Are Blood Moons, Jubilees and Other Old Testament Shadows Overrated?

Over the course of the past 50 years of ministry I have officiated at numerous weddings.

The highlight of any wedding is when the bride to be makes her way down the aisle to be joined in holy matrimony. Every bride is different, as is her beloved bridegroom.

However, in observing all the brides, I’ve never officiated at the wedding of a bridegroom and a shadow. Every bride is capable of casting a shadow but nobody ever marries one.

Why then is it that the present day church is so in love with shadows? They can’t seem to get enough of them. Hardly a week goes by that I don’t hear of another believer marrying a shadow. I’m referring of course to the recent phenomenon of blood moons, jubilees, days of awe, etc.

Suddenly “shadows” have replaced the substance of Christ Himself.

The church in her infancy faced great opposition from those not wanting to give up their Jewish ways. They insisted that in order to be saved one had to first of all be circumcised; otherwise, his faith was not deemed valid but false.

Those proponents of this belief grew in their opposition to the message of grace, to the point where the apostles met for what was to become a major turning point in church history.

The question at issue was how much the Jewish ceremonial law was applicable to the Gentiles? We find the answer in the book of Acts, the 15th chapter. One of the glaring omissions was the observance of the Jewish Feasts.

Paul wrote to the Galatians and Colossians insisting that these days, months, seasons and years were in fact a hindrance to their spiritual growth as they were merely shadows, the substance of which was Christ Himself. His language is such that he refers to the observance of these times as slavery! Paul even considers that his ministry among them may have been in vain because of their continuance of these things.

All this leads me to the question why is it that we are seeing such a plethora of teaching lately implying that ‘blessings’ await those who will take the time to observe or tap into these ‘days and months’?

Only a few days ago I read an article saying that now is the time to observe the Ten Days Of Awe and tap into the Jubilee blessings of God. Didn’t Jesus declare that He was proclaiming the ‘acceptable year of the Lord’? According to the Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary, “acceptable year” is an allusion to the jubilee year (Lev. 25:10), a year of universal release for person and property. (See also Is. 49:8; 2 Cor. 6:2.) Virtually every Bible commentary declares this to be an inference to the Year of Jubilee. In other words, every day is a day of blessing where God bestows upon us the rich blessings of His grace.

Let’s assume I’m in error concerning what I’ve written and that the various feasts and holy days still contain some form of blessing for the believer. That being true, then Biblically in order for you to receive your ‘blessing’, it was and is imperative that first of all you be circumcised. Without circumcision one was considered an outsider or foreigner and not a valid descendant of Abraham.

This being the case, then perhaps those televangelists need to level with their followers and insist that in order to receive their promised increase they first need to go under the knife. Otherwise they have no rights or claim to God’s promises.

I, for one, am glad that ALL the promises are Yea and Amen in Christ. I’m so glad I don’t have to wait for a special day or season to be blessed. Aren’t you? I’m glad too that I’m not married to a shadow! {eoa}

David Ravenhill has served the Lord for more than 40 years as a missionary, pastor, teacher and itinerant minister, having worked with the late evangelist David Wilkerson, Youth With A Mission, pastor Mike Bickle and the late evangelist Steve Hill. He is the author of several books, including For God’s Sake, Grow Up! and Welcome Home.