Clothed in Salvation: Sukkot 2024 Rest and Celebrate
October 20, 2024
Scripture referenced
The passage this message was preached from, in full, with every other passage it reached for.
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Revelation 1 (approximate) picture of Jesus barefoot tending the lamps, seen in the mind's eye during worship
1 This is the Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things which must happen soon, which he sent and made known by his angel to his servant, John,
2 who testified to God’s word, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, about everything that he saw.
3 Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy, and keep the things that are written in it, for the time is at hand.
4 John, to the seven assemblies that are in Asia: Grace to you and peace, from God, who is and who was and who is to come; and from the seven Spirits who are before his throne;
5 and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. To him who loves us, and washed us from our sins by his blood;
6 and he made us to be a Kingdom, priests to his God and Father; to him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.
7 Behold, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, including those who pierced him. All the tribes of the earth will mourn over him. Even so, Amen.
8 “I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”
9 I John, your brother and partner with you in the oppression, Kingdom, and perseverance in Christ Jesus, was on the isle that is called Patmos because of God’s Word and the testimony of Jesus Christ.
10 I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and I heard behind me a loud voice, like a trumpet
11 saying, “What you see, write in a book and send to the seven assemblies: to Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and to Laodicea.”
12 I turned to see the voice that spoke with me. Having turned, I saw seven golden lamp stands.
13 And among the lamp stands was one like a son of man, clothed with a robe reaching down to his feet, and with a golden sash around his chest.
14 His head and his hair were white as white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire.
15 His feet were like burnished brass, as if it had been refined in a furnace. His voice was like the voice of many waters.
16 He had seven stars in his right hand. Out of his mouth proceeded a sharp two-edged sword. His face was like the sun shining at its brightest.
17 When I saw him, I fell at his feet like a dead man. He laid his right hand on me, saying, “Don’t be afraid. I am the first and the last,
18 and the Living one. I was dead, and behold, I am alive forever and ever. Amen. I have the keys of Death and of Hades.
19 Write therefore the things which you have seen, and the things which are, and the things which will happen hereafter;
20 the mystery of the seven stars which you saw in my right hand, and the seven golden lamp stands. The seven stars are the angels of the seven assemblies. The seven lamp stands are seven assemblies.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Keep this verse
Isaiah 61:9-11
read aloud as the main passage for the sermon
9 Their offspring will be known among the nations, and their offspring among the peoples. All who see them will acknowledge them, that they are the offspring which Yahweh has blessed.”
10 I will greatly rejoice in Yahweh! My soul will be joyful in my God; for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation. He has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with a garland, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.
11 For as the earth produces its bud, and as the garden causes the things that are sown in it to spring up; so the Lord Yahweh will cause righteousness and praise to spring up before all the nations.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Deuteronomy (unspecified chapter)
cited alongside Leviticus 23 to show the feasts belong to the Lord, not only to Jews
Keep this verseLeviticus 23
cited to show the feasts are called the feasts of the Lord
1 Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,
2 “Speak to the children of Israel, and tell them, ‘The set feasts of Yahweh, which you shall proclaim to be holy convocations, even these are my set feasts.
3 “‘Six days shall work be done, but on the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy convocation; you shall do no kind of work. It is a Sabbath to Yahweh in all your dwellings.
4 “‘These are the set feasts of Yahweh, even holy convocations, which you shall proclaim in their appointed season.
5 In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month in the evening, is Yahweh’s Passover.
6 On the fifteenth day of the same month is the feast of unleavened bread to Yahweh. Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread.
7 In the first day you shall have a holy convocation. You shall do no regular work.
8 But you shall offer an offering made by fire to Yahweh seven days. In the seventh day is a holy convocation: you shall do no regular work.’”
9 Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,
10 “Speak to the children of Israel, and tell them, ‘When you have come into the land which I give to you, and shall reap its harvest, then you shall bring the sheaf of the first fruits of your harvest to the priest:
11 and he shall wave the sheaf before Yahweh, to be accepted for you. On the next day after the Sabbath the priest shall wave it.
12 On the day when you wave the sheaf, you shall offer a male lamb without defect a year old for a burnt offering to Yahweh.
13 The meal offering with it shall be two tenths of an ephah of fine flour mingled with oil, an offering made by fire to Yahweh for a pleasant aroma; and the drink offering with it shall be of wine, the fourth part of a hin.
14 You must not eat bread, or roasted grain, or fresh grain, until this same day, until you have brought the offering of your God. This is a statute forever throughout your generations in all your dwellings.
15 “‘You shall count from the next day after the Sabbath, from the day that you brought the sheaf of the wave offering; seven Sabbaths shall be completed:
16 even to the next day after the seventh Sabbath you shall count fifty days; and you shall offer a new meal offering to Yahweh.
17 You shall bring out of your habitations two loaves of bread for a wave offering made of two tenths of an ephah of fine flour. They shall be baked with yeast, for first fruits to Yahweh.
18 You shall present with the bread seven lambs without defect a year old, one young bull, and two rams. They shall be a burnt offering to Yahweh, with their meal offering, and their drink offerings, even an offering made by fire, of a sweet aroma to Yahweh.
19 You shall offer one male goat for a sin offering, and two male lambs a year old for a sacrifice of peace offerings.
20 The priest shall wave them with the bread of the first fruits for a wave offering before Yahweh, with the two lambs. They shall be holy to Yahweh for the priest.
21 You shall make proclamation on the same day: there shall be a holy convocation to you; you shall do no regular work. This is a statute forever in all your dwellings throughout your generations.
22 “‘When you reap the harvest of your land, you must not wholly reap into the corners of your field, and you must not gather the gleanings of your harvest. You must leave them for the poor, and for the foreigner. I am Yahweh your God.’”
23 Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,
24 “Speak to the children of Israel, saying, ‘In the seventh month, on the first day of the month, shall be a solemn rest to you, a memorial of blowing of trumpets, a holy convocation.
25 You shall do no regular work; and you shall offer an offering made by fire to Yahweh.’”
26 Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,
27 “However on the tenth day of this seventh month is the day of atonement: it shall be a holy convocation to you, and you shall afflict yourselves; and you shall offer an offering made by fire to Yahweh.
28 You shall do no kind of work in that same day; for it is a day of atonement, to make atonement for you before Yahweh your God.
29 For whoever it is who shall not deny himself in that same day; shall be cut off from his people.
30 Whoever it is who does any kind of work in that same day, that person I will destroy from among his people.
31 You shall do no kind of work: it is a statute forever throughout your generations in all your dwellings.
32 It shall be a Sabbath of solemn rest for you, and you shall deny yourselves. In the ninth day of the month at evening, from evening to evening, you shall keep your Sabbath.”
33 Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,
34 “Speak to the children of Israel, and say, ‘On the fifteenth day of this seventh month is the feast of tents for seven days to Yahweh.
35 On the first day shall be a holy convocation: you shall do no regular work.
36 Seven days you shall offer an offering made by fire to Yahweh. On the eighth day shall be a holy convocation to you; and you shall offer an offering made by fire to Yahweh. It is a solemn assembly; you shall do no regular work.
37 “‘These are the appointed feasts of Yahweh, which you shall proclaim to be holy convocations, to offer an offering made by fire to Yahweh, a burnt offering, and a meal offering, a sacrifice, and drink offerings, each on its own day—
38 besides the Sabbaths of Yahweh, and besides your gifts, and besides all your vows, and besides all your freewill offerings, which you give to Yahweh.
39 “‘So on the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when you have gathered in the fruits of the land, you shall keep the feast of Yahweh seven days: on the first day shall be a solemn rest, and on the eighth day shall be a solemn rest.
40 You shall take on the first day the fruit of goodly trees, branches of palm trees, and boughs of thick trees, and willows of the brook; and you shall rejoice before Yahweh your God seven days.
41 You shall keep it as a feast to Yahweh seven days in the year. It is a statute forever throughout your generations. You shall keep it in the seventh month.
42 You shall dwell in temporary…
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Song of Solomon (unspecified chapter)
young woman resting in the shade of a tree, receiving fruit, used to picture resting in the finished work of the cross
Keep this verseJames 4:6 (approximate)
God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble
6 But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Matthew 6 (approximate)
lilies clothed with splendor, God knows all our needs
1 “Be careful that you don’t do your charitable giving before men, to be seen by them, or else you have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.
2 Therefore when you do merciful deeds, don’t sound a trumpet before yourself, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may get glory from men. Most certainly I tell you, they have received their reward.
3 But when you do merciful deeds, don’t let your left hand know what your right hand does,
4 so that your merciful deeds may be in secret, then your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly.
5 “When you pray, you shall not be as the hypocrites, for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men. Most certainly, I tell you, they have received their reward.
6 But you, when you pray, enter into your inner room, and having shut your door, pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly.
7 In praying, don’t use vain repetitions, as the Gentiles do; for they think that they will be heard for their much speaking.
8 Therefore don’t be like them, for your Father knows what things you need, before you ask him.
9 Pray like this: ‘Our Father in heaven, may your name be kept holy.
10 Let your Kingdom come. Let your will be done, as in heaven, so on earth.
11 Give us today our daily bread.
12 Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors.
13 Bring us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For yours is the Kingdom, the power, and the glory forever. Amen.’
14 “For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.
15 But if you don’t forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
16 “Moreover when you fast, don’t be like the hypocrites, with sad faces. For they disfigure their faces, that they may be seen by men to be fasting. Most certainly I tell you, they have received their reward.
17 But you, when you fast, anoint your head, and wash your face;
18 so that you are not seen by men to be fasting, but by your Father who is in secret, and your Father, who sees in secret, will reward you.
19 “Don’t lay up treasures for yourselves on the earth, where moth and rust consume, and where thieves break through and steal;
20 but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consume, and where thieves don’t break through and steal;
21 for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
22 “The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is sound, your whole body will be full of light.
23 But if your eye is evil, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!
24 “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other; or else he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You can’t serve both God and Mammon.
25 Therefore I tell you, don’t be anxious for your life: what you will eat, or what you will drink; nor yet for your body, what you will wear. Isn’t life more than food, and the body more than clothing?
26 See the birds of the sky, that they don’t sow, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns. Your heavenly Father feeds them. Aren’t you of much more value than they?
27 “Which of you, by being anxious, can add one moment to his lifespan?
28 Why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow. They don’t toil, neither do they spin,
29 yet I tell you that even Solomon in all his glory was not dressed like one of these.
30 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today exists, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, won’t he much more clothe you, you of little faith?
31 “Therefore don’t be anxious, saying, ‘What will we eat?’, ‘What will we drink?’ or, ‘With what will we be clothed?’
32 For the Gentiles seek after all these things; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.
33 But seek first God’s Kingdom, and his righteousness; and all these things will be given to you as well.
34 Therefore don’t be anxious for tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Each day’s own evil is sufficient.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Recap
The message in order, in a few minutes of reading.
This was week two of a two-week look at Sukkot, the feast of Tabernacles, with the focus on celebration. Brian opened by doing something unusual: stopping to name that something felt off in the room, leading the congregation through a prayer to take authority over the spiritual atmosphere before moving into the message. The sermon then centered on Isaiah 61:10 and what it means to be clothed in salvation as a reason for overwhelming, unsuppressible joy.
What was said
Before anything else, Brian stepped out of his planned remarks to address something he and Lissa had both sensed during worship. Rather than push past it, he invited the congregation to do a quick inventory of their own hearts, named a few specific things that can open doors to darkness, and led a corporate prayer to clear the atmosphere. A text from someone watching the livestream was read aloud and prayed over as well. Only after that did the message begin.
Sukkot, Brian explained, is one of seven feasts God established as family traditions, and the invitation was never limited to Jewish people. He pointed to Deuteronomy and Leviticus 23, where the text calls them feasts of the Lord, not feasts of Israel. The tradition is simple: step away from normal comforts, build a temporary shelter, and spend time with God outside. Israel did this for forty years in the wilderness, and the Bible says their shoes never wore out, their clothes never failed, and there was not a sick person among them.
Every time Tribe honors one of these feasts, Brian said, they return to the same three purposes: to remember what God has done, to rehearse what is still to come, and to recalibrate where they are with him. Sukkot specifically points forward to the return of Jesus, and sitting outside under stars or around a fire is a small rehearsal of what that will actually feel like. You get out of these feasts what you put into them.
Last week covered rest, which meant ceasing from striving to earn God's love or approval. Brian came back to that briefly, noting how the finished work of the cross removes the need to perform. The book of Song of Solomon was mentioned, where the young woman rests in the shade of the tree and simply receives. God, Brian said, resists the proud but gives grace to the humble, and rest is what gives him something to work with.
This week the focus moved to the celebrating side, using Isaiah 61:10 as the text. Brian walked through the Hebrew weight of being "dressed" in salvation, the word carrying the sense of being so completely draped in something that nothing underneath can be seen. When we try to bring God our past failures, he said, God's response is that it has been dealt with. What he sees is the outer garment, the robe of righteousness, not what was underneath.
Several people in the room shared responses to the passage. One person connected the image of clothing to two dreams they had when they came back to the Lord. Another described a vision during college, in a time of depression, of rose petals falling and leaving them with new garments and new joy. A third described a stranger handing them money at a bus stop early one morning so they could look their best for an important meeting that day. Brian received each of these as evidence that Jesus is not a detached set of rules but a living person who meets people in specific, experiential ways.
The sermon closed by tying the two weeks together. Rest and celebration belong to each other. Ceasing from striving is what opens the door to the joy Isaiah describes, a joy Brian compared to a child running downstairs on Christmas morning or a dog at the door when its owner comes home. Being invited into God's family is what gives that joy its foundation, and it is also what gives a person reason to participate in the family traditions like Sukkot in the first place.
Doing a Bible study?
Here is a guide we have prepared for you: the passages in order, questions for the group, and room to write.
- Brian talked about doing a kind of heart inventory before the sermon, asking whether bitterness, anger, or other things were crowding out the Spirit. What makes it hard to do that kind of honest check-in, and what helps you actually do it?
- Brian described the feast of Sukkot as one of God's family traditions, saying the feasts invite us to remember, rehearse, and recalibrate. Which of those three feels most meaningful or most neglected in your own walk with God right now, and why?
and 3 more questions in the guide
Read the full transcript 6,598 words
Welcome to Tribe's podcast. Hey, we just wanna say thank you for making this message a part of your week. Our prayer is that these messages will inspire you to make the name of Jesus famous in your life and to the uttermost bounds of the earth. If you're ever in Jackson Hole, we'd love for you to visit our Tribe fam in person. To learn more about us, you can find us online or at Facebook by searching tribejh.com.
Welcome to Tribe's podcast. Hey, we just wanna say thank you for making this message a part of your week. Our prayer is that these messages will inspire you to make the name of Jesus famous in your life and to the uttermost bounds of the earth. If you're ever in Jackson Hole, we'd love for you to visit our tribe fam in person. To learn more about us, you can find us online or at Facebook by searching tribejh.com.
Alright. Peak. I'm gonna give you a peek behind the curtain this morning, and I want to be I wanna wanna give you a peek behind the curtain this morning. Many many Sundays we come in here. You know, we're setting up.
We we have our our prayer team that is here and they're praying and the band is getting ready. We're setting up. We're transforming this. We rehang those disco balls every week just for you. We make sure that all the wildlife are properly groomed, and then we get ready for for friends to arrive.
Friends arrive. We're going through worship, and Lissa is busy at the at the mic. But she and I are always talking, you know, throughout the day, our normal workdays. And many times, we're even talking while she's leading worship and or I'm preaching through looks or sometimes through text messages, but she can't she can't, like, send a text while she's leading worship. But we both were feeling something, I don't know if I wanna say off or amiss or there was something not quite right.
And so as I was sitting up here, I thought I got two choices. I can just jump right into the conversation that I have planned for us today, and I do wanna get to it, and I think we will get to it and still get out on time and just disregard what I was feeling or just address it and so, I think I'm going to choose the latter. Yeah, it's too late now. Here we go. Here we go.
So, during worship, I I was like, not necessarily disturbed in my spirit, but maybe a little. Something was, like, something was something something was going on. And so I thought, alright, Jesus. Walk in and among your people, like like like minister to your people and then I saw that picture in my mind's eye from the book of Revelation about Jesus being barefoot and tending the lamps and that's great and I I prayed. I was not I was not like waving my holy spirit, funky monkey detector over.
That's not what I was doing. That's I not what I was was like just trying to like I was trying to grab a hold of and take authority over the atmosphere. Now, if you aren't if you haven't walked with the lord for a very long time, if you have come from a church culture where they don't talk about like like atmospheres in the spirit, welcome to tribe. So let me ask you just really quick. And and if you don't raise your hand, it doesn't mean that you're not mature in the spirit or anything like that.
You just might have been thinking about tacos or or who know you might not have sensed it but did anybody else feel this morning like something something was going on? Okay, yeah, cool. Yeah. Well, I don't quite know what which is why I'm giving you a peek behind the curtain because normally the, you know, the preacher guy stands up here and he's like, well, I'll just soldier on through the message or he like like gets over spiritual and like, I wanna try to walk in intention and in balance and in wisdom. I wanna I wanna call it out and then I wanna just pray it out and we can all participate in this together.
And so I'm gonna be still for just a moment. And you, how about individually search your own heart? Are you coming in with some sort of, like, raging flare up of bitterness in your heart, or are you angry? Are you under the influence of drugs or alcohol this morning? Are you practicing even if you think of it as, like, white magic, good magic?
Nope. There's no such thing as good magic. It all belongs to the occult realm, and it is from the pit of hell. And if you knowingly or unknowingly came in with a mindset, I'd I know most of you in here, but I don't know all of you in here. If you came in trying to block or thwart anything, either knowingly or maybe even unknowingly through illegitimate access to the supernatural, you should just stop that.
You should repent, and you you really should get saved. Because greater is he that is in us than he that is in the name that you're operating in. And so, let's be still for just a moment and let's do a little bit of inventory of our own heart and then, as you're like, I I think I'm good. You you know, you may need to say, lord, please forgive me for, you did whatever. You just name it.
Repent, just come running into his arms, and then pray over this service and we will enter into agreement in unity and see how the atmosphere, the spiritual atmosphere of this room might change. Go ahead. Jesus. Jesus. May oh, maybe it was something in here the night before.
I mean, it is a bar. Jesus. Right now, we grab a hold of the spiritual atmosphere in this room. And we cancel and send back into the dry wasteland any spirit that does not confess Jesus Christ as the Messiah, the son of the living God. We own this place.
We own this atmosphere. God, the great I am, Hashem, Adonai, Yahweh, you are a territorial god. Our hearts are your territory. This room and the children's ministry area and every place tribe sets its foot this morning is your territory. You with your great light chase out any darkness.
We invite you, god. Chase out any darkness in our hearts. Chase out any darkness that could be lingering from this weekend. Chase out any darkness that could be in this room known or even unknown to us. We command the atmosphere of this room to shift in Jesus' name.
Now, in your own words, you agree with that prayer and then we will move on. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Holy Spirit. Come. Move in and among your people.
We pray these things with the authority of Jesus. And for somebody that their families watching the live stream and one person texted me, and so I wanna read their prayer out loud. We take authority over any spiritual activity in this place that does not glorify God. We speak the blood of Jesus to cleanse this space and the people here. We break any word or action that may have opened the door to evil in Jesus name.
That's a good prayer and all those who agree said, amen. And if you're completely clueless to what was happening the last six minutes or so, just like ask the lord like, what what was that about? I didn't I didn't I wasn't picking up nothing. Like, it's okay. You can you can take that before the lord.
If you have your Bible with you this morning, would you turn to the book of Isaiah? Isaiah chapter 61 and we're going to read verses nine through 11 and if you're new to tribe, one of the things that we like to do that you've probably already heard me say that may have caused a little, like like, what was that to go off in your head? I did say the word conversation. I would like this to be a conversation that we have together. Meaning, I encourage and invite your participation.
Well, what does that look like? It means that we're gonna do this together as we get into today's content. I would love to hear your questions, your comments, and most importantly, what I love the most are your connections. Something that we're talking about may remind you of something that you just read in the bible or something that you've been studying recently, and the Holy Spirit just bubbles it up into your memory and you go, oh, oh, oh, this reminds me what we're talking about of that that I just read or even maybe a a god dream that you had recently, some type of connection. I love to hear those.
And the way that it works is if you have a question, comment, or a connection, if you just raise your hand. Matt Grubowski is running the mic around today, and so he'll hand you the mic. The reason why we use the mic in this room is so that all of the families that are watching the livestream, they'll be able to hear and engage your comments. So with that in mind, could I get somebody to please read Isaiah chapter 61 verses nine through 11? I think Mark is over here ready to read this morning.
Okay, here we go. 61 verse nine, their descendants will be known among the nations and their offspring among the peoples. All who see them will acknowledge that they are a people the Lord has blessed. I delight greatly in the Lord for my soul rejoices in my God. For he has clothed me with the garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of righteousness as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest and as a bride adorns herself with jewels.
For as soil makes the sprout come up, the garden causes seeds to grow, so the sovereign Lord will make righteousness and praise spring up before all nations.
That's good. So this is week two of two weeks that we are taking time to honor one of seven major family traditions that god has that he invites his family into to participate year after year. If you are Jewish, you would know this as the feast of Sukkot, or sometimes it's called the feast of booths or the feast of tabernacles, and this is one of god's family traditions that he invites really, the whole world has an invitation, but most people think of it as only belonging to Jews. But the bible is super clear. In Deuteronomy and Leviticus chapter 23, it the bible says, these are the feasts of who?
Feasts of god. These are the feasts of the lord. And so one of those feasts at the end of the harvest season after all of the harvest has been brought in, god says, I want you to do this. I want you to take seven days and I want you to rest. This is a family tradition that I am establishing where you and I go camping together.
Now if you live here, chances are probably just about all of you like camping because it feels like you're camping, like, when the summer is really hot and you gotta go from outside to your car, anybody from the South is like, you don't know anything. In the cold of the winter when you're trumping through the snow and you've got a shovel and you got a snow blow and you got a plow, which is coming by the way, like like here in this region, we live kind of like we're camping anyways, but most of us really enjoy camping, getting out and enjoying God's creation. And knowing that, God says, I'm inviting you into one of my family traditions where we go camping every year. And while we're camping, we deny ourselves the comforts and the conveniences of our of our stove and our house and our warm, soft bed, and we we subject ourselves to little more austere conditions. And god says, I want you to set up a little shelter or tabernacle or a booth, a little a construct in in Hebrew, they call it a sukkah, and I would like you to spend 7 days out in that sukkah.
And here's what most people do today. Maybe they'll have breakfast out there. Maybe they'll have their quiet time out there. They'll gather together with their family and have dinner out there. Families, take time to build their sukkah together and to decorate it.
And last week, we invited you to take part in this family god's family tradition through this feast. Build a sukkah. Decorate it yourself. Some people are like, well, I can hang some paper chains, across my kid's tramp. Great.
Fantastic. Maybe make a couch cushion fort in your living room. Fantad we're not getting legalistic here. The idea is to just set aside some time to get out of your normal routine and rhythm and dwell with fellowship with god. And it reminds us of Israel spending forty years in the wilderness.
They lived in tents for forty years and the Bible says during that time, even though they didn't have like climate control condition, they couldn't see what was going on in in like with all of our modern conveniences. The Bible says that their shoes never wore out. Their clothes never got holes in them. God, there was not a sick person among them. He took great care of them.
And when we celebrate, when we honor god's family traditions, it helps us to do three things, and we talk about these tie we these three things every time we celebrate a feast of the lord. You can just just tell me one of them. What's one of the things that we are invited to do when we celebrate or honor one of the feast of the lord? To remember, to remember all that god has done for us. Nothing like sitting outside in this chilly weather to remember that god has provided you, whether you rent, own, or borrow a nice shelter to live in.
You have a nice bed that you sleep in. You've got a microwave. You have Wi Fi. When we're outside, we remember all of the good things that God has done for us. He has healed you.
He has saved you. He has redeemed you. He has set you free. He has filled you with his holy spirit. There's so much to remember and meditate on his goodness that it causes us to celebrate.
So we remember. That's one of the things that we do. What's another one? To rehearse. We rehearse some of it.
Would you put my little chart up there? Some of the feasts of the lord have been fulfilled already. For example, Passover. Passover was where and Jews still celebrate this meal today called a seder dinner. But Jesus perfectly fulfilled that Passover, not by as the priests would do by sacrificing bulls and goats and sprinkling sprinkling that blood on the altar and over to the people, the Bible says that Jesus is the lamb of god that takes away the sins of the world.
He fulfilled Passover. Now the feast of Sukkot or Tabernacles or Boots, that feast has not yet been fulfilled, and it is why we celebrate this feast to somebody said it a moment ago, to rehearse, to practice. And when we celebrate this idea of ceasing from our labor, resting in all that God has done, and then celebrating his goodness, what event are we rehearsing? The cheat sheet is up here. Was it him?
The return of Jesus. So when we celebrate the feast of Sukkot and when you sit outside and you just look up at the stars or wrap yourself in a warm blanket in the morning, maybe you've got a little fire going on your back deck. Life just gets really simple and easy and beautiful, doesn't it? That is a foreshadow, and it is an opportunity for us to rehearse what we will physically, actually encounter at the return of Jesus. And then there's one more thing that the feast of the lord that we that we focus in on.
We remember, we rehearse, and what's the other thing? Recalibrate. Thank you. When we sit outside in our sukkah, and in fact, this past week, we got to do it one night, and then we had folks over for dinner. Oh, I didn't I was gonna say maybe we can get a picture of that there and zap it up before the end of service.
I forgot to do that. We went camping this week. We invited our tribe fam. We had a number of young adults come down one one night. It was kinda rainy and a little bit cold, shift in the seasons other nights, but then Friday, we gathered again at our house, and we used the feast of Sukkot, the fam god's family tradition of Sukkot to recalibrate, to take stock, to take inventory.
Like, am I have I just kind of fallen into the rut of being a a big baby that I get grumbly and complaining about, like, the tourist traffic here in the summer? Like, hello? I don't have to live here. I could be living somewhere else, like, in Houston or Dallas or Sun. And if you're from there, like, lord bless you.
But, like, come on. Like, instead of taking me, like, like, eight minutes to get all the way from, like, out of town into the town square. Oh, no. It takes me twenty five minutes. Ugh.
Like, you use that you use these feasts of the lord to recalibrate. Lord, have I gotten off with you somewhere? I wanna be in sync with you, and you'll get out of these feasts what you put into them. And if you disregard them, well, that's really putting nothing into them. And if you put nothing in, what are you gonna get out?
Yep. You said it. Right? You get out of it what you put into it. If you seek the lord and not just go through religious motions, but if you use these as opportunities to interact and to engage with him, it's almost like, oh, it's not it's not a thousand percent theologically sound.
But here it goes. It's it's as if heaven, the distance between you and heaven, gets a little thinner. There's a little more transparency. There's a little more that that gets it's a little easier for god to speak to you and for him to transmit the kingdom into your heart as you're sitting outside one evening, as you're looking up at the stars, as you're wrapped in a blanket, and you're reading, as you're using these feasts to to remember, to recalibrate, and to rehearse. So I just want to encourage you to lean into these feasts in the best way that you know how.
The feast of Sukkot goes until, I believe it's Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday of this week. And so what we have been doing here at Tribe, we've taken two weeks to talk about this feast of Sukkot, and we split it into two weeks because there are two major themes that are associated with the feast of Sukkot, and it is resting and celebrating. Last week, we talked about what? Oh gosh. Where's my coffee so that I can take a sip?
Yes. Trinity, please. This is for you to gather your thoughts. Yes, we talked about resting and celebrating. We talked about one of them last week and it was.
Wow, that was so good. Resting. We cease from striving to earn god's approval. We cease from striving to try hey. There it is.
That was, on Friday as we were braving the chilly night air and enjoying a feast of the lord and having a meal together. Hey, good work, Trinity. We talked about we talked about resting from trying to earn god's love. So many of us get trapped into this rut of earning god's love, and we don't really feel it when when we are being when our behavior is good. What really becomes a challenge is if we've messed up, if if we've blown it, if we've fallen down, if we've fallen back into a rut, and then there's that voice of the enemy that says, well, you gotta do this, this, and this, or god ain't gonna love you no more.
Because of what Jesus Christ did on the cross on Calvary, it has removed the dividing wall of hostility and that wall of striving, trying to be a good person, or thinking that it has anything to do with you but simply resting in the finished work of the cross. Oh, I love it. In the book of Song of Solomon, the young woman is is seen pictured resting in the shade of a tree, and she says, feed me your fruit, as she speaks to the young man, the lover of her soul. She's resting in the shade of the cross, the finished work of Jesus, that nothing else needs to be done except to for you to receive it. And so when we rest from from striving, from trying to earn our salvation, from trying to be a good person, from trying to earn god's love.
When we rest from those things, god says, ah, finally. The bible says he resists the proud but gives grace to the who? The humble. When we quit trying to do this on our own, but we simply, as the the famous, altar call ministry song from the Billy Graham crusades was, here I come without a plea. Something something, it's just me, just as I am.
I come to the cross. And I know the Baptists are trading jokes with each other because you probably sing it all the time, and I messed it up. Sorry. When we rest, that's when he's like, okay. I you've given me something to work with.
And that's when we enter that place of encounter. And when we encounter, we get to talk about the next part, the celebrating part. So if you're taking notes, you can write the title of our conversation this morning. Sukkot twenty twenty four, rest and celebrate. This is week two, celebrate.
So let's look, zoom in on verse 10 of Isaiah 61. We'll put it up on the screen here. Verse 10 says this, I am overwhelmed with joy in the lord, my god. For he has dressed me with the clothing of salvation and draped me in a robe of righteousness. And I am like a bridegroom for his wedding or a bride with her jewels.
So beautiful. This is not on the screen, but I love how the message translation says this. So just close your eyes for a second and let me read this over so you can hear the words coming out of my mouth. Oh, those stiff necked people only closed one eye. I saw you.
Jesus still loves you. From the message I will sing for joy in god. Explode in praise from deep within my soul. He dressed me up in a suit of salvation. He outfitted me in a robe of righteousness.
As a bridegroom who puts on a tuxedo and a bride, a jeweled tiara. For as the earth bursts with spring flowers, wildflowers, and as a garden cascades with blossoms, so the master, god, brings righteousness into full bloom and puts praise on display before the nations. So cool. Okay. Let's look at this verse.
This is a NLT. I read from the NLT. Lot of of our tribe family reads from the NLT translation. As you look at sixty one ten, I would like to check-in with you. What observations do you see about this passage that particularly stand out to you?
You don't need to dive into some sort of super great spiritual detail, but I would love to see I would love to hear what you see about that verse. Matt's got the mic. Lanisha's coming forward. Matty g, right here. I love it.
Oh, he's on it. Oh, oh, who did you whoever you saw first, go for it. I love it. Matt g is running the microphone around. Best best lamb chops in the room.
He's sporting his Beastie Boys t shirt. He's got some triple trouble on the microphone today. I
appreciate the hustle. I think what stands out to me is, dressed me with clothing of salvation and draped me in a robe of righteousness. Maybe that just speaks to me specifically just because when I came back to the Lord, I had two dreams and I didn't understand them at the time until I died into his word. But one of the dreams I was in a bath and in the corner was a washer and a dryer and it looked like my clothes were getting clean. In the second dream, I remember being getting to a destination and somebody came by and dropped off a bunch of clothes and then I I changed and I looked down and I was like, man, I look really good.
I was in a I was in a white shirt but as soon as I walked through the building, they were telling me I didn't belong there and I saw somebody who I care very much about unclothed and I had to just move on because that place wasn't for me. So. Oh. I I just think about being dressed in clothing of salvation and draped in a robe of righteousness when I came back to the lord and began to follow him because he imparted his righteousness to
me. So good.
Mine's actually in the exact same boat. So. Okay, here we go. Stressed me with clothing, with the clothing of salvation. It reminded me of a vision that I had during college.
I was in my college apartment, this fly. I was in this college apartment at the time and I was going through just a real big time of darkness and depression and hatred of self and I was like, god, this cannot be what you have for me. There's obviously more out there and I just felt called to go lay down in my bed. So, I'm laying there. No blanket, just head on the Called
you to a nap?
Holy Spirit. Oh, yeah. I love god but the thing is, I wasn't asleep. It was a beautiful vision. I closed my eyes and while the tears were streaming down, during the vision was these beautiful, fluffy rose petals that are not of this earth at all, just flowing over me and with each petal hitting me, it was just straight in his love and his joy for me and at the end of the vision of the rose petals falling all over me, I had just a new body, new garments, and a new joy and hope that was truly just from him.
Wow. And now, to this day, whenever I'm going through, I could just remember that my clothing is from him, not from me.
Here's one of the many things that I love about Jesus. He ain't just a book of, like, hey. Like, try to live your life this way. And it's and it's detached and, like, well, Jesus is is dead or gone or he's up in heaven. And, like, this is, like, just some sort of kind of, like, we'll try your best.
But Jesus is alive and he is experiential. And when you encounter him, when you experience him through a dream, a picture, a vision, when you encounter him, our lives are changed and it it smashes religious religiosity and brings us into relationship. And that's my striving goal for us as a tribe family that we would actually encounter the real living Jesus of Nazareth.
You know, to me, it's kinda interesting because like, when there's something out there that's actually meant for us, the lord would do anything to make sure that we are prepared for it. So, within my life, so there's this one time where it was like 5AM in the morning, you know, I was at the bathrooms, you know, just waiting for the bus, ready to go to the village and.
Oh, oh, you weren't in the bathroom. You were out at Stilson?
I think so. I was just going like, you know, know, the bathrooms were like like.
Yeah. Yeah. To catch the bus. Yeah. Yeah.
Yes. I was
there. Alright.
Here we
And so like, I had no money on me, but that day, I had, like, a really important meeting to go to. And so I've been looking like a whole mess. And so this person walks into the bathrooms. He greets me like, hey. Good morning, etcetera.
And, like, he just asked like, hey, how's your money situation going? I'm just like, I was so confused because I was like, because like, to me, I'm dead broke. Like, nothing. So, I was like, I don't know to be honest or like be truthful but I was like, yeah, we're we're living. You know, we can't really complain but like, you know, but he just handed me money and I'm like, woah, that is god right there.
He handed me money so I can look good for that very important thing I had to do that day and I'm like, woah. Cause like that day, I look fresh. I had a wanna go get a haircut, wanna go get a real quick outfit and some shoes. And I was like, okay.
So it's
kinda really interesting to me.
I love it. What's that verse about the the lilies are, like, clothed with splendor, and he loves us so much that he knows all of our needs. And if he needs to set us up with some fresh drip, then he's gonna do what he's gotta do. I love how the how that story resonates with you and how the lord met with you. That is just that's beautiful.
I wanna a couple of observations that, I wanna share with you just really quickly as I'm looking at this passage that already many of you are are are touching on. So as we look at this verse, the question the the last question that I will ask you is how does this verse connect with Sukkot? How does this verse connect with Sukkot? So be looking at that verse as I I just share with you just a couple of quick observations. So in that passage, you will see, he says, I am overwhelmed with joy.
And the idea comes with it as we would think of, like a kid running down the stairs Christmas morning to see all of the presents left under the tree. How they're like with their little footy jammies hopping up and down and so excited for Christmas morning. That's the idea. I am overwhelmed with joy. Or when you come home from work, whether you've been gone for, like, eight hours or eight minutes, you come back in the door and your dog is so excited to see you.
Overwhelmed with joy. It also has with it this idea of jumping, leaping, or springing forward that even if you wanted to be reserved, calm, subdued, you just can't help it. I am overwhelmed with joy. In this word, you're you guys are already touching on it. He has dressed me.
It means exactly what you would think it means in Hebrew to to provide arraignment for, clothing for, to drape, to ensconce, to completely surround. So that from the outside, all you can see is what you're draped in with. Like, when it's chilly in the morning and you wake up and you got your jammies on, but you're a little chilly. So you, like, take a big fleece blanket or something, wrap it around you as you go into the kitchen. What people would see is that big fleece blanket wrapped around you.
You wouldn't see your jammies underneath. In a similar way, we try to remind the lord of our past failures, mistakes, mess ups, blow up. We seem to always bring those back to him, and he's like, I don't see that. That has been dealt with. He doesn't sweep it under the carpet, but it's been dealt with so that what he sees is that outer garment that we have been given that we could not earn, that marks us and identifies us as his own.
You have dressed me with the clothing of salvation. How many times do we look in our our metaphysical closet and we're like, ugh. That's too nice to wear today. I'm gonna put on the old raggedy garments of my past. I mean, that is where I've been living.
Oh, it's church. I better pull out the the fake garment of salvation that looks good, but, like, squeaks when you walk because it's cheap imitation. Like, when you see that costume on Amazon, you're like, that's gonna be so awesome. I'm gonna be, like, the best Batman ever. And you get it and you open it up, and it's, like, plastic and the ears are all bent, and you're like, great.
I look like a joke, not Batman. Or when we were kids, we had these like plastic masks with like a little tight band around and you could like and that was like your costume and you couldn't breathe out of it and you couldn't see out of the eye holes. Is he talking about Halloween at church? And then the author, Isaiah, who's seeing this picture, he says, how can I describe it? He's like, like like, how how can I oh, he's just said all of these amazing things?
And he's like, it's like it's like it's like it's like it's like and he's thinking of the most beautifully or, the most beautifully the most beautiful scene he can think of. And he's like, it's like it's like it's like a bridegroom. It suddenly comes to him. Can you see can you see that thought in his mind right there? He's like, between the period and the I, he's thinking.
He's thinking. He's thinking. What is it like? How can I describe this further to you? How can I add some more color, some more detail?
And then it it hits him. I'm like a bridegroom dressed for his wedding or a bride, not just a bride, not just a bride on her wedding day, not just in her dress, but the finest of accoutrement, the bride's jewels. This is how Isaiah pictures his salvation with the lord. This is the invitation for us today to to grab a hold of and to imagine what god has done for us. And so, remember I told you there's there's one more question for you.
So, let me check back in with you as we start to land the plane this morning. How do you see that you could put that verse back up, T one more time, sorry. How do you see Sukkot connecting to that verse? And it's specifically about the second part of what we're talking about today. Last week was resting.
What do you see? Oh, I love it because you're thinking. You're thinking. You're considering. You're engaging with the text.
Yes. When
I see this, when he says he has dressed me with the clothing of salvation, we're talking about him like providing for us and like say, like preparing us for salvation and for this wedding. I feel like he's inviting us into his family. Like a wedding is uniting two people and like making a family bigger. So, when I read this, I think of him as inviting us into his family and when you're part of that family, you get to do all the fun family traditions.
Yes, that's great. I love it. I love it. I love it. There are few more hands but Maddie G, let me just say say say this.
This is part of, yeah, we'll just hold hold on so we can land a plane. You're so awesome. Just come tell me afterwards. This is what gives us cause to celebrate. Last week, we ceased from striving, from trying to earn.
This week, we get to celebrate the fact that we have been invited into his family and that we get to experience joy unspeakable. That's what that's one of the things that makes you Christians so weird. Is that despite the circumstances that are going on at your job and in your life and in your health and with your family and with your finances, We have overwhelming joy because we've ceased from trying to earn it on our own and we get to celebrate that god has clothed us in salvation And if you haven't invited Jesus into your heart and you've not been invited into his family, the invitation is open. Fall to your knees. Repent of your sin.
Invite Jesus to be your savior, to be the leader of your life. The Bible says that he'll come and take residence within your heart. He'll remove your heart of stone and give you a brand new soft heart and then, that's what gives you cause and reason to celebrate. Prayed a prayer of blessing over you. Okay.
Before I start to pray, I wanna let you know if there's anything else that you need prayer for. Lanisha, remember, and members of her prayer team would love to pray with you and for you back here right underneath this moose. That is so great. Underneath the moose, you can receive prayer for anything that you need and next week, we're gonna be at the TMC. If you get the tribe text blast, you'll know where that is.
We'll send you more information about that. We'll do two services so we can squeeze us all into the TMC. Lord Jesus, thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you. I send my spirit out to walk in and among your tribe fam right now to touch them on the shoulders one more time, Lord, to impart and to command a blessing over their life. Thank you, lord for being so good to us. We love you.
We love you. We love you, Jesus. I command a blessing over my tribe fam. God, give them a great week of encountering you. We pray these things in Jesus name, the strong son of god and everybody said, amen.
I love you. Lord, help us to fill our freezers full of meat this fall. Have a great week and remember, you got this, Aaron.
Topics
Celebrating GodClothed In RighteousnessFeast Of SukkotHearing From GodResting In SalvationSpiritual Atmosphere
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