The last part of the ceremonial year represented a workthat would take place further on in time, when Godwould do a great work of judging the dead andcleansing his living people and preparing them forheaven.

The last feasts that would be fulfilled would have to befulfilled in the time when there was no earthly sanctuaryon earth. The last feast would take place at the end ofearth's history when God would do a final work toprepare a people to experience what was called theFeast of Tabernacles, in the New Jerusalem.

FALL CEREMONIES - 7th monthTHE FEAST OF TRUMPETSTHE DAY OF ATONEMENTTHE FEAST OF TABERNACLES

These feasts began with the feast of trumpets,sounding the warning that God's judgment day wassymbolically coming. Second, the Day ofAtonement, or the Day of Judgment. Atonementmeans at-one-ment, the day when God and manwould be unified forever. Next would be the Feast ofTabernacles pointing to when the redeemed wouldbe given eternal life.

The Day of Atonement was also known as the'Cleansing of the Sanctuary'. This is a veryimportant service and pointed forward to the Timewhen God's Judgment of all who had ever claimedto be His people would begin. Later in theprophecies of Daniel, the date when this wouldbegin was told.

"And he said unto me, Unto two thousand andthree hundred days; then shall the sanctuary becleansed." Daniel 8:14

When this is figuredout, (Daniel 8,9) itcomes to 1844. (457BC-1844 AD) At thattime a special work ofjudging the professedpeople of God wouldbegin. Jesus wouldpass into the Most HolyPlace of the HeavenlySanctuary.

It is interesting that the Prophetic book of Danielpoints out the coming Judgment and much ofRevelation is telling about the events surroundingthis Judgment. In these two books you see oneperfect picture even though they were writtencenturies apart! And behind it all, the great object-lesson of the Sanctuary and its services runsthrough to tie it all together for those that truly seekto understand!"Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary: who is so

great a God as our God?" Psalms 77:13

Ten days before the Day ofAtonement—the Day ofJudgment—the Day ofSealing; trumpets wereblown throughout the entireland of Palestine. Throughouthills and valleys, thetrumpets could be heardechoing through the valleys,and from mountaintop tomountaintop. And the peoplestopped whatever they weredoing.

Even the individual who wasleast concerned about hissalvation knew that at thattime he had to dropeverything, and be sure tohave his sacrifices finishedand all of his sins confessedand in that sanctuary. He onlyhad ten days to do this heart-searching work.

The blowing of the trumpetsignified God's loud call torepentance. Since thisseventh month closes up theyear's work in connection withthe sanctuary service, andwith the harvest, howappropriate for the trumpet toblow that the people shouldturn their attention more to thethings of God, and prepare forthe final work. Hence, this ismade one of the most sacreddays to the Jews.

They also teach that onthis day, three sets ofbooks are opened; theBook of Life to examinethe good deeds of thepeople, the Book ofDeath to examine theevil deeds, and a sort ofintermediary book, toexamine into accountsof those whose casesare to be decided on theDay of Atonement, tendays later. The ten daysfollowing this Sabbathday are called the TenDays of Repentance.

Even the most careless and indifferentduring these days devotes his time tothe service of God, and seeks forpreparation of heart that when theDay of Atonement arrives he mayreceive a seal of life for the year tocome, symbolizing the seal of God'scharacter forever.

The people put everything aside.They knew that this was their lastchance of the year to purify theirhearts and their lives, and then asthat tenth day dawned, theygathered their families around thesanctuary. They were all there.This was the most important dayin the year. Any Israelite, or non-Israelite that believed in theworship of the True God, whofailed to be there on the Day ofAtonement, were cut off fromIsrael and symbolically lostforever.

A Prophetic day equals ayear in real time. In 1833the ‘Falling of the Stars’occurred, and 10 yearsbefore 1844, the preachingof the message of Daniel8:14 began in real earnest.For centuries, this bookhad been 'sealed', but now,as the time came for thatlast great time prophecy tocome to its end, all overthe world, interest sprangup in the study of the timeprophecies of Daniel!

On the Great day ofAtonement, the only one thatwas to minister in the sanctuaryon that day was the high priest.He would enter the MOSTHOLY PLACE of the sanctuaryto do a special work.. This wasthe only time in the year whenanyone could enter there. Firsthe had to do a work forhimself—

He had to do a special work of purifyinghimself. If he was impure when he wentinto that sanctuary, he would die. So allaround the base of his robe the Lord haddirected that he was to put pomegranates,and between the pomegranates, bells sothat as he walked, they could hear thosebells tinkling through the sanctuary. Thecongregation were holding on by faith towhat was being done by the high priest;this purification that was to take place intheir lives by faith. They listened to thetinkling of the bells, and followed himthrough his work in the sanctuary. If thosebells stopped for very long, they wereterrified that their high priest may haveperished before the Lord.

The first thing that the high priest would have to do onthis special Day of Atonement; the Day of Judgment;was to take extra incense, and the portable incenseburner (the Censer) and fill it with incense so thatsmoke began to billow out of it. He walked through theHoly Place of the sanctuary, and there with this incensein his hand, adding it to the fire, and the incense burnerin the other, he walked up to the curtain that he had notentered all year long, into that room where glowed thatmysterious, supernatural light.

He went over to the edge ofthat curtain, and put his elbowin, pushing it aside, so sendinga cloud of smoke in before himto veil him. This veilrepresented the intercessionof Jesus Christ in our behalf.Then he walked into thatglorious room, before the Arkof the Covenant, where waskept the sacred Law of God.The Shekinah light blazed justbefore him, and he waved thatsmoke in front of him toprotect him. Then he put theincense burner down in theMost Holy Place.

He turned around now withthese gorgeous robes, andhis beautiful plate on hischest and went outside. Hetook a bull calf, and offered itas a sacrifice for himself andhis whole family, to purifytheir lives, so he couldperform this last work as a fitrepresentative of JesusChrist, our great high priest.Then he made his way backthrough the curtain, into theMost Holy, with the blood onhis fingers in one hand, andthe bowl of blood in theother.

Now the room was filled withsmoke, representing the finalintercession of Jesus in theselast days in our behalf. Hewalked up to the Ark, walkedaround it, and for the first time,turned and faced the east. Heplaced the blood on the MercySeat below that glowingShekinah, the glory of the infiniteGod. This turning around andfacing the east symbolized theend of mediation. If he did notdie, it showed that God acceptedthe sacrifice in his behalf, and hecould carry on the work in behalfof the sanctuary and the people.

Then he went out and hisgarments were completelychanged. He was not allowedto touch his own garments. Hehad to have his garments takenoff for him, and the newgarment, a plain, white linenephod placed on him. His hat,undergarments, everything waschanged. Now he representedthat he was not his own man;he was fulfilling the symbolismof doing the work of Christ, andhe was to have no part in that.He represented Jesus alone.

There were two goatsthat had been chosenand were tied justoutside the curtain ofthe sanctuary, waitingthrough all this for theirpart in this last finalsymbol of restoringunion between God,and man, and the endof sin.

1: The High Priest in these new white robes, wentout and they cast lots over the two goats. One waschosen to be the Lord's goat, and the other goatwas the 'scape-goat', the one chosen to representSatan. His name was called Azazel, and even tothis day the Hebrews use the name of Azazel torepresent the devil. In spiritualism at times, youalso find that Satan uses the symbol of the goat,and the name Azazel. (2: refers to the workdescribed above where the priest makesatonement first for himself)

3: First he would take theLord's goat and he wouldNOT confess sins over thatgoat. This goat was a sinoffering. It is called a sinoffering in the Bible, but nosins were confessed over theanimal. But the throat wascut, and the blood was taken,that blood representing theSinless Life of Christ.

The first place the priesttook this blood was to thecourt where the blood hadbeen placed upon thehorns of the brazen altar,symbolizing that the sinshad been transferred tothat. He touched the hornson that alter, representingthat the sins of the peoplewere now taken off of thealtar and were carried inthis blood, representing thesacrifice of Christ. Itrepresented Jesus bearingour sins.

The priest then went intothe sanctuary, and he wentup to the horns of that littlegolden altar of incensewhere the blood had beentaken faithfully inthroughout the ceremonialyear representing thetransfer of the confessedsins into the sanctuary, andhe touched those hornswith this blood of the Lord'sgoat representing that nowthese sins that wereconfessed are borne byJesus, our Saviour.

Then he went up to the curtain where the blood wassprinkled throughout the ceremonial year, and tooksome of this blood and sprinkled it, representing thatall the sin on record in the sanctuary, was now takeninto the blood, and borne by our Saviour in the finalwork that He does for mankind.

Those sins represent the sins that are confessed,repented of and forsaken. If anyone retained sinsduring this last work of Jesus Christ, those sins willstay on them. Jesus’ work, at the end of time, is to liftthe sins that we have confessed and forsaken, andremove them from our lives forever. The great wonderof this last work of Atonement, is that we can have therecord of sin removed forever, and be as though wehad never sinned with no record of those sins!

4: But the work is not finished yet.While he is carrying all of theconfessed sins of the peoplesymbolically, he makes his wayagain into that Most Holy room, justchoking with the smell of incenseand smoke, and walks to thatglowing light. He makes his wayaround the Ark of the Covenant,and takes this blood, now bearingthese sins, and touches the goldenMercy Seat that sits above the Lawof God, below the Shekinah. If hedoes not die, the sacrifice isaccepted and he can bear thosesins away from the sanctuary.

5: Then he would go out into thecourt, take Azazel, the othergoat, that represented Satan,and the priest would place hishands over the head of thatgoat. And he would confess allthe sins that had come into thesanctuary. Symbolically, itrepresented that the sins thatpeople had confessed, had nowbeen removed from their minds,their memories, and their lives,and transferred to the mind, thememory and the life of Satan,the instigator of sin.

Azazel: The Scapegoat

6: Now that goat was taken by a fit man, a verystrong man, out into a wilderness area and therehe was left, never to return to the camp.