*Part 2 in a 4 part series on the Feasts of the LORD
The power of a good story
“The value of the myth is that it takes all the things we know and restores to them the rich significance which has been hidden by ‘the veil of familiarity.’ The child enjoys his cold meat, otherwise dull to him, by pretending it is buffalo, just killed with his own bow and arrow. And the child is wise. The real meat comes back to him more savory for having been dipped in a story…by putting bread, gold, horse, apple, or the very roads into a myth, we do not retreat from reality: we rediscover it.” C.S. Lewis, On Stories: And Other Essays on Literature
This week I started listening to George MacDonald's Phantastes on audible. Not only have I heard my own dear sister gush about the way MacDonald's books offer the truth soaked in myth + fresh revelation, but so have Oswald Chambers, C.S. Lewis, and many others I admire who mutually share an adoration of this man's fantastical work. George MacDonald knew that story carries the essence of Truth - the very mechanism we were created to respond to.
What I have discovered to be true of our Heavenly Father is that He possesses deep and wide knowledge of our Divine design. He knows how He made us - the wonders and curiosities of the human intellect, and how the longing for our Heavenly home was deposited deep within us at our origin. A longing built-into our Divine design that causes us to grope the walls of the unseen for the unknown God, who is in truth not far from us at all. So expressed the Apostle Paul at Mars Hill in Acts 17, when, surrounded by statues of Athena and the host of Roman idolatry, he postulated that God intended for humanity to hunger for, thirst, and seek Him out - not for the pleasure of watching humans stretch out and grasp for the unattainable, but so that they would find Him (!) and discover that He has never been far from them. For, "In Him we live and move and have our being" (Acts 17:28).
Regarding the power of our imagination in our pursuit of God, George MacDonald said:
"In very truth, a wise imagination, which is the presence of the spirit of God, is the best guide that man or woman can have; for it is not the things we see most clearly that influence us the most powerfully; undefined, yet vivid visions of something beyond, something which eye has not seen nor ear heard, have far more influence than any logical sequences whereby the same things may be demonstrated to the intellect . . . We live by faith, not by sight." George MacDonald, “The Imagination: Its Function and Culture” in A Dish of Orts
Our imagination can lead us into the countless treasuries of wisdom and knowledge hidden in the person of God. He is always beckoning to us, knocking on the door of our hearts, whispering, "Come away with me my Beloved one... " The knows the power of story as a vehicle of truth. He woven it into the very DNA of His gospel. From the moment the Spirit inspired Moses to write, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth..." an epic of importance far beyond the temporal framework of time came into being.
The Scriptures, complete with the writings of Moses, the historical records of the Tanakh, the tear-filled words of the Prophets, the music and poetry of the Psalms, the parables of the gospels and the life of Jesus Himself, the epistles, and John's revelation of Jesus... all testify of the story God has given us in His eternal Word. The story of us. And we are invited to take our place within it, His earthly ambassadors destined for another realm.
Your life is a love letter to God - a living response to the story
As lovers of Jesus and disciples of our Rabbi Yeshua, our lives are often parabolic of the redemptive story He's writing in and through us. I have always loved that Paul wrote to the Corinthians:
"You yourselves are our letter, inscribed on our hearts, known and read by everyone. It is clear that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts." 2 Corinthians 3:2-3
If my life is to be an open love letter giving testimony to all of my transformation from spiritual death to spiritual life, I pray it is as rich and thrilling a story as the finest that have been written. We all want our lives to matter, and matter greatly - don't we? Jesus said:
I am the vine and you are the branches. The one who remains in Me, and I in him, will bear much fruit. For apart from Me you can do nothing. John 15:5
I believe we live-out the words in red and embody the Word who took on flesh, when we forsake our own devices (take up our cross), and live by His Spirit within us to do as we see our Heavenly Father doing (follow Him), and abide in the vine.
John gave beautiful language to this sentiment when he wrote:
If anyone confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. And we have come to know and believe the love that God has for us. God is love; whoever abides in love abides in God, and God in him. In this way, love has been perfected among us, so that we may have confidence on the day of judgment; for in this world we are just like Him. 1 John 4:15-17
"For in this world we are just like Him." That is a profound statement that I want to sit with for a while. And another like it from this very same letter - a clear theme - reads:
Whoever claims to abide in Him must walk as Jesus walked. 1 John 2:6
God's love speaks to the story woven within each of us - that we were created with Divine design and intention... That our lives matter and we are all interconnected... That the life of Jesus and the story of redemption is a story worth telling and re-telling, emulating, imitating, and being grafted into - like a wild vine onto a perfectly cultivated olive tree (Romans 11).
Yeshua was one of hundreds of first-century rabbis who roamed the countryside with a band of disciples. At the time, Jewish culture nurtured and celebrated discipleship - something Western Christianity has for the most part lost. There was a saying from a sage who lived a century before Jesus that said, “Let your home be a meeting house for the sages, and cover yourself with the dust of their feet, and drink in their words thirstily.” (David Bivin, New Light on the Difficult Words of Jesus, p.12) It is here in this Jewish idiom that Jesus words, "Follow Me" become all the more poignant.
The invitation into discipleship is an invitation to walk so closely behind our Rabbi Yeshua, that we are literally walking in the dust His sandals kick up. In His actual shadow. In the very real pages of His story.
He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty (Shaddai). Psalm 91:1
Everything I've shared thus far was to present a very specific thought progression - and that is that we are to love and cling to the shadow of Shaddai. We find our rest in His shadow, our provision, protection, and all other comforts proximity with our Heavenly Shepherd affords us. Read Psalm 91 - there isn't a blessing in there we don't want!
Something Church history has sadly failed to teach us is one of the incredible Scriptures Paul gives us about what it looks like to walk in our Messiah's shadow - not just in rhetoric and principle, but in practice.
What did Jesus practice but the Torah? What holidays did Jesus celebrate but the feasts of the Lord?
Did you know Paul wrote that YHWH's Sabbaths (appointed times) are the shadow cast by Christ Himself?
...That they may know the mystery of God, namely Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge... Therefore, just as you have received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him, established in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness... See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, which are based on human tradition and the spiritual forces of the world rather than on Christ. For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity dwells in bodily form... Therefore let no one judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a feast, a New Moon, or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come, but the body that casts it belongs to Christ. Colossians 1:3, 6-9, 16-17
God is a wonderful storyteller.
He has been from "In the beginning" all the way to "Yes, I am coming soon." Jesus only did what He saw His Father doing and then beckoned us to do the same - to enter into His story as the sons and daughters He created us to be. If there is a way that seems right to man, but it's end is the way of death (Proverbs 14:12), I don't want it. Jesus promised the abundant life (John 10:10) and living waters that never run dry (John 4). I want that. I want to follow so closely behind my Rabbi, that my life takes on the dust and story of His life. I want to feast and fast on the set-apart days He feasted and fasted on - because He Himself is the author of them! He kept them holy during His life on earth, and will one day punish the kings of the earth for not keeping them (Isaiah 66).
Learning about the Feasts of the LORD given to Moses in Leviticus 23 is like being given beautiful pieces of this cosmic puzzle - it tells such a story! This passage in Colossians is not a proof text for disavowing the Lord's seventh day Sabbath or set-apart feast days (as it is commonly so used), but rather, a proof text confirming the imperial significance of YHWH's appointed days to God's people.
I'll be diving into this more in Parts 3 + 4. You'll learn how YHWH's 'appointed times' or 'moedim' are by definition dress rehearsals of the fulfillment to come... Yeshua's return! Stick around and share this if it's been a blessing to you.
I'm going to close with some parceled out passages from Leviticus 23 and two simple questions to ruminate on as you go about your day.
Why have we been taught these feasts are 'Jewish' and not what the Bible says they are (the Lord's feasts)? When has it ever been a bad thing to walk in Christ's shadow?
These are the feasts of the Lord, holy convocations which you shall proclaim at their appointed times... (23:4) These are the feasts of the Lord which you shall proclaim to be holy convocations... (23:37) You shall keep it as a feast to the Lord… (23:41) So Moses declared to the children of Israel the feasts of the Lord. (23:44)
Steffany Gretzinger - Shadow of Shaddai
One Voice Worship featuring Canaan Baca - More Like Jesus
Blessings & shalom from the shadow of Shaddai,
Natalie
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