"Succoth" Nehemiah 8:13-18 Sunday Evening Worship Service

I invite you to open your Bibles now to the book of Nehemiah, chapter 8, continuing our study there, Nehemiah chapter 8.

Nehemiah 8 · chapter mention Nehemiah 8 · chapter mention

Right where we left off this morning.

We'll begin in verse 13, read to the end of the chapter.

It's Nehemiah chapter 8, verse 13, of using the Pew Bibles.

Nehemiah 8:13

It's page 404.

I'll read our text for us and then begin tonight.

This is the word of God, Nehemiah 8, verse 13.

Nehemiah 8:13

On the second day, the heads of the fathers' houses and all the people, with the priests and the Levites, came together to Ezra the scribe, in order to study the words of the law.

They found it written in the law that Yahweh had commanded by Moses that the people of Israel should dwell in booths during the feast of the seventh month, and that they should proclaim it and publish it in all their towns and in Jerusalem.

Go out to the hills and bring branches of olives and wa wild olive, myrtle, palm, and other leafy trees to make booths, as this is written.

So the people went out and brought them and made booths for themselves, each on his own roof, and in their courts, and in the courts of the house of God, in the square at the water gate, and in the square of the gate of Ephraim.

And all the assembly of those who had returned from the captivity made booths and lived in the booths.

For from the days of Jeshua, the son of Nun to that day the people of Israel had not done so.

And there was very great rejoicing.

And day by day, from the first day to the last day, that he read from the book of the law of God, and they kept the feast seven days, and on the eighth day there was a solemn assembly according to this rule.

This is the description of the celebration of the Feast of the Tabernacles, and we will study more about that tonight.

I pray God would seal this word on our hearts as we talk about it and dive into it more tonight.

The Feast of Tabernacles is one of the major feasts in Judaism.

It's probably their most festive holiday.

It's unique among all the holidays described in the Old Testament or even practiced by Jews to this day, because it is the only holiday that Gentiles are invited to participate in.

All the other holidays are just for the Jews or perhaps the sojourners that are staying within their gate, but not this one.

This one is an invitation, and that's because while the scripture we just read now says it hadn't been practiced since the days of Jeshua or Joshua until that day, Solomon did dedicate the temple in 1 Kings chapter 8 during this feast.

1 Kings 8 · chapter mention

They obviously didn't practice it like it was prescribed, but Solomon in his temple dedication announced that the temple would be an attractive point for the Israelites.

They would pray to it when they were in exile, they could pray to it.

And Solomon says in his dedication that if any Gentiles turn towards this place and seek a refuge from God in this place, that God would hear them.

Solomon begs God to hear the prayers even of Gentiles when they turn towards the Lord of the temple.

And so the feast of tabernacles or uh tents, it's called many different things.

The Jewish word for it is sukkot, and that's my how my you might be familiar with.

That's what it's often called today is the celebration that is extended even towards Gentiles.

It is certainly the most festive of all of the Jewish holidays, and it is important for you to understand it because you're gonna learn something new, I hope, right now.

Zechariah verse 14 and chapter 14, verse 16, says that we will celebrate the feast of Sukkot in the millennial kingdom.

So this is a fell uh a festivity, this is a festival that you will participate in.

If you're a believer in Christ, don't feel cheated that you're not practicing it here and now.

Although feel free to partake it with your family if you would like.

Uh, because as I mentioned, it's it's it's not cultural appropriation.

The Jews invited Gentiles to participate in this.

So go for it if you would like.

Uh this year, I believe it's September 20th, if you're looking for the it's a week long.

It's actually eight days long.

So carve out some time.

If you're homeschooled, tell your parents you get out of school that week.

It's part of the just the festivity and see what happens.

Uh but you will celebrate it in the millennial kingdom.

Uh, people will celebrate it's the give it's the day, it's the really the week, it's eight days long, uh, seven days for the festivity, and then the eighth day is the day of celebration after it.

They celebrate the fact that God led them through the wilderness for 40 years.

In the Bible, this is the feast that is referred to uh as the festival of lights, tabernacles, harvest.

Um, it is called just simply in the New Testament the feast.

It is the most major of all the Jewish holidays, so much that when John says it is the feast, that's this is what he means.

Every Jew, if you call it the feast winner, see, just like for Americans, if you would say the holiday season, you know, it's kind of a weird way to avoid saying Christmas, but everybody because everybody knows what you're talking about.

The holiday season is Christmas.

Well, for Jews, the feast is the Feast of Tabernacles.

This is the main holiday of the year.

It's a celebration, as I mentioned, of how God led the Israelites for 40 years through the wilderness.

They lived in shelters, they had the stars above them.

They were led by fire by uh by night and the cloudy pillar by day, and that guided them.

They had manna from the ground, they had water from the rock.

God provided all of their needs in their wilderness wanderings.

That's the point of this.

And they're supposed to remember it.

The Red Sea crossing and the Exodus wanderings is the most noted event in the Old Testament, is referenced more times than any other Old Testament event inside the Old Testament, and the feast of Sukkot is given to the Jews to remember that every single year.

It is seven days long.

It does not have a fixed starting date.

In other words, it doesn't just start on Monday, it starts on the 15th day after a full moon, and so it f after the certain moon, the seventh month.

And so it's a floating day, sometimes as early as the beginning of September or towards the end of October, much like our Easter floats around, except our Easter is always on a Sunday.

Sukkot will start at random days during the week, and once it starts, it goes for seven days.

So this year it starts Monday, September 20th, I believe, is a Monday, it goes Monday to Monday, and then the big party is on the eighth day after the end of it, unless the eighth day turns out to be the Sabbath.

And if the eighth day falls on the Sabbath, uh, once every seven years or so, then you don't have the big party at the end.

You read the Torah all day long on the 10th, just like we read this morning.

That's what they would do every seventh Sukkot.

As I mentioned, it's a celebration of how God led them through the wilderness.

It's a celebration of harvest.

It happens at the end of harvest season.

The grapes have just been pressed, the olives have just been picked, and this is their celebration.

It's a prayer for prayer for rain.

The rainy season in Israel rains for a couple months.

It's the winter season.

You know from studying the Old Testament that much of Israel's prosperity hinges on whether or not there will be rain.

And so this is kind of a dual-purpose holiday.

It celebrates the harvest that God has given you, like our Thanksgiving functions in that sense.

And it's also a prayer for future provision that God would give rain.

And it's done in faith because God has always given rain before.

In the wilderness, he may not have given rain, but he gave water from the rock.

So if God can give water from the rock, he can give water to his people when they pray to him for it.

That's the celebration of Sukkot.

When it's practiced today, people build tents in their courtyards or patios.

And just to give you the correlation here, you know, we put Christmas trees up in our house, or you put Christmas lights around the around your house or whatever you do.

I'm sure you do something to celebrate Christmas.

For Jews, they build these tabernacles or these tents, and they still do this to this day.

I don't know if you have uh lived in New York, uh, but if you if you have, you've seen these all over the place during Sukkot.

It's a very common feature.

Even in DC, I've seen them in DC.

In fact, I have found pictures of them because as I was describing this this week to people, most of the people I talked to said they've never seen anything like this.

And it's celebrated.

Even in Los Angeles, you see these tents around.

So I have pictures.

I brought show and tell tonight.

Show and tell.

So this is what in my notes it says a fancy suburban Sukkot tent.

Okay, and so the idea behind a Sukkot tent is it's supposed to have three sides: one side to entrance, three sides for walls.

The roof is supposed to be thatched.

Uh, and the rule is, and of course, in typical Judaic fashion, there are rules governing everything.

Uh, the the roof has to have enough openings in it that you can see the stars when the stars are out.

So if you turn out the lights, the roof has to have enough of an opening that you can see the stars because this is a reminder of the wilderness wanderings where they slept under the stars in their their huts or in their tents or whatever.

The tent the word used is tent, but this is what they have in mind.

This is a three-sided tent.

It is decorated.

Look at the little chairs that you all have in your backyard, right there, and everything.

Uh fancy suburban tent.

This one may not says a fancy driveway tent.

This one built in a driveway.

Uh again with the celebration.

And the idea is that you have meals in this.

So for all of Sukkot, the seven days of Sukkot, you're supposed to eat every meal in this tent.

That's what you're supposed to do.

Now, in practice, people don't actually do that.

Um, some people do, but most people uh will are supposed to eat all their meals on the first two days of Sukkot in the tent and perhaps on the last day.

And in the middle days, the rule is that you have to eat a piece of bread the size of an olive in the tent.

And it's the key part, you'll see why when we get to a few other tents, you'll see why that's a key part.

But they're all designed for meals because you're eating there at three times a day for at least a few days of this year.

In other words, you're spending time in here.

The idea is that you're practicing living in the tent.

A lot of families will sleep in the tent.

Um, in fact, they're encouraged to do that.

The the idea behind this is that you eat in there, you sleep in there.

And just like the Sabbath rules, you know, when Jews aren't allowed to travel on the Sabbath, the home is defined as where they eat.

If you eat a meal somewhere, that's your home.

The same principle here.

If you're eating in there, you're making it your home.

If you're sleeping in there, it is your home.

Um, this is a fancy college tent.

I stole this from uh the website of uh New York City University.

This is a uh an advertisement for Jewish fraternity on campus from Sukkot a couple of years ago.

Uh this is on their college campus.

They built a tent, you can see the hole in the roof, and they're having a meal in there during college.

Uh so because these are all American ones, um, and I had omini over my house today, I found an Indian, a Jewish Indian Sukkot tent.

Here you go.

Doesn't that have the Indian flair to it?

Uh this is some Jews that live in India.

This is their Sukkot tent uh right there.

It's kind of prettier, I think.

Uh has more an authentic feel to it.

Uh Indian, this one is a New York City renting tent.

This is along the East River in New York City, and you can rent this to eat your meal in it.

So if you work in New York City and you go out, uh you pay money and you can have your piece of bread the size of an olive in this tent, and you're practicing the Feast of Uh Tabernacles right there.

Um here is one from Washington, D.C.

This is a few years ago.

Uh same concept.

This is in the NPR parking lot.

If you're familiar with NPR in DC, this is the NPR parking lot.

Here's a tent that is built.

Uh I don't really know if that's a high-end tent or a low-end tent.

It's kind of hard to tell, isn't it?

Uh the ladder there makes me think it's still under construction.

Uh but Jewish employees in NPR will go out there at lunchtime during Sukkot and have their lunch in there, get there early for breakfast and eat in there, I guess.

So these are all you know yard tents.

But most Jews in the United States don't live in a house with yards, and so hence you see the parking lot or the renting ones.

But they often in New York City or in Tel Aviv especially have balconies or patios, and a lot of the apartment complexes in Tel Aviv and in New York City are built with the patios for precisely this reason.

You turn your patio into your Sucote tents.

This is in Brooklyn uh during Suco, this is uh this this year under COVID and everything.

Um there's the uh uh turning the different patios into Suco tents, and here's one from the ground still in Brooklyn, looking up, and all the patios get built out like that.

Uh kind of a cool idea.

And you would sleep in there, eat in there, etc.

Uh, and then finally, if you don't have a patio in New York City, what are you supposed to do?

Well, you can rent the truck for the full week, but what most people do is they would rent them just for an hour or so, or 20 minutes or so.

15 minutes, I think, might be the minimum time.

There's some minimum time, and so here's a fleet of trucks that will go through the streets of New York City for you to rent.

Now, this is the end of my pictures, but I'm thinking as I show you all these, I'm missing like the coolest ones aren't even, you didn't even get to see the cool ones.

You can look them up on your own.

Uh, the coolest ones are in Jerusalem in Tel Aviv.

I mean, it is extremely festive.

People decorate them like we would uh decorate for birthday parties.

There's colorful streamers.

People will hang fruit on them because there's four different kinds of branches that we'll read about in a minute that are supposed to be tied onto your tent, and one of them is fruit branches, and so it's become a kind of a custom that people will make a kind of a cornucopia of fruit sort of thing and tie that to the ceiling, and so it's very bright.

They'll tie lights to them.

It's not um, you might think, you know, a Sabbath, what's the deal with the lights?

No, you're allowed to use electric lights in this, and the more colorful the better, because it's the celebration of lights.

And so if you were to go to Jerusalem today or even Tel Aviv today, even it's a very much kind of a secular holiday in Tel Aviv.

People that aren't even religious Jews will still celebrate this as the whole city grinds to a halt for this week, and it is very colorful, lots of music.

The eighth day is supposed to be feasting and dancing, it's supposed to be the happiest celebration of the year for them.

Uh it's not it's not the Jewish New Year, but in a sense it is the Jewish New Year because the whole scripture reading for the year starts over on the eighth day of Sukkot.

It begins the whole reading for the year again, and so it is a very, very festive day.

Every day throughout the week, they're reading the Halail, Psalm 113 through 118.

They read that every single day uh throughout Sukkot, uh, except on the seventh year, uh in which case they read the whole Torah.

I mentioned that earlier.

Now, this is what is celebrated here in the book of Nehemiah.

In fact, before we get back to the book of Nehemiah, I want you to flip over to Leviticus chapter 23.

Leviticus 23 · chapter mention

So you can leave your uh finger there in Nehemiah.

Flip over to Leviticus chapter 23.

Leviticus 23 · chapter mention

Here's a section of Leviticus that describes the different feast days from uh the Day of Atonement to Pentecost, would be the other two big ones.

The Day of Atonement celebrating, of course, the sacrifice of the Passover land, Pentecost celebrating the coming of the Holy Spirit uh on his people, which is of course when God launches the church.

And in the middle of that is um the feast of Sukkot.

Um you can see this, it picks up in Leviticus 23, verse 33.

Leviticus 23:33

Uh as you're in the Pew Bibles, it's page 102.

Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to the people of Israel, saying, On the fifteenth day of the seventh month, and for seven days is the feast of the booths to Yahweh.

And booze here is just a translation of the word Sukkot.

And so all those tents you saw that's Sukkot.

So it's rendered booth here.

I I wanted you to see those pictures so you know what we're talking about.

Um they're picturing tents, sometimes made with canvas, sometimes with tent material, sometimes just with thatch and sticks, but that's what they're picturing.

Uh so the English translation booze is a weird one because when we hear the word booze, it used to mean phone booth, I think, right?

I don't even know what the word booth would be used for anymore in in England.

Maybe at a restaurant, that kind of thing.

Do you want a high top or a booth kind of thing?

But this is it's the tents they're talking about.

This is the feast of those booths.

Verse 35.

On the first day will be a holy convocation.

So, in other words, everybody gathers together.

You shall not do any ordinary work.

And so this first day, no matter what day of the week it falls on, this first day is celebrated like a Sabbath.

The Jews are not supposed to work on that day.

And as they take that day off from work, verse 36, seven days you will present food offerings to Yahweh.

Now, these food offerings, they are described over in the book of Numbers.

I'm not going to have you flip over there and look, um, but they're described in Numbers 29, verses 12 through 34.

Numbers 29:12–34

If you want to just jot that down, we won't take the time to go there.

But what's interesting about the food offerings, you won't turn there, but I'll just tell you what's there.

It's a very descript sacrifice that's brought every day.

The first day is 13 bulls, two rams, and fourteen lambs.

The second day is twelve bulls, the third day, eleven bulls, the fourth day, ten bulls.

So every day the number of bulls declines until the very end.

And when you sum up all of it, it's seventy bulls are offered over the course of the whole week.

Two rams every day times seven, fourteen rams, fourteen lambs every day times seven.

So it's a massive number of sacrifices, but it adds up to seventy bulls.

This is supposed to symbolize in the Jewish mind the seventy nations of the world.

In other words, a sacrifice for every nation of the world.

This is again hinting at the Gentile nature of this ceremony, that it is a it's a proc I don't even know if the Jews understood all that was behind this, but it's a proclamation that Gentiles will turn towards the Lord of the temple, pray to him, and have a sacrifice for their sins provided through the temple worship.

And of course, is obviously fulfilled in Christ.

But that's described in Numbers 29.

Back in Leviticus 23, it just says, uh, you'll bring the sacrifices that are prescribed.

Remember, the Torah was given as a unit, so when Leviticus is written, uh Moses is very well aware of what Numbers is going to say.

He's not repeating it.

He's just saying it's it's described to you elsewhere.

Um but this is a solemn assembly, verse 36 says.

You shall not do any ordinary work.

It's a Sabbath day, the how it starts.

Now these are the appointed feasts of Yahweh, which he will proclaim in the times of holy convocation, for presenting to Yahweh food and offerings and burnt offerings and grain offerings and sacrifices and drink offerings, each on his proper day.

Besides Yahweh's Sabbaths, and besides your gifts, and besides all your vow offerings and your free will offerings which you give to Yahweh.

On the fifteenth day of the seventh month, so we're still describing the feast of Booze, when you've gathered into the produce of the land, you'll celebrate the feast of Yahweh seven days.

The first day will be a solemn rest, again, describing the Sabbath.

And the eighth day will be also solemn rest.

So the eighth day, regardless of what day of the week it falls on, will also be a Sabbath.

You will take the whole day off of work.

And you will take, verse 40, on the first day the fruit of the splendid trees, branches of palm trees, and the bows of leafy trees, and willows of the brook, and you will rejoice before Yahweh your God for seven days.

The Jews today were just referred to this as the four kinds offering, the four kinds offering or sacrifice.

It's the four kinds of plants that grow in Israel.

Uh it's a palm branch, which you'll see with Jesus entering Jerusalem on the shouts of Hosanna, a myrtle, which is more of a bush, a citron or a fruit tree, and then a willow.

And if you think of the leaves between a fruit tree, which maybe even have fruit on it when they do this, the willow and the palm and the myrtle, they're all four very different things.

And what they'll do is they'll take those four branches and they'll tie them together into like one sheath, and you can wave it like this, and you wave it all six directions, up, down, left, right, all around, northeast, southwest.

And that's your offering.

That's how you do the offering of the branches.

You tie them together, you go into the tent, and you wave it before every meal.

That's what's described here in verse 40.

You're taking those different, the four kinds of branches that God has given you.

It's symbolizing all the fruit, the fruit and the food and the olives and the everything He's given you.

Uh, the date trees, which have the palm branches, are all over Israel, and you'll do that for seven days.

Verse 41 of Leviticus 23, you'll celebrate it as a feast of Yahweh for seven days in this year.

It's a statute forever throughout your generations.

Forever, it says, through all of your generations.

You'll celebrate it in the seventh month.

You'll dwell in booths for seven days.

All native Israelites will dwell in booths, that your generations may know that I made the people of Israel dwell in booths when I brought them out of the land of Egypt.

I am Yahweh your God.

Thus Moses declared to the people of Israel, the appointed feasts of Yahweh.

You can flip back to Nehemiah.

Do you see the emphasis on there?

Is you need to do this to remember who Yahweh is.

Now, do you see why when we read this morning in the first half of Nehemiah chapter 8, the Jews were so broken?

Nehemiah 8 · chapter mention

I mean, certainly there was the moral sins that you're thinking of.

Certainly they were unethical in their living.

Uh they were uh charging each other interest and uh contrary to what the law of God said, they're breaking God's law in all kinds of different ways.

But here's something very basic that you can't excuse that is repeated in Numbers and in Leviticus.

It's referenced twice in the book of Exodus.

If they would have read the Torah all the way through, four different times they're hearing God's word say, you need to spend a week in these booths to remember that he's Yahweh.

And they're reading it in the time they're supposed to be doing that.

And so all the weeping we read about in the first half of Nehemiah chapter 8, a lot of it, I'm sure, is focused on the fact that they're not doing what God has commanded them to do.

Nehemiah 8 · chapter mention

They were exiled for failing to keep the Sabbath years.

Well, this holiday has a Sabbath element to it, in that every seventh year they're supposed to read all of the Torah.

That's described over in the book of Numbers.

They're not doing it.

And so they're convicted by that back in Nehemiah.

Uh chapter uh eight, verse earlier when I said chapter seven, I meant Nehemiah chapter eight, verse thirteen, on the second day the heads of the fathers, houses, all the people with the priests and the Levites came together to Ezra the scribe in order to study the words of the law.

And they found it, this is Nehemiah 8, verse 14, written in the law that Yahweh had commanded by Moses, the people of Israel, should dwell in booths during the feast of the seventh month, and that they should proclaim it and publish it in all their towns and in Jerusalem, and go out to the hills and bring branches of olive and wild olive and myrtle and palm and other leafy trees and make these booths as is it written.

Nehemiah 8:14

So they're they're going off of what we just read, and they're saying, We're not doing this.

We've got to command everybody to come.

And so the people went out, and remember, Israel is not fully repopulated.

The population there is in Jerusalem.

It's a very, you know, a few hours' walk will get you all the way around there.

I mean, it would take 18 hours or so to get to Jericho, but other than that, you can get to the other uh little villages there in Bethlehem and all those areas around Jerusalem.

So that's where they send the word out.

Now, tomorrow we're doing this, we're gonna do this tomorrow.

The word out there.

Now, this is not the massive crowd we saw this morning in the first half of Nehemiah 8.

That was everybody in Jerusalem was there.

Up to 40,000 people could have been crowded around there.

But today, the day after that, verse 13 says it's just the heads of the fathers' houses and the priests and the Levites.

So it's, you know, every, not just the every husband, but kind of the leader of every family group is there.

So it's a smaller number of people.

They're talking about this, they're convicted about this, they develop a plan, they send out the word.

Verse 16, the people went out and brought them, and they made booze for themselves, each on his own roof, and in their courts, in the courts of the house of God, in the square at the water gate, and the square of the gates of Ephraim.

So this place is transformed overnight.

Booths pop up everywhere.

And all the assembly and those who returned from the captivity made booze and lived in the booze.

For from the days of Jeshua, which is another rendering of Joshua the son of Nun, to that day the people of Israel had not done so.

And there was very great rejoicing.

And people were stoked about this.

They were so happy they got to celebrate the feast of the booths, which God had given them that way.

It's again it's a festive, festive holiday.

Verse 18, by day by day, from the first day to the last day, all seven of those days, they read from the book of the law of God.

Remember, that was something that was supposed to happen every seven years.

They just jump in on it on the first one.

They're like, all right, we're here.

We're reading the law of Moses again.

It was just read to them a few days ago.

Ezra just read the whole thing from morning until lunchtime.

We looked at that earlier.

Now they're going to do it every day that week.

That's how exciting that was for them.

They're back into the Torah again.

They kept the feast these seven days, the middle of verse 18 says.

And on the eighth day there was a psalm assembly according to the rule.

That's the big party that happens at the end of it.

Here it's described as a solemn assembly.

When you look at how it's celebrated today, and even how it's hinted at in the Torah, it was supposed to be a festive time of celebration, singing, and dancing and celebration of God, who will, of course, come to dwell with man.

And that's what is behind this whole feast.

When you think about celebrating the feast, going through the wilderness, God is leading you.

God is the fire who is leading you.

You're looking up and you're seeing the light that is guiding you.

It is a sign of God's provision.

You see the water that God can bring out of the rock to provide for his people.

That's what this celebrates.

It's the end of the harvest, it's celebrating that God gave us everything we need.

God Himself is the vine.

He brings us water to help us survive.

God himself is the light, he illumines our path.

That's what even the even Jews today understand that that's what's behind the celebration.

By Jesus' life, they'd added another element to the celebration, by the way.

When the temple was there, after, at some point after Nehemiah 8, before the life of Christ, on the last day of Sukkot, they would fill up jars of water, very similar to what happened with Elijah at the uh the temple of the uh idol that was consumed by fire, the altar consumed by fire, they would fill up these jars of water and they would douse the altar at the temple with water.

That was something they did at the end from the pool of Shalom.

They would bring it up from the pool of Shalom where the angel would touch and they would bring it and douse it in the temple.

And that was the celebration of the fact that God provided water, so much water they could spill some out from the pool, that God was their healer.

That's what was happening at this feast of Sukkot, the celebration of Sukkot.

And this is the only time we really see it described in the Old Testament here back in Nehemiah chapter 8.

Nehemiah 8 · chapter mention

But we do see it described again in the Bible, up in the Gospel of John.

And so I want you to turn to John's Gospel.

As you're making your way there, if you recall, there is, I guess, one other shout out to Sukkot, and that is Jonah in the wilderness when he's rooting for Nineveh to go down in fire.

Do you remember?

That's the other place this word is used.

He went Nineveh repented.

Jonah was upset.

He goes up onto the hill.

He's angry at the Lord, saying, I knew you'd forgive them.

That's just exactly the kind of God you are.

Such a forgiving God.

Drives me crazy.

I want fire, God.

And remember what Jonah does?

He builds a sukkot.

He builds a little a sukkah, is the tent name.

He builds a sukkah for him to hide under and watch Nineveh's destruction.

Filled with irony, that passage is.

Filled with irony.

Because Jonah is using the tent that is supposed to be the outreach to the Gentiles to dwell in and root for the Gentiles to go down in fire.

And you remember how God responds to Jonah's irony.

He sends a worm who eats the tent.

I mean, it's just an incredible scene at the end of Jonah's life.

And now Jonah's angry about the tent, too.

But anyway, you jump forward to John chapter 7, verse 1.

John 7:1

Jesus went out in Galilee.

He would not walk around in Judea because the Jews were seeking to kill him.

Now the Jews, the feast of the Booz, were at hand, and Jesus' brother said to him, Leave here and go to Judea, so your disciples may see the works that you're doing.

No one works in secret if he seeks to be known openly.

If you do these things, show yourself to the world.

So Jesus sends his disciples ahead to them in verse 6.

The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify that its works are evil.

So you go to the feast.

I'm not going to this feast, for my time is not yet fully come.

So Jesus says, You go to the Feast of Tabernacles, the Feast of Booze.

I'm not going because they will kill me.

You go.

After saying this, he remained in Galilee, but verse 10.

After his brothers had gone up to the feast, then he also went up.

Not publicly, and some people say, hey, see, Jesus lied.

He said he wasn't going to go up.

Well, it's implied he wasn't going to go up publicly.

He wasn't going to go up with his brothers.

He wasn't going to make a big entrance.

I mean, this is a massive celebration.

All the Jews funnel into Jerusalem for this.

Jesus wasn't going to do that.

So instead, he goes up secretly.

Verse 11, the Jews are looking for him at the feast, saying, Where is he?

And there's much muttering.

Everybody's looking for Jesus at this.

Again, remember, there's tents everywhere.

There's fruit hanging from windows.

I mean, it's the whole city is in a festive mode, and people are celebrating, reading the Word of God, reading the Halail, and they're wondering, where is Jesus?

It's the talk of all of Jerusalem, and nobody can find him.

And yet in the middle of the feast, so in other words, you know, day three or day four, so there's been some anticipation, Jesus shows up in the temple.

In verse 15, the Jews marveled, saying, How is it that this man has learning when he never studied?

You know, where did this guy go to school?

He's preaching the lights out.

And Jesus responds in verse 16, My teaching isn't mine, but it's from him who sent me.

If anyone's will is to do God's will, he'll know whether the teaching is from God or whether I'm speaking of my own authority.

So Jesus says, I have authority that is attested to just by my own teaching.

And people begin to wonder, is this the Christ?

Is this the Christ?

Verse 25, the people of Jerusalem begin to say, I think this is the man they're trying to kill.

And others said, He is that man.

Only he's speaking openly, and they don't say anything to him.

Can it be the authorities know that he's the Christ?

So the crowd is beginning to wonder.

I mean, everybody is there, and Jesus is preaching, and the Pharisees aren't arresting him.

So Jesus, verse 28, proclaimed as he taught in the temple, You know me, you know where I come from, but I haven't come on my own.

He who sent me is true, and him you do not know.

I know him, for I come from him, and he sent me.

So Jesus, of course, is declaring himself to be from God.

Unlike the Pharisees, he's saying that here I am and I know God, unlike you, unlike you, you don't know him.

On the last day, verse 37, skip down to verse 37, on the last day of the feast, remember what happens last day of the feast?

They take the water out of the pool, they drench it in the temple courts, they pour it out, and Jesus, on the last day of the feast, standing at the temple, probably right where this is happening, says, If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.

Whoever believes in me, as the scripture said, out of his heart will flow living waters.

So do you see how Jesus is making himself the object of the fulfillment of the feast of the booze?

He's saying, This is the whole point of the feast of the booze is that God will provide for you bread, God will provide for you fruit, God will guide you, he will be your light, he will be your water.

And now Jesus is standing in the middle of them saying, I am from God and I am the water.

If you believe in me, I can give you water, rivers of living water from your heart.

Now he said this, of course, verse 39 about the Holy Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive.

Speaking of the future, those who believed in him then, you understand this.

Those who believed in him at this moment were not sealed with the Holy Spirit.

That was still a future sealing that was coming.

It says so very plainly right here, that those who believed in him had yet to receive the Holy Spirit, because Jesus hadn't been ascended yet.

So something new in the future will happen where God's people are sealed with the Spirit.

But in the meantime, Jesus is saying, I am the one who provides you living water.

Now, what happens next from verse 40?

It's the end of chapter 7 is a big argument about how can Jesus possibly be the Messiah if he's from Galilee.

Nothing good comes from Galilee or Nazareth, you've got to be kidding me.

Has there ever been a prophet from Galilee?

Search the scriptures and see.

Nicodemus speaks up and tries to defend Jesus and is shouted down, and it ends by saying, You figure out if there's ever been another prophet from Galilee.

And you know the answer to that, right?

Has there ever been another prophet from Galilee?

Yes.

Oh, those poor Pharisees.

Jonah, the prophet of the Gentiles, who built his little feet, his little tents on the feast of Sukkot, he was from Galilee.

But the Pharisees overlooked that.

They didn't want to talk about that.

And Jesus, of course, is really walking right in Jonah's sandals here.

He is from the same place where Jonah was from.

He is the fulfillment of the feast of the booze, the tabernacles, because he is the water, he will give water of life.

And so the first part of the Feast of Tabernacles is about the water.

The other part of Feast of Tabernacles is about the light.

The tents have to have the holes in it for the roof.

Chapter 8, verse 12, we're skipping the um the encounter with the woman caught in adultery.

I think chapter 8, verse 12 picks up with the narrative where it was left off at the end of chapter 7.

Your footnote in your Bible says probably the same thing.

Chapter 8, verse 12.

Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, I am the light of the world.

Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.

He's saying this on the seventh day of the feast of the tabernacle.

So they have been camping.

This is not subtle.

I know it's hard for us because we don't grow up with succot.

We can think this is too subtle, and you know, you have to have a Bible degree to understand this.

Understand that for the Jews, there was no tact or subtlety about this.

They have been sleeping in tents for seven days to remind themselves that God is the light who will guide them.

And on the seventh day, Jesus stands up and says, I am the light of the world.

This is not subtle.

He is very clearly proclaiming that he is the one who will guide the true Israel.

Whoever follows me, he says in verse 12 of chapter 8, will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.

He's declaring the Feast of Tabernacles finds its resolution in him.

And he's not telling this just on his own authority, verse 14.

Even if I do bear witness about myself, my testimony is true, because I know where I come from, where I'm going, you don't know anything about that, he says in verse 14.

You judge me according to the flesh, I judge no one.

Yet, even if I do judge, my judgment's true.

You catch Jesus' argument here.

Even if it's just me telling you that I'm the light of the world, I happen to be right.

So you should believe me.

Even if it's just me, I'm right, so go ahead and believe me.

But it's not just me.

My heavenly Father also bears witness, he says in the middle of verse 16.

It is not just me alone, but I am the Father who sent me.

In your law it's written the testimony of two people is true.

I'm the one who bears witness about myself, and the Father who sent me bears witness about me.

I mean, that is just a slam dunk Trinitarian argument right there, isn't it?

Jesus says, Your law that you're gonna kill me for blaspheming.

Your law says you have to receive testimony from two witnesses the Father and the Son.

We count as two, and I speak for both of us.

Case closed, I'm God.

Oh, and the third is the Holy Spirit, and he says, I'm going to send that.

I'm gonna send that to those who believe in me.

So you're gonna get three that bear witness about Christ: the Father, the Son, and the Spirit.

All will bear witness about Him.

I love the very Sukkot promise here, though, that if anyone is thirsty, they can drink living water from Christ.

Jesus rebukes those who don't believe in him in verse 19.

You know neither me nor my father.

If you knew me, you would know my father also.

Verse 21, I'm going away, Jesus says, You'll seek me, you will die in your sin.

Where I'm going, you cannot come.

And then verse 25, just what I've been telling you from the beginning.

I have much to say and much to judge, but he who sent me is true, and I declare to the world that I have heard from him speaking of his father.

All this is, of course, is pointed to the cross, verse 27, the middle of it, when you've lifted up the Son of Man, you will know that I am he, I do nothing on my own authority but speak just as the Father taught me, and he who sent me is with me.

He has not left me alone, for I always do the things that are pleasing to him.

I want you to see how this festivity that is still practiced today, where people will sit in tents, they will eat in tents, they will look at the stars through tents, they'll decorate them with lights.

It is a very festive atmosphere.

Is pointing to God as the one who provided bread for his people in the wilderness.

He's pointing to God as the one who provided light for his people in the wilderness, and is pointing as God is the one who provides water for his people in the wilderness.

And I want you to see how Jesus comes in on the feast of the booze to Jerusalem and proclaims that he is the bread of life in John chapter 6, that he is the light to the world in John chapter 7, and the water to the world in John chapter 7, that he provides all of those things.

John 6 · chapter mention John 7 · chapter mention John 7 · chapter mention

I think we're very good at understanding how the Day of Atonement points to Christ, of course, how Pentecost points to the church and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and believers.

But this is one we need some shoring up on.

And so I hope when you think of Nehemiah chapter 8 from here on out in your life, you think of how Jesus Christ walks into Jerusalem on the feast, on the middle of the feast, takes over the feast, and by the end of the feast says, This all is fulfilled in me.

Nehemiah 8 · chapter mention

Now the Bible does not command us the New Testament to celebrate, of course, Sukkot.

You're welcome to if you would like and build a little tent.

We will not build them at the church.

Don't even don't give David Jones any ideas.

We will not, because if you were listening, he's probably designing a place to put tents up right over the choir loft right now.

No.

But we have a different ceremony, might be a good word for it, that we celebrate.

Communion, which, unlike Sukkot, Sukkot pointed forward to Christ.

Communion points backwards to Christ.

Sukkot pointed forward to Jesus as the one who will send waters, uh rivers of living water through people's hearts.

Communion points backwards to Jesus Christ as the one who shed his own blood for our sin.

Sukkot points forward to Jesus as the one who is the bread of life, the one who provides for us and guides us and illumines us.

And communion points backwards to Jesus who gave his body as the bread of life.

The bread that we hold in our hands is not festive bread like in Sukkot, the bread that you would eat in the tents, but the bread that we hold in our hands for communion is, in a sense, uh more somber, solemn, because it represents the body of Jesus Christ broken for us on our sins.

And so I think it's appropriate tonight after studying Sukkot that we go before the Lord's table together.

Father, we're grateful for the Feast of the Booze, Tabernacles, Sukkot, that reveals to us our Savior, the one who fulfills the law, fulfills the moral law by never sinning.

He fulfills the ceremonial law by pointing to him.

He brings us purity, he sanctifies us, keeping us from the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of sin.

And he transforms our hearts into new newness.

We're thankful for the Holy Spirit who comes at uh who came at Pentecost and seals the hearts of those who believe.

We're grateful that we have those rivers of living water that flow in us as we study your word, as we have the joy of the Spirit that we're grateful for the reality of Jesus Christ.

And now, Lord, we look backwards to the cross.

We know the joy we have in studying Christ uh is ours because of his death on the cross.

As the Jews celebrate Sukkot, it was an anticipatory celebration.

They were looking forward to the Savior, maybe even in ways they didn't fully understand.

But as we celebrate communion, we are, it's not anticipatory, it's uh cumulative.

We look backwards and we recognize what Christ has done for us.

As we hold this cup, we think of his blood that was shed.

As we hold this bread, we think of his body that was delivered over for our sins.

But without his death on the cross, there would be no forgiveness of sins.

There would be no joy.

Without the death and resurrection of Christ, we couldn't declare with Nehemiah, in Nehemiah 8, verse 10, that the joy of Yahweh is our strength.

Nehemiah 8:10

But because of what this bread represents and this wine represents, we can declare that the joy of the Lord is our strength.

We give you thanks for sanctifying us and drawing us to your table tonight.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

And now for a parting word from Pastor Jesse Johnson.

Thanks for joining us today.

If you're in the Washington, D.C.

area, I would love to meet you personally at Emmanuel Bible Church.

Our service times and other church information is on our website at ibc.church.

If you want information about the Master's Seminary and their Washington, D.C.

location, go to tms.edu.

I hope this resource has been an encouragement to you and it helps you seek the Lord daily, serve others around you, and share the gospel of Jesus Christ with boldness.

May the Lord bless you.