THE FEASTS WILL STILL BE CELEBRATED IN THE MILLENNIAL, AND NEW EARTH AGES
When the "feasts" were instituted, they were "His feasts." God instituted and commanded them in the Old Testament. Yet, even before the new covenant, wherein they are being fulfilled prophetically, they became "a feast of the Jews" (John 5:1). They had become hollow and meaningless ritual. The misuse, misunderstanding, the doing them without sincerity, had made God turn from accepting them as worship and teaching.
Isaiah 1:11-15
"...YOUR APPOINTED FEASTS, MY SOUL HATETH..."
People had lost the complete meaning and teaching of the feasts. The feasts had become corrupted. The people had become corrupted.
However, in the last days we receive a fresh revelation of prophetic truth. It is that fulfillment of prophetic truth that we will find in the study of the feasts.
God allowed a number of the "feast" days to be possibilities for certain future events. They not only celebrated some event of history, they prophetically spoke of a coming event of the new covenant time.
Some have chosen the first of Tishri as being likely for the rapture, and some have chosen the fifteenth of Nisan. Still others will choose the day of Pentecost (the sixth of Sivan) to be the most likely. There are points of argument for each date. God has made the "feasts" to be possibilities. We can study and determine which is the most likely, but our best guess may be incorrect. Still, the study of these feasts, and the "guesstimations" are intriguing.
Isaiah 42:9
"BEHOLD THE FORMER THINGS HAVE COME TO PASS, NEW THINGS I DECLARE UNTO YOU, BEFORE THEY SPRING FORTH, I TELL YOU OF THEM."
The Jewish nation went year to year to celebrate some of these feasts. These celebrated different epochs in their history.
1. The feast of the Passover, commemorated their departure from Egypt. Prophetically, it pictured the coming of Jesus as the Lamb to be offered for release from our captivity in sins.
2. The feast of Pentecost was in commemoration of the giving of the law upon Mount Sinai. It spoke prophetically of the giving of the Holy Spirit in the new grace covenant.
3. The feast of tabernacles was in commemoration of their wandering forty years in the wilderness. It spoke prophetically to the Lord’s coming to abide with us in this wilderness world.
This last feast, the feast of tabernacles, according to Zechariah, will be celebrated for all ages to come, and the others will still speak prophetically to us.
Zechariah 14:16-19 (KJV)
16 And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall even go up from year to year to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles.
17 And it shall be, that whoso will not come up of all the families of the earth unto Jerusalem to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, even upon them shall be no rain.
18 And if the family of Egypt go not up, and come not, that have no rain; there shall be the plague, wherewith the LORD will smite the heathen that come not up to keep the feast of tabernacles.
19 This shall be the punishment of Egypt, and the punishment of all nations that come not up to keep the feast of tabernacles.
This feast of tabernacles will, in the millennium and on the new earth, be celebrated by not just the Jewish people, but by all nations. It originally only had significance to the Jewish people, but its fulfillment in Jesus’ coming to this earth, is something even we Gentiles we always want to celebrate.
The other two great yearly feasts, Passover and Pentecost, are not specified, here by Zechariah, but I will want to celebrate Jesus’ death and resurrection, pictured and shadowed by the Passover, and celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit, on Pentecost. The shadows have been fulfilled, and celebration of them will be natural.
The feasts were ‘seed’ revelations, now blooming as trees in the garden of prophecy. We will celebrate them.... All of them... Not for the same reasons as many thought, not corrupting them as many did, but in sincerity and in truth, we will continue to celebrate them for eternity.