JESUS, THE RED HEIFER
by charles h.
clever
Contrary to that suggested by Upper Room tourist
attractions in Jerusalem, the scriptures testify that Jesus actually conducted
the Last Supper in Bethany.
After this, He fulfilled the Red Heifer predictions of the Old Testament,
and todays popular speculations of Israel’s new prophetic role were previously
fulfilled.
He substituted
the yearly Passover-lamb ritual with bread and wine in Bethany, then Jesus became the atypical Red Heifer
4
in the Garden of Gethsemane (Hebrew: oil
press) that permitted humanities purification. After fulfilling the Red Heifer
prediction, from there He was soon led to die at Calvary.
Matthew tells of Jesus' last full meal – a Sabbath
day's journey from Jerusalem.
1
It was in Bethany at Simon the Leper's house.2
There Jesus indicates where they would eat the Passover, "And He said, Go into
the city . . . " (Matthew 26:18).
Observe that
Jesus did not instruct them to walk nearly three miles to the Garden of
Gethsemane, on the west side of the Mount of Olives and located in the Kidron
valley – and then to Jerusalem. They were at Simon's and would eat a
new Passover in a house in the city
of Bethany – then considered a suburb of Jerusalem. That was within the legal
Sabbath-days walking distance.
1
How can we know
Jesus did not keep the Last Supper in Jerusalem?
Because John was there and testifies of their departure from the Last
Supper to the Mount of Olives garden outside the East Wall of Jerusalem: "Jesus
said these things and went out with His disciples across the
Brook Cedron [Kedron], to a place where there was a garden, where He and
His disciples entered" (John 18:1).
Jesus had just prayed, "I am no more in the
world", yet His disciples did not comprehend they were escorting the real
"Passover lamb" to Jerusalem – abolishing that symbolic festival. There, Jesus
is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.
3
They pass the
southern edge of the Mount of Olives15
and continue the journey to the entrance
of Gethsemane on the west side of that mountain. They disbelieve when Jesus says
they will soon deny Him. This is not far from the
East Wall of Jerusalem – nearby Jesus
would be captured with the assistance of Judas; then led for trial, abuse, and
then sacrificed at Golgotha (Hebrew: skull).
The Garden of
Gethsemane was probably shaded with tall cedar trees, then serving as a
resting place for travelers or to meet
and exchange news outside Jerusalem – Jesus is there to fulfill the Old
Testament red-heifer sacrifice.4
They walk briskly and crossed the Brook
Kedron in the valley separating Bethany from Jerusalem. That brook received
drainage from the temple area where, according to the first-century Jewish
historian Josephus, more than 250,000 sacrificed Passover animals were killed
each year.
5
Jesus knew that
discharge of blood represented His sacrificial offering as the Lamb of God.
He previously implemented a substitute
reminder – bread and wine – to commemorate God's internal presence, "as oft as
ye drink it, in remembrance of me", representing the sacrificed–and victorious–
"Christ in you, the hope of glory."
6
But first Jesus must, in the Garden of Gethsemane,
represent humanity – where He "who knew no sin became sin for us."
7
Other sacrifices
were male and offered within Jerusalem, but Jesus is here depicted as feminine,
the Red Heifer,
8
representing God's saved people, "I have likened the daughter of Zion to a
comely and delicate woman" (Jeremiah 6:2).
Moses and Solomon puzzled over the burnt Red Heifer offering with its red cloak,
cedar wood, herbal hyssop and water;
9
4
Apostle Paul
knew, "the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the
purifying of the flesh" (Hebrews 9:13).
Judicial rules
require witnesses for death sentencing and God required this to convict Jesus:
"At the mouth of two witnesses, or three witnesses, shall he that is worthy of
death be put to death" (Deuteronomy 17:6 ).9
Of course
Jesus knew this, and the red heifer was sacrificed
"outside the camp"
– outside Jerusalem –
so He, leaving all but three disciples, enters the garden area with His
witnesses, Peter, James, and John.
10
There He must
finalize His commitment as the sin–bearer through prayers of dedication as God
withdrew His presence, then placing humanities sins on Him who knew no sin. This
assignment of guilt made Jesus guilty and subject to the death penalty as a
transgressor of God's laws.
Three times, as a human who the Bible calls
the last Adam, Jesus says He would
drink the baptism of death. In
greatest agony, blood seeped from His pores (hematohydrosis) and stained His
garment red – Jesus' red skin and garment then typified the red-colored heifer
whose purifying sacrifice justifies the defiled.
Let our
imagination look to a cloud above where God once spoke, "This is my beloved son,
in whom I am well pleased, hear ye Him" (Matthew 17:5).
Now the Father utters the words,
This is my Son, guilty of humanities sins and He is now condemned and sentenced
to death by crucifixion as the vilest criminal.
Understanding
divine love, we know the Father gave His only begotten Son for us. As Jesus
utters "Thy will be done" the third time, we visualize Jesus further fulfilling
the red-heifer prophecy by plucking hyssop from the ground to cleanse His bloody
torso. We watch Gabriel, who God sends to strengthen Jesus. He is lying prostate
on the ground and receives supernatural strength to endure further assaults; the
Bible records, Jesus was strengthened by an angel.
11
Hyssop is a
sponge-like herb used for ritualistic cleansing with blood. It was also burned
with a red garment, cedar, the red heifer, then all pulverized for combining
with cleansing water to purify anything defiled.
12
Those sinister
moments in the Garden of Gethsemane marked a legal fulfillment – the suffering
Messiah is the "Son of Man" – the culpable Sin–Bearer and must be executed as
humanities substitute on Calvary.
3
He is also the Lamb,
representing God's dying for us.3
When people visit
the alleged Upper Room in Jerusalem located over King David's tomb, let them
contemplate the true cost of their redemption that fully materialized
after Bethany's Last Supper.
Let them recall
that Jesus walked across the blood-stained Brook Kedron (Hebrew,
qadhar:
black river) to
complete His mission as the purifying Red Heifer – and then led to Calvary as
the sacrificial Lamb of God.
Let them
contemplate the great I AM on His
last moonlit Passover journey across the Kedron Valley with its pungent odor of
stagnating blood.
Yes, Jesus knew it
represented what He faced: His blood, shed in Golgotha, and also from His pores
as He, burning in agony, becomes red
with blood and
perspiration, all pre-figured by the
red heifer offering.
Jesus also
knew blood would spill from His pierced side. This, after He was led like a red
heifer to the Golgotha "slaughter house." There, He was also "lifted up like the
saving bronze serpent – symbolizing the guilty sinner He
became."
He knew
this all ratified the commitment He made before the foundation of the world was
set.13
He knew His gift for humanity, that His
sacrificial blood satisfied the wrath of God against sin and He was well
pleased,
14
"For He [the Father] hath made Him [Jesus, to be] sin for us, who knew no sin;
that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him" (2 Corinthians 5:21).
-----------------
Credits:
1: Bihop K. C. Pillai. "A Sabbath-Day's Journey"
http://www.biblecustoms.org/bishop-kc-pillai/orientalisms-by-verse/new-testament/acts-1-12-a-sabbath-day-s-journey.
Accessed 25 June, 2018
2: Mark
14:3
3: John 17:11; John 1:29; Isaiah 53:10; Ellen G. White,
Testimonies Vol. 4 (1876-1881) p
120.4).
4: Numbers 19:2-10
5: Josephus (Jewish
Wars 6.9.3)
http://www.askelm.com/temple/t050115.htm. Accessed 25 September,
2018.
6. Colossians 1:27; 1 Corinthians 11:25, 26.
7: 2 Corinthians 5:21
8.
Epistle of Barnabas 8:1
9.
Mélbourne O Banion. The Law of the Red Heifer. April 2005.
https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1041&context=studiaantiqua.
Accessed 25 September, 2018
10: Matthew 26:37
11: Luke
22:40-46
12: Exodus 12:22
13: Revelation 13:8
14: Isaiah 53:10
15: Matthew 26:30-35
----------------------------
(c) September 9, 2018 --
posted on Facebook: Charles H. Clever,
and the Internet at:
http://red.heifer.html
----------------------------
Only one part of the
Bible is sealed "until the end of the days." Read Daniel 12
and wonder -- what is the "key" to unlock these encoded scriptures.
Then open it using a
last-day key represented by the
Hebrew word for day -- YOM. The opened message
will do more than identify the Messiah, or the Abomination of Desolation He
warns us of, but it defines the precise boundaries of this cosmic conflict. That
is when Eden is restored and Planet Earth becomes the Capitol of the Universe:
English:
http://revelado.org/thetimeoftheend.pdf
In Spanish:
http://revelado.org/spanish.htm
Arabic:
http://revelado.org/arabic.pdf
--------------------------------
*
Jesus’ birthday may be accurately calculated using Jewish festivals which
fulfill precisely.
Jesus was born during the Feast of Tabernacles which is one of
three “memorials” that the Old Testament indicates will be kept throughout
eternity when Earth is restored.
Calculate this significant event and take an imaginary trip with the author to
God’s eternal Kingdom:
http://revelado.org/jesus.birthday.html