Sukkot Chol HaMoed Shabbat 5783

Me

Kids are fun in a lot of ways… But, there are definitely some aspects of having kids that are less fun than others. Like the lack of sleep in the early days. Or the constant worry about them getting hurt. Or the nights spent awake with them because they’re sick and projectile vomiting all over the place. Or when they get to be about our kids’ ages and decide that talking back and running their mouth is always the best first option…

But, there are legitimately a lot of lessons I have learned from watching my kids too… One such in particular is how fond they are of their parents, at least when they are young. You watch a baby who has imprinted to their mom and dad’s voice and see how soothing that voice can be to them. Or when Elyana and Natanel were little when they’d get fussy I would sing Avinu Malkeinu to them and it would always calm them down. I don’t know if it was the gripping melody of the prayer or my singing voice or what; but every time I’d begin singing Avinu Malkeinu it would calm them down and they’d stop crying almost immediately.

Likewise, just the sight of a parent can make a child feel so much more secure and safe. When our kids were babies we’d regularly place them in their Bumbo, which is this neat little seat for infants who can hold their heads up and it helps them develop the strength to sit up on their own, and we’d also give them plenty of belly time. When we’d set them in the Bumbo or on a mat for belly time they were the happiest little munchkins ever, as long as we were in the room. However, if we had to leave the room for any reason, even just to walk into the kitchen to get a drink, they’d lose their minds.

In their limited experience they registered our absence as a danger, or perhaps as potential abandonment. They’d begin to cry and scream, and those sounds would only get louder the longer we were gone, almost as though they thought we couldn’t hear them initially so maybe if they got louder it would work. Then as soon as we’d walk back in the room and they could set eyes on us again, as soon as they could know without a doubt our presence was for real within a few steps from them, they’d calm right down and go back to whatever it is babies do when they’re doing their own thing.

Just being able to see us would settle Elyana and Natanel down. They loved hearing our voices, they knew hearing our voices meant we had to be close. But if we called out from the kitchen when they started crying and told them we’d be right back, we were only in the next room, we hadn’t really left them it would make absolutely no difference at all. But the moment we walked back in the room, the moment they could set their eyes on us again, all was right with the world again. Just the sight of mom and dad, just the knowledge that we were physically in the same room was enough security to make them feel safe and sound again.

We

And I don’t think we ever truly grow out of that in a lot of ways…

When there’s a fire there’s something oddly soothing about the arrival of the fire department, right. We don’t even need to see the hoses pulled off the truck, or the fire hydrant cracked open… Just hearing the sirens and seeing the lights in front of our house helps to make things feel a little better.

The same is true when something tragic happens in our lives and the cops show up. Their presence doesn’t necessarily solve the issue right away. But something about having the police there to hopefully deescalate the situation makes a tremendous difference in our psyche.

What about a crisis with a coworker? Most of us have the capacity to address it and work through it on our own. But, there is definitely something encouraging about having the boss in on the discussion.

What about in our faith walk? When things are rough and we are getting tested left and right, when we feel the winds and waves of the storm crashing all around us… There’s just something about feeling the Lord’s loving embrace, about seeing some sort of clear and evident sign of His Presence with us…

God

This week we read a special reading for Sukkot Shabbat Chol HaMoed, Exodus 33:12-34:26 and Numbers 29:26-31.

The Numbers passage, as is the case with each of the previous fall Moedim, is a synopsis of the observance of Sukkot, particularly the daily procedurals of the Temple service for Sukkot.

The Exodus passage is immediately following the Egel HaZahav, or the Golden Calf which Isreal built at the base of Mount Sinai while Moses was on the Mountain getting the Torah download. In this section of Scripture we see Moshe beseeching HaShem for His Shechinah to continue with Israel. Then we see the re-carving of the Tablets, the Thirteen Attributes of God, and the reiteration and reestablishment of the divine covenant with Israel after their sin and repentance.

But today we’re going to specifically focus on Moses’ interceding on behalf of Israel and begging that the Lord not remove His Presence from the midst of Israel. This is a very important passage to consider as we celebrate Sukkot, especially in that Sukkot is a reminder each and every year of Israel’s wilderness journey with the Presence of God.

And from this we can learn a very powerful reality in our walk in the Lord:

Our discipleship means nothing without the clear and present revelation of the Presence of God in our lives.

(Repeat)

So, with that in mind, let’s spend some time together in the Word today.

Exodus 33:12–17 TLV

So Moses said to Adonai “You say to me, ‘Bring up this people,’ but You have not let me know whom You will send with me. Yet You have said, ‘I know you by name, and you have also found grace in My eyes.’ Now then, I pray, if I have found grace in Your eyes, show me Your ways, so that I may know You, so that I might find favor in Your sight. Consider also that this nation is Your people.” “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest,” He answered. But then he said to Him, “If Your presence does not go with me, don’t let us go up from here! For how would it be known that I or your people have found favor in Your sight? Isn’t it because You go with us, that distinguishes us from all the people on the face of the earth?” Adonai answered Moses, “I will also do what you have said, for you have found favor in My sight, and I know you by name.”

Keep in mind, at this point in time Israel has heard the Baht Kol speak forth the Aseret HaDibrot. The entire nation of Israel heard the audible voice of God speak to them. They saw the Presence of God upon the mountain. They encountered the Living God of all Creation right before their very eyes. And this wasn’t even the first time they had encountered His Presence, was it?

Israel witnessed the Cloud of Glory and Pillar of Fire leading them from Egypt to Sinai. They witnessed the Cloud of Glory separate Israel from Egypt’s armies. They witnessed His Presence fight for them and create chaos among the armies of Egypt. The Presence of God was very real and tangible before Israel. This is what distinguishes Israel from the rest of the nations, the God of Israel is active in their lives. Whereas the idols of the nations were all fake and made by human hands and had no power or presence at all.

But, Moses ascended Mount Sinai to receive the rest of the Word of God because Israel had decided they couldn’t not bear hear His voice again. Yet, unfortunately, Israel was impatient and couldn’t stand waiting for Moses to come back and when they felt he was gone too long they quickly forgot about the might and power of God. And what stumps me, what has always perplexed me about this narrative is that the Shechinah had never left Israel. His Presence was still upon the Mountain right in front of their eyes. Nothing had changed in the forty days Moses was on the mountain except for the Nation of Israel’s faith...

So they build the Egel HaZahav and begin to worship it and dance around and a lot of other pretty sketchy things… They immediately forgot about the Presence of God right before them and turned to acting like the nations around them.

So HaShem gets angry, and rightly so… Could you imagine…? He draws Israel out to be His own and almost immediately they forsake Him and turn to idolatry… And what we understand from history is they legitimately turned back to the idolatry of Egypt from whom they had just been saved…

Now, to rightly set this passage in Exodus 33 up, we must first go back to what the Lord said to Moses immediately following the Egel HaZahav…

Exodus 33:1–3 TLV

Then Adonai said to Moses, “Leave, get out of this place, you and the people that you have brought out of the land of Egypt, into the land which I swore to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob saying, ‘I will give it to your seed.’ I will send an angel before you. I will drive out the Canaanites, Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites and the Jebusites. Head up into a land flowing with milk and honey, but I will not move within the midst of you, so that I do not destroy you along the way, for you are a stiff-necked people.”

HaShem tells Israel to get out and get moving to the Promised Land. He says He will still give Israel the Promised Land as is His covenant with them. But, He will only send an angel ahead of them. He Himself will not be going with them and He will not move within their midst anymore…

Israel has officially jacked it all up! God redeems them from slavery in Egypt by His own mighty and miraculous hand. He fights for them against Egypt’s armies chasing them. He leads them to Mount Sinai and reveals Himself to them in a very powerful, awe-inspiring, and intimate way. And almost immediately afterward they completely forsake Him.

And after Adonai tells Moses His Presence will not go with them, what is Israel’s immediate reaction? The same as a child when their parents leave the room… They immediately began to cry out… They immediately felt abandoned and lost… And this wasn’t Adonai’s fault, this was Israel’s fault. We chose to reject God, we saw His Presence before us on the mountain and still choose to not only create an idol, but to worship it and declare it the god that brought us out of Egypt. We chose to replace Him.

So when Abba said He was going to leave the room and we realized we were going to be all alone we became afraid, just like a child. It was then that we suddenly woke up to how bad we had messed things up. And it was then that Moses immediately began to intercede on Israel’s behalf.

And in our passage in Exodus 33:12-17 we see Moses, who honestly has little to no desire at all of being stuck with Israel on his own, cry out to God. He says, “God, look… We need to have a chat… You told me to take these people and bring them to the Promised Land… And I was game, but if You aren’t going we aren’t going, because if You aren’t going I ain’t going!”

The Lord tells Moses He’d go with Him and will give Him rest. But, Moses isn’t done… Moses recognizes finally what it truly means for the Presence of God to go with Israel, to dwell among Israel, and really what it would mean if He doesn’t.

Exodus 33:15–16 TLV

But then he said to Him, “If Your presence does not go with me, don’t let us go up from here! For how would it be known that I or your people have found favor in Your sight? Isn’t it because You go with us, that distinguishes us from all the people on the face of the earth?”

Moses cries out, “Lord, what will the nations think? What will their thought of You be if You bring Israel out of Egypt but You do not continue all the way with them? What will the nations think if You abandon them in the wilderness?”

Moses realized what Isaiah proclaimed, that Israel is to be a light to the nations. The main thing that made Israel important isn’t that we came from Abraham, or even that we found freedom out of Egypt… It was that the Shechinah of the Living God was with us, in our midst, leading our way, and fighting for us. If we loose that than what do we have to offer to the nations? If we loose that then what are we really?

See, this is the key… If the world around us doesn’t see His Presence in us, then what are we really doing? If the world doesn’t see His Presence in us before they hear us open our mouths, then why would they want to hear what we have to say? The world is lost, the world is a dark and hopeless place… What the world needs most is to see His Presence in us, to see the hope of redemption and restoration in us, to see the power of Salvation in us. Unfortunately, more often than not, what the world generally sees in most believers is a lot of hypocrisy, faking it, and putting on a good show…

Our discipleship means nothing without the clear and present revelation of the Presence of God in our lives.

This is the beauty of Sukkot, and this is why this passage is read during Sukkot. The temporary dwelling place we build is not just some neat little shanty or lean too… The temporary dwelling place is to remind us of the time in which our very existence solely relied on the Presence of God dwelling in His Tabernacle, His Mishkan—His temporary dwelling place—among us.

And through Salvation in Messiah Yeshua and the indwelling of the Ruach HaKodesh His Presence isn’t just something we look up to the Mountain top to see… It isn’t just something we look to the Tabernacle or Temple to find… It isn’t just a reality in the Holy of Holies that only the High Priest could enter, and only if protected by the smoking incense. No, now His Presence very literally dwells within us, in our hearts and our lives.

John 1:10–14 TLV

He was in the world, and the world was made through Him; but the world did not know Him. He came to His own, but His own did not receive Him. But whoever did receive Him, those trusting in His name, to these He gave the right to become children of God. They were born not of a bloodline, nor of human desire, nor of man’s will, but of God. And the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us. We looked upon His glory, the glory of the one and only from the Father, full of grace and truth.

We are a stiffnecked people… How easily we forget all the wonderful things HaShem has done for us. How quickly we loose sight of His Glory before us… But, through it all, He has never forsaken us.

He sent His only begotten Son to bring restoration, to recreate us in His image and likeness, to make us a holy dwelling place for His Presence.

Ephesians 2:14–22 TLV

For He is our shalom, the One who made the two into one and broke down the middle wall of separation. Within His flesh He made powerless the hostility— the law code of mitzvot contained in regulations. He did this in order to create within Himself one new man from the two groups, making shalom, and to reconcile both to God in one body through the cross—by which He put the hostility to death. And He came and proclaimed shalom to you who were far away and shalom to those who were near— for through Him we both have access to the Father by the same Ruach. So then you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but you are fellow citizens with God’s people and members of God’s household. You have been built on the foundation made up of the emissaries and prophets, with Messiah Yeshua Himself being the cornerstone. In Him the whole building, being fitted together, is growing into a holy temple for the Lord. In Him, you also are being built together into God’s dwelling place in the Ruach.

And much like Sinai was a foreshadowing of Acts 2, we also see that what Paul writes in Ephesians 2 of us being made into the holy dwelling place of HaShem’s Presence is a foreshadowing of what is awaiting us in the Olam Habah where we are able to reside in His Presence for all eternity.

Revelation 21:1–4 TLV

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. I also saw the holy city—the New Jerusalem—coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. I also heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, “Behold, the dwelling of God is among men, and He shall tabernacle among them. They shall be His people, and God Himself shall be among them and be their God. He shall wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more. Nor shall there be mourning or crying or pain any longer, for the former things have passed away.”

Our discipleship means nothing without the clear and present revelation of the Presence of God in our lives.

Part of the reason the Body of Messiah has been less than as effective for the Good News as we should be is because we often fail to let the Presence of God be at the forefront in our lives. Much like Israel at Sinai we attempt to make it work on our own. Yet, what the world needs to see most is His Presence alive and well, the active fire of God in the hearts and lives of the Body.

You

Call worship team back and unmute them

What is holding you back from experiencing the fullness of the power and Presence of God in your life?

Do those you encounter in your day to day life see the Shechinah in you before they hear you begin to speak?

Do your actions and your words align with what you say you believe?

Is the Ruach HaKodesh truly at the forefront of your discipleship? Do you give God free reign in your heart and life?

Are there things you’ve made Golden Calves in your life? Have you found yourself feeling separated from God like Isreal when Moses was on the mountain longing for the dwelling of His Presence in you?

We

Today is the day to make that change. Sukkot is the perfect opportunity to ask for His dwelling manifest in us. As we sit in our Sukkah, as we contemplate all that God has done for us, as we consider His dwelling among our forefathers in the Wilderness, may we humble our hearts in order to be made a holy dwelling place for Adonai.

Our discipleship means nothing without the clear and present revelation of the Presence of God in our lives.

Our liturgical recitation means nothing without the clear and present revelation of the Presence of God in our lives.

Our observance of Torah means nothing without the clear and present revelation of the Presence of God in our lives.

Our words, our actions, our good deeds, our tzedakah, our singing, our Shabbat services, our Bible studies, our arm raising, our clapping, our encouraging others, and so on and so forth means nothing without the clear and present revelation of the Presence of God in our lives.

We need to walk in the manifest Presence of God at all times. The world around us needs to see His Presence in us. Our Jewish community needs to see the Presence of God in our midst. The nations around us need to see His Presence in us and leading us. The lost and broken need to see His Presence in us. Before we open our mouths to preach the mystery of the Gospel—which is that in Messiah Yeshua both Jew and no–Jew find restoration and redemption, that through Messiah Yeshua both Jew and non-Jew can be filled with the Presence of God—we better have the Presence of God active and tangible in our lives.

In a moment we are going to spend some time in worship, I want to encourage you today to focus on His Presence as we do. Cry out to God to make Himself tangible in your heart and life today. If you feel distant from the Lord ask Him to fill you with His Ruach HaKodesh right now. If you’ve never experienced the Love of Messiah, if you do not know Yeshua as your salvation and Messiah, today is the day to find true freedom in Him, today is the day to call on the Name of Yeshua and be saved, to repent of our sins and to find forgiveness. Today is the day for you to experience the love of your Heavenly Father who will never leave or forsake you, and who desires to heal all your wounds and to use you for the Good and Glory of His Holy Name, to use you to be a light to the Nations.