As I write this, the time is 8:30 am, Monday, Sept 6. In 25 minutes, the sun will set in Jerusalem, and the two days of the ‘Feast of Trumpets’ (Rosh Hashanah, Israel’s New Year) will begin. The Feast of Trumpets is also known as ‘the Wedding of the Messiah’!
We know Who the Messiah is, and we know His Bride because we are His Bride!
Jesus said that no one knows the day or the hour of His return for us, and that very phrase always pertains to the Feast of Trumpets. It is celebrated over two days; no one knows the exact time of its beginning because it begins when two witnesses watching in Jerusalem finally see the tiny sliver of the New Moon begin to rise in the East. Then, they go back and report to the High Priest, and so it begins.
We don’t know the day or the hour, but it is also true that the Word tells us we should not be caught off guard, being ignorant of the Signs of the Time. We are to be studying God’s Word, like Daniel did, as he recognized that the time of Israel’s release from bondage in Babylon was near. We should, above all other people, recognize that the time of Messiah’s return for His Bride is near, even at the door!
Wake up! Look up! Watch, and keep on watching! Yes, today could be the day, but yesterday could also have been the day. His return for us is near; watch, wait, and faithfully draw near to Him as He, then, draws near to you.
His return for us is not what is most important; what is of utmost importance is what He is doing in us now as He faithfully molds and shapes us into the image and likeness of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
“But now, Lord, You are our Father; We are the clay, and You our potter, And all of us are the work of Your hand” (Isaiah 64:8).
“For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work among you will complete it by the day of Christ Jesus” (Philippians 1:6).
And never forget: His number one tool in shaping us is trials, trials, and more trials; each one is meant to form in us, more and more… patience and endurance!
“And let patience have its perfect result that we may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing” (James 1:4).
“Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer person is decaying, yet our inner person is being renewed day by day. For our momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison” (2 Corinthians 4:16-17).
Whether the Lord returns for us on a Feast of Trumpets or any other time, the signs tell us that we are in the season of His return, and we are to keep looking up, for our redemption draws near, very near.
Tom Tillman