Dublin, Ohio | August 2017,

“Walking the beans”. 50+ acres. Each row half a mile. Blazing heat. August sun.

     By the end of the day, as above, all I could muster was incomplete sentences! Regardless of the fact that a dear Brother needed help, it was in no way my decision to walk back and forth, row after row, in this field. Never in my life have I done this kind of work, and neither was I eager to learn. Nonetheless, as I prayed and considered, loud and clear, I heard

 

–The-VOICE–

 

“Learn about growing food!”

 

     OK! In obedience, I did my duty – one day. For the rest of that week every day in prayer there was the nagging sense that more was expected of me. Finally at the end of the week I called my friend and worked again three or four more days the next week. Then something strange, but I guess not unexpected, happened. Maybe less than a week of my life was invested into the wellbeing of those rows of plants; and yet there existed a sense of caring. Now that we have pulled all those weeds, will the harvest be better? Indeed, how DOES one harvest these things? --It was not a convenient “I’m busy”. I was invited back to help with the harvest, but I could not make it. With all of that behind me, My focus turned toward planning for Sukkot.

 

     As I worked through all the planning details for Sukkot a Fall harvest festival, I felt a nagging sense of loss. Finally one day I had to sit down, and in prayer, dig around to understand. What is this “sense of loss”? When I was shown, my eyes flew wide open from prayer! If there is any time when many workers are needed, it’s at harvest time. When I was REALLY needed, I was not there for my Brother. Nonetheless my appreciation for, and understanding of Sukkot has been permanently elevated. Additionally my appreciation for the specific Scripture is burned into my reality. (The harvest is great and the workers few.)

 

     Here we are now, March 2018, three days before the First Night Seder of Passover, seven months since the events detailed above. Almost every day since then, about 210 days, like a morning mist, the thought of writing about the above events walks through my mind, but I am turned away. I want to write; but in obedience I set it aside. Today the door was opened.

 

     It’s accurate to write, as my Brother Jerry in Israel did here (PESSAH (PASSOVER, Jerry Golden): “Yeshua died on the Feast of Pessah, was buried on the Feast of Unleavened Bread, and rose on the Feast of First Fruits. Fifty days later the Holy Spirit was sent on the next successive holiday; Shavuot (Pentecost)”.

 

     But how does that all fit together? The more I studied, I had a startling realization. It all fits into an agrarian calendar, of planting, growing and harvesting. But Ed, we KNOW that. Yes but… there are times in one’s life that today we know, and look back at the times that we thought we knew!

 

     Those few days walking back and forth in the rows, I would frequently look up at that unbelievably huge oak tree. It took seven months for it to sink in. The Tree of Life –The Torah– is best understood, when it is rooted in an agrarian understanding of how Scripture perfectly fits together.

 

YES!

Yeshua died on the Feast of Pessah

was buried on the Feast of Unleavened Bread,

and rose on the Feast of First Fruits.

Fifty days later the Holy Spirit was sent on Shavuot

 

And he said to them, “The harvest is great and the workers are few,

beseech therefore from the Master of the harvest to send out workers into his harvest.

Go! Behold, I send you as sheep among wolves.

Malachi 3: (ISR98)

6. “For I am יהוה, I shall not change, and you, O sons of Ya‘akov, shall not come to an end.

 

Divrei-HamYamim Bet (2 Chronicles) 36: (ISR98)

23“Thus said Koresh sovereign of Persia, ‘יהוה Elohim of the heavens has given me all the reigns of the earth.

And He has commanded me to build Him a house in Yerushalayim, which is in Yehudah.

Whoever is among you of all His people, יהוה his Elohim be with him, and let him go up!’ ”

 

Exodus 20: (ISR98)

8 “Remember the Sabbath day, to set it apart.

9 “Six days you labor, and shall do all your work,

10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath of יהוה your Elohim. You do not do any work – you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates.

11 “For in six days יהוה made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore יהוה blessed the Sabbath day and set it apart.

 

Matthew 5: (Aramaic English NT)

18 For truly I say to you that until heaven and the earth pass away not one Yodh or one stroke will pass from Torah until everything happens.

19 All who loosen, therefore from one (of) these small commandments and teach thus to the sons of man, will be called little in the Kingdom of Heaven, but all who do and teach this will be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven.

 

Matthew 10: (Aramaic English NT)

34 Do not think that I have come to bring calm on earth. I have not come to bring calm, rather a sword.

35 For I have come to divide a man from his father, and a girl from her mother. And a daughter-in-law from her

Mother-in-law.

36 And the advisories of a man will be his household.

37 Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.

38 And anyone who does not take up his staff and come and follow me is not worthy of me.