The Gospel of John, Crucifixion, part 16

The eleven disciples spent at least a full week in Jerusalem, which covered the entire time of Unleavened Bread. Jesus met with them as a group that first evening and then a week later.

The Law of the Wave-Sheaf

His day of resurrection and presentation to the Father occurred, as I said, on an eighth day, according to the law in Exodus 22:29, 30. In this case it was the eighth day of the week, i.e., the first day of the week, which is called Sunday. He fulfilled the wave-sheaf offering, presenting Himself to the Father while the priest waved the sheaf of barley in the temple at the third hour of the day. The law of the wave offering is found in Leviticus 23:11,

¹¹ He shall wave the sheaf before the Lord for you to be accepted; on the day after the sabbath the priest shall wave it.

The Sadducees and Pharisees disagreed in their interpretation of this law. The Pharisees taught that they were to wave the sheaf on the day after Passover, regardless of what day of the week it was. The “sabbath” to them was the day of Passover, since Passover (Abib 15) was to be a day of rest, and the sheaf was to be waved the following day, Abib 16.

However, the Sadducees taught that the sheaf was to be waved on the first Sunday after Passover, that is, the day after the first weekly Sabbath. The Sadducees were the rulers of the temple from the high priesthood of Annas until the temple was destroyed in 70 A.D. Hence, their rules applied during that time.

It happened, however, that Jesus’ resurrection took place on Sunday, Abib 16 of 33 A.D., satisfying both the Pharisees and Sadducees that year. While this made for good harmony and less grumbling that year, Jesus’ fulfillment of the feast that year did not resolve the legal question. If in some year He had been raised on a Wednesday, Abib 16, we could say definitively that the Pharisees were correct. On the other hand, if He had been raised on a Sunday, Abib 18, we could say definitively that the Sadducees were correct.

So this particular law of the wave-sheaf offering remained obscure, apart from the supportive law in Exodus 22:29, 30, which is the law of the presentation of the firstborn sons. This law demands that the firstborn must be presented on the eighth day alone, which was precisely one week after his birth.

So what actually occurred when these laws were fulfilled? First, if we do the chronological study (which is lengthy), we find that historically, Jesus was crucified in 33 A.D. precisely at the end of Daniel’s 70 weeks (490 years since 458 B.C.). He had been baptized in September of 29 A.D. on the Day of Atonement shortly after He reached the age of 30. He had ministered for 3½ years until His crucifixion in April of 33 A.D.

In that year, Passover fell on the Sabbath (Saturday, April 4), and Jesus was crucified on the Preparation Day, April 3, when Jesus was precisely 80 x 153 days old.

His resurrection was a new birth, for He was raised as a New Creation Man, no longer limited by the flesh. He then presented Himself to the Father on the third hour of the day that same morning, and this was lawful only because it was an eighth day. In this case, it was the eighth day of the week, as the Sadducees believed about the wave-sheaf offering.

The Second Presentation

But Jesus was not yet eight days old. Hence, to fulfill Exodus 22:29, 30, He presented Himself a second time a week later—again, on an eighth day—but this time to His disciples (John 20:26). In this presentation, all eleven disciples were present, and Jesus proved to them that He was indeed the Son of God who had been crucified but also raised from the dead.

Even Thomas, the skeptic, affirmed that He was indeed “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28).

This second presentation suggests also what happened the previous week when Jesus presented Himself to the Father. He showed the Father the wounds which proved His crucifixion, which were marks of honor, even as Paul considered his own scars on his back to be so in Galatians 6:17,

¹⁷ From now on let no one cause trouble for me, for I bear on my body the brand-marks of Jesus.

Just as Paul bore the “brand-marks” proving who he was in Christ, so also Jesus Himself bore the marks to prove who He was.

So we see that two weeks in a row, Jesus presented Himself as “the Firstborn of all Creation” (Colossians 1:15) and “the Firstborn from the dead” (Colossians 1:18). On Sunday, Abib 16, the eighth day of the week, He presented Himself to the Father in heaven.

On the following week, Sunday, Abib 23, on His eighth day of new life as the Firstborn from the dead, He presented Himself to His disciples—those who had been given authority as judges in the earth (Matthew 19:28; Luke 22:30; John 20:22, 23). Hence, by the law of the double witness, Jesus was officially proclaimed the Living Son of God, the Firstborn from the dead and the Firstborn of all Creation. Heaven and earth came into agreement!

Recall that the purpose of the Gospel of John was to present the “signs” by which Jesus Christ would manifest the glory of God in the earth. The idea was to bring the glory of heaven to earth and to bring them into unity, that great marriage between heaven and earth. Earth had suffered through disagreement with heaven since the sin of Adam. Christ came to restore agreement, so that He could enjoy a New Covenant marriage.

Hence, when Jesus presented Himself to those called as judges in the earth, and when they agreed with heaven’s decree, a new creation was established by the law of the double witness. While it has certainly taken a long time to work its way into the earth, we can be confident that His purpose will be fulfilled, as established by law.

The eighth sign in the Gospel of John followed these two presentations. Its purpose was to show the outworking of that which had been agreed upon earlier. As we will see, it was about learning the heavenly technique in being successful “fishers of men” (Matthew 4:19). Although both God and His authorized judges had come into agreement, there was still much work to be done to bring the rest of the world into agreement. Because of the nature of this particular sign, the disciples had to go fishing on the Sea of Galilee. Hence, the two angels gave the disciples instructions that Jesus would meet them in Galilee (Matthew 28:7).

Fellowship with Christ

There is another underlying factor that is largely hidden in the law and in the timing of these events that fulfilled the law. As we have seen earlier, the law can be obscure, such as the precise day on which to wave the sheaf of barley. The prophets clarified many of those obscurities by their own revelation, and the Gospels reveal the actual way in which the law was to be fulfilled.

The law of Unleavened Bread is another that needs some clarification, for it has to do with fellowship with Christ.

The day of Passover, Abib 15, was the first day of Unleavened Bread. Exodus 12:17, 18 says,

¹⁷ You shall also observe the Feast of Unleavened Bread, for on this very day I brought your hosts out of the land of Egypt; therefore you shall observe this day throughout your generations as a permanent ordinance. ¹⁸ In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at evening, you shall eat unleavened bread, until the twenty-first day of the month at evening.

The 14^th of Abib “at evening” means sundown, the start of Abib 15, because they were to remove leaven from their houses on Abib 14. Hence, part of Abib 14 was still leavened and could not qualify as part of the feast itself.

On the day of Jesus’ crucifixion, the people were removing leaven from their houses in preparation for sundown, the start of Abib 15, shortly after Jesus was buried by Joseph and Nicodemus. The next morning would be the anniversary of Israel’s departure from Egypt. The law dates Unleavened Bread on the very day that God brought Israel out of Egypt, Abib 15.

That day of Passover happened to fall on a Sabbath (Saturday) in 33 A.D. The following week was Unleavened Bread, from Saturday to Saturday. However, running almost concurrently with that week was the seven-week period leading to Pentecost. These weeks, however, were one day different, because the seven-week countdown to Pentecost began on the next day, Sunday.

The start of the seven-week countdown began on the day that the sheaf of barley was waved in the temple, “on the day after the Sabbath” (Leviticus 23:11).

Leviticus 23:15, 16 continues,

¹⁵ You shall also count for yourselves from the day after the sabbath, from the day when you brought in the sheaf of the wave offering; there shall be seven complete sabbaths. ¹⁶ You shall count fifty days to the day after the seventh sabbath; then you shall present a new grain offering [wheat] to the Lord.

In Jewish practice, the people took a measure (an “omer”) of barley and divided it into 49 small piles. One pile each day was counted, and they finished on the day before Pentecost. The word “omer” in Hebrew is spelled ayin, mem, resh (i.e., eye, water, head), prophesying that they were watching for “water” (the Holy Spirit) to be poured out on their heads at Pentecost.

The seven weeks started on Sunday and ended on Sunday. These “weeks” are “sabbaths” and can be translated either way. Hence, these seven “weeks” are “seven complete sabbaths,” beginning on Sunday, which was “the day after the (weekly) sabbath.” In essence, the law tells us of two sabbaths, one referring to Saturday, the other to Sunday.

The seven sabbaths leading to Pentecost were designed to prophesy (obscurely, of course) of a change in the Sabbath law that would come after Jesus’ resurrection. The seven weeks leading to Pentecost were based on Christ’s resurrection and His presentation to the Father, whereas the previous Sabbath was based on Passover, i.e., Christ’s death.

Hence, the original Sabbath began on the 15^th day of the second month, which was the Second Passover (Exodus 16:1). This was when the people began to receive manna for six days and none on the seventh. The manna cycle determined their Sabbaths and established their Sabbath calendar until the crucifixion of Christ fulfilled the feast of Passover.

Then a new era emerged, as Passover was superseded by Pentecost with its seven sabbaths that began on Sunday. In essence, we left the Passover Age and entered the Pentecostal Age, and this was characterized by a new reference point that the Sabbaths were to commemorate. The first seven sabbaths leading to Pentecost jump-started this new system, even as the manna cycles had established the original Sabbath.

For this reason, Jesus met with His disciples every eighth day (where Scripture dates it). It was meant to set the pattern where His disciples would fellowship with Jesus each Sunday from that time on. Although His meeting at the shore of Galilee was not dated, we find in the gematria the predominance of the number eight, as we will see shortly.

Early Church Practice

And so we find in the writings of the early church fathers that the vast majority of them met on Sunday. The only holdouts were those of the small Jewish sects whose fellowships were not founded by either Paul, Peter, or John. The vast majority from the beginning were agreed that they were to fellowship (partake of communion) with each other and with Christ on the first day of the week, when Jesus ate bread with them after His resurrection.

So the Didache, “Teachings” (of the Twelve Apostles), dated around 65 A.D., says, “On the Lord’s Day of the Lord, gather together and break bread and give thanks.” The Epistle of Barnabas says, “Wherefore, also, we keep the eighth day with joyfulness, the day also on which Jesus rose again from the dead” (chapter XV). Justin Martyr, who died in 165 A.D. affirms this, saying, “But Sunday is the day on which we all hold our common assembly.”

Centuries later, the Emperor Constantine legalized the day on which the Christians had been meeting for nearly three centuries. Constantine, however, did not change the day, nor did he force anyone to keep a day that they were unaccustomed to keeping. There is a lot of historical misinformation circulating in various churches in this matter. Therefore, we ought to know what the church fathers actually wrote—not the claims of modern teachers, who assume that the small Jewish communities in the first century were the true representatives of Christianity.

It is most important that we understand the purpose of counting the omer for seven “sabbaths.”