Sermon Tone Analysis

THE EIGHT RUDIMENTS OF CELEBRATION

THE EIGHT FEASTS OR FESTIVALS OF ISRAEL

The Feast of First Fruits

Leviticus 23:9-14

(festiv4.doc)

*THE NEW HARVEST*

 

        Harvest had begun in a Midwest farming community.

Combines were moving through the fields looking for the payoff.

Soybeans were flowing into the waiting grain wagons.

One farmer climbed up onto one of these bins to check out the "first-fruits."

What he saw had to be an encouraging sight.

His community, along with many others, was in the middle of the worst corn crop failure in more than 40 years.

Yet as the beans began coming in, there was evidence that all was not lost.

*Those first loads gave reason to thank God for the harvest that He did give.*

The Feast of First Fruit (*not the feast of unleavened Bread*) had its roots and meaning in an agricultural setting such as this.

At the Lord's direction, Jewish farmers *celebrated* a Feast of Harvest.

In a tradition rich with symbolism they recognized the Hand of God that had given them the "first-fruits."

I am preaching a nine message series on the rudiments, skills, or principles of celebration.

*  God has been showing me that humanity needs celebration.*

*  He has been showing me that celebration is a very important part of the Christian life!*

*  He has been showing me that celebration is of special significance and importance to African-American Christians.*

Life is a struggle for everybody, no matter what your color or nationality, but for African-American people life is even more of a struggle because of the residual effects of slavery.

After we have been beat up and beat down all week; after we have struggled and striven to achieve life through material and earthly means, we need to take a break from the rat race and return to the human race by entering God's presence for a time of celebration.

The importance of celebration is illustrated in the Old Testament in Leviticus the 23rd chapter.

Four messages ago, we began to deal with the eight feasts or festivals which God commanded Israel to celebrate.

These festivals were holy convocations, conventions, or celebrations which God invoked upon His people.

There is a major rudiment or skill which is taught in each festival, which will yield a principle that we can learn and apply to our own modern worship celebrations.

In the first two messages, we covered the feast or festival of the Sabbath.

The major rudiment, skill, or principle of celebration that we covered was *resting* from our worldly labors.

In the next message, we studied the festival of the Passover.

The major rudiment of celebration that we covered was *remembering* God’s *redemption*.

In the last message, we studied the feast or festival of unleavened bread.

The major rudiment of celebration that we covered was *removing* all sin, worldliness, and filthiness of the flesh from our lives.

/(Let's move on to the next section of Scripture in Leviticus 23:9-14.

Would you turn there with me please.

Would you follow along silently, as I read aloud for us.

The next major principle of celebration is:)/

 

IV.

RENDERING (Sacrificing).

If you have been following along from week to week, you have noticed that all of these rudiments or principles begin with the letter "R," and that I am continuing the same outline from week to week.

The next major festival was the Feast of First Fruits.

*The major activity of this festival was offering or rendering to the Lord the first fruits of harvest.*[1]

"Although the Passover was established on the night they left Egypt, it was not observed as a commemorative feast throughout the forty years they were wandering in the wilderness.

This is probably because they had *no* lambs, or because the people were being sustained by the manna which God provided from day to day.

After keeping the Passover on the night of their deliverance, they *never* observed it again until they entered the Promised Land.”[2] "Until this time they had eaten only manna.

In the desert, a roaming people had no fields to sow nor harvests to reap."[3]

This festival could *not* be celebrated until the Children of Israel entered into the Promised land and the manna stopped.

As long as they were wandering through the wilderness, because of their own disbelief and disobedience, God rained down manna from heaven to feed them.

When they entered the Promised land, the manna stopped and they planted a crop.

*No man was permitted to partake of any part of the new season's harvest until the first fruits had been presented.*[4]

\\          If you will look at the chart in the middle of your bulletin, which I tediously put together for you, you will notice that “Closely connected with the Passover, and while the feast of unleavened bread was in progress, the third of Jehovah’s Feasts took place.

*This was the Feast of First-fruits.*

The land of Canaan was the proper scene of its celebration.”[5]

"It must be borne in mind that this feast was kept on the sixteenth day, and that at that time the day began at six o'clock in the evening (hence the repeated statement in Genesis 1:  `And the evening and the morning were a day.')

Toward the close of the fifteenth day, just before the going down of the sun, three men, each carrying a sickle and a basket, walked out through the city gate.

Separating from one another, each one would move toward one of the three previously buried hoops, and stand there.

These men would be accompanied by representatives of the people, both religious and secular--in other words, priests and elders--who would wait outside the city gate.

Quietly they would watch the sun set, denoting the end of that day.

As it slipped over the horizon the three men would address the priest with the following questions:

 

        Has the sun gone down?

On this fifteenth day?

        Into this basket?

(Each man would hold above his head).

With this sickle?

(Holding it high for all to see).

Shall I reap?

To each question the priest would answer in the affirmative.

With the last `yes,' the three men simultaneously would thrust their sickles into the barley within the hoops, and the sheaves would be placed in the baskets that they were carrying.

Then these men, with the priests and elders, would march processionally up to the temple with much rejoicing, where the bundles would be put together into one great sheaf or bundle and handed to the priest.

*He, in turn, took the sheaf and waved it before the Lord as a wave offering (this is seen in Leviticus 23:10-11)*:

 

`...When you enter the land which I am going to give to you and reap its harvest, then you shall bring in the sheaf of the first fruits of your harvest to the priest.

And he shall wave the sheaf before the Lord for you to be accepted; on the day after the Sabbath the priest shall wave it.’

This wave sheaf was accompanied by burnt and meal offerings."[6]

\\         *You can see then, that they celebrated this festival by waving a sheaf or bundle of barley before the Lord*.

"According to Exodus 9:31-32, barley was the first of the grain; flax was second; wheat was third."[7]

So, "According to the Jewish Calendar, this takes place in the spring of the Jewish year."[8]

"The beginning of barley harvest was marked by the waving of the sheaf of the first ripe grain, announcing the death of winter and the arrival of spring."[9]

*The act of waving the sheaf from one side to the other before the Lord held the suggestion that the sheaf, which was a memorial, was waved sideways to indicate that it represented the whole harvest yet in the field, from one side to the other side of the land*.

*In brief, men gave thanks to God for the harvest while it still stood in the fields.*

We must learn to give thanks to God by waving the first fruits or ten percent of the things which He has provided us with.

The ten percent is a token of the entire provision of the Lord.

We wave the ten percent before Him and offer it up to Him as a representation of all that we own or will own.

"The sheaves were brought to the Lord as an acknowledgment of His goodness.

There would *not* even be a harvest were it not for the goodness of God!  Israel would *not* even be in their land were it not for the faithfulness of the Lord.

*The Feast of the First Fruits was a reminder to them that everything they had came from God*."[10]

We must be reminded of that same truth!!!

 

/(But there is another very important principle here!)/

God always claimed the first fruits of everything.

He still does!

There could be no celebration without thanksgiving for what God had provided.

And there could be no thanksgiving without rendering, sacrificing or giving to God out of what He had provided.

God ordained three festivals, and this is one of them, when all the males were to appear before Him:  and they could not appear before Him empty-handed.[11]

Deuteronomy 16:16, "Three times in a year all your males shall appear before the Lord your God in the place which He chooses, at the Feast of Unleavened Bread and at the Feast of Weeks and at the Feast of Booths, and they shall not appear before the Lord empty-handed."

There can be no true worship or celebration without thanksgiving.

And there can be no true thanksgiving without sacrifice.

*Therefore, the main rudiment of this festival and the principle of celebration that we want to learn and apply is rendering, sacrificing, or thanking God for His blessings by giving Him the first fruits or first part of that which He has blessed us with!!!*

        "We don't bring our offerings grudgingly, because God loves a cheerful giver."[12]

*This means then, that we do not give Him leftovers!*

"How many people there are who use their money, time, energy and resources for their own selfish pleasure, and then if there's something left over, they give it to the Lord."[13]

“But let me make it clear that the New Testament Church has not been promised earthly riches.