What is your favourite festive in the year? Maybe it is Christmas, where you enjoy sharing a Christmas carol with friends and family under warm candle lights, remembering the birth of our Lord. Or could it be Easter, a season where we remember the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ?

Festivals help to create rhythms in our lives. Especially in Singapore where we do not have the four seasons, festivals form a cycle of rest, remembrance and celebration. We cannot be constantly busy with celebrations, neither can we be forever in a stage of quietness and stagnancy. It helps us to appreciate God’s goodness in every season. The special feasts we read from chapter 16:1-17 served the same purpose for the Israelites as well. Verse 16 tells us that:

Three times a year all your males shall appear before the Lord your God at the place that he will choose: at the Feast of Unleavened Bread, at the Feast of Weeks, and at the Feast of Booths.

The people of Israel received instructions to celebrate God’s blessing to them in three important festivals: Passover (v1-8), the feast of Weeks (v9-12) and the feast of Booths (v 13-17). Passover serves to remind of God’s deliverance of the Israelites from slavery and Egypt. The bread must be unleavened as a reminder of their hurried departure. The feast of Weeks, also called Pentecost, marked the first fruits of the barley or wheat harvest. It was a celebration of God’s provision and blessings. The feast of Booths or feast of Tabernacle was another harvest festival commemorating the forty years of Exodus in the wilderness. The people lived in small booths to remember God’s provision during their time in the wilderness and leading them into the promised land.

The celebrations draw people to remember with a thankful and gratuitous heart the blessings they have received and ultimately turn their focus to the giver of these grace, who is God himself. Their joy is made complete as they remember and celebrate these wonder time of the year. The Israelites are reminded not to appear before the Lord empty-handed. Every man shall give as he is able, according to the blessing that the Lord God has given.

Now, here is an issue. We are used to the idea of joy as a spontaneous emotion, and to be commanded by God to complete our joy through a series of festivals seem to be forcing or faking an emotion. How can something be joyful when it becomes a routine which we have to follow annually. Here, God is giving us a godly understanding of joy. True joy begins with obedience towards God. In the midst of obeying God by celebrating the festivals, we take pauses in our mundane or busy lives to count our blessings. We become present to the God of blessings. As our hearts begin to tune in to God, we begin to enjoy His presence of joy in our lives. Our obedience to God leads us to the fountain of joy, which can only be found in God alone. Our actions result in joy.

Dear brothers and sisters, God’s instruction of festivals when taken with a correct posture will help us to meet with God which will then result in abundant joy. Let us take every opportunity to celebrate in great expectancy of meeting God in intimacy as we obey and worship Him.

Prayer: Dear God, would you help me to obey you and during it, experience the joy of following after you. Help me to grow in this cycle of obeying and renewing of faith so that I will draw closer to you. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.