In Chapter 16 Moses has briefly been going back over the instructions for Passover and for the Festival of Weeks. Today he reminds the congregation about observing the Festival of Tabernacles.
"Celebrate the Festival of Tabernacles for seven days after you have gathered the produce of your threshing floor and your winepress." (Deuteronomy 16:13) When the Lord gave this festival to be observed by Israel, He said, "On the fifteenth day of the seventh month the Lord's Festival of Tabernacles begins, and it lasts for seven days. The first day is a sacred assembly; do no regular work. For seven days present food offerings to the Lord, and on the eighth day hold a sacred assembly and present a food offering to the Lord. It is the closing special assembly; do no work." (Leviticus 23:33-36)
The Festival of Weeks, which we talked about yesterday, was a type of harvest holiday because it began seven weeks after the people first began reaping grain. It takes place in late spring. The Festival of Tabernacles is also a type of harvest holiday because it takes place near the end of harvest when people have threshed their grain and have gathered their grapes from the vine. This is a fall festival. In 2021 it begins at sundown on September 20 and ends on the evening of September 27.
It is to be a time of joy and thankfulness for all that the Lord has provided. "Be joyful at your festival---you, your sons and daughters, your male and female servants, and the Levites, the foreigners, the fatherless and the widows who live in your towns." (Deuteronomy 16:14) If the Lord had not commanded that this holiday be observed and that no regular work was to be done on the first and last days of the holiday, the servants could not have attended. People who were not self-employed might have been forced to work too. Also it would have been easy for those who were self-employed to skip the holiday because of how much work they had to do. This is a mandatory "vacation" for everyone so that all the congregation of Israel can rest, rejoice, and recuperate in the presence of the Lord. The Lord who created the human body knows exactly what the human body needs. For our physical and mental health we need days off from work. For our spiritual and emotional health we need to take breaks from our everyday responsibilities to focus on the Lord. Holidays such as the ones commanded by the Lord were for the benefit of everyone so they could be healthy and strong physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually.
We know in that the time came when Jerusalem was chosen as the religious capital of Israel. (The tabernacle will be located in more than one place during the conquest of the promised land until King David moves it to Jerusalem where his son Solomon will build the first temple.) But in Moses' day the people didn't yet know where they would be required to celebrate the mandatory holidays. He tells them that, when they get into the promised land, the Lord will tell them where to celebrate these festivals and that is where they must observe them. As we said earlier in our study of Deuteronomy, if we are going to worship the Lord we must do it in His way. Part of worshiping Him in His way is holding festivals where He tells the congregation to hold them. "For seven days celebrate the festival to the Lord your God at the place He will choose. For the Lord your God will bless you in all your harvest and in all the work of your hands, and your joy will be complete." (Deuteronomy 16:15) There are blessings involved in worshiping the Lord in His way. If the congregation had elected to worship Him somewhere other than an approved location, they would have been living in disobedience to Him. The Lord is a good father and does not bless disobedience anymore than a good human parent praises and rewards a child for doing the opposite of what they've been told.
The Festival of Tabernacles is one of three yearly holidays which every able-bodied Jewish man was commanded to attend. (The other two are Passover and the Festival of Weeks.) These were holidays of pilgrimage for any man living at a distance from the center of worship. But whether the persons attending the Festival of Tabernacles were coming from near or far, everyone was to lodge in temporary shelters (tabernacles) during this holiday. "Live in temporary shelters for seven days: All native-born Israelites are to live in such shelters so your descendants will know that I had the Israelites live in temporary shelters when I brought them out of Egypt. I am the Lord your God." (Leviticus 23:42-43)
The festival commemorates Israel's years in the wilderness and the way the Lord protected and provided for the people during that time. It also celebrates the fact that the Lord, in a sense, lived in a temporary shelter with them, for His tabernacle was in the midst of the camp.
You and I can have a Festival of Tabernacles of the heart every day, if you think about it, because we have so much to thank the Lord for! He has protected us and provided for us. He has been with us every step of the way. We have never been alone or out of His sight. In gratitude for all He has done for us, we must worship Him in His way by bringing the offering of praise and thankfulness. As the Apostle Paul put it, we should "continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise---the fruit of lips that openly profess His name". (Hebrews 13:15) Because we have been blessed, we owe it to the Lord to be a blessing to others: "And do not forget to do good and to share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased." (Hebrews 13:16) If we are going to worship the Lord in His way we will have a grateful heart toward Him and a loving heart toward our fellow man. We will also stay closely connected to the Lord through prayer and praise, which King David compared to an offering, saying, "May my prayer be set before you like incense; may the lifting up of my hands be like the evening sacrifice." (Psalm 141:2)
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