Today, I am reading and commenting on Leviticus 22-23.
I think we can learn something from the appointed festivals the Israelites were supposed to observe. First I want to note that there were seven of these festivals. We tend to forget that the Sabbath was as much one of the festivals ordained by God for the Israelites as was Passover. I am not sure how Jews view these festivals, but the Christians I know who think about them tend to focus on Passover, the Day of Atonement, and, perhaps, the Festival of Tabernacles, mostly forgetting that the Sabbath is one of these Festivals. I think that the importance of remembering that the Sabbath is the first of these Festivals cannot be overstated. The importance of Passover for Jews, and Easter for Christians, cannot be overstated. In fact, I think the fact that the English language uses Easter for that event, rather than a word derived from Passover as most other languages do, causes us to to make less of a connection between Jesus’ death and resurrection and Passover than we should. Similarly, our failure to take notice that the Sabbath was the first of these Festivals established by God causes us to fail to take seriously God’s call for us to dedicate one day a week to worshiping and thinking about Him.
I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.