Posted by Steven Benjamin on April 11, 2009, 6:20 pm, in reply to "Re: Shepherds Rod: TRACT No. 3 (pt 15)"
Both the wave-sheaf and the wave-loaves were thank offerings for the first fruits. One was dedicated at the beginning of the harvest; the other at the completion of it. In contrast to the wave-sheaf of cut stalks of grain, prefiguring fruits to be gathered after the sheaf was offered, the wave-loaves, being a finished product, signified fruits previously gathered. (The reader who would best comprehend the significance of these three ceremonial celebrations all-important to our salvation, will follow the chart of page 77, as we proceed. )
It will be observed that the command regarding observance of the seventh-day Sabbath, as well as that regarding observance of the yearly ceremonial feasts, is recorded in the twenty-third chapter of Leviticus, verse 3. Care, therefore, must be exercised not to confuse the one truth with the other.
The wave-sheaf was to be offered "on the morrow after the Sabbath" -- that is, on the first day of the week, now commonly called Sunday. This offering was to be presented, not on a special day of the month, but rather on a special day of the week, before the sickle was put to the grain and gathered into sheaves (Lev. 23:11, 14). Coming just at the right time, in the season of the first fruits, the Passover week was the period in which the wave-sheaf was usually offered before the Lord, its ritual prophetically projecting
Christ, The Antitype Of The Wave-Sheaf.
For more than a thousand years the annual waving of the sheaf pointed forward to its antitypical event, the resurrection of Christ. And as Christ arose on the very day that the wave-sheaf was to be offered, the day "after the Sabbath," let no one attribute the singular concurrence of these two events on that day to mere coincidence or to any cause other than divine design. "He was the antitype of the wave-sheaf," declares the Spirit of Prophecy, "and His resurrection took place on the very day when the wave-sheaf was to be presented before the Lord. " -- Desire of Ages, p. 785 .
So Christ, the first fruits, and those who with Him at His resurrection came forth from the grave, raised to everlasting life, were the antitypical wave-sheaf of the dead. And since the wave-sheaf of grain pointed forward to the ingathering of the first fruits of the field, just so those who arose with Christ, being first fruits of the dead, pointed forward to the ingathering of the gospel's first fruits -- the 120 disciples. But as those who arose with Christ ascended with Him as trophies of His victory over death and the grave, they thereby became a living type, and thus
The Wave-Sheaf Of The Living.
Just as Christ arose on the very day the sheaf was to be offered, likewise the Holy Spirit fell upon the 120 disciples on the very day the wave-loaves were to be presented before the Lord. The apostolic Pentecost was accordingly the prototype of the ceremonial Pentecost (the day the wave-loaves were offered). And since the wave-sheaf was a figure of Christ and of those who arose with Him as the first of the first fruits of the dead, hence the wave-loaves were a figure on the 120 Spirit-filled disciples who were the full complement of first fruits of the dead, and who were gathered in after the resurrection.
From these facts it can more clearly be seen that those whom Christ took with Him were the living wave-sheaf and the only one that has been offered in the heavenly sanctuary; and that as ones raised from the dead, they are the first fruits of the dead, whereas as ones everliving before the Father, they are the living wave-sheaf of the first fruits of the living, the 144,000 servants of God, who sequentially precede
The Second Fruits And The Feast Of Tabernacles.
The 120 disciples on the day of Pentecost being the gospel's first fruits of the dead, it follows that the great multitude added to the church daily thereafter, naturally were the gospel's second fruits of the dead.
"Also in the fifteenth day of the seventh month," continues the Levitical record of the Lord's commands concerning the harvest rites, "when ye have gathered in the fruit of the land, ye shall keep a feast unto the Lord seven days:. . . and ye shall take you on the first day the boughs of goodly trees, branches of palm trees, and the boughs of thick trees, and willows of the brook; and ye shall rejoice before the Lord your God seven days. . . . Ye shall dwell in booths seven days; all that are Israelites born shall dwell in booths. " Lev. 23:39, 40, 42.
As the wave-sheaf and the wave-loaves are typical, then also the Feast of Tabernacles must be typical. Otherwise the ceremony would not have been observed as a part of the harvest rite. And as in the type the feast was to be celebrated at the close of the final ingathering of the year's harvest, then correspondingly in the antitype it must be celebrated at the close of the final ingathering of earth's harvest, which is nearing its fulfillment. So the time consumed in producing and in offering the wave-sheaf and the wave-loaves, also in observing the Feast of Tabernacles, is representative of the entire spiritual harvest time of the living and of the dead.
Bearing out this fact the Spirit of Prophecy says:
"The Feast of Tabernacles was not only commemorative, but typical. . . . It celebrated the ingathering of the fruits of the earth, and pointed forward to the great day of final ingathering, when the Lord of the harvest shall send forth His reapers to gather the tares together in bundles for the fire, and to gather the wheat into His garner. At that time the wicked will all be destroyed. " -- Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 541.
Plainly, therefore, since the first and the second fruits of the literal harvest and its attendant rites foreshadowed a spiritual harvest of first and second fruits, they are to be climaxed by the antitypical Feast of Tabernacles.
(CONTD)
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