Sunday October 23rd was the conclusion to the Holy Feast Calendar based on the seven Holy Feasts laid out by God in the Old Testament. Several friends and family members of mine met to honor the feast known as Tabernacles. Other names include the Feast of In-gathering, Feast of Booths, or Sukkot. A lot of people don’t spend much time investigating and studying feasts like this because it sounds to unfamiliar. In fact, I think most Christians even may skip over these when reading the old testament or read them but miss the relevance and connection to us as followers of Christ. But…they are jam packed with so much details about God’s redemptive plan for humanity and all of them point to some character attribute of Jesus Christ and His past and future work here on earth. In one of my previous blogs I introduced a little on the feasts. This post is all about the Feast of Tabernacles.

I love the feasts and Tabernacles is one of my favorite. Some of the feasts are meant to be solemn but other are meant to be full of rejoicing. Now there are obvious reasons to be joyful and full of hope with all of the Holy Feasts and in Tabernacles we are actually commanded by God to celebrate and be full of joy and thanksgiving. How awesome is that? So here is a little taste of why this feast is so cool, most of all for Christians.

The theme of the feast is in the title. The tabernacle, or dwelling, is a common symbol used for God’s presence among His creation. In Exodus, God commands Moses to build a tabernacle in the wilderness. Why? Because God wanted to dwell among the nation of Israel. Later on Solomon would build the first temple which had a similar layout as the tabernacle and served the same purpose…God’s presence among His people. Fast forward to John chapter one and we see an even greater representation of God dwelling among us.

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

John 1:14 (NIV)

The Word is obviously Jesus, who was the full embodiment of God in the flesh. Jesus is the tabernacle and the temple. The word “dwelling” in this verse is actually the same word used for “to tabernacle”. If that’s not enough to blow your mind and prove the significance of this feast for Christians, then lets keep going.

 Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own;²⁰ you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.

1 Corinthians 6:19-20 (NIV)

As believers in Christ we too are tabernacles/temples. God no longer just appears to us in temples and tents and churches, God’s Spirit is dwelling/tabernacling in us. Those who just look at this feast from it’s old testament meaning are missing more than just one piece of the puzzle. Yes, it originally pointed to God dwelling among Israel and them living in temporary homes known as booths while on their journey to the promised land, but all of that was a foreshadowing of greater meaning later on.

¹¹ Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul.

1 Peter 2:11 (ESV)

Just as the Israelites wondered in the wilderness and dwelt in temporary homes before reaching the promised land, so too are we. The word “sojourner” means a traveler…someone passing through. You’ve seen the bumper stickers. “We are not of this world”. They come from the statement Jesus made when praying in the garden of Gethsemane the night before He was crucified. We, as Christians, are passing through this world on our way to THE promised land, which is actually our home.

For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ…

Philippians 3:20 (NASB)

So this Feast has a past significance (the tabernacle, the temple, and Jesus coming to live on earth), a present significance (God’s Holy Spirit living in us), and also a future significance.

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.

Revelation 21:3 (ESV)

This is what we celebrate when we celebrate the feast. We honor God’s faithfulness in the past, present, and future. We praise Him for wanting to be among us and that He has allowed us to be in His presence. This is only a taste of what this feast means of humanity. I encourage anyone in search of knowing more about God’s character and His plan to research all of these feasts. Knowing these unlocks so much of the bible and gives us so much hope that He is control. That’s something we need in these difficult days.