Leviticus 23:23-25; 1 Thessalonians 4:16; Matthew 24:36; 1 Corinthians 15:52
"The Lord said to Moses: Say to the Israelites: On the first day of the seventh month you are to have a day of sabbath rest, a sacred assembly commemorated with trumpet blasts. Do no regular work, but present a food offering to the Lord."
"For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first."
"But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father."
"In a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed."
The Feast of Trumpets, or Rosh Hashanah, is the only biblical feast that begins on the first day of a new moon. Every other feast falls on a fixed date. Passover is the fourteenth of Nisan. Firstfruits is the day after the Sabbath during Passover week. Pentecost is fifty days after Firstfruits. You can calculate them all on a calendar. But the new moon is different. In the ancient world, the new moon was declared when two witnesses saw the first sliver of the crescent in the evening sky. Until those witnesses arrived, no one knew when the feast would begin. It could be one day. It could be two. No one knew the day or the hour.
Sound familiar.
Jesus said about His return: "But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father." He was speaking in the language of the feasts. He was referencing Rosh Hashanah. The one feast no one could predict. The feast of the trumpet. The feast of the King's return.
The shofar, the ram's horn trumpet, was central to this feast. It was not a musical instrument. It was an alarm. A wake-up call. In ancient Israel, the shofar announced the coronation of a king. It warned of approaching danger. It called the people to assembly. On Rosh Hashanah, the shofar was blown one hundred times. One hundred blasts saying "Wake up. The King is coming. Get ready."
Paul picks up this imagery in 1 Thessalonians 4: "The Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God." And in 1 Corinthians 15: "At the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed." The last trumpet. The final shofar blast. The feast that will be fulfilled when Jesus returns.
Rosh Hashanah is also known as the day of judgment in Jewish tradition. It is believed that on this day, God opens the books and begins judging the world. The ten days that follow, leading to Yom Kippur, are called the Days of Awe. A time of repentance. Of self-examination. Of making things right. The books are open. The judgment is underway. And on Yom Kippur, the books are sealed.
This is the fall feast cycle. Trumpets sounds the alarm. The King is coming. The books are open. Then comes the Day of Atonement, where the blood is applied and the people are cleansed. And then Tabernacles, where God dwells among His people in celebration. Three feasts. Three movements. Alarm. Atonement. Dwelling. And all three point to the second coming of Christ.
"At the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed."
Here is what I carry from this feast. The trumpet will sound. It is not a question of if. It is a question of when. And the fact that we do not know when is not a cruelty. It is a mercy. It means every day is a day to get ready. Every morning is an opportunity to live like the King could return before sunset. We are not called to predict the date. We are called to be ready for it.
The shofar is still blowing. Can you hear it.
With the trumpet still sounding and my eyes on the horizon, Claire