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Jesus And Moses – Page Two
Significance of Unleavened Cakes
Nisan 14 began at six PM. The Passover meal must be eaten after six PM on that evening. All Passover celebrations are therefore evening events; these always fall on a full moon.
Previously, it was briefly mentioned that unleavened bread was eaten that night. This was commanded by God in Exodus 12:1-11.
And they shall eat the flesh in that night, roast with fire, and unleavened bread; with bitter herbs they shall eat it. (ASV)
The eating of unleavened ring cakes or bread initiated the festival of Unleavened Cakes, a seven day festival. The significance in regard to Jesus is this:
In Matthew 16:6,11,12 Jesus warns against the leaven of the Pharisees; thus leaven signifies corruption. Unleavened bread accordingly signifies purity and perfection.
When Christ during his last Passover observation instituted the Last Supper, he equated the wine served with his blood and his flesh with the unleavened cakes eaten at the table.
Matthew 26:26, And as they were eating, Jesus, having taken the bread and blessed, broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat: this is my body. 27And having taken the cup and given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it. 28For this is my blood, that of the new covenant, that shed for many for remission of sins. (Darby) From this it is observed that the Passover's unleavened cakes is the prophetic representation of Jesus perfect body or unsoiled unleavened flesh being sacrificed to pay for our redemption.
Thus in regard to the festival of Unleavened Cakes, this too is pointing forward to Christ's unleavened flesh that we have to 'eat' to survive and receive redemption.
John 6:48, I am the bread of life. 49Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness and died. 50This is the bread which comes down out of heaven, that one may eat of it and not die. 51I am the living bread which has come down out of heaven: if any one shall have eaten of this bread he shall live for ever; but the bread withal which I shall give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.
Pentecost / Festival of Harvest
Leviticus 23:15-16, And ye shall count from the morning after the sabbath, from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave-offering, seven weeks; they shall be complete; 16even unto the morning after the seventh sabbath shall ye count fifty days; and ye shall present a new oblation to Jehovah. (Darby)
From Nisan 16, the day Jesus was resurrected, fifty days had to be counted to reach the Pentecost.
Webster's Dictionary says (1913): Gr. ? (sc. ?) the fiftieth day,
1. A solemn festival of the Jews; -- so called because celebrated on the fiftieth day (seven weeks) after the second day of the Passover (which fell on the sixteenth of the Jewish month Nisan); -- hence called, also, the Feast of Weeks. At this festival an offering of the first fruits of the harvest was made. By the Jews it was generally regarded as commemorative of the gift of the law on the fiftieth day after the departure from Egypt.
Leviticus 23:19-20, And they shall sacrifice one kid of the goats for a sin offering, and two lambs of a year old for a peace offering, with the loaves of the firstfruits. 20And the priest shall place them with the loaves of the firstfruits an offering before the Lord with the two lambs, they shall be holy to the Lord they shall belong to the priest that brings them.
What catches our eyes here are the correspondence between the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, the Helper upon the firstfruits of the Christian congregation assembled at Pentecost in the upper chamber. This is no coincidence. The fifty days were strictly observed in the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, the Helper, upon the disciples. Again, every letter, every word prophesied must be fulfilled.
The plurality of these loaves from their household means that these loaves were as the Israelites usually made them -- were they leavened? I could not determine, but it would seem so. If they were leavened, this would indicate that the firstfruits of the Chrisitan congregation were taken from sinful mankind. That there were two loaves would indicate that the firstfruit Christians were taken from the fleshly Israelites and from the Gentiles.
Here again, the Law Covenant showed the pattern of which was to come.
Of course, the sin offerings of the Law Covenant all portray the one sacrifice of Jesus. Included in this symbolism is "one kid of the goats for a sin offering." The sacrifice was symbolic of our beloved Jesus Christ while the two lambs and the loaves were symbolic of the Christian firstfruits.
The Temple
Briefly, the temple consisted of the Holy, the Most Holy, and the courtyard. The temple's construction and what was inside was all decided by Jehovah God. Of course, the first 'temple' was the tabernacle that Moses was told to fabricate.
In regard to interpreting what this means to Christians, we have an interesting detail that permits insight into this. This detail came to our attention when Christ died.
Luke 23:44-46, And it was now about the sixth hour, and a darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour, 45 the sun’s light failing: and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst. 46 And Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit: and having said this, he gave up the ghost. (ASV) When Jesus died on April 1, 33, Nisan 14, a Friday, at 3PM, the curtain of the Temple which divided the Holy from the Most Holy was torn in two. Those who like math may verify the date calculation here: Calculation of Nisan 14, 33CE
The significance of this was that now access to the heavens had been opened – no obstruction stood in Jesus way any longer for him to go to heaven. So what was the curtain?
Hebrews 10:20 tells us! ". . . through the veil, that is to say, his flesh . . ." Obviously, the Most Holy must then be the heavens. What is the Holy then?
That is a trickier problem. First, the veil didn't rent for just anybody's death! It only divided in two when God's Son, the Holy One of God, the Messiah, Christ himself died. Then the conclusion is that this is individual specific.
The Most Holy, the Heavens, is what the perfect son of God was resurrected to because of his status!
Since the curtain did not rent until Christ died then this status of perfection without blemish that Christ possessed before his death must represent the Holy compartment of the temple . Can this only be applied to Christ? No. Because the Bible teaches that there are joint heirs with Christ and heirs of God, Christ's brothers, the Saints, the Born Again, the Elect or Chosen Ones, the Anointed. These all have to be kings and priests with Christ in heaven.
For this reason, i t may be stated that all of the Saints that die approved are in the Holy compartment of the antitypical temple of God, the spiritual temple of God. After death, when they are resurrected, they cross through the curtain into the Most Holy, the Heavens, from the time that Christ is present during God and Christ Day of Wrath. (1 Cor 15:23) This claim may be sustained with scriptures from one of the small prophets.
Mal 3:1, Behold, I send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, will suddenly come to his temple; and the messenger of the covenant, whom ye desire, behold, he cometh, saith Jehovah of hosts (ASV)
This scripture mentions the messenger of the covenant, Jesus, the Lord that we seek. He comes to his temple when God and Christ Day of Wrath starts his presence on that day. This shows us that the holy is as described above. We now this because the Saints also are said to be building blocks of the temple itself. (1 Cor 3:16)
The courtyard must then have its antitype in the whole earth in which the meek, the righteous, the Other Sheep shall inhabit. In light of the above, one may be so bold as to say that all non-Saints but true Christians in this wicked world are in God's temple's courtyard at the moment.
There are other things in Revelation that shows even further application. There are the Lampstands such as the temple contained. So all in all, the study could be enlarged. Nonetheless, the above should show all that the OT and NT has intimate relevance and correspondence.
In this small way, I hope that all may agree that Moses predicted throughout the Pentateuch a great many things about Jesus, the Messiah.
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