God’s Gardening Calendar and the Feasts of Israel

The Feasts of Israel: Part 16

Most of us are not farmers today, yet Scripture is replete with agricultural references. Even the seven feasts God appointed for Israel are tied to the cycles of seedtime and harvest. Those living during biblical times may have found it easier to find meaning in these festivals than some of us do, just because of how closely their lives were tied to farming cycles. Even the more urban among them knew when market fare was changing.

We, too, may harvest a greater understanding of His character and His plans for us by becoming more familiar with God’s gardening calendar and the appointed times for these feasts.

The Beginning of the Year

Most of us live by a Gregorian calendar, with our year beginning in the dead of winter with the month of January. But God instituted a calendar for Israel which began in the spring with the month of Abib and would cycle with the phases of the moon (Exodus 12:1–2). As we learned in Passover, the Beginning of Months, this was in honor of Israel’s release from Egypt.

I’m sure some of the Israelites found the connection between spring and their new-found freedom quite meaningful, but I’m guessing they would have been just as happy to leave Egypt at any time of year. But God wanted to make sure their deliverance was timed so that, forty years later, they would celebrate Passover (along with the other two springs feasts—Unleavened Bread and Sheaf of Firstfruits) just as the barley harvest was ripening in the Promised Land.

God gave instructions for observing these feasts, along with four others, in Leviticus 23. The funny thing was, these directions were delivered while Israel was still wandering in the desert. Until the people had land of their own, it would be impossible to celebrate these feasts the way God commanded. As long as they were nomads, they lacked a critical element for the celebrations—a harvest.

The Turning of the Seasons

Once they did have fields to plant, Israel could fully observe the spring feasts and then Pentecost fifty days later. The third month of the year was Sivan (our May or June)—the same time of year Moses had climbed Mount Sinai to receive the Ten Commandments. For that reason, Pentecost was closely tied to this event and made the feast a celebration of the giving of the Law (see Pentecost 1.0) and was timed to coordinate with their future wheat harvest.

The Fall of the Year

The final three feasts of the year would be saved for the fall, after the people put in three months of field work. Tishri (our September or October) was the seventh month of Israel’s year, when the final harvest of the year ripened. It was time for the great in-gathering of grapes, figs, and olives, celebrated with the feasts of Trumpets, Atonement, and Tabernacles.

All these feasts matched up with harvests yet to come. But I’m guessing while Israel was waiting for rescue, all they cared about was getting out of Egypt. I don’t think wheat or barley or grapes seemed important to them in the moment.

But while God was concerned about getting them out of their old life, He was simultaneously focused on preparing them to enter something new. He had harvests, fruitfulness, even abundance in mind, and set thanksgiving celebrations in motion long before they had the first seeds in their hands.

God’s Timing

Sometimes God seems to take longer than we want to rescue us from a situation, to bring His promises to pass, to work out resolutions to our problems. But maybe what appears as a “delay” is just God focusing on the end from the beginning, as He coordinates our past and present with our future. Perhaps it’s more important than we realize to walk into our Promised Land just as a certain fruit is ready to pick.

God gave Israel the scripts for festivals long before they felt the weight of the yoke leave their shoulders. Why, then, shouldn’t we appreciate the celebration He’s preparing before we see the flowers bloom?

There have been plenty of times in my own life when I felt the wait was too long. For one thing, it seemed to take eternity to find the man I was to marry. But looking back, I see God’s hand at work. He coordinated our separate working lives until He could draw us together across several states. At last, our jobs landed us in the same place at the same time. God’s ability to guide more than one life at a time was on full display and getting us wrangled together was necessary for the fruit we now bear.

Then there was was the depression I would have preferred to leave behind much sooner than I did. Instead, it worked out gradually as my husband’s job took us from state to state. Each time I lost a community of believers, I joined another one which touched my heart in a different way. I needed particular gifts of particular people at particular stages of my life to minister the healing I needed. An abbreviated journey would not have resulted in setting my own gifts free.

No matter how long it seems to take, we can rejoice that all things are working out for our good. Let’s prepare for the celebrations to come, because God has our names on His gardening calendar. He has timed our rescue perfectly to match up with the harvests destined to fill our hands.