God And Time

A couple weeks ago I wrote about God being bound, in a manner of speaking, to our time.   Every year the Israelites were to remember the anniversary of their deliverance from Egypt and meet with God.  But God also set up a weekly time to meet with the people He created.  And this was begun by God Himself.

            After Adam and Eve were created on the sixth day of creation week, they got to witness the creative act of God in creating the seventh day and making it a Holy Day.   The first six days were filled with physical signs. Things appeared that could be seen.  The seventh day was not filled with physical evidence, but spiritual.  The Scripture says:  "God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it",  (Genesis 2:3)  What was it like on that first Sabbath with no sin to mar the sight of the first people? To have the Creator present Himself to talk with?  Was the first Friday night sundown, marking the first Sabbath beginning, more beautiful?  You see my mind first goes to the physical.  That is because, with the weight of centuries of sin, we think first of what can be seen and felt.

            But what is a day filled with blessing like?  To sanctify means to set apart for a holy purpose.  To make holy.  What does holy mean in time?  Ever since we have marked our weeks as seven days.  There have been efforts by some nations to make the week another number of days long, but it always fails.  God marked the week with a holy day at the end, and that is the way it is:  "He spoke and it was done, He commanded and it stood fast".  (Psalm 33:9) 

            "The natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, and cannot understand them, in fact he thinks they are foolish, because they are spiritually discerned."   (1Corinthians 2:14)  The Spiritual, the crown of creation, was the Sabbath.  With sin humanity chose another master and so were unable to understand and know the spiritual.  In order for us to understand and know the blessings of God we must be born again.  I may stop my work and read my Bible for the 24 hours of the seventh day, but unless I have been born again I am not able to discern the blessings and the holiness of the day.  "Unless a man is born again,"  says Jesus,  "he cannot see (understand, comprehend) the kingdom of God".  (John 3:3) 

            Unless a person is born again, keeping the first day of the week or the seventh day doesn't make any difference.  "As long as I honor God on one day, what difference does it make?"  In that is both the question and the answer.  The difference can only be seen with the eye of faith.  Only the spiritual person born from above, can know the difference. 

            Yet, because of God's infinite mercy and the sacrifice of Jesus for us, the blessings of the seventh day still pour out onto everyone, saint and sinner.  The sinner does not see and honor the One who gives life and everything they have and enjoy. He takes without acknowledging the Giver.  But those who have been born anew give thanks and rejoice in the blessings they receive, leaving the Sabbath day filled again with new life for the coming week.  And looking forward to spending another Holy Day with the Creator Who has bound Himself to His creation in time. 

God's Happy New Year

            Those of us who follow the western calendar have just celebrated the beginning of a new year.  As the day moves from December 31 to January 1 we go through all kinds of rituals and celebrations.  Many resolutions are made,  and most determine that the new year will be better than the last in some way.

            Does God have a "new year celebration"?  Does the Infinite One even acknowledge time, or is it purely for our benefit that He may even notice time's passage?  I believe that ever since Our Heavenly Father created beings that are subject to time, He has bound Himself to its passage.  It's just another evidence of His humility.  Here is one reason why I believe this.  I'll give another reason in a later post.

            Since this is about "God's Happy New Year", we will first look at Exodus 12.  In the first two verses God instructs the Israelites through Moses that the current month (Abib) will now be the first month of the year to them.  While it was not the first month of the civil year, nor of the other nations around them, it was to be the first, the foremost, or primary month in their thinking and planning.

             This was the month that marked their great deliverance from slavery in Egypt.  Deliverance!  Freedom!  No wonder that from this time forward they were to mark this as the first month.  Just as we now mark the turning of the calendar with "new beginnings", so this was a time of new beginnings for them.  It's as if God said:  "Happy New Year.  From this time forward things will be very different for you.  As you follow Me, keeping your eyes on Me, I will lead you forward to great and wonderful things.  Do not dwell on the past with its bondage.  Look to me and have freedom!"

            The tragedy of Israel was they kept slipping back into the old ways, the old slavery to evil habits.  Many are the sad records we have of their longing for the wicked ways of Egypt. 

            The question for us now is: have we been delivered?  Have I found freedom in Christ to leave the old sinful past behind?  Do I now look to Jesus as my Guide and Counselor?   "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new."  (2 Corinthians 5:17)   If you have not already enjoyed God's Happy New Year in your own life, then let it begin right now.  Submit all your plans and thoughts to God right now.  Give Him all your past with its failings and rebellion.  May God say to you:  "This month shall be unto you the beginning of months: it shall be the first month of the year to you."  (Exodus 12:2)