Celebrating the biblical feasts is often a bone of contention within the Church.  Should Christians celebrate the biblical holidays?  Should they (we) not?  Whether we believe Christians are obligated to keep the feasts, obligated to avoid the feasts, or free to either celebrate or not celebrate, our reasoning should be based on Scripture, not tradition, comfort zone, or personal preference.

In our family, we believe the feasts are richly beneficial, and that it’s preferable to keep them, as a means of both honoring God and blessing ourselves, but that they are not a means or requirement for right standing before God, any more than any other behaviors make us right with God.  This post will not aim to be a comprehensive argument for our position, but I do want to address a series of points where we frequently encounter objections.

They’re God’s Feasts

Perhaps the most fundamental point is that these are God’s feasts.  Christians often think of them as “Jewish holidays,” relegate them to Israel, and think they have nothing to do with us in the New Covenant, but the Bible doesn’t present them that way.  Leviticus 23 begins:

“And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying,  ‘Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: ‘The feasts of the LORD, which you shall proclaim to be holy convocations, these are My feasts.'”

Did you catch that?  God called them “My feasts.” “The feasts of Yahweh.”

Israel was told to keep them, but they weren’t “Israel’s.” They were — and are — His.

The Feasts Are Not Part of the System of Sacrifices

Although some of the feasts do include elements of sacrifice or offering — and the Day of Atonement is closely interlinked with the sacrificial system — as a group, the primary function of the feasts was never right standing before God.

They were part of the law that was to be obeyed, yes — just as refraining from murder and covetousness and honoring parents were — but they did not, even under the Sinaitic system, provide a substitute for sin.  (The Day of Atonement being an exception but, again, we’re talking about the feasts as a group.)

Passover was, from an Old Covenant perspective, a feast of remembrance.  Early and Latter Firstfruits and Sukkot were feasts of Thanksgiving.  Just to name a few.  The point is, each individual holiday had its own particular function and, as a series, the function was not, at any point, to serve as substitutes for human sin and maintain right standing before God.

We Are Grafted In

The Church is not a replacement for Israel; the Church is part of Israel.  God did not scrap His “first people” and take on a “new people.” There is, and always has been, one single “people of God,” and the New Testament Church consists primarily of Gentiles who were graciously grafted in.  Consider Romans 11:

“For if the firstfruit is holy, the lump is also holy; and if the root is holy, so are the branches.  And if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive tree, were grafted in among them, and with them became a partaker of the root and fatness of the olive tree, do not boast against the branches. But if you do boast, remember that you do not support the root, but the root supports you.

You will say then, ‘Branches were broken off that I might be grafted in.’  Well said. Because of unbelief they were broken off, and you stand by faith. Do not be haughty, but fear. For if God did not spare the natural branches, He may not spare you either. Therefore consider the goodness and severity of God: on those who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness, if you continue in His goodness. Otherwise you also will be cut off. And they also, if they do not continue in unbelief, will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. For if you were cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, who are natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree?”  (vv. 16-24)

There’s only one olive tree here.  There isn’t an “old olive tree” and a “new olive tree.” There’s just one tree that has original branches, grafted-in branches, and (sadly) broken-off branches.

There is “neither Jew nor Greek”; we’re all heirs together.  God has one family, one tree, one law.  He’s One Bridegroom with one Bride.  He is the same yesterday, today, and forever — and what pleases Him has never fundamentally changed.

A Family Guide to the Biblical Holidays: With Activities for All AgesCelebrating Biblical Feasts: In Your Home or ChurchCelebrating Jesus in the Biblical Feasts: Discovering Their Significance…A Christian Guide to the Biblical FeastsGod’s Appointed Times: A Practical Guide For Understanding and Celebrating…

The Biblical Feasts Are Shadows

I mentioned that Passover was a feast of remembrance.  It’s possible you balked at that, because you recognize that Passover pointed to Christ.  This is also true!  In one sense, Passover pointed (and points) back to God’s provision in Egypt, but it also pointed forward, toward Christ.  All of the feasts pointed to Christ in one way or another.  Some in one way and another, as they’re multi-layered!

And some Christians have suggested that celebrating the biblical feasts necessarily undermines what Christ has done, by focusing on the Old Testament era and failing to give attention to the work of Christ that they pointed to.  The New Testament doesn’t seem to view them that way, though.

“So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ.” (Colossians 2:16-17)

Did you catch that?  Paul said these things are a shadow of things to come.  Not that they were a shadow.  Although clearly at least some of the feasts have been at least partially fulfilled through Christ’s first coming, the Apostle Paul seems to view them as less than fully fulfilled — and still shadows that point us to Christ as the substance.

Celebrating the Biblical Feasts As Christians

What makes celebrating the biblical feasts different for us as Christians is that we recognize not only the shadow, but also the substance.  Far from denying the substance by engaging with the shadows, we grow in our appreciation for the substance by using the shadows to help learn its shape.

Everything about this earthly life is a shadow.  That’s how God operates.

We don’t stop marrying because Christ has redeemed His Bride; we seek to enter into marriages that honor God, and so learn about (and display) His love for His Church.

We don’t stop having physical children because we can make disciples; we bear (and/or sometimes adopt) and train up children, and in so doing, we learn about (and display!) God’s fatherhood.

We don’t stop sowing grain or planting vineyards or eating or building or any of a thousand other things because they’re merely shadows.  We engage in these everyday activities, and as we do, we learn things about God and His character and His Kingdom through their earthly shadows.  The more closely we engage in any given area, the more fully we understand the characteristics that specific area reflects.

Those who write stories more intimately understand God as Author.  Those who raise sheep more intimately understand God as Shepherd.  Those who tend grapevines more intimately understand God as the Vinedresser — and the Vine.

And the rich object lessons God established as His feasts provide opportunities for those who engage with them to more intimately understand and learn to appreciate the spiritual realities to which those physical celebrations point.  Christ our Passover.  Christ the Firstfruits.  Watching and waiting for the trumpet to sound.  Christ dwelling — tabernacling — among us (temporarily at His First Coming and permanently at the Second).  Order and rest.  Etc.

We need not set aside the feasts because their substance is real any more than we need to abandon baptism or the Lord’s Supper because the substance they signify is real.  We need only to appreciate that they are shadows, and use them to point us to the Substance, rather than seeing them as ends in themselves.

Read more about:

• Passover
• Firstfruits
• Shavuot/Feast of Weeks/Latter Firstfruits
• Day of Trumpets/Yom Teruah/Rosh Hashanah
• Day of Atonement/Yom Kippur
• Feast of Tabernacles/Sukkot

• Purim
• Hanukkah