God gave the Jewish people seven Feasts to celebrate every year forever. All seven Feasts are detailed in Leviticus 23. Through these special days God wants us to know that He is Lord of every moment. He gave us this calendar to show His prophetic history of Messiah, Jesus Christ, His first and second comings, through the Millenium to the New Heaven and the New Earth. By examining all seven Jewish Feasts Christians and Jews alike can gain a deep understanding of God's perfect and complete provision of salvation for all people through Yeshua HaMashiach.

Passover represents the crucifixion of Messiah; Unleavened Bread, the burial; First Fruits, the resurrection. Pentecost, or Shavuot, celebrates the giving of the law at Mt. Sinai and the baptism of the Holy Spirit at the beginning of the church age. The fall Feasts are spiritually fulfilled for believers in Yeshua, and contain prophetic future significance for both Jew and Christian. Rosh Hashanah could be the Rapture and the beginning of the Tribulation. Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, Messiah will return to the Mount of Olives; and Tabernacles, or Succoth, will initiate the one thousand year reign of Messiah on earth, ruling from Jerusalem.

The seven Jewish Feasts are divided into two groups, spring and fall, with one feast in the middle during summer. The first group of Feasts takes place in the first month, Nisan on the Hebrew calendar; they include Passover, Unleavened Bread and First Fruits. Seven weeks after Passover comes Pentecost. The fall group of Feasts takes place in the seventh month, Tishri on the Hebrew calendar; they include Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur and Succoth. All the Jewish Feasts are celebrated from sundown to sundown.

In the Bible the number seven represents spiritual completion or perfection. It appears frequently in Jewish life, as in the seven days of the week, the seven feasts, the seventh year as a sabbath year in which crops are rested; after seven times seven years, the 50th year is the year of Jubilee, when in ancient days property was restored to its original owner and slaves were set free. The feasts that occur during the seventh month of the year, Tishri, have a special importance and are referred to as the High Holy Days.

The sound of the shofar, or ram's horn, signals the start of Rosh Hashanah. This mighty trumpet sound is associated with a call to war, with awakening, with alarm, with the commencement of the Jubilee year and with the coronation of kings. In Exodus 19:19 God blows the shofar at the giving of the Law at Mt. Sinai. In Joshua 6:20 the trumpet blast brings down the walls of Jericho. In Zechariah 9:14 God blows the shofar to announce the coming of the Messiah.

On Rosh Hashanah Orthodox Jews blow the shofar over 100 times to confuse Satan, whom they believe is accusing each person before God. Tradition states that God is passing judgement on each person, deciding whether their names will be written in the Book of Life or Death. The shofar blasts are intended to make Satan think that the Messiah has come, bringing an end to Satan's reign on earth.

The shofar makes its first appearance in the Bible in the form of a ram caught by its horn in a thicket, in the story of Abraham's sacrifice of his son, Isaac. Genesis 22 is the traditional scripture reading for Rosh Hashanah.

Every Rosh Hashanah Jews read in the synagogues of how Abraham responded to the command of the Lord to sacrifice his son Isaac. Abraham's faith in God was so pure and unwavering that he obeyed this difficult instruction, certain that God must be able to transcend death, since He had promised Abraham that Isaac's seed would be blessed forever. He took the young man (Isaac may have been 33 years old) to Mt. Moriah to perform the sacrifice. The son willingly carried the wood on his back, and when Isaac asked his father, Where is the lamb for a burnt offering?", Abraham responded, "My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering."

Just as Abraham was raising the knife to sacrifice his son, the Angel of the Lord appeared and stopped him. A substitutionary sacrifice was provided by the Lord in the form of a ram caught in a nearby thicket. Abraham named the place Jehovah Jireh, or The Lord will Provide, thus making a prophetic statement about a future provision of a substitutionary sacrifice.

This story may be seen as a foreshadowing of the sacrifice of God's own son, Yeshua, or Jesus, which took place on the same spot 2000 years later. Like Isaac who was born miraculously to Sarah in her old age, Jesus was born of a miraculous conception; he was a son sent to be sacrificed by his Father; he had a Father who was confident that death would be overcome; he went obediently and submissively like a lamb to slaughter; he carried the wood on his back on which he would be bound; through him God provided a substitutionary sacrifice; through him all the nations of the earth gained blessing for themselves. We also see in both stories the great faithfulness and mercy of our Lord.

Rosh Hashanah leads into the Ten Days of Awe, a personal time for taking stock and confessing sin, a time to make up differences with people, to practice charity, mend wounded relationships and to reconcile with God through repentence. After the Ten Days of Awe the sixth feast begins. It is Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, the day that God's judgement will be final for the coming year.

The traditional greeting used on Rosh Hashanah is "L'Shana Tova, Tikatevu", which means "May you be inscribed in the Book of Life for good." We who have accepted the redemption offered by God in the form of the sacrificial lamb, his son Yeshua HaMashiach, are already inscribed in the Book of Life. However, we can still use this time of reflection as part of our ongoing relationship with the Father. At this time of year the traditional Orthodox ritual of Tashlik involves taking crumbs or rocks from our pockets and throwing them upon water, as a way of casting away sin on cleansing waters. We who have embraced salvation through Yeshua cast our sin upon the living water, in gratitude that God loves us so deeply that He provided for our redemption through the sacrifice of His only son.