What’s that Sound?

0:02 Shava, this is in Judaism, remarkably different than other New Years. Uh, as he was talking about this is we, we focus on coming to the Lord on, we repentant on seeking out others that we have, uh, wronged throughout the year and asking, uh, and repenting or, or apologizing for what we've done wrong throughout the year. We come to the Lord, we seek forgiveness, you know, to it, it, this, there, there's just a very serious aspect to this, to Judaism's New Year. It's not exactly the same as everyone else,

0:48 but it is important for us in our, in our yearly routine. I would like to reread, just to bring it back to our mind, uh, what Steven and McKayla read partially because this is where we get one of the definitions for, for this, uh, holiday that we're celebrating starting tonight. Leviticus 23, verse 24 and 25, speak to the children of Israel saying, in the seventh month, on the first day of the month, you are to have a Shabbat rest, a memorial of blowing the shofar. A holy convocation you are to do no regular work, and you are to present an offering made by fire to the Lord. So this is where we get kind of the, the loose definition of

1:35 what we do and, and when it is. This is Yom Torah as it's known in the, in the Torah. Also we call, call it Rosh Hashanah, in, in, uh, in our modern calendar. It's the Rosh Hashanah simply means the head of the year. And, and likely it's a term that comes, um, post the Torah, not likely, it certainly comes post the, the Torah, the writing of the Torah. It's likely actually that the term comes from the, from the time of exile in Babylon. And what do we do? Well, we have here in this verse what we do. We have a Shabbat rest, a memorial of blowing the shofar, a holy convocation. We do no regular work, and we present an offering made by fire,

2:21 the primary element for Rosh Hashanah, for the observance of Rosh Hashanah. The primary element is centered around the blowing of the shofar. This element, the blowing of the shofar, finds its roots in the Torah passage that's read on Rosh Hashanah. We will read it tomorrow, uh, from Genesis 22. And this passage concerns, uh, the time when Abraham takes Isaac as he's commanded by the Lord up to Mount Mariah for the purpose of offering him as a sacrifice to the Lord. And then lo and behold, he's there with the knife ready to sacrifice Isaac. And the Lord says, stop. Actually, the Lord says, Abraham. And uh, and Abraham stops

3:07 and he says, look, here's a ram caught in the thick at the ram was caught by its horns. And, and, and here we have a substitutionary offering for Isaac, the son of Abraham. You'll hear more about this tomorrow. I'm just telling you that because this is where the element of the shofar finds its roots, because it, it was the horn of the ram that got caught in the thicket. And so now we, we observe this, and so we have our opportunity to blow the shofar and, and the shofar does, um, multiple things for us on Rosh Hashanah. First of all, Rosh Hashanah in the blowing of the shofar should recall, or,

3:53 or it helps us to remember the day upon which the world was created, or very specifically mankind was created in early Genesis. Today marks the anniversary or the birthday, if you will, of us being a new creation. You see, before, before the creation of mankind, it was, it was, uh, it was void before the creation of the world, it was formless and void. But then all of a sudden with creation, God made a new creation. And so today is that anniversary or birthday, if you will. Uh, actually today's also, oh, he's not here tonight. I was gonna say it's also Rocky Carter's birthday, but, um, but he's not here. He is probably watching online. Hi, Rocky.

4:41 Um, anyways, this is this, uh, this birthday celebration. We all celebrate birthdays and we do things differently. Almost every year while on Rosh Hashanah, we do things almost the same every year, uh, we, we make a couple allowances, but here what we do is we, we mark, or we remember the anniversary of us being a new creation. Why, why do I say that? Well, partially because after creation, mankind in our, in our, in our, um, ability to not follow the Lord, we chose to not follow the Lord and to walk away from his directions.

5:28 And this is why, or part of the reason why Rosh Hashanah or the New Year is connected to repentance, repentance being the act of turning to the Lord. You see, mankind walked away from the Lord, and in order to get back to him, we have to turn back to him. That's what repentance is. Repentance requires acknowledging that you're going in the wrong direction, and now that you're going, you're, you're adjusting your, your, uh, trajectory and going in a different direction by following the Lord. We are encouraged in Colossians chapter three verses one through 10 by Paul. Therefore, if you have been raised up with the Messiah,

6:16 keep seeking the things above where the Messiah is sitting at the right hand of God. Focus your mind on the things above, not on the things of this earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with the Messiah in God. When Messiah, who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory, therefore put to death what is earthly in you. Sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil de evil desire and greed for that is idolatry. Because of such things, God's wrath is coming upon the sons of disobedience. At one time. You also walked in these ways when you used to live in these ways, but now set them all aside.

7:03 Anger, rage, malice, slander and foul language out of your mouth do not lie to one another. After all, you have taken off the old self. You've taken off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self that is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of the one who created him. It is through the life of our Messiah, Yeshua that we are able to draw near to the Lord and be in relationship with him. As we left that relationship, not, uh, toward the beginning of the creation of the earth, we, we left and now we're able to come back through the Messiah and John near to the Lord. Paul here tells us what it means to be in, if you will, the life of the Messiah.

7:48 It is to put to death that which is earthly within us. And he names out sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil, desire, and greed. And he then he says, and you set them all aside, anger, rage, malice, slander, foul language, do not lie to one another. What does it mean when you set something to the side? It means you put it over here and you stop doing it. You leave it there, and then you turn away from it and walk toward the Lord. Paul finishes this with after you've taken off the old self. So this is when you set these things to the side

8:35 and you put to death what is earthly within us? What you were doing is you were taking off the old self with its practices, and now you put on the new self that is being renewed in knowledge. That new self is the life or is the Messiah. And this putting on the new self is something that we have to practice daily, the this time of year. Listen, we may practice it daily or we may say we should practice it daily. Some of us forget. So this time of year serves as a reminder on the calendar. It's like you go ahead. I don't know how many of you, when you use Apple Calendar or Google Calendar, whatever, and you set your reminder, gimme a reminder 15 minutes early so I'm not late to my dentist appointment. This is your reminder

9:21 to take off your earthly self and to put on the Messiah. This is the reminder that God puts on the calendar for us. It's not to say you shouldn't do it all, all year round, it's just to say, if you forgot, now, now is a good time to do it. So we have to practice this daily taking off ourself, our, our old self and putting on the Messiah. And what we have in the Messiah is an everlasting hope. And this is what Paul says in one Thessalonians. Now, we do not want you to be uninformed brothers and sisters about those who are asleep so that you may not grieve like those, like the rest who have no hope for if we believe

10:07 that Yeshua died and rose again. So with him, God will also bring those who have fallen asleep in Yeshua. For this, we tell you by the word of the Lord that we who are alive and remaining until the coming of the Lord shall in no way proceed. Those who are asleep for the Lord himself shall come down from heaven with a commanding shout with the voice of the archangel and the blast of God. Shofar and the dead and Messiah shall rise first, then we who are alive, who are left behind will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore, encourage one another with these words.

10:54 We have a hope, those of us who have placed our trust in the Messiah and we shed our earthly selves and we put on the Messiah each and every day, and especially as we come to this time of year, we have an everlasting hope that when we die, some of us will die. That's what the passage says. Some of us may not. Paul wrote this nearly 2000 years ago. For some reason, all of the actions of this week have caused me to wonder, are we a little bit closer to that day when some of us will not die, but yet the trumpet will blast and Yeshua will come down and the dead will rise first. It is it, I I don't know.

11:43 I've had multiple conversations this week. The world is right. It's right riding on the, on the edge of a knife and it, and it will fall one, one way or the other. We're really, it, it's, it's if we're not, If we're not at that point, and I'm not saying that Yeshua's coming back today or tomorrow, though, I, I I hope. But what I am telling you is all of what is happening in the Middle East and now reverberating throughout the nations, I wonder if it's no longer Braxton Hicks. I wonder if it's actually the beginning. You guys have heard me share the, my wife's labor stories before. I'm not gonna share 'em again, but sometimes there's false

12:30 labor and it, and it precedes real labor and then there's real labor. I don't know, maybe we're in the false labor, maybe we're not. Whatever we are, we're in one of those two because everything just seems to be, the earth seems to be groaning. The earth, the peoples in the nations are aligning themselves against Israel. Slowly but surely. And at some point, it is going to take God's miraculous intervention. Right now, I praise the Lord for the ability of the IDF to provide security and, and defense for the people of Israel. At some point, it seems to me the scripture says

13:16 that will no longer be and that the people will be there and, and the Lord himself will step in And all of them will turn to him. So we look forward, this is the hope that we have, that we look to the day when Yeshua will return. And all of all of our brothers and sisters, all of Israel will turn and look upon him whom they have pierced as we read in, in Zechariah. And then they will mourn because the reality of what is the, the, the blinders will be, will be removed.

14:02 We stand in the hope that we know it's gonna happen. The rest of Israel stands in the hope that the Messiah is coming. We just know he's coming again. So what does this mean for us? Tomorrow you'll hear the blast of the shofar here in the sanctuary. If you're here, you'll hear the blast of the shofar. Let me encourage you to allow the shofar to do these multiple things with you. Allow it to cause us to pause what we are doing. In other words, to stop where we are and listen. Let it cause us to remember our creator and his creation.

14:51 Let the sound of the shofar cause us to turn to him in our lives. Let it cause us to put to death what is earthly within us, and let it cause us to put on the Messiah today and let it cause us to place our hope in that which is eternal and not fleeting. Tonight, let us reflect on our own lives and turn and give it all to him. May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you. May the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace.

16:04 The name of our Messiah, Yeshua Amain Shava, happy New year. May you have a sweet New Year.