Therefore
let us not judge one another anymore, but rather resolve this, not to put a
stumbling block or a cause to fall in our brother's way. What I am emphasizing
is the error of vain and false worship, to avoid people from giving to Satan
the honor and glory which should only go to the Lord.
So
then, since we know what time Jesus Christ´s body was placed in the heart of
the earth, it should not be difficult to determine the precise time of His
resurrection, because the one and only sign that He gave to prove that He was indeed
the Messiah is that, He would spend three days and three nights in the heart of
the earth. Therefore, the precise time He was placed in the heart of the earth,
is the precise time that He resurrected from the dead after spending three days
and three nights.
Remember,
when Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb before the dawn
of the first day of the week while it was still dark, they were greeted by an
angel who said to them; “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 Him at the first instance because 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, they came to Him,
clasped His feet and worshiped Him. (Matthew 28:8-10; John
20:10-18).
Now
consider this for a moment, if Jesus Christ was placed in the tomb when the
evening had come, and as it began to dawn towards the first day of the week
when the women went to the tomb, Jesus Christ was no longer in the tomb, He was
already raised from the dead, signifying that, Sunday which is the first day of
the week is in no way 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 which is
the Friday night and one day which is Saturday in the tomb, and this would
consider Him to be an impostor, because He would not have risen as He said which
is three days and three nights and thus not fulfilling His only miraculous sign
to prove His Messiah ship.
Now
consider this again, if the day which followed the Preparation Day, the High
day Sabbath was the weekly Sabbath
(Saturday), 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 in the night after the Sabbath before 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 which is the High Day Sabbath which followed the crucifixion 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 (Saturday), 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 the
High Day Sabbath, the second day was Friday, the preparation day for the weekly
Sabbath, the day the women bought and prepared spices and ointments, and the
third day was the Saturday the weekly Sabbath, and at the end of the weekly Sabbath,
precisely the same time Jesus Christ was placed in the tomb, He 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? Are you one of those who believe in a Good Friday crucifixion and an Easter Sunday resurrection? When Jesus Christ was not crucified on a Friday, nor was He resurrected on a Sunday. The choice is yours.
With brotherly love
Lucius Joseph
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