Spring Feast Psalms - 117

Did you know that Psalm 117 is the shortest chapter in the entire Bible? Did you know that Psalm 117 is also the exact middle chapter of the entire Bible? Did you know that Psalm 117 is a song that is sung at the Passover Feast to praise the Lord for His gracious and merciful work of redemption? If your answer to any of these questions is no, well… now you know!

In certain forms of Hebrew writing, the opening and closing verse express the same concept, and the middle verse expresses the major point and message of the entire passage. It is safe enough to say, although I could be wrong, that what is expressed in Psalm 117, being the middle chapter, is the major point and message of the entire Bible. The message is Praise the Lord! In the beginning, God and man dwelt together in perfect peace in a life of worship, fellowship, and harmony with God. In the end, God will dwell with His redeemed people from all nations of the earth, and we will worship Him for eternity.

So, the major message is that for His unfailing love and faithfulness we praise Him!

Psalm 117 was sung at Passover to celebrate how death passed over the Hebrews and Israel was delivered from the oppression of Egyptian slavery. However, God’s covenant with Abraham, the patriarch of Israel was that all nations would be blessed through him and the lineage of his promised son, Isaac. Isaac was the father of Jacob. Jacob’s name was changed to Israel, and he fathered twelve sons who became the patriarchs of the twelve tribes of Israel. Israel’s son Judah, whose name means praise, is the ancestor of King David. King David is the ancestor of Jesus Christ, the Messiah and Savior of Israel, and everyone from any nation, who by grace through faith, receives the free gift of salvation that He offers. Through the sacrifice of Jesus, the eternal Passover Lamb of God, all who believe are delivered from the oppression of sin, reconciled with God, restored to a life of fellowship with God, and are free to worship without hindrance or shame until the end of time, just as God designed from the beginning. For this, we praise the Lord!

Jesus Christ has crushed the head of the ancient serpent who tempted mankind to sin back in the beginning in the Garden of Eden. Jesus Christ has conquered sin and death, He has overcome the works of the devil, He has redeemed all who believe in Him from the pit of destruction, He has paid for our sins by His blood which was shed on the cross, He has invited us to share in His eternal inheritance, and He has atoned for our lives so that God does not remember our sins any more but only delights to bless us. Through faith in the finished work of Jesus, we have life to the fullest measure, and we live in perfect harmony with God until the end of time, just as God designed originally in the Garden of Eden.

Can anyone say Praise the Lord!?!

Read Psalm 117 with fresh perspective. Think of the Israelites praising God for their deliverance from death and bondage on the original Passover. Then take a moment and praise the Lord for delivering you from death and bondage and restoring you to fellowship with Him through your Passover Lamb, Jesus.

Praise the Lord! That’s pretty much the whole point!

Psalm 117 (New Living Translation)

Praise the Lord, all you nations.

Praise him, all you people of the earth. For he loves us with unfailing love;

the Lord’s faithfulness endures forever.

Praise the Lord!

Originally published as: "Praise the Lord - Psalm 117" - Reprinted from The Obedience of Faith Blog - Copyright © 2013 Wendy Bowen – ALL RIGHTS RESERVED WORLDWIDE

Spring Feast Psalms - 118

The stone the builders rejected has now become the cornerstone. This is the Lord’s doing, and it is wonderful to see. Psalm118:22-23

Psalm 118 is the pinnacle expression of God’s work of redemption through His Son, Jesus Christ. It is also, most likely, the last song Jesus ever sang during His life here on earth. Moreover, when all believers praise Him as the conquering King, when we are resurrected to a new life of heavenly worship, we will, most likely, sing this song together to praise the Lord for His enduring love. Needless to say, there is too much that could be written about Psalm 118 to express its profound eternal implications. That said, let us look at this Psalm through the lens of Passover, Israel’s exodus from Egypt, and Easter, resurrection Sunday, the two most significant examples of God’s redemption in the Bible.

Leading up to the original Passover, God sent His servant Moses to confront Pharaoh and to demand the release of His people from the bondage of slavery so that they could be free to worship God. God hardened Pharaoh’s heart so that he would not release the Israelites, and God produced miracles, signs, and wonders through Moses to prove His approval of His chosen messenger. Even after Pharaoh aggressively kicked the Hebrews out of Egypt and the whole nation of Israel set out into the wilderness, the situation grew worse and worse as it appeared that the Israelites were lost and confused, and the Egyptians pursued them to kill and conquer them. BUT GOD opened the gates of the Red Sea, parting the waters so that the Israelites walked through on dry ground. God delivered victory to His people, but their enemies, the Egyptians, were drowned and buried in the sea as it closed back up again. All Israel rejoiced at the salvation of the Lord! God is their God, and He had shined His face upon them!

Leading up to the original resurrection Sunday, God sent His Son and servant Jesus to confront the world, the flesh, and the devil and to demand the release of God’s people from the bondage of sin and the snare of death so that they could be free to worship God. God hardened the hearts of the religious and political leaders so that they would not believe that Jesus was the Messiah, and God produced miracles, signs, and wonders through Jesus to prove His approval of His chosen messenger. Once Jesus was tried and crucified on the cross and was placed in the tomb, the situation grew worse and worse as it appeared that Jesus may not have been God’s Messiah for it seemed that death had conquered Him. This was terribly confusing to those who believed that He was the Christ. BUT GOD opened up the gates of the tomb, rolling away all reproach, and Jesus walked out on dry ground, resurrected to new life. God delivered victory to His Son, and the enemies of mankind, namely sin and death, were overcome and conquered for all who would believe. Through this, Jesus Himself became the gate for all believers everywhere to worship God freely. Now, all of God’s people from all nations can rejoice at the salvation of the Lord! God is our God, and He shines His face upon us!

Read Psalm 118 again with fresh perspective. More importantly, give thanks to the Lord, for He is good. His faithful love endures forever! No ma er what you are facing today, even if it appears to be growing worse and worse, place your trust in God and cry out to Him in your anguish and distress. He will answer you and set you free. This is the day the Lord has made – REJOICE!

Psalm 118 (New Living Translation)

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good! His faithful love endures forever.

Let all Israel repeat:

“His faithful love endures forever.”

Let Aaron’s descendants, the priests, repeat: “His faithful love endures forever.”

Let all who fear the Lord repeat: “His faithful love endures forever.”

In my distress I prayed to the Lord, and the Lord answered me and set me free.

The Lord is for me, so I will have no fear. What can mere people do to me?

Yes, the Lord is for me; he will help me.

I will look in triumph at those who hate me.

It is better to take refuge in the Lord

than to trust in people.

It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in princes.

Though hostile nations surrounded me, I destroyed them all with the authority of the Lord. Yes, they surrounded and attacked me, but I destroyed them all with the authority of the Lord.

They swarmed around me like bees; they blazed against me like a crackling fire. But I destroyed them all with the authority of the Lord.

My enemies did their best to kill me, but the Lord rescued me.

The Lord is my strength and my song; he has given me victory.

Songs of joy and victory are sung in the camp of the godly. The strong right arm of the Lord has done glorious things! The strong right arm of the Lord is raised in triumph.

The strong right arm of the Lord has done glorious things!

I will not die; instead, I will live to tell what the Lord has done.

The Lord has punished me severely, but he did not let me die.

Open for me the gates where the righteous enter, and I will go in and thank the Lord.

These gates lead to the presence of the Lord, and the godly enter there.

I thank you for answering my prayer and giving me victory!

The stone that the builders rejected has now become the cornerstone. This is the Lord’s doing, and it is wonderful to see.

This is the day the Lord has made. We will rejoice and be glad in it.

Please, Lord, please save us.

Please, Lord, please give us success.

Bless the one who comes in the name of the Lord.

We bless you from the house of the Lord.

The Lord is God, shining upon us.

Take the sacrifice and bind it with cords on the altar.

You are my God, and I will praise you!

You are my God, and I will exalt you!

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good! His faithful love endures forever.

Originally published as: "God's Love Endures" - Reprinted from The Obedience of Faith Blog - Copyright © 2013 Wendy Bowen – ALL RIGHTS RESERVED WORLDWIDE

50th Day - Feast of Weeks (Shavuot) - Pentecost

People ask me why I follow dates and festivals on the Biblical calendar rather than the dates and observances that many churches follow and observe today. In case you were wondering this same thing, my answer is quite simple.

Jesus is coming back. Jesus is Jewish. I could be wrong but when Jesus comes back, I’m betting it will be according to the Biblical calendar, not the Gregorian calendar we follow today, and not according to our man-made dates of religious observances for significant events. God established the calendar of feasts as everlasting ordinances for generations to come, wherever in the world His followers may live. God is not a God of coincidence but precision. While we are not subject to obeying the regulations of these feasts because Christ fulfilled the Law for us, Jesus does instruct us to be ready and alert and aware of the times. Keeping track of the Biblical calendar and feasts, in my opinion, is one way of doing this.

That said, on this very day in history according to the Biblical calendar, some amazing things happened, and I don’t think it is a coincidence that these things happened on the same date in different years. This day is an example. It has been 50 days since the day when Israelites passed through the Red Sea, and it is also 50 days since the Resurrection of Jesus many years later. Let’s take a look at what happened on this day and what this reveals to us about being ready for one day when Jesus returns.

On this day in history: God came down on Mount Sinai in fire, revealing His power and glory to His chosen people whom He had redeemed from slavery in Egypt, and He spoke to them from heaven, speaking His laws to them to confirm His covenant with them. ~ AND ~ Every year following that, all Jewish men were to make pilgrimage to God’s Temple in Jerusalem, bringing with them the first and best of their fields – the first fruits of the harvest for the year – to offer them and dedicate the harvest to the Lord. ~ AND ~ After the Resurrection, the Holy Spirit came down in Jerusalem, resting upon the earliest followers of Jesus like a fire upon them and filling them with the wisdom, power, and gifts of God, including the ability to speak in languages they had never known or spoken before.

Read the following passage (Exodus 19:16-19) describing God’s power when He revealed Himself on Mount Sinai.

“There was thunder and lightning, with a thick cloud over the mountain, and a very loud trumpet blast. Everyone in the camp trembled. Then, Moses led the people out of the camp to meet with God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain. Mount Sinai was covered with smoke because the Lord descended on it in fire. The smoke billowed up from it like smoke from a furnace, and the whole mountain trembled violently. As the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses spoke and the voice of God answered him.”

Imagine, for a moment, that you were with the Israelites, standing at a safe distance at the base of Mount Sinai because you were not allowed to come too close. See in your mind’s eye the glorious fire of God descending as a pillar from heaven to touch the peak of the mountain top, and hear in your spiritual ears the voice of God speaking in His thundering voice to you, telling you what to do. Can you see it? Can you hear it? Isn’t it marvelous?

Now read this passage (Acts 2:1-4) describing this same day, the first day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit was poured out of heaven to fill Christian believers. “

When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly, a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the wholehouse where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest oneach of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as theSpirit enabled them.”

The same mountain top power you just envisioned seeing and the voice you imagined hearing came INTO followers of the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ. This is still true for all of us as followers of Jesus – this mountaintop power of God dwells WITHIN us! This fire, this power, and the ability to hear God’s voice (now more like a whisper than booming thunder) is IN us, directly telling us what to do and even giving us His own words to speak. Just like these first believers, we receive gifts of the Holy Spirit which enable us to perform the work of God on earth as it is in heaven. If we are fully surrendered and filled with the Holy Spirit, we can even feel the heat of the power of God burning within us.

The Feast of Harvest, which falls on this same day according to Jewish Law, required all Jewish men to unite together in Jerusalem and offer their first fruits to God. They dedicated the first and the best of the harvest to God, even while the harvest was months away, as evidence of their trust that God would be faithful to bring forth abundance in the Promised Land which God had given them. No ordinary work was allowed on this day, rather they celebrated and worshiped, praising God and remembering how He had delivered them from slavery in Egypt. They gathered at the Temple and offered to God a special burnt offering, sin offering, and a fellowship offering for peace in their community and in their land as they united together as one people in Jerusalem to worship.

But just as the fire of God on the mountain foreshadowed the fire of God dwelling within us as believers, the Feast of Harvest is just a foretaste and preview of what is to come for all believers. Let’s quickly recap the events which all occurred on this day in history and then look toward the future which we await with hopeful expectation – one day when Christ returns and reigns for eternity.

On this day at Mount Sinai, the entire nation of Israel had prepared and consecrated themselves – waiting – so that they could stand united together before God, offering themselves from a distance, and observing from afar the amazing power of their almighty God. They received the first fruits of redemption – the Law of God, which confirmed God’s covenant with the Jewish people.

~ AND ~

On this day in Jerusalem, all covenant believers gathered together as one people to worship in harmony and in peace with one another and to dedicate their first fruits to God – waiting – for the abundance of the harvest to come. They celebrated God’s faithfulness in delivering them from their past oppressions while they enjoyed the fullness of the land God had given them as He had promised.

~ AND ~

On this day in Jerusalem, all of the early Christian believers were united together in one meeting place – waiting – to receive the power of this same almighty God who was no longer distant but who filled their very own bodies with His marvelous power. They received the first fruits of the resurrection – the Holy Spirit, which is our deposit and guarantee of the new covenant of Christ.

One day, God will be faithful to bring forth the fullness of His Kingdom, and there will be a new heaven and a new earth. All believers who worship the one true Living God will unite together as one person in the new Jerusalem at the new Temple of God to freely worship in peace with God and in harmony with one another. We will praise God, remembering how He delivered us from the broken and oppressive old order of things here on earth. There will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain, and everything will be made new. The Spirit of God will be our own breath of life, and God Himself will dwell among us, just as He did with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.

Until that day, let all of us who believe and follow the Lord Jesus Christ consecrate ourselves to God and unite together in harmony with one another – waiting – for Jesus to return as our conquering King. Come Lord Jesus!! Come!!

Scripture References:

Mount Sinai: Exodus 19-20 and Deuteronomy16:9-12,

Feast of Weeks/Harvest: Leviticus 23:15-21

Holy Spirit Poured Out: Acts 2

Other: 1 Corinthians12, Psalm 87, Revelation 21

Originally published as: "This Day and One Day" - Reprinted from The Obedience of Faith Blog - Copyright © 2013 Wendy Bowen – ALL RIGHTS RESERVED WORLDWIDE