3/3/2011
Yesterday morning I met with a friend for coffee. It wasn’t really the coffee; coffee was a prop. We met because of our mutual friendship and kinship with the Lord God. When I left home that morning, my gas tank was low. There was enough to make it the coffee shop, but not much more. On the drive there, I had planned to purchase gas between the coffee shop and my next appointment. Leaving the coffee shop, I noted that I had over a quarter tank of gas. This isn’t the first time gas has appeared in my tank; nor is it the first of my automobiles where gas has appeared in the tank. The extra fuel allowed me to do the driving I needed for the day, and did not purchase additional gas until the drive home in the evening.
Why only a quarter of a tank? Every time it has been around a quarter of a tank. When I asked God he said, “That is all you needed.” I add gas to the tank a couple times a week. A quarter of a tank is not all I think I need, but it got me through the day. God told Israel, in the wilderness, to get a days supply of Manna every day but the sixth day and on the sixth day to get two days worth; the second portion for the seventh day. It is faith building to get the provisions for the day in the day, but what about the seventh day. The double portion on the sixth day is preparation for the seventh day, the day of rest in the Lord. How does that relate to our walk with God today?
Here is a glimpse God has shown me. The evening and the morning is the day; from the first day until the seventh day. The evening is the beginning of the day and the night is in between. The night is not a reward for the day just lived, but preparation for the rest of the day to come. God renews us at night and His mercy is new for us in the morning, when the day is already half over. Again this is preparation of the rest of the day. Then the seventh day comes, a day created for rest in the Lord. But Jesus answered them, “My Father has been working until now, and I have been working” (John 5:17). And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done (Genesis 2:2). Which is true? Has He been working or has He ended His work? Was Jesus speaking of the Sabbath (seventh day)? For this reason the Jews persecuted Jesus, and sought to kill Him, because He had done these things on the Sabbath (John 5:16). Yes. The answer is prophecy.
Jesus is the Lamb slain before the foundation of the earth, but manifested the cross in the earth at the time designed by God. God created the Sabbath when He created the earth as a time of rest that had not yet been fulfilled when Jesus walked the earth. The seventh day of creation had not yet happened but had already happened, just as Jesus was already slain before He suffered the cross for our witness. The Children of Israel celebrated a day of rest as prophecy, just as they sacrificed animals as prophecy of what happened before the foundation of the earth but was still to come in the earth. Provisions were made for our redemption and our rest before they were manifested in the earth.
There is a day coming when there will be no night. When the evening comes and the new day begins there will be no night. It is the seventh day that has no end; it is the first day when God commanded the light when there was no sun. It is the eight day of the feast of tabernacles (the Last Great Day). Christians do not worship on the first day instead of the seventh; we worship on the eight day of prophecy – the seventh day without end – the everlasting rest of the Lord. We celebrate what has not yet come; the day when God will end all of His work; the seventh day without end. That is why we worship God everyday (the Sabbath without end) and come together on one day to worship together – prophesying being the temple of God – the city of God has no temple for the Father and the Son are the temple and we are in the Son; we are the stones of the temple – the body of Christ.
© 2011, Tim D. Coulter Sr.