Wednesday 2 October 2013

Unto Us a Child is Born


(Taken from The Seven Feasts of Israel by Zola Levitt) 

 

There are seven Jewish Holy Days described in Leviticus Chapter 23:  The feast of Passover, Unleavened Bread, Firstfruits, Pentecost, Rosh Hashanah (Feast of Trumpets), Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) and Feast of Tabernacles. Prophetically, the first three occur in the first month of the Jewish calendar corresponding to the time of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.  They find their fulfilment in the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus. Pentecost occurs 50 days after the Feast of Firstfruits and prophetically signifies the empowering of believers by the Holy Spirit for evangelism and witness.

In the Jewish calendar Rosh Hashanah occurs on 1 Tishri, which is the first day of the 7th month, and signifies the day the trumpet shall sound, which to a Jew means the heavens will be opened. Ten days later, Yom Kippur is observed.  Five days later, on 15 Tishri, the Feast of Tabernacles is celebrated.

There is an incredible parallel between these seven feasts and the gestation period of a human baby.  The following revelation shows that the Bible had to be written by God as man had no knowledge of or scientific understanding of gynaecology and obstetrics 3500 years ago.

Psalm 139 v 13 – 14:  "For thou hast possessed my reins: thou hast covered me in my mother’s womb. I will praise thee:  for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvelous are thy works, and that my soul knoweth right well." Zola Levitt discovered this connection between the feasts and development of a baby in the womb, quite by accident.  He had been asked to write a book about the birth process for doctors to give their patients when they fell pregnant.  He invited a physician, Dr. Margaret Mathison, to help with the research.  She gave him a detailed description of how a baby forms and grows in the womb.

The first feast, the Passover, represents the appearance of the egg ready to be fertilised; and the planting of the seed is the second feast -  Unleavened Bread (the burial of Jesus) the fertilisation process. The firstfruits festival is next, but it does not occur at the same time every year, which the previous 2 feast days do. This feast is observed on the Sunday during the week of Unleavened Bread.  It could be the day after or a week later.  Dr. Mathison remarked that the next stage of the process was a bit indeterminate.  The fertilized egg travels down the fallopian tube at its own speed.  It may take anywhere from two to six days before it implants.

Two to six days!  How incredible Zola Levitt thought, that it should be timed so perfectly with Firstfruits – the Spring planting.  Implantation is the correct medical term for the moment when the fertilised egg arrives safely at its destination in the womb and begins its miraculous growth.

From now till Pentecost, the next feast, is a long wait.  So does some special event in human development occur before then?  Dr. Mathison put it this way: “Well, of course, we have a slowly developing embryo here for a long time.  It goes through stages, but there is really no dramatic change until becomes an actual foetus.”  She showed Zola a chart picturing an embryo becoming a foetus. Next to her drawing were the words ‘fifty days’.  Zola asked if the fiftieth day was important.  She replied that up to the fiftieth day you would not know if you were having a duck or a cocker spaniel, but at the fiftieth day it becomes a human foetus. No wonder the Psalmist wrote in Psalm 139 v 14 – 17:

"I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made … My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.  Thine eyes did see mine substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there were none of them.  How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God, how great is the sum of them!”

Only God could design the embryonic growth of a human child and then build His Holy Feast days around its development.

From this point the foetus’ progress is somewhat general, with nothing momentous happening until the first day of the 7th month, when the baby’s hearing is fully developed.  The baby can then distinguish sounds  e.g. he can hear a trumpet, so it is not surprising that this is the feast of Rosh Hashanah, the feast of trumpets, followed 10 days later on the 10th day of the seventh month, the Day of Atonement.

The doctor stated that the important changes are in the blood.  It is necessary for the foetal blood which carried the mother’s oxygen through the baby’s system to change in such a way that the baby can carry the oxygen that it will begin to breathe at birth. Technically, the haemoglobin of the blood has to change from that of the foetus to that of a self-respirating human being.  The foetus does not breathe, but rather depends on the oxygen obtained through its mother’s blood circulation, and the textbooks say that the change happens in the second week of the seventh month, precisely on the tenth day!

On the Day of Atonement, the 10th day of the 7th month, the high priest, according to Mosaic Law, takes the blood of sacrificed lambs into the Holy of Holies and presents it as an atonement for the sins of Israel.  Leviticus 17 says:

“For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that maketh atonement for the soul.” The blood acceptable – just as in the baby the blood is made acceptable to sustaining life after birth!

The baby is not yet ready to be born, there is one more development yet to occur which beautifully coincides with the fifteenth day of the seventh month on which the Feast of Tabernacles is celebrated.  Dr. Mathison said, "That’s when the lungs are developed, and as long as they can get their little lungs going, they can survive if they are born early.  If they are born before the lungs can breathe air, they will struggle to live.  The tabernacle is the house of the Spirit, just as the lungs are the tabernacle of the breath.  God blew air into Adam’s lungs to make him a living soul, and Jesus breathed the Holy Spirit upon His disciples so that they may be born again!

This is the miracle of life and true proof that we are not some random evolutional soup. We have a Creator, a Father, who made us in His own image, with love and kindness.

Prayer: Father God You do all things well! Thank You for the care You took in making all things. Let us be good stewards of Your creation and especially of our own selves that we may return home to Heaven at the appointed time. In Jesus' name. Amen.