PIECES OF THE PUZZLE - WHERE ARE THE MODERN DAY NEHEMIAHS IN THE MIDST OF AN ELECTION YEAR?

(Written by Sheila Gail Landgraf) 

 The people of Nehemiah's day were in transition.  They probably thought the great days of God with their nation had passed, and that all of God's great deeds had been done.  They had lost any sense of mission, any sense of calling, any sense of challenge. 

As a result, they almost missed their chance to see God act powerfully among them.  They almost missed the chance to experience His reclaiming them as His beloved people all over again. 

Isn't that much as our world is today? 

Our nation has been in such a huge spiritual struggle to hold on to anything that is sure and right.  We fight for a while, sometimes; then we reach for the remote and the volume control of the radio and the television.  It is easier to ignore it and just hold on than to continue to fight.  We turn off the newscast on the television and the radio because we can’t take any more bad news.  Day after day we are more aware that we seem to be losing the battle, both on earth and in the heavenly realms.  What is happening to our ability to renew our spirits, receive our marching orders from God and move ahead? 

We have let the enemy into the camp for so long that we have become used to him being there.  He is so familiar and so everywhere around us that we just don’t even notice it is him anymore.   We have forgotten what the fight is all about.  We can’t remember why we are fighting or who we are fighting against.  We haven’t listened for a long, long time.  A whole generation of young people has grown up while we have sat still and very complacent in this condition, not moving, not protesting; just being politically correct and remaining silent.  This is all that the generation living right now has ever known. They have formed new ideas without our knowledge and experience.  They have listened to the world while we hid from things we did not want to face or confront.  How can we expect them to rise above it all when we have thrown away our hope and reason? 

Where are the Nehemiahs of today?  

The church must call them forth and put them in charge of the task of restoring the Kingdom of God to the earth.  Time is growing very short.  When Nehemiah engineered the walls and gates around Jerusalem, he also provided support and worked with the priest who was proclaiming a true and real message from God that did not conform to the culture they had come out of.  The message of God's way of life was being restored with each stone on the wall and with every gate that was hung.  Some people had forgotten the truth of the message.  It all had to be repreached and retaught.  The people of God had to relearn the things they had forgotten while away from their own true culture.  

 Thank God for Nehemiah pointing the way to Christ, and thank God if you can find a modern Nehemiah hiding in the culture where we currently live.  I pray that each and every one of them will receive their calling and come forth.  They are still out there somewhere!  God doesn’t stop calling and anointing people to do His work on this earth.  Who will answer the call?

The Church has walls and gates to rebuild! 

 In an amazing period of just 52 days - under constant threat of attack – by the help of God and the hard work of Nehemiah’s men, the walls of Jerusalem were raised.  

It was a great miracle!  Miracles have not passed away my friends.  They DO still happen, but only when we are seeking God’s will and God’s way for them to happen.  That news we keep turning off on the radio and television can change!  All it takes is a nation with a heart for God, truly committed to following His instruction book, and a few good men – like those that Nehemiah led, like those that Christ led!  Those are the men we need.  Pray every day for them to show up and come forth, and when they do – support them and help them.   Are you confused as to who our new leaders should be?  Try praying and asking God to show you.  

  

We need another such miracle of restoration with the walls around our church congregations today.  Time is drawing shorter and shorter.  The Bride must be ready.  We must begin to rebuild.  Our leaders, much like Nehemiah, must take a deep breath and start their tasks.  The work is not all out there in another land of foreign missions – the greatest mission any soldier of Christ can take on today would be to open the eyes and wake up your own local church congregation.  Why are they coming week after week?  Is it to be entertained or to worship?  Is it to learn how to best follow God or to socialize?  This is the great mission field we must conquer now.    

In congregations across the land you can hear the people of the church today groaning.   

They groan and they morn as they sit and wait for things to change.  That certainly was not the case in Nehemiah’s time.  Nehemiah was willing to DO something.  There was not any sitting and groaning and waiting!

After convincing the king that he should be allowed to go, Nehemiah made that long, hard journey to Jerusalem.  He brought with him supplies and leadership. Nehemiah had clear vision.  He knew the walls were torn down and needed rebuilding. He realized there were no gates of protection.  The people themselves needed to be rebuilt.  He set about to change things with the help and authority of God.

Have you convinced your King (Jesus) that you are ready to go to that holy place and begin to work? Have you asked him for your supplies? He will grant them just as Nehemiah was granted what he needed by the earthly king, but even Nehemiah had to ask first! 

 There is a place right here, right now that God is calling you to today.  It is located right in your own front door, in your own community, in your own local church, in your own country.  What is needed?  Just exactly what God gave you to offer. 

There are broken down walls and gates every way that you turn, in every area of the nation and all across the land.  There are dead people walking that need to be given new and eternal life.  There are churches that sit in decay and ruin because no one has invited God to come inside for quite a while.  There are poor, hungry, needy people just holding on to their very survival that need rescuing.  There are those who are being tortured by terrorist because they will not deny The One True God of Heaven and Earth.  These precious ones have been forgotten and overlooked or ignored by the very one that Christ has chosen to call His bride!  How long will it be before he notices and says, this isn’t the one I have chosen to love?

 When will the church in America return to her first love and worship God again?  

Numbers mean nothing – souls on fire for God mean everything.  

When is the last time you asked God to let His Holy Spirit fall on you and give you new direction?  

f you do this, you might be the next Nehemiah that we are looking for.  He was led of God in all that he did.

 In the days of Nehemiah, the broken walls became a metaphor for the broken people.  Nehemiah was not just mending a wall - he was mending a nation.  The nation of Israel was God’s tool for speaking to the world.  Their voice must be heard again.  The voice that God has graced the nation of America with must be revived.The broken walls of America must also be repaired.  We must once more become one nation, under God with liberty and justice for all.  Who will rise up and lead us?  Pray for God to send the right people.  

 The Church is God’s voice today for speaking to the world.  The silence must end.  The entertaining and babysitting must stop.  The real work must begin.  We need strong walls and gates.  We need brave and courageous people.  We need to love one another and get along with one another and seek God's face together.  We need to be willing to listen to what God tells us collectively, as a nation of true believers.

With Nehemiah's Godly leadership, the people of God once again became great.  This happened because they were willing to work together under God's leadership to accomplish a common goal.  The unity of our faith must be restored.  All of God’s people must once again work together.  We must quit pointing fingers at one another and bow our heads together to pray in one voice.

 In Nehemiah’s time everyone pitched in to do the work.  That is; everyone but those who opposed the work that God had led Nehemiah to do.  There will always be opposition.  Today it is stronger than ever.  We live in a world full of evil thinkers that are determined to overturn correct ideology and replace it with their own new brand of truth, which is false!  

Who will speak out and tell the truth in the face of false doctrines?  

Who will study The Word enough to be qualified to do this? 

 Back in the day of Nehemiah, there were those who did everything they could to stop the rebuilding of the walls and gates of the city.  Opposition of the church is just as rampant in our culture today.  We can expect it; but how many of us realize that our God is greater than the opposition?

 We are to be overcomers.  

We are to be builders.   

This is not the time to stop - this is the time to go to work!

Can you hear the voice of God calling your name?  Are you listening?

The Godly people of that day in which Nehemiah lived handled much adversity and opposition to obtain the restoration of their city.  

God only promised us that the Kingdom will be good.  He never said it would be either easy or safe. We must hold on to our hope.  We must keep moving forward and looking up as Nehemiah did.  With Christ as our hope, the people of God are always moving forward, always seeking God’s Face and always helping and allowing His will to prevail in the earth.

  Because of Nehemiah's Godly leadership and the people's spirit of unity, a broken, disorganized, discouraged bunch of individuals who were alienated from God and from one another by a bunch of pagan rulers transitioned into a strong, well-organized, deeply committed and proud community.  They were rededicated to God, recommitted to each other, and when this happened they began to be respected by their enemies.

God's people haven’t changed much through time.  They still face similar dilemmas and they still ask the same hard questions.  They consistently have their periods of doubt and faith.  But true men and women of God keep looking toward a river whose streams shall make glad The City of God.

Like the few good men in the days of Nehemiah, they look to the future with the hope of a restored Kingdom, where God is in the midst, and they shall not be moved.

May our hearts join in with Nehemiah’s once more!

May God’s churches be filled with faithful, true, believing, trusting, overcoming, persevering hearts again!

May the sound of Non Nobis Domine ring out again  – “Not to us Lord, not to us but to Your Name give glory.”

May new Nehemiah’s come forth and begin to rise up and build!

COME AS A CHILD LESSON 104 ISRAEL BLESSES EPHRAIM AND MANASSEH AND JOSEPH

(Written by Sheila Gail Landgraf)

So now Jacob/Israel is very old and he has been living in Egypt almost seventeen years under the favor of Pharaoh because of his son Joseph.

 Israel had fallen very ill.  Joseph heard of his father’s failing health and he went to visit him.  He took Manasseh and Ephraim, his two young sons with him.  These two boys had been born to Joseph before their grandfather ever arrived in Egypt.  That would make both of them at least 17 years old or older.  They had spent 17 years knowing and loving their grandfather, Israel.

When Joseph arrived Israel rallied.  He gained a little strength and sat up on his bed.  He spoke with Joseph of things that mattered very much to him.  These were his words:  “God Almighty appeared to me at Luz in the Land of Canaan, and there He blessed me and said to me, ‘I am going to make you fruitful and increase your numbers.  I will make you a community of peoples, and I will give this land as an everlasting possession to your descendants after you.’”

Remember that “Luz” was another name for Bethel.  Bethel was where Jacob had wrestled with The Angel of The Lord, which most people now consider to be Christ Himself in the form of a Christophony.  It is thought that Jacob was now dying in peace because of this experience where he had met God at Bethel.  Jacob never forgot what happened there. He knew that he was redeemed by the Angel of The Lord at Bethel.  He had held on to the Angel until The Angel had blessed him.  Jacob had been begging for pardon of his sins, both against his brother and against God.  At Bethel he gave up his old self.  There he had repented, confessed, pleaded and wrestled and begged forgiveness from The Angel of The Lord all night long until the sun began to come up.  He had held on all through the dark night until The Angel of The Lord finally agreed to his request.  The “blessing” that The Angel of The Lord brought to him was Jacob’s pardon for his sins and guilt.  There at Bethel Jacob had been redeemed and changed.  He was a new man, forgiven and had the new name of Israel.

We all have our Bethels.  They are unforgettable.  Do you remember yours?  Has it happened yet?  There comes a time in a person’s life when they have to repent of their sins, turn from their old self and allow God to bless them with a new name. 

There at Bethel, Jacob had received the greatest blessing that one can receive; the blessing of being the first physically redeemed new man of Christ.  Only Jesus has the power to forgive sins.  He earned this right as he died on the cross as a perfect sacrifice, once and for all, for the sins of mankind. 

Try to wrap your mind around what truly happened to Jacob at Bethel with Christ.  Jesus had come back from outside of time with God the Father as The Angel of The Lord and had forgiven Jacob, making him the first after Abraham, who had believed in Messiah on faith alone, ahead of the cross and the coming of  Messiah.

 Jacob was given so much more than Abraham to hold on to; He had met Christ in person, seen him with his own eyes and wrestled with Him and had been redeemed and promised a new life with a changed name.  At Bethel, Jacob had become Israel, the first of a nation of people who would follow God The Father. 

Now Israel lay dying, ready to go meet with God again, just as soon as he passed on his blessing to his son Joseph and his descendants as well as Joseph’s other brothers.

Israel continued to talk with Joseph.     

“Now then, your two sons born to you in Egypt before I came to you here will be reckoned as mine; Ephraim and Manasseh will be mine, just as Ruben and Simeon are mine.  Any children born to you after them will be yours; in the territory they inherit they will be reckoned under the names of their brothers. 

Israel spoke to Joseph once again of his mother, Rachel and spoke of how she died in The Land of Canaan on the way to where they were going, just a little distance from Ephrath.  (This was Bethlehem.)  Israel spoke to Joseph of how he had buried Rachel near Bethlehem.  He felt it was important for Joseph to remember this. 

Then he went on to explain to Joseph his plans for Ephraim and Mannesseh’s future.   In so many words Israel was explaining to Joseph that he was legally adopting Ephraim and Mannesseh as his own sons. This adoption would make them the legal heirs to all that Israel possessed. They would be considered first, above all the rest of Israel’s sons, as heirs to Israel’s estate and blessings. 

One cannot help but think of the old saying “what goes around comes around.”  Jacob’s sons were jealous of his love for Joseph.  They once would have inherited equally, but because they cast him away from Jacob his love for Joseph had only been multiplied.  The inheritance of Joseph and his sons was much greater than the inheritance of all of Joseph’s brothers, though he was not the oldest at all.  He was the most favored.  His sons were the most loved.  The brother’s of Joseph had brought justice on their own heads by their plots against Joseph.  Even though Joseph and Israel had forgiven them, Joseph had only gained favor, just the opposite of what they had hoped to accomplish. 

Once again we see the proof of Joseph’s dream where his brothers would bow to him.  Once again we see that people plotting with that ugly green monster called jealousy never win in the end.  Joseph never had to say a word in his own defense.  God looks after those who follow Him in righteousness through all kinds of circumstances.  In the end, it is God who arranges their outcome, not the plotters and the schemers. 

Ruben and Simeon were physically the oldest two sons, the first and second born, but they had disqualified themselves as leaders of the family long ago and Israel was placing Ephraim and Mannesseh in their place of leadership as head of the family. 

How could he do such a thing?

There is a good logical explanation, even more than all the love he held in his heart for Joseph. It had to do with the type of people Ruben and Simeon had become.   It had to do with the type of people Ephraim and Manesseh were already and would go on to be.  Israel had been with them for seventeen years and God had been speaking to him about them all along.  God had given this knowledge to Israel by Divine counsel, through the spirit of prophecy.

Manesseh had been named by Joseph.  Manesseh meant “forgetting.”  It was Joseph’s wish that with the birth of his first son, Manesseh, he would become more content in his circumstances and learn how to forget the disconnect he had to endure by living in a land away from his family and all that he loved against his will.  The “forgetting” that came with Manesseh had made Joseph a stronger person, a person who could endure and cope with all circumstances and situations.  This is a very good trait for a man to have. 

Israel perceived that Manesseh would inherit these same traits of his father.  Even though Manesseh was born in a pagan land and the odds of him being like his father in the culture he grew up in were low, Israel sensed that he was going to rise above the mediocrity of his culture and become very much a man like Joseph.  Manesseh has become for the world looking back, a perfect example of a man who rises above the teachings of his culture and society and becomes righteous and godly in spite of his surroundings. 

Then there was Ephraim who was born second to Joseph.  Ephraim was born to a much stronger, more settled, very stable Joseph.  By the time of Ephraim’s birth Joseph had become very prosperous and successful in a foreign land.  Joseph named him Ephraim because it meant “God has made me fruitful in the land of my affliction.”  Joseph had transformed beyond merely surviving to thriving because of his faith that God would see him through anything.  By the time of Ephraim’s birth Joseph had moved on up to a higher spiritual plane.  He had come to a place of experiencing the joy of communion with God in any circumstances.  Ephraim’s birth was symbolic of Joseph’s joy. 

In spite of the fact that Ephraim too was born in a culture that was pagan, he also had begun to aspire to be like his father Joseph, to possess integrity in a land where integrity was not required or expected.  Israel perceived from God that Ephraim would be very great.  Ephraim became the symbol to mankind after him of one who could rise above mediocrity, one who could obtain physical and spiritual enlightenment from God in any circumstances.  He could swim against the current and keep moving upstream with no problem.    

So Joseph brought his beloved sons to Israel.  When Israel saw them he asked, “Who are these?”

Joseph said, “They are the sons God has given me here.”

Israel and Joseph both knew who the boys were.  This was simply Israel giving Joseph the chance to state out loud and in front of God and his two sons that they were a gift from God.  Joseph acknowledged in this statement that all that they were and all that they would become were simply a blessing from God’s hand on their lives and nothing that Joseph had done on his own.  It was a way of showing honor and thankfulness to God for the gift of the two boys.   Israel wanted to honor God first before passing on the blessings he had received from God.

Then Israel said, “Bring them to me so I may bless them.”

Israel’s eyes were very bad in his old age and he could hardly see the boys.  Joseph brought his sons close to him, and his father kissed them and embraced them, then he said to Joseph, “I never expected to see your face again, and now God has allowed me to see your children too!”  I can imagine both men’s eyes being filled with tears at this point.  It was a very sweet moment in both of their lives.

Joseph bowed down toward his father showing him the great love and respect he held for him.  Then,  Joseph took both sons, Ephraim on his right toward Israel’s left hand and Manasseh on his left toward Israel’s right hand, and brought them close to Israel. 

An interesting thing happened next.  Israel reached out his right hand and put it on Ephriam’s head, though he was the younger, and crossing his arms, he put his left hand on Manasseh’s head, even though Manasseh was the first born.

This wasn’t a mistake.  Israel crossed his hands on purpose.  It was what he had discerned from God that should be done.  This has happened over and over again throughout the history of God and his people and the passing down of blessings.  Remember how it happened with Jacob and Essau?  It has happened with many more since them. 

Everything does not always go as expected by humans when God is in control.  God sometimes gives more to some than others.  This should never be questioned.  It may not seem logical to humans at the time.  Often this happens to those who expect to receive less.  We are reminded of that worn out verse that people like to ponder that says ‘the first shall be last and the last shall be first.’  God’s idea of fair isn’t always on a human level.  That is because His wisdom is so far beyond our ability of thinking that we cannot begin to understand it. 

The right hand always holds the idea of showing the most favor.  The right hand is said to be the hand of strength and skill.  We  hear much later in history of Jesus being seated at the right hand of The Father in heaven.  It is because He has the most favor from God that he sits on the right.

Joseph was displeased that his father placed his right hand on the head of Ephraim, so when he saw this he took hold of his father’s hand to move it from Ephraim’s head to Manasseh’s head saying, “No, my father, this one is the firstborn; put your right hand on his head.,” But Israel said “I know, my son, I know.  He too will become a people, and he too will become great.  Nevertheless, his younger brother will be greater than he, and his descendants will become a group of nations.” 

That was exactly how it happened years and years later.  Ephraim became the father of Joshua who led the people of Israel into the promise land!  Israel had the discernment to bless them according to how God would use them and lead them later.  God gave this discernment to Israel and there was no doubt in his mind that he was making the right blessing.

These were the words he used in the blessing:

“May the God before whom my fathers, Abraham and Isaac walked faithfully, the God who has been my shepherd all my life to this day, the Angel who has delivered me from all harm – may he bless these boys.  May they be called by my name and the names of my fathers Abraham and Isaac, and may they increase greatly on the earth.”

This blessing from Israel was the first place in the scriptures where God was related to as a Shepherd who would guide the nation of Israel.  It was very appropriate for Israel, a shepherd himself, to state. 

And then Israel said something amazing: “In your name will Israel pronounce this blessing; ‘May God make you like Ephraim and Manasseh”.

It has come to pass after this blessing that all of the nation of Israel, even up until this present day, still pray for their sons to be like Ephraim and Manesseh.  Many Christian families have adopted this tradition too. They are hoping that they have sons who will rise above the commonplace people of their culture and society and conform to and worship God in all circumstances at all times.  This was what Ephraim and Manesseh did in Egypt.  This is also a perfect blessing for the sons of the earth today from any parents who wish for them to follow God’s will and ways all the days of their lives.

Then Israel blessed Joseph.

After Israel had blessed Joseph’s sons, he looked up at Joseph and said “I am about to die, but God will be with you and take you back to the land of your fathers.  And to you I give one more ridge of land than to your brothers, the ridge I took from the Amorites with my sword and my bow.”

Later scriptures hints at where this ridge that Joseph inherited as an extra portion was.  John 4:5 seems to imply that with this blessing Joseph was given the land of Sychar.  Joshua 24:32 goes on to explain:  “And Joseph’s bones, which the Israelites had brought up from Egypt, were buried at Shechem in the tract of land that Jacob bought for a hundred pieces of silver from the sons of Hamor, the father of Shechem.  This became the inheritance of Joseph’s descendants. 

A while back we studied what happened in Shechem with Reuben and Simeon.  It was a terrible tragedy and it was the reason they were disinherited.  

The word for “portion” is “Shechem.”  Shechem was the name of the city where this land that Israel spoke of had existed.  The tribe of Ephraim eventually possessed this land.  Israel was seeing this as he blessed Ephraim under the spirit of prophecy.  When Israel refers to obtaining the land with his sword and bow, he speaks of his money.  His money at that time was marked with an archer holding a sword and a bow.   This was the way the land was obtained.  He bought it from the children of Hamor the Hivite.  You would do well to review the story again, I do not have time or space to re-teach it here. 

The Jewish people state in their writings that Jacob and his sons had a very grievous war with the Amorites because of their capture of the Shechemites. 

By giving to Joseph this portion above his brothers, it seems that Joseph was given the birthright, the double portion, all that Jacob had obtained in the land of Canaan. 

This land of the double portion, was the spot where Joseph later declared that his bones should be buried when he died.  

SEASONS GOD'S SACRED HOLY DAYS KEEPING THE SABBATH

(Written by Sheila Gail Landgraf)

Do you keep God's Holy Days?  If so, you must start with The Sabbath.    It is a most sacred time.  The Sabbath is God's gift to mankind.  It is a precious gift that should not ever be overlooked.

God created time.  He placed the sun, the moon and the stars in the sky as signs to mark our time.  He is outside of time, but He placed us inside of time.  He speaks to us of time through the heavenly bodies of the sun and the moon, and He has written His story out for us in the skies. 

When He created time,  God appointed certain times and seasons for us to come closer to Him. 

God created these special sacred times so that we could better understand His ways and to make it easier for us to commune with Him.  

He uses these special sacred times to tell us who He is, why He created us, and how we should worship.  He also gives us glimpses of our future destiny in His Kingdom through these special sacred times.

THE WEEKLY SABBATH

The first special sacred time God set aside for us is called The Sabbath.  It occurs every seven days.  God made six days in which we are to work, and He made one day in which we are to rest.   This one day in seven is The Sabbath.  It is a special gift God made just for us.  Every seven days God gives us this special gift of a sacred set-apart time with Him.  He has asked us to put our work aside and to rest with Him.  Like all good Fathers, God likes to have quality time with his children.  The Sabbath is our quality time with our heavenly Father.   God showed this to Adam and Eve in the garden at the beginning of time.  They in turn taught their children, and people have been keeping Sabbath ever since. 

Sometimes various human people have tried to change the days God sanctified and use another day of the week for the 7^th day; but God always pointed out the correct day as history progressed so that we would not be confused.  He wanted us to keep THE day.  He sanctified it and called it Sabbath.  It was not up to us to change the day. It was God's decision.  It was His gift to us, not our gift to Him.  The Jewish people have always kept this day.  We can trust their calendar, because God has used them to keep the calendars straight for the rest of us.

God clarified this with the children of Israel in the wilderness when he rained down the manna from heaven for six days.  On the sixth day only they could gather double portions for the next day and keep it fresh for two days.  On any other day if they gathered more than they needed it would spoil.  The manna did not fall on the seventh day.  God was at rest and so were those who followed Him.  The people ate the manna gathered on the sixth day and they rested with God.  It was a day of rest and a day of worship; a special sacred space in time, set apart from the other days of the week.  This pattern of how the manna fell allowed men to once again know how to exactly keep the seventh day so that they never lost count of the proper seventh day again.  Ever since those days in the wilderness the faithful Jewish culture has been careful to keep the days accurate with God's calendar.  We can easily trace back to the proper times in history and trace back forward again to be sure.    

The other special sacred times come in their appointed seasons.  There are special set-apart days in the spring, in the summer and in the fall.  

God gave us the moon to help us track these days correctly.  It was as if God said:  "I'll hang a big watch in the sky so you all can tell time by it," and he created the moon with its phases.  By the phases of the moon we know exactly when one day ends and another begins; we know when spring has begun, and we can tell when God's special appointed times arrive by counting the phases of the moon.  God made the phases of the moon correspond exactly to the days He wanted us to keep in the spring, summer and fall seasons. 

When you truly come to be a child of God you drop all of the world's dividers; those of race, nationality, language, culture or religious laws

and you trust in God's greatest law of love to settle your differences. 

 There is now only one way that is open, workable and clear to you; it is the way of The Lord.  The main rule is love and the way to the best ways to live in love, grace and mercy are all spelled out in the holy scriptures.  You must study to show yourself approved.  This is exactly how we come to know of God's Holy Days.    

THE HOLY DAYS OF GOD

With spring comes the sacred season of Passover.  Passover incorporates three holy, sacred times; beginning with the days of Passover itself, then the seven days of Unleavened Bread which follow, and  within the Days of Unleavened Bread we find The Feast of First Fruits. 

With summer comes the sacred season called Pentecost.  We come to Pentecost by counting the omer.  It is always 50 days  from the Day of First Fruits after Passover.  This day of Pentecost represents the late harvest, especially the wheat harvest, and the giving of The Holy Spirit to God’s people.

With Fall comes the sacred  season of the Fall Holy Days which are:  The Feast of Trumpets (Rosh Hashanah), The Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) and The Feast of Tabernacles (Sukkot.)

There are also other days I will not mention here that man has set aside to honor as memorials of great events that God brought about; but the days above are the specific Holy Days God commanded His people to keep.  They are God’s days; and they do not belong to any specific culture or region of people.  They were given and sanctified by God specifically to anyone who wishes to follow Him and celebrate His way of life.  Does your church congregation keep these holy days?  God has not revoked them, even though He has fulfilled the spring and summer days; all the more reason to remember them!  If God fulfilled the Spring and Summer days, will He not eventually fulfill the Fall days?  We should be watching, studying and waiting to see what God is going to do next!

It is true that we no longer have a physical Temple inside Jerusalem to go up to, but did Jesus not explain that the new temple would be Him living through His Holy Spirit within our bodies?  So, we do have a temple left on this earth; hence that is no excuse.  

If you are a believer, The Temple of your body is now the habitation of God.   Your own physical body with your soul residing inside with God's Spirit is your holy temple.  The tent of your body houses The Holy Spirit of God.  Is that not an awesome thought to ponder?  

There is that fact so many people are hung up on which proclaims that God told the people to go up to Jerusalem to celebrate these feasts.  That was because the Temple was in Jerusalem!  Now the temple resides within the believers who have The Holy Spirit dwelling inside them.  There is no Temple in Jerusalem anymore!  We are the Body of Christ.    We are the Temple folks.  We must keep the days that were meant to be kept at The Temple.  The Temple now goes with us everywhere that we go.  It is no longer confined just to Jerusalem, though our hearts still love Jerusalem.  Jesus has made this easy.  We no longer have to travel far away to a building.  We are living, breathing and walking around in The Sanctuary of The Most High God.  It cost us absolutely nothing to go to the temple.  It is the gift of God's Holy Spirit that has made this miracle happen.   Jesus first died for us, rose from the grave for us and then went away from us in order to make this possible.  He sent the comforter.   We have no excuse for not keeping the days, we have everything that we need.  Jesus has explained this to us in a million different ways all through the new testament scriptures.

You should not have to be a Christian worshiping with a Messianic congregation in order to keep these days.  Messianic congregations were originally conceived to help Jewish people become Christian, not to help Christian people become Jewish.  The Church was originally set up to house all those who believed in The Messiah and God the Father.  It is shameful that the church has decayed into this state, that we must divide off into groups to worship the same God! 

 The ways of God and His Holy Days are clearly spelled out in the Old Testament and New Testament of the Christian bible.  What excuse will we give when we stand face to face with God?  Why do we feel we can cut out almost one third of the bible as if it doesn't exist and ignore it?  

God's church should begin to recognize ALL of the holy scriptures and teach and keep the days that God gave to us.  The fact that our great, great grandfathers got off track is no excuse for us to stay off track.  The fact that we have allowed ourselves to become a business instead of a body is no excuse.  We should not be calling ourselves Christians and doing just the opposite of what God has clearly proclaimed in the scriptures.  If Jesus returned tomorrow, would He see even one of the customs He taught us to follow being carried out within our congregations that proclaim His name?  I wonder?

These days are a great gift that Our Father has bestowed on all of His people to be celebrated throughout all generations.  They are one of the greatest ways of all to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ to others.  We should not have to separate ourselves from ourselves in order to keep God's commandments and enjoy His gifts to us.  Do you not realize there will be no denominations in heaven?  God will not say "all Baptist must answer to this and all Methodist must answer to that and all Catholics must check off this list and all Presbyterians must check off that list!  God will simply look at each of us individually and ask "Why have you not obeyed the Holy Scriptures?  Did you not read the book I sent to you? "   

All who believe on the Name of God should always be welcomed within the family of God, whether you were born of the specific race which God used to start his family, or whether you were adopted into the family after the family was formed.  All are the same here inside The House of God. God loves each and every one of the children He created.  God has given His gifts to ALL of His children and He expects all of His children to learn and understand and practice them.  

God gave certain patterns that show how He wished His Holy Days to be kept, observed and celebrated.  He gave them to the nation of Israel first.  He made these instructions specific to the people of Israel in the days of Moses.  Two of these tribes of Israel (Benjamin and Judah)  are known today as The Jews.  These two tribes have been faithful to keep God’s Holy Days for years and years and years; but they fail to see how The Messiah has come and has already fulfilled the Spring and Summer Feast Days.  They keep the spring holy days year after year with blinders on.  They keep the Summer Holy Day of Pentecost also; but once again fail to see how this day as well as the Fall Holy Days are pointing to the return of Christ.  For them, the fall days are just a glimpse of the very first time they will ever know the Messiah.  

Some of both sides of this equation are true.  We who know He has already come will see Him coming again one day, and at that time they who have never known Him will know He is The Messiah.  For us it will be the second time.  For them it will be the first time.  All will know in the end, and we will finally be united in our faith in God, Our Father. 

We will not trouble the Jewish people about this right now.  We will let God open their eyes in His good time.    We will love them until that happens, and we will forever be grateful for the gifts they have saved up for our learning.  We will always recognize that God chose them of all people to become the nation who bore The Messiah.  

The day will come when God will open their eyes just as He is now opening the eyes many of the Gentiles to the truths they are learning about  keeping the holy days these Jewish people have kept for so many generations.  They did not trouble us about learning these days.  They let us learn in God's good time.  With the fullness of knowing The Messiah, our blessing is very great.  

God usually goes about doing things a little different than we would.  He knows more about us than we know about ourselves, after all; He created us!  He knows how we learn best; and He knows how to bring the circumstances about that teach us better ways.  We must simply love one another until that time of unity arrives and trust Him for these answers in His own good timing.  Let us pray as we wait that all people who believe in God will come to know The Messiah.    

Ten of the tribes of those first Israelites which God announced the details of His Holy Days to were scattered around the earth as lost little lambs.  They were separated from the other two tribes and the ways of their people by assimilation because of the sudden rule of a very powerful culture who captured them and ruled over them.  These assimilated people of the lost ten tribes are now known as The Gentiles.  They lost their identity as Israelites when they were separated and isolated from each other.  Over time their ancestors have come to populate all corners of the earth.  The teachings of God were lost from them for many, many years.  They had no way of knowing and remembering all of the details of the Holy Days of God while they lived in a foreign culture that separated them from each other for so long.  

Because of being removed from what they knew of God, most of the Gentiles today, though they believe in Messiah,  fail to see the importance of keeping God’s Holy Days and they have fallen into the trap of keeping the days that were made up later by greedy pagan men claiming to know God who were only using religion to rule and unite their own kingdoms instead of God's Kingdom.  These rulers, using the name of God in vain, changed dates and times.  They created new customs that worked better for their causes and their own ruling governments.    To persuade people to follow them they simply incorporated some of the stories of God that the people remembered into their own proclaimed dates and celebrations, luring them into a false sense of security.  This is one of those times when a little bit of knowledge can be dangerous.  These greedy rulers deceived many, many people into a whole different way of celebrating holy days and worshiping God.  The whole picture of what God had laid out carefully to the Hebrew people originally was not even considered.      

There remains to this day an element of truth in all of those days made by men, but they are counterfeit days, not the original days that God gave for observance.

One day every one will see all of the truth because The Messiah will be physically with us and He will proclaim the truth in person directly to everyone living in His Kingdom.  All of God's Holy Days  point to and lead up to that wonderful end.   

Thank God for the faithful meticulous way the Jewish culture has recorded and kept with accuracy and precision these most awesome Holy Days of God.  We Gentiles can learn much truth from them and our understanding is heightened and we can worship in a more pure sense of knowing and observing the true story.  Because of them, we may know the truth of the history of the children of God and the words God gave directly to them in the scriptures regarding these special set apart days of God.  

Because of the faithful Gentile believers of Jesus Christ, the Jewish people too may come to know a truth that they have not  yet been taught.  Through the Gentiles they will learn the  Good News of The Messiah, the One these days point to, the One who will fulfill every part of the knowledge of these days.    These special, holy, set apart and appointed days should be the key that unlocks this for them.  

Iron sharpens iron; God works in mysterious ways, always bringing His plan about in a supernatural surprising array of events beyond our wildest imaginations.   He has used the truth each group has learned separately to be a light bearer to the other.

One day all eyes will be opened at the same time and we will all see the whole picture as a very beautiful tapestry that God has been weaving for all eternity.  In the meantime; as we are all growing and changing every day, God has used each culture to teach the other.   He has used the Gentile culture to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ to the Jews.  Though they for some odd reason have not always known of or observed the beautiful rich background of the holy days that are shadows of all the teachings of Christ.  The Gentiles simply believed in The Messiah by faith, and God counts this unto them for righteousness because of the blood of Christ shed on the cross for all sins.  God has in turn used the Jewish culture to teach the Gentiles His original ways of worship.  

Blessed are the followers of Christ from both cultures who already have open eyes to see all of the truth from the scriptures, who can celebrate their time the way God has sanctified it from the beginning of the world.  Their days will be joyful and full of God’s stories!   Their hearts will always be full; even in the worst of circumstances.  Their stories will spread and fill the earth until all come to see The Messiah is Jesus Christ.

  







Thanks be to God who has given us such beautiful and significant holy days which teach us all about our beginning, middle and end times as we walk through His Kingdom in faith. 

 Because He has proclaimed these days before us and guarded them through a chosen people, we have come to know the hope of His Son and we have come to see there is hope for our own sons who follow Him and keep His ways.

If you have The Holy Spirit residing within your heart, you will eventually find the path of God that leads you into the joyful celebration of your own destiny in the observance of God's Holy Days in light of His Son, Our Messiah, Jesus Christ.  

May your journey be delightful and full of God's glory!

  

FOOD ART AND FAMILY TRADITIONS - A MENU FOR TORTELLINI SPINACH CASSEROLE

( An Everyday Simple and Good Recipe Collection Collected and Tested by Sheila Gail Landgraf)

ORANGE CONGEALED SALAD

Ingredients:

1     (6-ounce) package orange flavored gelatin

1     (8-ounce) can crushed pineapple in heavy syrup

2 cups buttermilk

1     (8-ounce) container frozen nondairy whipped topping, thawed

¼ cup chopped pecans

Directions:

Combine gelatin and pineapple with syrup in a large saucepan and bring to a boil; stirring to prevent sticking. Cook slightly and stir in buttermilk. Fold in whipped topping and pecans. Pour into mold (spray the mold lightly with vegetable spray)

and chill for about 3 hours or until set. Garnish with fresh orange slices and whipped cream, if desired.

TORTELLINI SPINACH CASSEROLE

Ingredients:

2 packages (10 ounces) frozen cheese tortellini

1 pound sliced fresh mushrooms

1 teaspoon garlic powder

¼ teaspoon onion powder

¼ teaspoon pepper

½ cup butter, divided

1 can (12 ounces) evaporated milk

1-8 ounce bag cubed cheese (your favorite flavor)

3 packages (10 ounces) frozen chopped spinach (thawed and squeezed dry)

2 cups (8 ounces) shredded part-skim mozzarella cheese

Directions:

Cook tortellini as instructed on package.   Saute mushrooms, garlic powder and onion powder and pepper with ¼ cup of butter in a large skillet until mushrooms are tender.  Remove from skillet and keep warm.  Using the skillet again combine milk and remaining butter.  Bring to a gentle boil.  Stir in cubed cheese.  Cook and stir until smooth.  Drain tortellini.  Place in a large bowl.  Stir in the mushroom mixture and the spinach.  Add cheese sauce and toss to coat.  Transfer to a greased 13 inch x 9 inch baking dish.  Sprinkle with mozzarella cheese.  Cover and bake at 350 degrees until heated through and cheese is melted.

FIG CAKE WITH BUTTERMILK GLAZE

Ingredients:
2 cups all purpose flour
1-1/2 cups sugar
1 teaspoon salt1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
3 large eggs, lightly beaten
1 cup vegetable oil1 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup chopped fresh figs
1 cup chopped pecans

Ingredients for Glaze:
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter or margarine
1/2 cup buttermilk1 teaspoon light corn syrup
1 teaspoon vanilla extract


Directions:
Mix together first 7 ingredients.  Fold in eggs, oil and buttermilk.  Stir in vanilla.  Fold in figs and pecans.  Pour into a greased 13 x 9 inch pan.  Bake at 325 degrees for 35 minutes.  While cake is baking make a glaze by boiling all of the above glaze ingredients in a small saucepan for 3 minutes.  Pour over cake.