PURIM – THE LAST HOLIDAY

The story of Purim is the story of the preservation of Jewish life, and one day this holiday, which ends the biblical year, will be the last holiday celebrated in the world. All biblical holydays were given to us as images of the plan of God for the redemption of mankind, as shadows of the things to come. When a holyday is fulfilled it becomes the most important and significant holyday of its age, until the next holyday is fulfilled.

The book of Vayikra lists eight God-given Holydays called: “the appointed times of Yehovah, holy convocations” Eleh moadei Yehovah mikraei kodesh (Leviticus 23:4). Purim is not included in those eight because Purim is a later established historical holiday. Purim is the first to be called “a holiday for the Jews” (Esther 8:17), a Jewish Holiday, all other ones are called God’s Holydays. But Purim is the last holiday in the biblical calendar and within itself contains all the other holydays, which are: Passover (together with the Feast of Unleavened Bread - Hag haMatzoth and the first First Fruits - Hag haBikurim), Shavuot - second First Fruits, Rosh haShanah, Yom Kippur and Sukkot.

Concerning Passover and its fulfillment, and how important it is for us during this age, Rav Shaul wrote in the Brit Chadashah: “For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Yeshua on the night in which He was betrayed took matzah and when He had given thanks, He broke it, and said, 'This is My body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of Me.' In the same way He took the cup, after supper, saying, 'This cup is the new covenant in My blood; do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.' For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes.“ 1 Corinthians 11:23-26

During this age, between the first and the second coming of Messiah, for almost two thousand years, the most important and significant holiday to our Lord Yeshua, and therefore to us by His request, is Pesach. That is why the apostle Paul said in verse 26: “as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes.” But notice the last three words, "until He comes." When He comes there will be something added, another dimension and something else to focus on. But during this age the most important thing that we can do is to observe Pesach. This is the age of the fulfillment of the Pesach. We have seen its fulfillment, and its message has been poured out in our hearts at the feast of Shavuot. Passover and Shavuot are together, they are speaking of the same time in history. They say Yeshua died for our sins, than He rose, ascended to the Father's right hand to make intercession for us, and returned to us in the Ruach haKodesh, the Holy Spirit. When He came into our hearts He said, “I will be with you and I will be present with you at all times; the world will not behold Me but you will behold Me.”

So Pesach is not just a holiday, Pesach is reality, it has happened in the physical as well in the spiritual realm. Yet, when Yeshua returns to Zion, Pesach will be incorporated into the celebration of Sukkot. And Sukkot will become the most important holiday for all people to observe. “Assuredly, a time is coming — declares Yehovah — when it shall no more be said, 'As Yehovah lives who brought the Israelites out of the land of Egypt.'” Yirmiyahu (Jeremiah) 16:14

God has said through the prophet that there is coming a time when we will no longer read the Passover Haggadah commemorating the exodus from Egypt, but we will say instead: “'As Yehovah lives who brought the Israelites out of the northland, and out of all the lands to which He banished them.' For I will bring them back to their land, which I gave to their fathers.” Jer. 16:14

Certainly, we understand that the message of Pesach and Shavuot will be observed in the millennium in a different way. It will be observed by celebrating the fact that God has brought back all the sons and daughters of Israel from every country to which they were dispersed, specifically the land of the north, former Soviet Union, of which we have been witnessing that miracle already. Since 1948, the Jewish people have come out of many countries and are still coming out. God is going to do great and wondrous things and those will be remembered forever by the Jewish people and will cause the exodus from Egypt to pale in significance next to them. This time, God will be calling the Jewish people back into their Land. “Hineni, I am sending for many fishermen — declares Yehovah — and they shall haul them out; and after that I will send for many hunters, and they shall hunt them out of every mountain and out of every hill and out of the clefts of the rocks.” Yirmiyahu (Jeremiah) 16:16

It will be a one-by-one, a personal in-gathering of the Jewish people to Eretz Yisrael, the land of Israel. At this time in history, it looks like the fishermen were already sent and many Jewish people made Aliyah (went up) for the lure of Zion, and now the hunters are coming. Anti-Semitism is rising, and the Jewish people will have no choice but to make Aliyah.

There are some Jews right now who are hiding from the world their Jewishness, just like Esther did. Or worst, they do not even know that they are Jewish. But God is going to gather them too because He knows who they are, and He is going to bring them back to Israel. He says that He will look on every mountain, and on every hill, and in the clefts of the rocks. He will look throughout this earth; He will turn every rock to find every Jew that is on the face of this earth, and bring him or her back to Zion, because He cares for every single Jewish person.

When this is fulfilled, the holydays that will come to pass are Rosh haShanah, Yom Kippur and Sukkot — the Feast of Trumpets, the Day of Atonement, and the Feast of Tabernacles. And when these holidays will be fulfilled, they will also become reality, because they all speak of the return of the Jewish people, physically and then spiritually back to the land of Israel. Right now, these holidays are just holydays, but these biblical holydays are living events that will happen just as Passover and Shavuot did.

We know that when the great Shofar will sound, the gathering will begin for Israel and God will look for them on every mountain and on every hill. We also read about this gathering in Isaiah. What we read in Jeremiah is reiterated here and furthermore explained when this will take place: “And in that day, Yehovah will beat out [the peoples like grain] from the channel of the Euphrates to the Wadi of Egypt; and you shall be picked up one by one, o children of Israel! And in that day, a great ram's horn (shofar) shall be sounded; and the strayed who are in the land of Assyria and the expelled who are in the land of Egypt shall come and worship Yehovah on the holy mountain, in Jerusalem.” Yeshayahu (Isaiah) 27:12,13

With the sound of the Shofar He begins His work here on earth to gather the unbelieving Jewish people back to Him and back to Zion, one by one. Rosh haShanah speaks of their gathering, Yom Kippur speaks of God's calling them to spiritual repentance, to receive Yeshua as the Messiah, to repent of having rejected Him and make teshuvah. And after this it is the great celebration called Sukkot, Chag haSukkot or the Feast of Tabernacles, which will cause all celebrations and holidays that went before it to pale in comparison to the fulfillment of this holyday. This will be the most wonderful holiday fulfillment on the face of this earth. It will be a great exultation on Sukkot, when the Jewish people will see the very presence of the Lord Yeshua, the King Messiah reigning in Zion. At that moment, they will have repented of their rejection of the One who suffered and was pierced for their transgressions, but whom they despised all these years.

So then, what is Purim all about?

The fulfillment of Purim is revealed in the book of Revelation. The millennium is a time or an age when people will be celebrating Sukkot, the Feast of Tabernacles, as Zechariah 14:16 says, by all people throughout the earth. But, into the new heavens and new earth, after the millennium is over, the Feast of Tabernacles will not be celebrated as the main holiday, because it will be incorporated into the holiday of Purim: “And when the thousand years are completed, Satan will be released from his prison.” Revelation 20:7

After Yeshua's return on earth Satan will be bound and put in prison. But after one thousand years of Yeshua's reign from Mount Zion, Satan will be released. For one thousand years Satan will not be able to tempt anyone, to hurt anyone, or to do anything to deceive anyone. This will be ample proof that people sin on their own without Satan's help. But at the close of the millennium, Satan will be set free to lead the nations against Yeshua, Israel, and the saints. “... and he will come out to deceive the nations which are in the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog [terms for the nations that had attacked Israel previously, before the coming of Yeshua] to gather them together for the war; the number of them is like the sand of the seashore.” Revelation 20:8

Most people who will be born during the millennium will not really love Yeshua, they will stay in obedience to Him, or they will pretend to stay in obedience to Him, so that they will not have drought and other plagues upon them, but when Satan is let loose, he will lead them in an attack against Yeshua, Israel and the saints. The sand of the seashore is an idiom for numerous, they are uncountable, they may be billions of people. “And they came up on the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city [Jerusalem, where Jewish people have been gathered and have been experiencing the glory of the Lord for a thousand years] and fire came down from heaven and devoured them.” Revelation 20:9

How did Haman get hanged on the gallows that he made for Mordecai? Just like that, it seems like fire came down from heaven and devoured him suddenly and he was hanged on the gallows quickly.

All these people will come up against the believers and the Jewish people and especially the King Messiah Yeshua and they will be devoured immediately. And that will bring about the greatest celebration of all times, because it will be over. No more of satanic business on earth; God is going to create a better world for all of us, where there will be no more evil. The book of Revelation gives us great hope for the future and for our eternity: “And I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and there is no longer any sea. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, made ready as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, 'Behold, the tabernacle of God is among men and He shall dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be among them, and He shall wipe away every tear from their eyes.’“ Revelation 21:1-4

That means that during the millennium God is not going to wipe away all tears from our eyes; it is not at that time that it will happen. Right now, there is pain in the world and there is pain among believers, but He is going to wipe away every tear when we go into the new Jerusalem, in the new heavens and the new earth: ... and there shall no longer be any death; there shall no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.' And He who sits on the throne said, 'Behold, I am making all things new.' And He said, 'Write, for these words are faithful and true.'“ Revelation 21:4,5

There is going to come a time when we will never cry again over anything, when there will be no pain, there will be no sickness, there will be no assaults, no attacks, there will be no accidents happening, there will be no disease, there will be no death, and no one will have to mourn for anyone. There is coming a time in the New Jerusalem, the new heavens and the new earth, after the thousand-year reign of Messiah, when He will wipe away every tear from our eyes. Everything that God has done will be summed up in Purim, the final, ultimate and complete deliverance of all the people of God. And only after all is fulfilled in Purim can there be a true Shabbat.

For right now we celebrate Shabbat, yet we realize that when it is over, we will have problems. But in that day, when Shabbat comes, we will enter into it and never leave it. “'For as the new heaven and the new earth which I will make shall endure by My will,' declares Yehovah, 'so shall your seed and your name endure. And Rosh Chodesh after Rosh Chodesh, and Shabbat after Shabbat, all flesh shall come up to worship Me,' said Yehovah.“ Yeshayahu (Isaiah) 66:22

Rosh Chodesh, the New Moon is emphasizing the fulfillment of the old heaven and earth and the re-creation of the perfect world which happens right after Purim. Even as the first month of the year, Aviv/Nisan, which is the month of Passover, begins a new year, it will begin a new creation. It will bring with it eternal peace without sin, a true Shabbat, and it can only come after the fulfillment of Purim.

This is the fulfillment and the reality that Purim represents. What we are looking forward is actually to live Purim in the new heavens and the new earth.

Hag Purim Sameah — Happy Purim!