Marcheshvan

 Today would be a perfect day for the First of Marcheshvan...

                                                                    Instead, it's still Sukkot!

We've had so much beautiful rain during Sukkot this year, that it seems HaShem has heard our prayer for rain even before we spoke this year on Shemini Atzeret and requested it! Isn't He just such a wonderful Father!

    For various reasons which I won't discuss here, this Sukkot has been the most least joyful season of our joy for me. Even so, this morning as I was preparing for Shacharit with some lady friends, I acknowledged before HaShem how grateful and privileged I am that He has called me back to Him in such Totality, restored the Jewish roots of my Faith and made me part of the House of Israel. Yes, even in the lowest of moments, HE is enough, more than enough!

    Today, Hoshanah Rabbah, sees the falling of the last few drops of rain that HaShem has apportioned to us for this time. I just went outside to see how my plants are doing - they're looking very happy! - and as I gazed upon my Borage, I felt the caress of those last few drops. So it's over, but not yet. The fat lady still has to sing! (I've always wondered where that saying comes from - if anyone knows, please do let me know!)

    As I write this, I am seeing that there are still quite a few huge buckets of water waiting for us in Shammayim! My Wednesday visit to my mom will have to be a Zoom call today. I do hope that Abba gives me an hour of no rain sometime today so I can go and get my few things at the Spar around the corner - Wednesdays are Pensioner Discount Days!

    This Sukkot has been a time of firsts for me and a few of my friends. For me, at the age of 60, I finally had the privilege to hold in my hands, and later eat, a real pomegranate! From the Holy Land! Another first is that I actually had all the elements on my table for the Rosh HaShannah seder. I know, these are things many people take for granted, that one can have whatever one wants or needs on your table at any time. But I can't and don't. I'm grateful for every morsel that I eat. And I'm overwhelmed by HaShem's Amazing Provision. I often say to Him: "I'm so overwhelmed by how well You feed me and look after me and take care of all my needs - and so much more!" And I truly am.

    One of the Morning Blessings thanks Him for providing us with all we need. Every time I eat, or pray, or wake up in the morning, I am strongly reminded that every breath, every heartbeat, belongs to Him.

    John 7 tells us of  one of the last Sukkot Festivals that Yeshua kept when He was here on earth with us:

    "After this, Yeshua traveled around the Galil, intentionally avoiding Yehudah because the Judeans were out to kill Him. But the festival of Sukkot in Yehudah was near; so his brothers said to Him, 'Leave here and go into Yehudah, so that your talmidim can see the miracles You do; for no one who wants to become known acts in secret. If you're doing these things, show Yourself to the world!' (His brothers spoke this way because they had not put their trust in Him).

    We do know from Scripture that later on, Yeshua's brothers did believe in Him. His brother Ya'akov (James) was the President of the Synagogue in Jerusalem. A testimony to the fact that Yeshua-believing Jews and non-Yeshua-believing Jews lived and worshipped together - for the next few centuries.

    "Yeshua said to them, 'My time has not yet come; but for you, any time is right. The world can't hate you, but it does hate me, because I keep telling it how wicked its ways are. You, go on up to the festival; as for me, I am not going up to this festival now, because the right time for me has not yet come.' Having said this, He stayed on in the Galil.

    "But after His brothers had gone up to the festival, He too went up, not publicly, but in secret. At the festival, the Judeans were looking for Him. 'Where is he?' they asked. And among the crowds there was much whispering about Him. Some said, 'He's a good man'; but others said, 'No, He's deceiving the masses.' However, no one spoke about Him openly, for fear of the Judeans.

    "Not until the festival was half over did Yeshua go up to the Temple courts and begin to teach. The Judeans were surprised: 'How does this man know so much without having studied?' they asked. So Yeshua gave them an answer: 'My teaching is not My own, it comes from the One who sent me. If anyone wants to do His will, he will know whether my teaching is from God or I speak on My own. A person who speaks on his own is trying to win praise for himself; but a person who tries to win praise for the one who sent him is honest, there is nothing false about him. Didn't Moshe give you the Torah? Yet not one of you obeys the Torah! Why are you out to kill me?' 

    "The crowd answered, 'You have a demon!' Who's out to kill you?' Yeshua answered them, 'I did one thing; and because of this, all of you are amazed. Moshe gave you b'rit-milah - not that it came from Moshe but from the Patriarchs - and you do a boy's b'rit-milah on Shabbat. If a boy is circumcised on Shabbat so that the Torah of Moshe will not be broken, why are you angry with me because I made a man's whole body well on Shabbat? Stop judging by surface appearances, and judge the right way!'

    Yeshua had just healed the man who had been blind from birth; The authorities, who were corrupt, didn't know how to deal with this!

    "Some of the Yerushalayim people said, 'Isn't this the man they're out to kill? Yet here He is, speaking openly; and they don't say anything to Him. It couldn't be, could it, that the authorities have actually concluded that He's the Messiah? Surely not - we know where this man comes from; but when the Messiah comes, no one will know where He comes from.' Whereupon Yeshua, continuing to teach in the Temple courts, cried out, 'Indeed, you do know me! And you know where I'm from! And I have not come on my own! The One who sent Me is real. But Him you don't know! I do know Him, because I am with Him, and He sent Me!'

    "At this, they tried to arrest Him; but no one laid a hand on Him; because His time had not yet come. However, many in the crowd put their trust in Him and said, 'When the Messiah comes, will He do more miracles than this man has done?'

    "The P'rushim heard the crowd whispering these things about Yeshua so the head Kohanim and the P'rushim sent some of the Temple guards to arrest Him. Yeshua said, 'I will be with you only a little while longer; then I will go away to the One who sent Me. You will look for me and not find me; indeed, where I am, you cannot come.' The Judeans said to themselves, 'Where is this man about to go, that we won't find Him? Does He intend to go to the Greek diaspora and teach the Greek-speaking Jews? And when He says, 'You will look for me and not find me; indeed, where I am, you cannot come' - what does He mean'?"

    So, all of this happened on the 7th Day of Sukkot, known as Hoshana Rabbah - which is today! Yeshua was keeping the Appointed Times of  His and our Father.

    The next portion of Scripture refers to the 8th Day, called Sh'mini Atzeret. 

    "Now on the last day of the festival, Hoshana Rabbah, Yeshua stood and cried out, 'If anyone is thirsty, let him keep coming to me and drinking! Whoever puts his trust in Me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water will flow from his inmost being!' (Now he said this about the Spirit, whom those who trusted in Him were to receive later - the Spirit had not yet been given, because Yeshua had not yet been glorified.)

    "On hearing His words, some people in the crowd said, 'Surely this man is "The Prophet"; others said, 'This is the Messiah.' But others said, 'How can the Messiah come from the Galil? Doesn't the Tanakh say that the Messiah is from the seed of David (2 Samuel 7:12) and comes from Beit Lechem (Micah 5:1), the village where David lived?' So the people were divided because of Him. Some wanted to arrest Him, but no one laid a hand on Him.

    Apart from the fact that the above verses of Scripture testify to the fact that Yeshua, a Jewish Rabbi, kept the Mo'edim of Adonai and celebrated the Festivals along with His brothers, the whole House of Israel, there is something special about the above portions of Scripture that I never understood until a few years ago.

    Why did the people suddenly exclaim: "Surely He is the Messiah!"?

    On Shemini Atzeret - the day Yeshua made the statement "if anyone comes to me he will never thirst again", part of the Temple service was that the priests would carry golden water jars from the Temple down to the pool of Shiloach, fill them with water and carry them back to the Temple, pouring them out as a libation to God. This was part of the annual prayer for rain from the Almighty, as Israel needs the early and the late rains for their harvests. It was during the fetching and carrying of all this water that Yeshua made His proclamation. I Am the Living Water. 

    

All Scripture references are from The Complete Jewish Bible, the life work of David Stern, of Blessed memory.

Hag Sameach!