Prophetic Patterns of God’s Calendar
I. The Weekly Sabbath Cycle (6+1=7 Days): Moses not only gave us the key to the chronology of the entire Bible in Psalm 90, but he also recorded God’s prophetic patterns and precedents. The seven-day week which has been observed by God’s people since creation is the first and primary pattern. The end has been prophesied since the very beginning in this simple formula, work for six days and rest on the seventh day. So important was this continuous 7-day cycle that it was written in stone by the finger of God as the 4th of ten commands.
Exod. 20:8 “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. 11 For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.
One of the reasons it is important for Christians to set apart the Sabbath of every week as a day of rest and reflection is that it keeps our focus on the Millennial Sabbath of Christ’s Kingdom.
II. The Millennial Week Sabbath Cycle (6K+1K=7K): The original creation week forms the pattern for a week of millennia according to Moses’ prayer.
Psalm 90:4 For a thousand years in Your sight Are like yesterday when it is past, And like a watch in the night.
The ‘Day’ in which Adam sinned, in which God said that he would die, is the first millennium. This 1,000-year ‘Day’ was also “as a watch in the night,” which was 1/6th of a whole (a “watch” was a 4-hour period, which is 1/6th of a day). Thus, the first millennium is 1/6th of the completion of man’s time under the curse.
2 Peter 3:8-9a 8 But, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. 9 The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, …
Peter applied Moses’ millennial scheme to the delay in Christ’s return. John applied it to Christ’s Kingdom of 1,000 years.
Rev. 20:4 And I saw thrones, and they sat on them, and judgment was committed to them. Then I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for their witness to Jesus and for the word of God, who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received his mark on their foreheads or on their hands. And they lived and reigned with Christ for a thousand years. 5 But the rest of the dead did not live again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection. 6 Blessed and holy is he who has part in the first resurrection. Over such the second death has no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years.
III. The Annual 50-day Sabbath-Pentecost Cycle (6+1×7+1=50 Days): When God gave Moses the Feasts of the Lord to be strictly observed by His people, He included an extrapolation from the weekly cycle. On the Sunday after Passover, the “first-fruits” offering was to be given to the Lord. Jesus was crucified on the day of Passover (Nisan 14th) which is why Paul referred to “Christ our Passover.”[1] Jesus rose from the dead on the following Sunday, the day of the first-fruits offering. This is why Paul referred to Jesus’ resurrection as “the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep.” [2]
God told Moses to mark that Sunday as the beginning of a seven-week countdown to the Feast of Pentecost, the anniversary of the giving of the Law, which also became the anniversary of the giving of the Breath of Truth for Jesus’ followers.
Lev. 23:10 “Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: `When you come into the land which I give to you, and reap its harvest, then you shall bring a sheaf of the first-fruits of your harvest to the priest. 11 `He shall wave the sheaf before the LORD, to be accepted on your behalf; on the day after the Sabbath [Sunday] the priest shall wave it. … 15 `And you shall count for yourselves from the day after the Sabbath, from the day [Sunday] that you brought the sheaf of the wave offering: seven Sabbaths shall be completed. 16 `Count fifty days to the day after the seventh Sabbath; then you shall offer a new grain offering to the LORD.
Here we have the original week multiplied seven times (seven weeks) plus one day, the 50th day. This pattern is critical to the proper calculation of the next extrapolation. It is important to note both the seven full weeks (counting from Sunday to the Sabbath of each week). Then the 50th day, which is necessarily always a Sunday, always follows the seventh Sabbath. The word Pentecost means “50th“. The celebration was not on the 49th day (a Sabbath) but the following day. This sequence occurred once a year immediately after the Passover.
IV. The Semi-Centennial 50-year Sabbatical-Jubilee cycle (6+1×7+1 Years): The above principle of seven weeks plus one day was applied to years giving a semi-centennial cycle.
Lev. 25: 3 `Six years you shall sow your field, and six years you shall prune your vineyard, and gather its fruit; 4 `but in the seventh year there shall be a sabbath of solemn rest for the land, a sabbath to the LORD. You shall neither sow your field nor prune your vineyard. … 8 `And you shall count seven sabbaths of years for yourself, seven times seven years; and the time of the seven sabbaths of years shall be to you forty-nine years. 9 Then you shall cause the trumpet of the Jubilee to sound on the tenth day of the seventh month; on the Day of Atonement you shall make the trumpet to sound throughout all your land. 10 `And you shall consecrate the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a Jubilee for you; and each of you shall return to his possession, and each of you shall return to his family. 11 `That fiftieth year shall be a Jubilee to you; in it you shall neither sow nor reap what grows of its own accord, nor gather the grapes of your untended vine. 12 `For it is the Jubilee; it shall be holy to you; you shall eat its produce from the field. 13 `In this Year of Jubilee, each of you shall return to his possession.
The Kingdom of God will come to earth on a Jubilee Year. The Gospel of the Kingdom is the good news of the 120th Jubilee Year which is also the 6000th year.
Isaiah 61:1 “The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon Me, Because the LORD has anointed Me To preach good tidings to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives, And the opening of the prison to those who are bound; 2 To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, And the day of vengeance of our God; To comfort all who mourn, 3 To console those who mourn in Zion, To give them beauty for ashes, The oil of joy for mourning, The garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; That they may be called trees of righteousness, The planting of the LORD, that He may be glorified.” 4 And they shall rebuild the old ruins, They shall raise up the former desolations, And they shall repair the ruined cities, The desolations of many generations.
Peter applied the Jubilee-year cycle (every 50th year) to the whole 6,000-year period when he indicated in 2 Peter 3:5-7 that “the same statement” in Genesis 6:3 (which delayed the flood for 120 years) is now delaying the judgement of the Day of the Lord (120 Jubilee years {50×120=6000}).
This is God’s divine calendar revealed in the Scriptures. It provides the proper framework for a biblical chronology using two independent witnesses. The years on this calendar begin and end in the fall of each year, on Rosh Hashanna (Head of the Year).
The entire pattern of God’s calendar was given through Moses, as well as the chronological data necessary to calculate from creation to the first entrance into the Promised Land under Joshua. The total span of 6000 years under the curse was given through Moses using two witnesses, Genesis 6:3 and Psalm 90. The remaining data, from the first entrance into the Promised Land under Joshua until the final entrance for the permanent possession under Jesus Christ, is also provided in the pages of the Bible with no gaps left to be filled from secular sources.
There are many prophetic patterns in Scripture such as Moses ascending Mt. Sinai into the cloud to meet with the Lord on the seventh day, and Jesus repeating the same with His disciples on the Mt. of Transfiguration to be shown a vision of the future Kingdom on the seventh day. Some might disparage using such types-antetypes as “allegorical” interpretation. But that is not accurate, since the “allegorical method” denies the literal grammatical-historical sense and substitutes another sense. The method of concealing prophetic patterns for hidden truths to be discovered at a later time has a very long history in Scripture. One of the best examples of this is Genesis 22 where Abraham’s statement to Isaac, “God will provide Himself the lamb” referred both the ram sacrificed in place of Isaac and prophetically to Christ, the Lamb of God. This dual fulfillment, one historically and grammatically accurate and the other a mystery concealed, was known to Abraham himself. Moses tells us a very important tradition and saying that was the result of this incident. “So Abraham called the name of that place, ‘The LORD will provide’; as it is said to this day, ‘On the mount of the LORD it shall be provided'” (Gen. 22:14 ESV). Note the future tense. All of the Feasts in Leviticus 23 have even a 3-layer meaning, one historical, one for present day Chrsitians, and one as a future prophecy. It is through these kinds of layered fulfillments, both historical and prophetic, that a great deal of the mystery of Christ was concealed until it was revealed to the Apostles. Yet the Jews, to whom the words were written, were blinded by God to certain concealed truths.
[1] 1 Cor. 5:7
[2] 1 Cor. 15:20,23