Sukkot has got to be one of my favorite times of the years and my most anticipated season of the Lord.
I love fall and winter anyway, and i’m so glad that Sukkot has mixture of both fall and and late summer (for the beach goers) but fall for the cooler weather birds, like me.
See, this couple is wearing clothing and not bathing suits. Thanks so much, Lord.
I have anticipated every season and feast of the Lord, every year and cycle because Hashem always shows me something new. (Hashem-the Name). Sukkot is no exception. Sukkot is the 7th and final feast of the Lord and reminds us of the past (the wilderness experience) and the future, (the messianic age).
I think Brad Scott talked about how one of the Hebrew words has to do with ruts, as in when a cow walks down a row in a field so many times, eventually, he just follows the rut. Since Hebrew thinking is circular, we are traveling in a circular rut, which gives us opportunity to learn something new the second, fifth, and infinity time around!
The Lord has shown me several things about Sukkot, in the past. One of the things that i saw, I saw during the Sukkot year i was trying to figure out if the pop up sukkah was okay for me to use on my way to a Sukkot celebration. They have them for $99 on the internet. I was reading what had been written by the website authors, concerning this little minimalist invention, and saw something they had written that was an eye opener (revelation) for me. They said that “the ancient rabbis have always regarded the glory cloud that covered the Israelites in the wilderness as the actual “sukkah”. For one thing, i think they dwelled in tents, did they not? It was so profound to me, because i had come to realize that theirs was a truly supernatural environment. Despite the great desire for charismatic individuals like me to see the Holy Spirit poured out in such a way, that we would see our “shadow” causing folks to be healed, just like those of the apostles, there has always been a supernatural element to God’s people that transcended normal experiences.
This was today, the 15th of August and they are sold out!
The second revelation that has always stayed with me, had to do with the dimensions of the Sukkah or booth. I really tried to imagine what this looked like, but i had to go search the internet when i first found out about it. I camped in a tent for years with folks at a local messianic synagogue and LOVED IT. However, as my sukkoting involved going to different encampments and gatherings in the future, i had to make adjustments. So i was in a quandary one year, thinking, “Am i really obeying the Lord, using a tent?” (It looked like the Taj Mahal, and I emerged from that tent like a princess with all my makeup on). The Lord interrupted my thoughts on this one day, and i really was getting quite worked up over it and He said, “But I’m the sukkah Ginny”. I had this revelation hit me as I saw the Lord, wrapped in swaddling clothes, unable to help himself, exposed to the elements, with the body of a human, and totally dependent on Mariam and Yoseph! And not only that He had the “soft spot” on His head that made Him even more vulnerable to injury, but prophetic of the fact that the dove descended upon him like a dove in bodily form. “and the heavens opened”…wow. Glory.
So this year, I’m reading three different Bible portions: the Torah portion, the chronological Bible, and the Daily Audio Bible. I’m getting different perspectives. I realized that in 1 Kings 8, the most glorious temple that was built, Solomon’s temple was dedicated on the first day of Sukkot. I saw that the scriptures used the date of “Ethanim, the seventh month”, and knew that something was up with Sukkot and the Temple being built.
8 Then King Solomon summoned into his presence at Jerusalem the elders of Israel, all the heads of the tribes and the chiefs of the Israelite families, to bring up the ark of the Lord’s covenant from Zion, the City of David. 2 All the Israelites came together to King Solomon at the time of the festival in the month of Ethanim, the seventh month.
Maybe this is something everyone in the world has already seen, but I had not. That made me SO excited. Look at ALL the connections! So i had googled “Was the temple of solomon build on the first day of Sukkot?” I found several cool websites.
I found this on “TheTorah.com” and here’s what the author said:
“Introduction
The association between Sukkot and Jerusalem Temple goes all the way back to the Bible’s first descriptions of the holiday in Deuteronomy 16. In this chapter, God commands the Israelites to go to the Temple to celebrate the three primary Temple festivals – Pesah, Shavuot, and Sukkot. Yet Deuteronomy 16 links the Temple to Sukkot more strongly than to the other two festivals by implying that the Israelites must remain in Jerusalem throughout the duration of the holiday.”
First of all, this blew me away. Now I have something concrete to work with! (pardon the pun). This article points out the messianic significance of Sukkot and the Temple.
“The Hasmonean period saw a sharp rise in Jewish apocalyptic and messianic literature. By the end of the Second Temple period, more and more Jews believed that they were living on the cusp of the messianic era.[1] Some Jewish leaders made use of their positions to seek opportunities to present themselves in a messianic role.”
A great little book called “What the Ancient Rabbis believed about the Messiah” says just exactly what this article says. However, the author explains that they were called “sages” back then. They were wise. The time when a “messiah” was most likely to come was the time Yeshua arrived.
Selah.
The author, however, does not confess Yeshua as Messiah because he says that Yeshua made the case that Mosaic law was irrelevant. Here’s the quote, again, from theTorah.com.
New Testament
Similarly, The Gospel of John, which stands apart from the other three canonical Synoptic gospels in its particularly anti-Jewish disposition, tells us that Jesus proclaimed Mosaic law irrelevant while standing on the Temple grounds on the holiday of Sukkot. John 7:14-24 reads:
About the middle of the festival Jesus went up into the temple and began to teach. The Jews were astonished at it, saying, ‘How does this man have such leaning, when he has never been taught?’ Then Jesus answered them, ‘My teaching is not mine but his who sent me…If a man receives circumcision on the Sabbath in order that the law of Moses may not be broken, are you angry with me because I healed a man’s whole body on the Sabbath? Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.’
The conversation soon turns to whether Jesus himself is the Messiah:
Now some of the people of Jerusalem were saying, ‘Is not this the man whom they are trying to kill?’ …Can it be that the authorities really know that this is the Messiah? Yet we know where this man is from; but when the Messiah comes, no one will know where he is from.’ Then Jesus cried out as he was teaching in the temple, ‘You know me, and you know where I am from. I have not come on my own. But the one who sent me is true, and you do not know him…’ Then they tried to arrest him, …but many in the crowd believed in him and were saying, ‘When the Messiah comes, will he do more signs than this man has done?’ (Jn 7:25-31 NRSV)
In John’s narrative, Jesus’ invocation of Mosaic law at the Temple site on Sukkot immediately gives rise to the Jews around him asking, Is this man a king? A Messiah? An inheritor of the Davidic dynasty? Or perhaps some combination? The answer is not provided in the gospel, but perhaps all Jesus wanted was that the question be asked. He knew of those earlier individuals such as Solomon and Nehemiah who had set precedent by guiding the Jews at the Temple site on the holiday of Sukkot into a new phase of religious government, and was intentionally linking himself with them.”
The reason this gentleman does not recognize Yeshua as Messiah, is that Yeshua did not establish the earthly kingdom right then and there. It starts with a Seed.
The second temple (Ezra’s temple)was not built prior to Sukkot but was celebrated right before the foundation was laid.
Ezra 3 NIV
Rebuilding the Altar
3 When the seventh month came and the Israelites had settled in their towns,the people assembled together as one in Jerusalem. 2 Then Joshua son of Jozadak and his fellow priests and Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel and his associates began to build the altar of the God of Israel to sacrifice burnt offerings on it, in accordance with what is written in the Law of Moses the man of God. 3 Despite their fear of the peoples around them, they built the altar on its foundation and sacrificed burnt offerings on it to the Lord, both the morning and evening sacrifices. 4 Then in accordance with what is written, they celebrated the Festival of Tabernacles with the required number of burnt offerings prescribed for each day. 5 After that, they presented the regular burnt offerings, the New Moon sacrifices and the sacrifices for all the appointed sacred festivals of the Lord, as well as those brought as freewill offerings to theLord. 6 On the first day of the seventh month they began to offer burnt offerings to the Lord, though the foundation of the Lord’s temple had not yet been laid.
Rebuilding the Temple
7 Then they gave money to the masons and carpenters, and gave food and drink and olive oil to the people of Sidon and Tyre, so that they would bring cedar logs by sea from Lebanon to Joppa, as authorized by Cyrus king of Persia.
8 In the second month of the second year after their arrival at the house of God in Jerusalem, Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, Joshua son of Jozadak and the rest of the people (the priests and the Levites and all who had returned from the captivity to Jerusalem) began the work. They appointed Levites twenty years old and older to supervise the building of the house of the Lord. 9 Joshua and his sons and brothers and Kadmiel and his sons (descendants of Hodaviah) and the sons of Henadad and their sons and brothers—all Levites—joined together in supervising those working on the house of God.
10 When the builders laid the foundation of the temple of the Lord, the priests in their vestments and with trumpets, and the Levites (the sons of Asaph) with cymbals, took their places to praise the Lord, as prescribed by David king of Israel. 11 With praise and thanksgiving they sang to the Lord:
“He is good;
his love toward Israel endures forever.”
And all the people gave a great shout of praise to the Lord, because the foundation of the house of the Lord was laid. 12 But many of the older priests and Levites and family heads, who had seen the former temple, wept aloud when they saw the foundation of this temple being laid, while many others shouted for joy. 13 No one could distinguish the sound of the shouts of joy from the sound of weeping, because the people made so much noise. And the sound was heard far away.
Wow. ” No one could distinguish the sound of the shouts …from the weeping”.
It’s another “selah” moment.
Here’s this years revelation that I pulled out of the glory cloud: They were instructed to “remain” in Deut. 16. Is this not a picture of our life with Messiah? We will be caught up with Him, in the air, and forever be with the Lord”.
Amen.
Celebrations are Biblical, people. They really are! Look at the feasts that God already ordained, yes, ordained, for His people to celebrate. Some of them are more somber, but all of them involve seeking a deeper relationship with God unlike the traditional American holidays. these are what i have been transitioning too, with many believers, and we are all learning how to celebrate these “feasts” because some of them don’t come with a lot of instructions. Blow a shofar? Okay. then what. We’re getting better. Some do them better than others. But we do have the Word if we…go a little crazy here and there. Makes for great debates.
Occasionally Profound 