Yomim Teruah: Days of Awe

Greetings to Greater Yisrael of the Spirit from Roots & Branches Virtual Yahad (NeVY.us).  We were really blessed to hear from those of you who have let us know you value this newsletter.  That means a lot.  We haven’t yet heard a ‘discouraging word.’

A Major Festival This Weekend

One of the eight major feasts arrives the 1^st day of next week (Sun[god]day). We will gather at 7:30 PM at the beginning of the Seventh day this week (Erev Shabat, September 19) to enjoy the Convocation of Trumpets a little bit early.  No kipas or other gear is necessary except your shofar or trumpet.  If you haven’t any, we will issue you a temporary shofar when you arrive.

The Yahad will happen at Tabernacles Ministries in the River Room.  For directions, try this link or reply to this mail.  There will be no Sabbath Roundtable this week (Saturday) because several in the group will be attending “A Rood Awakening” (Michael Rood’s ministry) Festival of Trumpets in Boca Raton FL on the first day.  Try this link for info about this event or the Rood ministry.

Home or Small Group Feast

Waikra (Leviticus) 23:24.  Yahweh says, “Say to the people of Israel, In the seventh month, on the first day of the month, you shall observe a day of solemn rest, a memorial proclaimed with blast of trumpets, a holy convocation.”

Feasts kept by all of Greater Israel (ie all who keep faith in Yahweh and express the Testimony of Yahshua).  They are to be kept throughout all our generations.  They are not optional for Israel, Spiritual Israel or Secular Israel.

And why shouldn’t enjoy Yahweh’s festivals – he gave them in love for us to experience a chip of time out of the old block to commune with him, learn from him, and rest in him?  These are wonderful, meaningful times – and biblical holidays – unlike the secular and quasi-religious holidays that bring no rest, but instead, stress, seasonal depression, idolatry, and the casting of money to swine.

Yahweh’s Feasts are not difficult to keep in authentic ways.  The difficulty comes in changing over from the calendar of the world and its holidays to the Almighty’s.  Once that is accomplished, the stress is off, and one wonders why he/she waited so long to turn back to the good.

Easy Guides

I have composed easy guides for people moving to the feast days.  Many among our family and friends have made the switch in the last several years, and most have used some facets of our guides.  One may start keeping the feasts alone – and the Feast of Trumpets a good place to jump in, because little is required – the minimum requirements are to take a day of rest, blow the horn, and read the scriptures. At the following links you may find my resources for a home service you can do by yourself or with your family.  It includes downloaded music, readings, and authentic acts of worship.

Streaming Feast Music from EloHymns.com:

Shattered Pot

Yom Teruah is the Day of Awe

Horn of a Unicorn

Some of my home resources are here, at Bible-News.com:

Blow Ye the Trumpet Blow!  For Yom Teruah.

Yom Teruah is the Day of Awe; the Feast of Trumpets and the Court of Law

Hearken To The Thunder Of His Voice: Hurricanes and Natural Disasters

Feast of Trumpets

For those who have given up secular / Christian holidays, or for those who have added Yahweh’s Festivals (not to be confused with Jewish Holidays), the Feast of Trumpets is anticipated as one of the most probable days for Messiah to descend.

Consider what you know about Trumpets from your Scripture studies.  When the trumpet sounds, awesome happening follow.  This is why the Feast is called Yom Teruah, the Day of Awe. Leviticus 23 tells us in short exactly when Trumpets is to be (the 7^th new moon of the year),  and a little about what it means.  We find out a lot more about trumpets in Joshua and Judges – trumpets sound to rally the army in anticipation of an attack or retreat.  The walls of Jericho fall down. The prophets predict trumpet blasts in connection with judgment.  Paul speaks of the “sound of the great trumpet,” and John of the prophetic and sinister “seven trumpets.”

Ivan the Terrible

Personal testimony: At the beginning of Yom Teruah in 2004, seven of us were ‘hunkered down’ for the storm of the century, Hurricane Ivan.  We were in the eye of that awesome hurricane.  There was some question whether the front window of the house would stand the storm.  As that was being repaired, I looked at the mezuzah on the doorpost and asked protection.  At two A.M., the roof began to lift off in then midst of a terrifying groan.  The winds were fierce, trees were falling everywhere – we knew the were not because we could see them – but hear them crashing down.  I fell asleep in the very midst of the worst hurricane in a generation.

When I awoke, all was calm.  I went back to the front porch to survey the damage.  I noticed the mezuzah on the doorpost . . . then looked out and around the neighborhood.  Yom Teruah had arrived with Ivan the Terrible.

Everything in the perimeter was destroyed; houses, trees, cars.  Everything was affected!

Everything except the parsonage in which we were all huddled.  It hadn’t been touched.

I spied a different world.  (The rest of this story is here.)

In the Scripture,

Jackson Snyder

www.JacksonSnyder.org