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(1)
The Sabbath--
Impressing the character of
Israel's typical history
(see Heb. 4:9 Greek).
(2)
The Passover--
Redemption, deliverance 'out of'.
(3)
The Unleavened bread--
The sheaf waved (Lev. 23:10).
A firstfruits.
(4)
Pentecost--
Two wave loaves. Fifty days.
Jubilee anticipated.
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(5)
Feast of Trumpets--
Joel 2:1,15; 1 Cor. 15:52.
(6)
The Day of Atonement--
Repentance (Lev. 23:28,29).
Reconciliation and access.
(7)
Tabernacles--
The sunteleia. Harvest and
ingathering. The eighth
day stressed (Lev. 23:39).
While, experimentally, we must all begin with redemption -- Passover,
'the first month of the year to you' (Exod. 12:2), God begins with the
Sabbath, and the purpose of the age is to restore that which is past.
Passover, Unleavened Bread, Pentecost and the Firstfruits have received
their fulfilment (1 Cor. 5:7,8; Acts 2; 1 Cor. 15:20). Between Pentecost and
Trumpets (Nos. 4 and 5 in the list above) is an interval of some months, with
no feast to mark it, only a reference to 'the poor, and to the stranger'
(Lev. 23:22). Here, in these silent months between Pentecost and Trumpets,
is where the unrevealed dispensation of the Mystery finds its place.
The feast of Tabernacles, being the sunteleia, must be given a little
closer attention. This feast celebrates both the harvests of 'the corn and
the wine' (Deut. 16:13). At the return of the captivity under Ezra, and
again under Nehemiah (Ezra 3:4 and Neh. 8:14) it was observed, and this is
the feast picked out by God for annual observance by all the nations that are
left after the coming of the Lord (Zech. 14:16 -19). The association of
'tabernacles' and the Coming of the Lord explains Peter's suggestion on the
mount of Transfiguration, that he should make three tabernacles (Matt. 17:4).
After the detailed statement of Leviticus 23:34 -36, the writer returns
to the Feast of Tabernacles to give further particulars (verses 39 -43), thus
marking it as of great importance. Here we have the command to take boughs
of trees and to dwell in booths or tabernacles. Here also is emphasized the
'eighth day' which is 'the last day, that great day of the feast' (John 7:2
and 37), when the Lord spake of the full outpouring of the Spirit -- upon His
own glorification -- partially fulfilled at Pentecost, but awaiting His
Second Coming for its complete fulfilment.
The 'eighth day' brings us to Resurrection. The tabernacles speak of
true 'peace and safety', and all these typical observances are covered by the
word sunteleia used by the disciples when they came to the Lord with their
question 'What shall be the sign of Thy coming, and the end of the age?'