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The following suggested or possible grouping of Scripture passages are offered to aid beginning fellowships. The readings and limited commentary are, hopefully, obviously thematically related. And the concept behind this selection is the resurrection of Christ Jesus. Possible songs include the following hymns: Readings for the Wave Sheaf Offering 2006April 16, 2006 The person conducting services should open services
with two or three hymns, or psalms, followed by an opening prayer acknowledging
that two or three (or more) are gathered together in Christ Jesus’ name, and
inviting the Lord to be with them. The
first passage read should be Leviticus chapter 23, verses 1 and 2, then verses 9
through 14. Commentary: The Wave Sheaf Offering is an appointed feast of
the Lord that is to be kept by all generations of Israel as is the weekly
Sabbath to be kept—and as with the Sabbath commandment, which moved from being
a law written on stone tablets that governed the actions of the hand and the
body to being a law written on the fleshy tablets of the heart and the mind to
govern the thoughts of the mind and the desires of the heart, the Wave Sheaf
Offering moved from being the waving of the first ripe sheaf of Judean barley
to being the celebration of Christ Jesus’ acceptance by the Father. When the old written code inscribed in stone
tablets was abolished—this code physically divided humanity into two divisions,
the Circumcised and the Uncircumcised (Eph 2:11-22)—and a new covenant was made
with Israel, a covenant written on hearts and placed in minds (Jer 31:33 &
Heb 8:10), the nation of Israel went from being the physically circumcised
nation to being a spiritually circumcised nation, this spiritual circumcision
coming from receipt of the Holy Spirit [Pneuma
’Agion]. The former nation ended the marriage made at Sinai by murdering
its Husband, who had put the nation away for its adulterous behavior (Ezek
chaps 16 & 23). Thus, the murdered Husband was free to marry another (Rom
7:1-4), but not another physical nation, for He will not again enter His
creation—the Logos, as Theos, came as His son, His only (John
3:16), to end the marriage He made at Sinai (Exod 19:5-6) when He entered His
creation to be seen in His glory [His backside] by the man Moses (Exod
33:20-23), and to be seen from a distance by Moses, Aaron, Nadob, Abihu, and
seventy elders of Israel (Exod 24:9-10)…the marriage of the Lord to Israel was
for the purpose of producing offspring, just as is the marriage of a man to a
woman. But few offspring came from this marriage, for the nation would not walk
in the ways of the Lord, nor would the nation quit profaning His Sabbaths (Ezek
chap 20). Thus, as the promise did not go to Abraham’s eldest son, Ishmael, but
to his next son, Isaac—and as the promise didn’t go to Isaac’s eldest son,
Esau, the twin born first, but to the younger twin, Jacob—the promise of
salvation didn’t go to the Logos’
eldest son, natural nation of Israel (Exod 4:22), which the Apostle Paul
compares to Hagar (Gal 4:21-31), but to the holy nation (1 Pet 2:9) born
second, which Paul compares to Isaac. But from Isaac comes two sons, twins, one
hated before birth, one loved (Mal 1:2-3 & Rom 9:13). Likewise, two sons
are in the womb of the Church, struggling as Esau struggled with Jacob in the
womb of Rebekah (Gen 25:22). One is hated by the Lord even though no sin is
presently imputed to it, for this son remains cloaked in the mantle of Grace.
The second son is loved, for this son practices walking uprightly before God
while wearing the mantle of Grace. The first son walks lawlessly before God,
profaning His Sabbaths. The second son keeps the commandments that are written
on heart and mind. The first son labels the second son a legalist, and openly hates his law-abiding brother, whose keeping
of the commandments convicts the first son of blasphemy against the Holy
Spirit. Two sons of spiritual Isaac. Twins. One hated. One
loved. Both struggle against the other in the womb of the Church, the last Eve.
The Apostle Paul reminds Roman converts that God told Moses that He will have
mercy on whom He will have mercy, and compassion on whom He will have
compassion (Rom 9:15 citing Exod 33:19), and the context of the Lord telling
Moses that He will be gracious to whom He
will has Moses pleading for the nation’s life after the golden calf
incident—the Lord would not accept Moses’ life in exchange for the lives of all
of Israel, nor would He take Moses’ life for the sins of Israel. Instead,
Israel was figuratively placed on a very short leash so that when these people
rebelled against the Lord in the wilderness of Paran (Num chap 14), all
Israelites over twenty [the age of adulthood] died in the wilderness and never
entered God’s rest (Ps 95:10-11), with the exception of Joshua, who served
Moses, and Caleb, who had a different spirit in him. And all of spiritual
Esau—that greater portion of the Christian Church that profanes the Sabbaths of
God—is on this figurative short leash, and will be condemned to death when it
rebels against the God, and tries to enter His rest on the following day, the 8th
day, instead of the 7th. The struggle of the hated and the love twin in the
womb of the Church has seen the hated son drown disciples who would be baptized
as adults [the Anabaptists], has seen many of the greatest atrocities humanity
has known committed by that hated son, has seen that hated son take his lawless
gospel to the world in previously unimagined power, and has seen the loved son
passively absorb the abuse that come from keeping the commandments—this loved
son is now largely ashamed of the identifier Legalist, which should be worn proudly. But the hated son has so
effectively twisted the epistles of Paul (as the Apostle Peter said was already
being done in the 1st Century — 2 Pet 3:15-17) into its lawless
gospel that the message this son teaches confuses even the spiders of Google that hang as Jonathon Edwards’
spider over the flames of hell. And this day on which the Wave Sheaf offering is to
be observed epitomes the hated son’s twisting of Paul’s epistles: from the days
of Moses, Israel was commanded to celebrate the resurrection of Christ Jesus,
and His acceptance by the Father. But the natural nation of Israel, like
Ishmael, the firstborn son of Abraham, was not of a spiritual promise. It was
physical, a nation made with hands and the cutting away of flesh, a nation in
bondage to sin and death, a nation that grew in the hill country of Judea as if
it were the barley and wheat it harvested, a nation that forms the lively but
spiritually lifeless shadow of the Church, a nation that because of its lawlessness
was given statutes by which it could not live (Ezek 20:25-26). And the Church,
as the spiritual reality that cast the lively shadow commanded to burn its
firstborns because of its lawlessness and its profaning the Sabbaths of God,
has been commanded to burn the hated firstborn son in the fires of gehenna because this son’s lawlessness
and profaning of the Sabbaths of God. Yes, the Church, like natural Israel, has
been commanded to spiritual burn its firstborn son in lake of fire for the same
reasons that natural Israel was given statutes that defiled the nation, and
should have made it abhorrent in its eyes. But as the natural nation never repented of its
evil doing, keeping only the statutes given that defiled the nation, the Church
has visibly kept only the statutes that showcase its lawlessness and its
profaning of the Sabbaths, which will sent its firstborn hated son into the
lake of fire. Again, two sons. One is today celebrating Easter.
The other is either avoiding celebrating this day so as to not celebrate
Easter, or is observing the Wave Sheaf Offering. The firstborn son of the
Church will have assembled before dawn to observe the rising sun, then dressed
in its finery, will now be hearing a message about Jesus’ resurrection, before
it sits down to a ham dinner as families gather together on one of two or three
annual occasions…what can be wrong with families getting together, this
firstborn son will ask, little realizing that those who sanctify and purify
themselves, following after one another, eating pig’s flesh, shall come to an
end together (Isa 66:17), for many will be the slain of the Lord when He comes
(v. 16). Jesus’ appearance before his Father and His God on
this day, this year as it was in 31 CE, the fourth day of the Feast of
Unleavened Bread, should be commemorated. * The
reader should now read John chapters 19 & 20; followed by Luke chapter 24
and Matthew chapter 28. Commentary:
As the last Adam, the first
spiritual man, Jesus was the first sheaf of the early barley harvest that was accepted
by God. The loved son of the Church will constitute the remainder of the barley
harvest. And this will be the message of the last High Sabbath of Unleavened
Bread. * The person conducting the Sabbath service should close services with two hymns, or psalms, followed by a prayer asking God’s dismissal. * * * * * "Scripture
quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, copyright ©2001
by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All
rights reserved." [ Home ] [ Sabbath Readings ] |