IN THE SHADOW OF LOVE

This morning my lover embraced me and showered me with sweetness and fellowship.  My husband did too.

Ok, I knew that would get your attention.

In truth, my husband and my love becomes so much more beautiful, romantic and sweet the closer we grow to each other in grace, through fellowship with God's Valentine to us - Jesus Christ.  It's sharing on the deepest level.  I'm certain that is why in Genesis 4 and numerous OT passages, the inspired words were "Adam KNEW his wife....and conceived." It's so much more than just the sex...it's a far more intimate spiritual connection and union that expresses itself in the physical.  Adam knew Eve after their nakedness was revealed and covered by grace.  Their sexual union now became the concealed shadow of being rejoined spiritually, the foreshadow of Christ and his church. 

As I read from Exodus 29 and 30 this morning, the shadows of the Old Testament leapt out again.  The enormous detail God dictated regarding the sacrifice caused me to think, "there must be a reason - what am I missing?"  So I went back to my study, Seeing Christ in the Tabernacle by Ervin Hershberger, as a source, and peeled back yet another layer of onion skin.

This time, the layer revealed that Christ's resurrection took place the same month and day that the Bible TELLS us the Ark came to rest on Mt. Ararat.  I emphasize TELLS because wouldn't this be the reason God would give us the date???  It blew me away that the OT Jews who studied God's word so meticulously missed the fact that Jesus resurrected on the exact same day the Ark rested.  If Jesus is our Ark, through him we enter that Sabbath rest (it's a state, which is another study altogether) and celebrate new beginnings.

It makes sense to me that as believers we have already entered into that rest and now Sunday is our day of fellowship, our "Pentecost" - new beginnings, the first day of the week.

On the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread...  Acts 20:7.

We are not looking for that rest - it has begun (for my family out there, gives new meaning to our song, "We've Only Just Begun....").

In reading further, I thought it was beautiful how, before instituting the Passover, God demonstrated He was making all things new by taking the last half of the Hebrew civil calendar and making it the beginning:

This month [Abib] shall be unto you the beginning of months:  it shall be the first month of the year to you.   Ex. 12:2

I immediately thought, "no wonder Jesus said to the laborers in the garden in Matt. 20:16, "So the last shall be first, and the first last." Abib became the first month of the sacred calendar.  The same month the Ark came to rest on Mt. Ararat.  The same month Jesus rose, victorious over the sin (and as mom pointed out that Aaron's rod, as a serpent, swallowed up Pharoah's magicians' serpents, synonymous with "death is swallowed up in victory! everything is a picture for those who have eyes to see!)

At this point, I decided to check out the Jewish Calendar section in my Bible.  Well, I couldn't find Abib.  Turns out Abib was changed to Nisan.  WHY?  WHEN?

I should have kept reading because the answers were ahead, but God was making my study personal, making me ask questions (and any teacher will know a student assimilates best their instruction when they can formulate questions).  I likely would have missed the point, like I did in so many previous readings.

Abib became re-termed Nisan during the Babylonian Captivity. The significance of that blew me away.  First off, God never told them to change the name to Nisan as far as I can tell.  It was adopted from the Babylonian's term for the month!  Imagine that!  Remember they went into captivity in Babylon for idolatry and failing to keep the Sabbath!  Talk about idolatry! Subsequently, God's first sacred month was disguised to future generations.  Henceforward, unless they had eyes to see when they searched the scriptures and understood that Nisan was in fact Abib, they would fail to connect the Sabbath rest with its fulfillment.  The repeated use of Nisan rather than Abib shows a disconnect. Another shadow or picture that we must be born again to see the kingdom of God....or enter the Sabbath rest. Their sin took them into captivity in Babylon where Satan was God's instrument in blinding their eyes to Christ's very fulfillment of the Sabbath rest.   

I gave them My statutes and informed them of My ordinances, by which, if a man observes them, he will live.  Also I gave them My sabbaths to be a sign between Me and them, that they might know that I am the LORD who sanctifies them. Ezekiel 20:11-12

Sanctify My sabbaths; and they shall be a sign between Me and you, that you may know that I am the LORD your God. Ezekiel 20:20

For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath. Matthew 12:8

Because they kept not the Sabbaths, they failed to see Christ was the Lord who sanctifies them.  Christ IS the Sabbath rest.  

Is it any coincidence that the Lord said in Matthew 16:4,

A wicked and adulterous generation looks for a sign, but none will be given it except the sign of Jonah.

A sign so obvious, so, shall we say, "headline newsworthy" -

JONAH, THREE DAYS AND THREE NIGHTS IN THE BELLY OF A WHALE, VOMITED ONTO SHORE.

but, do we see the sign?  Is it so obvious, we don't see it?

JESUS, THREE DAYS AFTER BURIAL, SWALLOWS DEATH UP IN VICTORY, THE FIRST FRUIT OF ALL WHO ENTER THE SABBATH REST.

I pray the Word of God would embrace you today, that you would discover the riches of his glory, the enormity of his grace, and fall in love.