Transcript
Speaker: Well, praise the Lord and welcome to Grace Talk. This is Apostle Cordery, Senior Pastor of ah Grace Temple Church in Louisville, Kentucky, and we're so thankful and grateful for you to join us in fellowship as we have our lesson on today.
Speaker: We are fastly approaching the fall feast, Yom Teruah, Yom Kippur, and Sukkot, We're looking for those wonderful celebrations to come that we can enjoy the Lord and be in his presence and ah get ready for those last days and that final call.
Speaker: We think initially the Feast of Trumpets or Yom Teruah is coming first. And if we could just for a moment tonight, we want to talk to you about the trumpet and the call of God.
Speaker: The contemporary church is focused on man-made festivals. And so they biblically, there are no defined times or days. But certainly the scripture teaches us that this is a biblical feast.
Speaker: It is Yom Teruah the day of blowing the horn. It is a memorial of our sanctification. God had called Israel to the mountain.
Speaker: And then he told them to sanctify themselves in Exodus chapter 19, verse 10. And the Lord said unto Moses, go unto unto the people and sanctify them today and tomorrow.
Speaker: Let them wash their clothes. And be ready. Saints of God, it's time to be ready. Be ready against the third day. For the third day, the Lord will come down in the sight of all the people upon Mount Sinai.
Speaker: This is our expectation and this is our hope. But all the blessings that God provides in this life. Our hope is not in this life only. If we were, we would be men most miserable. Our hope is in the ah expectation that Jesus is it going to return and come back for us. And so God calls us into sanctification as preparation for his final return.
Speaker: The law was given unto Israel. ah so that they would understand the divine majesty of this God that had just brought them out of Egypt, and to show them how man had deviated from Lord's will, because as they compared their life to his law, they found themselves error.
Speaker: And so Yom Teruah has the intention of bringing us back or calling man back to God and to his true word. It is also a feast of remembering.
Speaker: Israel remembered that God, after bringing them out of Egypt, called them to himself. What a wonderful blessing for God allow us ah comment to come into his presence.
Speaker: But they responded to the call by entering into covenant with Yahweh. This contract was simple. God would be their God. He showed them he was their God by delivering from the strongest nation, and then they would be his people, that they would serve him in obedience to his desire. Let's remember a few principles as we look at this.
Speaker: They had to be delivered before God would present himself in person to them. ah Prior to this, he spoke through Moses, but according to Isaiah 59 and 2,
Speaker: Any he continued sin separates us from God, but your iniquities have separated between you and your God and your sins have hid his face from you that he will not hear. Make no mistake about it.
Speaker: ah Contrary to whatever the world will tell you, God does not hear sinners. We really have to have a change of life in order to comfort him. God's blood was not shed so that we would have the capability to continue in sin.
Speaker: His blood was shed to give you a reason to come out of sin. And then secondly, he he chose to prove himself worthy of your honor, not demand it.
Speaker: but prove and give you a reason for it. So a common greeting on this day, Yom Teruah, is shana tovah, meaning good year.
Speaker: However, it's not just a greeting. It's a statement of expectation. It's not wishing someone a good year. It's declaring that we are going to have, by faith,
Speaker: a good year. The Yom Teruah occurs on the ah first day of Tishri, what we've come to call it Rosh Hashanah, which is the head of the year.
Speaker: And so it's the first day as we go into a new calendar year, ah it begins on Tishri, Yom Teruah. And so the declaration was made, there was a belief that God would would put your name in the book,
Speaker: And those who would would would make it in would be inscribed in the book on this day. the The common or the total quote that was said was, Shana Tova, may Hashim, and I'm saying it in English, may Hashim inscribe your name in the book of life and bring perfect peace to your household.
Speaker: This ought to be our wish for all men as we enter into this festival of the blowing of trumpets. So the shofar was blown and it was looked upon as an act of crying out to God in time of great need.
Speaker: ah Before the shofar sounded on Yom Teruah, Psalm 47 was recited seven times. Verse one in particular is significant. It says, Oh, clap your hands, all ye people.
Speaker: Shout. Aruah unto God with the voice of triumph. I want encourage you today to declare victory over the enemy, to declare victory over sin, to declare victory over all that would hold you and have you bound and know that God is a God who sets free.
Speaker: So the Lord tells us specifically when and how to keep the feast. We see it in Leviticus 23 and 24, verses 24 to 25. Unlike the common church's holidays, the the scripture doesn't define when. In fact, things like Christmas or Easter, you will find is defined by the church as being the first Sunday after the full moon following the spring eglonaut.
Speaker: None of that's in the scriptures. It's all man defined, but God defined when and how to keep the feast. In Leviticus 23 verses 24 and 25, speak unto the children of Israel, saying in the seventh month, in the first day of the month, shall ye have a Sabbath. Seven month meaning seven months from the time that they came out, from the time of their beginning, which was in Abib.
Speaker: And Abib not a new year. Abib 1 has never been declared in the scriptures to be a new year, but Abib was declared to be the beginning of months unto them. So it's where they begin to count their existence, kind of like your birthday or your anniversary.
Speaker: It doesn't mean it's the start of the year. It just means the beginning of your existence. In the first month, so you have a Sabbath, a memorial of blowing of trumpets and a holy convocation.
Speaker: That's telling us two things there. We should rest, from our daily work and that we should come together in an assembly together of like believers. Verse 25 says, ye shall do no serve our work therein, but ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord.
Speaker: It's a time we ought to offer praise and worship to the Lord. And when God sends the fire of his Holy Spirit, he is putting his sanction on the offering. The trumpet is meant to call us.
Speaker: And we should understand that, that Matthew 24 and 30. I know I'm a little rushing little bit here. I don't want to take up all your time on tonight. And then shall there appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven.
Speaker: And then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds from one end of heaven to the other.
Speaker: Amen. So there's a purpose in our call. First Thessalonians 4 and 7. But God has not called us unto uncleanness, but unto holiness.
Speaker: He's called us to separate ourselves. This is why this points back to Mount Sinai when he gave us the law and gave us direction as to how to keep it. One last thing I want you to know as we approach this day, you ought to be preparing your own ruah, your own shout.
Speaker: When Israel approached Jericho, and we all know the story, don't have to go through it. God gave them instructions. He said, go around the city six days. Seven priests shall carry seven shofars. But on the seventh day, go around seven times, blow the shofars, and then shout, Joshua 6 and 5.
Speaker: And it shall come to pass that when they make a long blast with the ram's horn, and when you hear the sound of the trumpet, All the people shall shout with a great shout and the wall of the city shall fall down flat and the people shall ascend up every man straight before him.
Speaker: Now want to encourage you we prepare for this feast, get your teruah together, get your strong shout together, get your loud sound together and be prepared to bring the walls of your Jericho down.
Speaker: God will blow the trumpet when he calls us in and we ought to be so rejoiceful at the thought of it that we continue in his glory and that we expect him to come with great joy and expectation.
Speaker: God bless you. We're so thankful for you joining us on today ah in this Grace Talk and we look forward to being with you real soon. Again, until then, grace and peace.
