Why didn't the Jews understand the prophecies of Christ's first coming?
Why weren't they ready to receive the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost?
The answer will surprise you!
EVER since the time of Adam man has rebelled against the government of God. As the Supreme Ruler of the universe, God has decreed that 6000 years be allotted to man to decide for himself whether he will voluntarily submit to the Government of God and keep holy the time He made holy.
Man universally has rejected God's rule, His authority, His holy days. But God has not been idle in human affairs.
What God Has Been Doing
What God is doing these 6000 years very few recognize.
Now is not the time God is trying to save the world. He is rather calling out of the world a select few whom He chooses. To us He reveals Himself, His Will and His Purpose. But we must voluntarily choose to obey Him — and to keep holy the days He set apart.
In the days of Moses God first organized His Church and revealed to them His Plan. To keep that Church in the knowledge of that Plan, the Eternal ordained seven annual festivals. These festivals pictured the seven steps in carrying out God's Plan.
When the Old Testament Church departed from celebrating these festivals, they lost the knowledge of the Plan. This is exactly what had happened to the Jews in New Testament times! The Jews did not understand the prophecies of the first coming of Christ because they were not keeping the one festival (Passover) which pictured that Christ was coming first as the paschal lamb. They knew He would come later — at the close of 6000 years of history (pictured by the Feast of Trumpets) — as the conquering King!
The Jews knew five out of the seven steps in God's Plan because they still observed five out of the seven festivals. But the two festivals on which they had become confused and divided pictured the very part of God's Plan which they had lost! The Passover pictured the coming of the Messiah as the Passover lamb — to bear our sins (I Corinthians 5:7). Having changed the day of the true Passover the Jews cut themselves off from their God. To change the day, to neglect it, is sin. And sin cuts one off from God. Hence they were unable to recognize the true gospel when it came to them through Jesus Christ. They were not expecting Christ, the Messiah, to come as a man to bear the sins of the world.
They were expecting only a conquering king. Had they been celebrating the true Passover on its right day, instead of confusing it with the Feast night of the days of Unleavened Bread, they would have known that their Messiah would first come as a man to bear the sins of the world!
No wonder the Jews crucified the Savior! They had forgotten the true Passover!
How important it is that we today keep this day so we do not forget what Christ has already done for us!
And no wonder they did not receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. They were not properly keeping the day of Pentecost which pictured the coming of the Holy Spirit. Only those who were correctly observing these two days knew that the Messiah had come, who He was. Only they were ready to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
It seems almost no one has really grasped the true reason why the Jews rejected Christ and ceased to be the Church through whom He could work in spreading the gospel.
It is only because we today keep these days — all of them — that we today know all the steps in God's Program.
Why Jews Lost True Dates for Passover and Pentecost
It is time we understand why the Jews forgot to properly celebrate Passover and Pentecost. Here is an important lesson in Church Authority — God's Government — which we today need to understand!
Granted the Jews preserved the Sacred Calendar. Granted that the Jews celebrated five of seven annual festivals on the correct date according to the Bible and the Sacred Calendar.
Why, then, did the Jews, who to this day have preserved the true calendar, celebrate their Passover and their Pentecost on different days from those plainly stated in the Bible?
The Jews in Judaea in Christ's day celebrated their Passover one day later than did Jesus and the Galileans. The Pharisaic Judeans also ceased to count fifty days to determine the day Pentecost is to be celebrated. Why? How did the Jews become confused, divided?
What happened to Church Authority? Here are the facts!
Most Jews today celebrate their Pentecost — or feast of first-fruits — on the sixth day of the third month, Sivan. According to Jewish tradition the day of Pentecost no longer needs to be counted. Their Pentecost falls on a fixed day of the month, no matter what day of the week it occurs!
Yet Moses was inspired to write that Pentecost has to be counted (Lev. 23:15). Unlike every other annual festival, Pentecost does not fall on a set day of the month. It falls, rather, on variable days of the month, but on a specific and invariable day of the week!
The Jews in New Testament times became divided as to the correct time for celebrating this festival. Sadducees, who were mainly priests, still continued to count fifty days long after Pharisees, who were laymen in high places, fixed the festival on Sivan 6. Why?
Because no authority was exercised to keep unity in the Jewish community in New Testament times!
The apostles and faithful Jews in Galilee and throughout the world alone continued to celebrate Pentecost on a Monday, a fixed day of the week.
Also, Jesus and the Galileans observed Passover on Nisan 14, the correct day. The Jews in Judaea celebrated it one day late, on the night of the Feast, the 15th of Nisan or Abib. Today the Jews do not really keep any Passover. They observe only the Feast. This is the real reason why the Jews as a nation forgot their God!
Now let us understand how it all happened. How the Jews became mixed up in their thinking. How people today can fall into the same snare when they begin to use individual human reason on matters that pertain to the whole Church and hence are the responsibility of the ministry through which Christ governs His Church.
First, let's take the date of the Passover.
Why Different Passover?
Did you know that scholars are as much divided about the date of the Passover today as were the Jews in Christ's time? Even some in the Church of God during the Sardis Era of the Church became divided on this question.
The reason for every such confusion is the lack of the Government of God. The New Testament Church replaced the Old Testament Church because the Jews in Christ's day had not spiritually yielded to the Government of God. They followed their own traditions.
Centuries later, when Jesus Christ could no longer use the Sardis Era of the Church, He raised up this work — the Philadelphia Era of the Church of God (see Revelation 3).
We are not divided today because we follow the Government of God. "Thou . . . didst keep my word," says Jesus of this Church today (Rev. 3:8). We obey the Bible. We follow the example of Jesus. We do what He says. We submit to His government in the Church. Christ is and will ever remain the Head of this Church. He has promised it!
Now consider the facts of history — why the world generally believes that Christ died not on the Passover, but on the Feast — and who it is that first caused the world to believe this fable.
Did you know that it was Pope Leo — the first absolute Pope — who originated the idea that Christ died on the 15th of Nisan, not on the 14th, as the Bible makes plain? The same power that worked through him had already worked through the Jews and led them to deny that Christ is our real Passover! Jesus said of the Jews: "You are of your father the devil." And the world has followed his lies ever since! The devil wants people to deny Jesus is the Christ. And one of many ways is to delude them into thinking that Jesus did not die on the Passover, Nisan 14.
Pope Leo lived four centuries after the time of Jesus Christ. Here is what led up to his idea that Christ did not die on the true Passover. The Christian world was divided as to the date for Easter, which they had adopted from the pagans. Leo proposed to settle it. In so doing he wanted to stamp out the true Passover altogether. To do so he had to make the Christian world believe that Jesus died on Nisan 15, not 14. "At the same time," declare Schaff and Wace on page 56 of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, vol. xiv, "also was generally established, the opinion so little entertained by the ancient authorities of the Church—one might even say, so strongly in contradiction to their teaching — that Christ partook of the Passover on the 14th of Nisan, that he died on the 15th (not on the 14th, as the ancients considered)
In the letter we have just mentioned, Proterius of Alexandria openly admitted all these different points" — and the Pope officially approved the contents of the letter about 440 A.D.
And that is why the world believes what it does today!
But notice the plain evidence of Scripture now.
The Testimony of Scripture
The Scripture is our final authority. No man has ever been given any authority to replace it with human tradition. Here is what we find.
In Luke 22:8 we read: "And he (Jesus) sent Peter and John, saying, Go and prepare us the Passover that we may eat." And in the last part of verse 13 we find: "And they made ready the Passover." Now continue with the next two verses: "And when the hour was come, he sat down, and the twelve apostles with him. And he said unto them, With desire I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer."
The next morning of this same day (a day begins at sunset), Jesus Christ was brought to trial and crucified. Late the afternoon of the same day, shortly before sunset, Jesus was buried. And in Luke 23:54 we read these plain words from the inspired Greek Text: "And it was preparation day; a Sabbath drew on." Note that it was a Sabbath according to the original Greek, not "the Sabbath" as in the King James Version.
The women returned home, rested that Sabbath following the day of preparation (Mark 16:1), then — two days after the Passover — purchased and prepared spices and — notice Luke 23:56: "And rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment."
Here is the weekly Sabbath mentioned. It was not one day after the preparation, nor two days after, but three days after that preparation day on which Jesus was killed. This plainly proves that Luke knew that Jesus was crucified on the day before an annual Sabbath.
Since Leviticus 23 and many other scriptures prove that the 15th of Nisan is an annual holy day, Luke plainly makes the crucifixion on the day before — that is, on the 14th of Nisan. Both Matthew and Mark agree with Luke, yet critics would have us believe that Luke had Jesus crucified on the 15th, an annual Sabbath, the first holy day of the seven-day Festival of Unleavened Bread!
Plainly Jesus ate the Passover on the eve of the 14th of Nisan, was seized, tried, crucified and buried on that same day, and was in the tomb on the 15th — that annual Sabbath which followed the Passover.
The record of the apostle John agrees perfectly with this. In fact most critics acknowledge that John places the crucifixion record on the 14th. They think the other three gospel writers place it on the following day — thus contradicting one another! But there is no contradiction. Matthew, Mark and Luke all agree with John in plainly stating that the day following the crucifixion was a Sabbath.