Are we worshiping the true Messiah (part two)

 Since the sign was a test sign to prove that Jesus was indeed the Messiah, anything short or beyond the stipulated three days and three nights would render him a hoax and an impostor.

After Jesus Christ was resurrected from the dead, on the road to Emmaus which is about seven miles from Jerusalem, two of His disciples were talking with each other about everything that happened. As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus Himself came up and walked along with them; but they were kept from recognizing Him.

He asked them, “What are you discussing together as you walk along?” After relating all what happened to Jesus Christ, they said, “And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place” (Luke 24:13-28).

At the precise time of Christ’s resurrection, which was hall-marked by a violent earthquake, for an angel of the Lord came down from heaven and going to the tomb, rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothes were white as snow.

The angel said to the Mary Magdalene and the other Mary who went to look at the tomb, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. He is not here; He has risen, just as He said. Come and see the place where He lay” (Matthew 28:1-6).

 To get to the crux of the matter, we need to confirm and establish the time that Christ was placed in the tomb? According to all the four gospels, Jesus Christ was placed in the tomb by Joseph of Arimathea accompanied by Nicodemus when the evening had come, or as the Sabbath drew near (Matthew 27:57; Mark 15:42; Luke 23:54; John 19:42).

According to Luke’s gospel, Joseph went to Pilate and asked for Jesus’ body. Then he took it down, wrapped it in linen cloth and placed it in a tomb cut in the rock, one in which no one had yet been laid. It was the Preparation day, and the High Day Sabbath drew near.”

Since we know what time He was placed in the heart of the earth, the other important question is, what time was Christ resurrected from the dead?

According to the gospel of Matthew, “After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb. There was a violent earthquake, for an angel of the Lord came down from heaven and, going to the tomb, rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothes were white as snow.

The guards were so afraid of him that they shook and became like dead men. The angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. He is not here; He has risen, just as He said. Come and see the place where He lay” (Matthew 28:1-6).

Mary Magdalene was still outside the tomb crying, when Jesus met her. She was not allowed to touch Jesus at the first instance. Jesus said to her, “Do not hold on to Me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them. I am returning to My Father and your Father, to My God and to your God.

Later on that same day when Jesus met them and they came to Him, clasped His feet and worshiped Him. (Matthew 28:8-10; John 20:10-18).

If Christ was placed in the tomb when the evening had come, and at the dawn of the first day of the week when the women went to the tomb, He was no longer in the tomb, He was already raised from the dead, signifying that, Sunday, the first day of the week is not associated with the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Now, if the Sabbath which followed His death was Saturday, the weekly Sabbath as commonly taught and assumed, then, Jesus Christ only spent one night – Friday night, and one day – Saturday in the tomb, and this would consider Him to be an impostor, because He would not have risen as He said and thus not fulfilling His only miraculous sign to prove His Messiah ship.

If the day which followed the Preparation Day was the weekly Sabbath, and the Jews and the women who followed Jesus Christ rested on the Sabbath Day according to the commandments, and it is stated that, “The next day, the one after Preparation Day, the chief priests and the Pharisees went to Pilate and said, “Sir, we remembered how that impostor said, while He was still alive, ‘After three days I will rise again.’ Therefore order the sepulcher to be made secure until the third day, lest His disciples go and steal Him away, and tell the people, He has risen from the dead,’ and the last fraud will be worse than the first.”

Pilate said to them, “You have a guard of soldiers; go, make it as secure as you can.” So they went and made the sepulcher by sealing the stone and setting a guard” (Matthew 27:62-66).

If the day which followed the crucifixion, or the High Day Sabbath was the weekly Sabbath – Saturday, on which both the chief priests and the Pharisees rested, what time did they go to Pilate  and receive the orders to make the tomb secure as they knew how, by putting a seal on the stone, and posting the Guard?

It would have to be “After the Sabbath toward the dawn of the first day of the week, exactly the same time when the angel of the Lord rolled back the stone and sat on it. But ironically, if the Friday crucifixion has any merit, it tends to suggest that guards were already posted by the tomb even before the orders were given, because the guards who were guarding the tomb were so afraid of the angel, that they shook and became like dead men?

So then, what is the truth of the matter? The irony of truth is, the High Day Sabbath which followed the crucifixion and the Jewish Passover was the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread which according to the scriptures, the Passover lamb was killed at twilight, at the going down of the sun, and eaten with unleavened bread, and as they have been instructed saying; “So you shall observe the Feast of Unleavened Bread, for on this same day I will have brought your armies out of the land of Egypt. Therefore you shall observe this day throughout your generations as an everlasting ordinance” (Exodus 12:6, 14-17).

On that day the chief priests, the Pharisees, and the women who followed Christ and His disciples rested. “When the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome, bought and prepared spices and ointments, so that they might go and anoint Him” (Mark 16:1).

It was also after the High Day Sabbath that the chief priests and the Pharisees went to Pilate and said to him, “Sir, we remembered how that impostor said, while He was still alive, ‘After three days I will rise again.’ And Pilate gave them the permission to secure the tomb as best as they can.

Then, on Saturday, the day after the women bought and prepared the spices and ointment, they rested on the Sabbath according to the commandment. (Luke 23:56).

Then after the (Weekly) Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, meaning that, it was not yet the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb, and behold there was a great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone, and sat upon it (Matthew 28:1-2).

Therefore, Jesus Christ fulfilled the Messianic sign precisely as He foretold: He spent exactly three days and three nights in the heart of the earth: The first night was the night He was placed in the tomb on the preparation of the High Day Sabbath, the night of the Passover, which was on a Wednesday: The second night was Thursday, the end of the High Day Sabbath and the third night was the Friday.

The first day was Thursday, the day light part of Feast of Unleavened which was a Sabbath, the second day was Friday, the preparation day for the weekly Sabbath, and the third day was the Saturday the weekly Sabbath, and at the end of the weekly Sabbath, precisely the same time He was placed in the tomb, Christ was resurrected.

This amazing truth has eluded the minds of those who have rejected the annual festivals of the Lord. Had they not rejected these festivals they would have known that Jesus Christ our Passover was crucified for us exactly on the day of the Jewish Passover.

The only difference was that Jesus ate the Passover with His disciples on the night before the fourteenth day, instead of the night of the Passover, since He as the real Passover had to die at the precise time of the evening sacrifice. So He partook of it with His disciples before He died, and instituted the New Covenant of His blood for the remission of sins.

The Feast of Unleavened Bread should still be observed by Christians today, because the apostle Paul admonished us saying, “Your glorying is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven (typical of sin) leavens the whole lump? Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover was crucified for us: Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth” (1 Corinthians 5:6-8).

The question now remains, whom are you worshiping! Are you worshiping a false Messiah, a hoax, an impostor who only spent a night and a day in the heart of the earth, or are you worshiping the true Messiah, who spent three nights and three days in the heart of the earth as He said He would?