First Fruits to Shavuot: The Heart of His Feast Cycle

http://www.messilife.com/First%20Fruits%20to%20Shavuot.pdf

The link above will download the actual teaching.   The notes below will set the premise.

I've gotten so much positive feedback on the Pesach vs. Passover study, so I decided to share the notes from the "First Fruits to Shavuot" study we did last year too.   Although this is essentially a powerpoint turned into a PDF, I think there are enough notes in the fine-print to get the idea of where I am going here.   I promise I will put this in a more independent format that breaks down the ideas deeper and more succinctly, but for those who have had experience with the Feasts and a basic understanding of Hebraic thinking, I'm hoping the visuals and notes will speak for themselves.

The premise is this: First Fruits is not a "feast" unto itself...and neither is the day of Shavuot.   They are the beginning and ending of a 50-day-long Feast that begins with the theme of "salvation" and ends with the celebration of "perfection".   Shavuot is a plural word that means "weeks", so we need to paying attention weekly (and daily) to the lessons he has for us during all 7 weeks (49 days plus one), and not just routinely phone-in some "omer counting prayers" as we wait for the big event at the end.   

None of the feasts stand alone, all seven are stops along the roadmap of YHWH's plan...teaching us crucial principles IN THE ORDER that they occur in our lives and in prophecy.   The Feast of Weeks needs to be looked at as the heart of the feasts...as they are literally CENTRAL to his plan.   I think we've also made the error of looking at Shavuot as the "giving of the 10 commandments" when the real culmination is not that event...but the celebration of the Mosaic Covenant with all 70 elders on the top of Mt. Sinai--eating a covenant meal in the very presence of YHWH!

Towards the end of the power point, I reference 7 events that occur in the lives of our people from the moment they cross the Sea up until that collective moment on the mountain top.   The last few slides hold the briefest of sketches on notes of the "Fall Feasts", simply because it's impossible to study one feast without the context of all 7.   I'm sure many of you will notice that I have come to a less-than-traditional understanding of Yom Teruah--much of which has come through my new understanding of the Feast of Weeks.

Last year, many in our fellowship replaced their normally scheduled Torah portion with a study of each of these 7 events during 7 Sabbaths along the path to Shavuot.   We were truly blessed, and we hope you are too!

If you are used to the Jewish reckoning of the timing of Shavuot, and to the notion of "counting the omer" as the point of this feast...I'd also recommend reading our former posts on those issues too:

http://www.homeshalom.blogspot.com/2011/04/first-fruitscounting-omer-video.html

http://www.homeshalom.blogspot.com/2011/04/counting-omerdays-revised.html

Thanks as usual for growing a sojourning with us!

Ben