometime we sin! We break our promise to do and to hear, or even to hear and to do. We hit a rough spot, and instead of trusting the Word to sustain us even as it tries us, we look for a detour. Once we become aware, we must tune our ears to Yeshua’s voice, return to him, and follow him back to the flock. Our little sin-runaways are places where we cease to “complete our deeds” as Yeshua warned the assembly at Sardis in Revelation.
When we return, we can continue to grow up in the Word. Too many strays and runaways stunt growth, and as the Footsteps of Messiah draw near at the fall feasts, those stray sheep find themselves nursing on milk, still having to go back to the basics of repentance and other fundamentals. They can’t tolerate solid food, so the great wedding feast of Sukkot will not be palatable to them. Instead of a glorious resurrection, baby bottles and pacifiers are strewn around during the Ten Awesome Days between Trumpets and Yom HaKippurim as they seek the Word that could sustain them during such tribulation. Sadly, that Word will be hard for them to follow or swallow. Eating dairy foods at Shavuot should remind us to ramp up our spiritual diets between Shavuot and Sukkot.
James counsels these scattered sheep:
- James, a bond-servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes who are dispersed abroad: Greetings. Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. (Ja 1:1-4)
This is exactly what Abraham was told, to walk before El Shaddai and be "perfect,"; that is, upright, ethical, and faithful, not literally a perfect human being. Abraham would make mistakes as he learned, but he had righteousness credits in his account while he walked in faithfulness and learned.
In the following passage, James assumes that believers in Yeshua who obey the Torah are STILL in need of repentance as they walk through life. We might see these “scattered-abroad tribes” as though influenced by the testimony of Shavuot in Acts Two, which motivated the hearers to be immersed.
The remedy for everything, James writes, is a ”prayer of faith.”
This was part of the original relationship to the Creation, pray and obey.
- Is anyone among you suffering? Then he must pray. Is anyone cheerful? He is to sing praises. Is anyone among you sick? Then he must call for the elders of the church and they are to pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; and the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up, and if he has committed sins, they will be forgiven him. Therefore, confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another so that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the earth for three years and six months. Then he prayed again, and the sky poured rain and the earth produced its fruit. My brethren, if any among you strays from the truth and one turns him back, let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his way will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins. (Ja 5:13-19)
A righteous person can be a mediator in prayer, praying down the blessing that brings the growth to its potential. The righteous person is one who is walking faithfully in the Torah, displaying a life of ongoing repentance; therefore, he/she can mentor others in the process so that the encoded potential of the seed, the Word, is released by aiding others in removing sin so they can grow up and walk in their Shavuot sealing...so they can keep their promise to hear and obey, not to stray.
It is possible to walk in the truth, yet to “stray,” like a sheep. Our text, however, says that these sheep come up from their washing (in the sea) without having even lost their young. Peter alluded to this in Acts Two.
James urges the sick to seek out righteous believers for prayer, for should there be sin complicating the illness, they will be able to identify sin if such is the case. These older (in experience) believers not only know the Word, they've been tested in it and learned not to run from testing. Some illnesses are just the natural result of living in a fallen world. Sometimes our straying and disobeying contributes, and it moves us out of the earshot of the Great Shepherd. If the tribes are “scattered abroad,” then they would not have access to the priests or Temple ritual, and perhaps the illnesses were functioning as a type of to turn back ”the sinner” in need of repentance. In absence of a competent priest, James says to seek out a competent member of the royal priesthood.
When we pray for other believers' needs, we should see them as their Father sees them: perfect from their washing. Mature. Confidently, yet humbly walking in Yeshua's righteousness that has been placed in their accounts so that they will grow to the maturity for which we intercede and model.
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Shabbat Shalom!
