Bully's Blog

“Then He said to the disciple, ‘Behold your mother!’ And from that hour that disciple took her to his own home.”  John 19:27

Although they are spread throughout the four gospels, Jesus’ seven words from the cross are easy to put in chronological order. Once in order, they follow the themes of the annual Feasts.

At Firstfruits, Christ on the cross is Moses, mediating between heaven and earth. From the mountain, He transfers His legal responsibility for His mother to John.

He calls her Woman. At this point in the garden, the Lord married Adam to Eve. Of the seven elected Judges, this is Deborah, the warrior-mother. This step is always about the Covenant head lifted up to make a house for Greater Eve.

With this loving act, Christ prefigures the responsibility for the faithful remnant of Old Covenant Israel being transfered to the Apostles.

Interestingly, Revelation 18:7-8 follows the same structure. At the Firstfruits/’Woman/Bride’ step, Israel, who has rejected and killed her Messiah, says, “I am no widow.”

Rieu’s theory of Jesus as a ‘man of letters’ is borne out by the structure of the Sermon on the Mount. As with many of the prophets, His “book” begins with a preamble that follows the themes of Israel’s 7 feasts in Leviticus 23.

Jesus begins with the Sabbath rest of those who have a humble spirit, works through those who mourn for their sins at Passover, and ends with the Atonementcovering of the blood of those who would be persecuted yet to be shed on the Land. And at Tabernacles, their reward is in heaven.

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Two Waters

Why is baptism for both males and females, when circumcision was only for males?

I have been following the Exodus pattern through the Bible, and an offshoot of that was an ‘accidental’ application to baptism. I’ll let you decide whether or not you think it holds water.

There are two ‘waters’ in the exodus pattern, the Red Sea (death) and the Jordan (resurrection).

Both are ‘baptisms’, but circumcision pertains to the Passover, the 2nd feast (unleavened bread). It is exit from the world and entry into a new people. There is blood and then water.

With Jordan, there is water, then blood – Jericho, the first conquest. This second baptism pertains to Atonement, the sixth feast. It is entry into, not a people, but an army. (The order of feasts comes from Lev. 23.)

Sabbath – God’s word through Moses (a single mediator for the people – Adam)

000PASSOVER – a baptism (death) that removes Adam’s sin. A ‘people’ assembled

000000FIRSTFRUITS – Moses ascends to receive the Law

000000000Pentecost – the Law given, the people tested

000000Trumpets – the ‘army’ is assembled and the Law repeated (Deut)

000Atonement - baptism (resurrection) and blood shed that removes ‘Eve’ from sin

BOOTHS – the army makes the Promised Land home (a corporate mediator for the nations – Eve).

Israelite males presented themselves before God at Passover/Unleavened Bread, Firstfruits and Booths. (Exodus 23:14-17) picturing the death, resurrection and marriage of the “bridegroom.” Trumpets summoned the people to prepare for Atonement, making ready the “bride.”

WEPOW

Passover versus Atonement = Circumcision versus Baptism

With that background, the entire Bible follows this pattern:

Sabbath - Creation to Abraham

000Passover - Circumcision divides humanity in two

>000000Firstfruits - Under Moses, a priesthood ascends before God,
>000000and draws near over blood sacrifices

000000000Pentecost - In the biblical pattern, this central point is always
000000000testing in the wilderness. This is the life of Christ,
000000000who is tested in the way all men are, but who does not sin

000000Trumpets - Christ assembles the New Covenant church,
000000making out of Jew and Gentile one new man in the first century

000Atonement - A corrupted Judaism is destroyed as Jericho, vindicating
000the words of Christ. This is the first conquest of the age
000in which we now live

Booths - the final coming of Christ and the judgment, after which the saints live with Him in glory

Now, to get to the point…

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A worship service should follow the seven-fold Covenant pattern:

Call to Worship (Genesis – Sabbath)

…..Confession of Sin (Exodus – Passover)

……….Ascension of Praise (Leviticus – Firstfruits)

Thanksgiving & Dismissal (Judges – Booths)

This pattern also structures the Creation week (Genesis 1), the Tabernacle speeches (Exodus 25-31) and the Ascension offering (Leviticus 1).

What is interesting is that the Firmament is Day 2 (Red Sea – death), but the Tabernacle puts it at Day 6 because Adam needs resurrection (Jordan).

So, in our services, at confession of sin, the saints are in the Laver. At Communion, the Laver is in the saints. We in Him and He in us.

Rieu’s theory of Jesus as a ‘man of letters’ is borne out by the structure of the Sermon on the Mount. As with many of the prophets, His “book” begins with a preamble that follows the themes of Israel’s 7 feasts in Leviticus 23.

Jesus begins with the Sabbath rest of those who have a humble spirit, works through those who mourn for their sins at Passover, and ends with the Atonement covering of the blood of those who would be persecuted yet to be shed on the Land. And at Tabernacles, their reward is in heaven.

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What gave David the right to add music, singing and dancing to the Tabernacle worship? The Tent of Moses was a place of silence.

The answer is in Deuteronomy. The Law was given to Moses at Sinai (Firstfruits), and repeated to the next generation before Israel crossed the Jordan. In between was 40 years of testing in the wilderness. God spoke at Sinai, and Moses listened in silence. But in Deuteronomy (Trumpets), it was Moses, the mediator, who “sang” the Law (Deut 31-32).

On to King David. After the continued flagrant disobedience of the sons of Eli, the Ark took itself into the ‘wilderness’ on Israel’s behalf at the hand of the Philistines, and conquered the serpent (Dagon). Besides a plunder of Philistine gold, it returned with both Jew and Gentile singers in a restructured worship that included music. The silent Tent of Moses, ready to pass away, had been broken down and prepared for incorporation into a permanent Temple built of David’s spoils. It was a bride ready for Solomon the bridegroom.

In the New Testament, following Christ’s example, the church came out of the Egypt of corrupted Judaism. She was tested in the wilderness, like Israel, with persecution and false teachers. Before the full inauguration of the New Covenant in AD70, she was presented as a bride ready for her husband, a rebuilt Tabernacle of David (Isaiah 16:5; Amos 9:11; Acts 15:16). Paul the tentmaker had completed the difficult process of stitching together a bride from both Jewish and Gentile worshippers. Purified by testing, she was a wise virgin with her lamps full of Pentecost oil. Her music was a new song accompanied by the seven Trumpets that brought the fall of Herod’s Jericho. The marriage feast of the Lamb followed, and Greater Solomon now rules the earth with His bride – a Temple built of living stones – until all enemies are under His feet.

At ascension (Firstfruits), Adam speaks and Eve listens as a people. Testing follows. At Trumpets, Greater Eve is a holy army ready to conquer. Now Eve sings.

A Blazing Torch and a Smoking Firepot

Moses spent 40 years in the wilderness, then Israel did. God’s prophet lives through the pattern, then God’s people follow him in a larger pattern. The head of the sacrifice, then the body. The Adam, then the Greater Eve. Jesus, then the church.

James Jordan observes that the Promised Land failed to support Abram both during the famine and also later concerning the flocks of Abram and Lot. Only after the Lord “purified” the Land with a sacrifice was it again a garden for the people of God. Like Adam, a deep sleep fell upon Abram, but it was animal substitutes that were divided.

The Lord passed over Abram, but in the darkness, a smoking firepot and blazing torch passed through the divided animals. God structured this event to follow Israel’s feasts, with Passover and Atonement at each end, and the Lord’s prediction of the Hebrews’ slavery in Egypt at the “wilderness” centre.

The blazing torch and smoking firepot are the Lord’s chariot throne. The blazing torch (the head) is His throne, the Ark. The smoking firepot is the Incense Altar, the cloud of angel elders in His train (the body), the Holy Place positioned ‘underneath’ the Most Holy (see Ezekiel 1).1

Revelation 8

After the ascension of Christ, Satan was expelled from his “ministry” before God as the Accuser of man. Like the evil twin of the blazing torch that measured Abram’s sacrifices, he was then used by God to bring an end to the Old Covenant upon the Land.

And the fifth angel blew his trumpet, and I saw a star fallen from heaven to earth, and he was given the key to the shaft of the [Abyss]. He opened the shaft of the [Abyss], and from the shaft rose smoke like the smoke of a great furnace, and the sun and the air were darkened with the smoke from the shaft.

The seven trumpets are a chiasm, with the third and fifth corresponding symmetrically. The “de-Ascension” of Satan mirrors his fall in the third trumpet. Like Christ, he was given a key. His throne-coming was also accompanied by clouds of smoke, but as false High Priest, instead of a sweet-smelling aroma it was the sulphur of Sodom. As Pentecost’s fire came from the Altar of Incense in heaven, its evil twin bore an army of unholy mighty men—the “smoking firepot” body of Satan’s blazing torch head. It was the children of Satan (John 8:44), an army of Judaisers, locusts who would devour the Land. As in Daniel 7, the winds of the Spirit raised up beasts.

“as with Tyre of old, the Abyss is being dredged up to cover the Land with its unclean spirits. Apostate Israel is to be cast out of God’s presence, excommunicated from the Temple, and filled with demons. One of the central messages of Revelation is that the Church tabernacles in heaven; the corollary of this is that the false church tabernacles in hell.”2

As the preaching of the seven-sealed Gospel to the Land began with a white horse, so at the destruction of Judaism, the preaching of the Gospel to the World began with the white horse passing through the divided pieces of the Land (Zechariah 14:4). However, this time, Christ did not ride alone but with His bride. He was a blazing torch, and She was now the smoking firepot—a permanent part of His Ark-chariot. A government of ascended men had replaced the government of angels. Together they passed through the midst of a divided Land to carry the seven seals to the World.

“Then passing through the midst of them, He went His way.” Luke 4:30

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1 Note also that in Exodus 25-31, the Ark is the Light of Day 1, and the Incense Altar is the “swarms” of Day 5 – birds from above and fish from below. The Tabernacle was both a portable Sinai and an image of the chariot of God.
2 David Chilton, The Days of Vengeance, p. 244.

“I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot!
So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth.” (Revelation 3:15-16)

In the book of Revelation, many sentences contain multiple Old Testament allusions knotted together. Sometimes these are more obvious (the Judaisers as Babylonian locusts from Joel with long hair added to make them ‘bad Nazirites’, for example), but sometimes they only become apparent from their position within the structure of the passage in question.

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“And I cut off the three shepherds in one month…” Zechariah 11:8

Who are these mysterious three shepherds?

Theories abound, most prominently that the Lord refers to the offices of prophet, priest and king in first century Judah. Perhaps, as with Zechariah 14, the pattern of Israel’s feasts (as outlined in Leviticus 23) structures Zechariah 11. If you look carefully you will also see the Creation week.

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