First Fruits

• And Yahuwah spoke to Moses, saying, "Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: 'When you come into the land which I give to you, and reap its harvest, then you shall bring a sheaf of the firstfruits of your harvest to the priest. He shall wave the sheaf before Yahuwah, to be accepted on your behalf; on the day after the Sabbath the priest shall wave it. . . . You shall eat neither bread nor parched grain nor fresh grain until the same day that you have brought an offering to your Elohim; it shall be a statute forever throughout your generations in all your dwellings.'" Leviticus 23:9-11, 14, NKJV

Before the children of Israel were to harvest their barley in the spring (the first month of the year), they were to bring a thank-offering which the priest would wave before Yahuwah in grateful acknowledgement of the One who had given them the harvest. Only after this ceremony of gratitude were they to harvest their fields. The offerings brought were not just limited to a sheaf of grain. Someone who had, the year before, sheared an abundance of wool from his sheep could bring a bale of wool as a thank-offering. Nor were the women left out. A woman could bring a piece of cloth she had embroidered or some other gift as an expression of gratitude to the great Gift Giver.

Yahuwah did not need the gratitude of the people. After all, "He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust." (Matthew 5:45) This ceremony was for the benefit of the people. As they paused in the busy course of life to acknowledge the many blessings their loving Heavenly Father had showered upon them, their hearts would fill with gratitude. Yahuwah knew His people needed to recognize His goodness because only by love is love awakened. When, in gratitude, they saw His love for them, love would be awakened in their own hearts for Him and trust would lead them to depend on Him in whom was centered their every happiness.

First Fruits was also to inspire faith in the Promised One to come. While Passover pointed forward to Messiah's death, First Fruits pointed to His triumph: His resurrection! Had the Saviour in any way broken the divine law, He could not have been resurrected after His crucifixion, "for the wages of sin is death." (Romans 6:23) The fact that He lived a perfect life and was the perfect sacrifice guaranteed His resurrection on First Fruits.

Paul clearly understood this concept when he stated: "But now Yahushua is risen from the dead, and has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep." (1 Corinthians 15:20, NKJV) The Saviour was the "first fruit" of all who have died loving Yahuwah and who will be raised back to life at the Second Coming. Just as the harvest followed the First Fruit offering, so the multitude of the redeemed who have died will be the harvest at the end of the world. "But each one in his own order: Yahushua the firstfruits, afterward those who are . . . [His] at His coming." (1 Corinthians 15:23, NKJV)

First Fruits also points forward to the 144,000 - those who, through full surrender, have the image of Yahuwah perfected in them through faith in Yahushua.

• And I looked, and, lo, a Lamb stood on the mount Sion, and with Him an hundred forty and four thousand, having His Father's name written in their foreheads . . . These are they which follow the Lamb withersoever He goeth. These were redeemed from among men, being the first fruits unto Elohim and to the Lamb. (Revelation 14:1, 4, KJV)

These are they who will be translated to Heaven without seeing death. They are accounted as "first fruits" because the mystery of Elohim is finished in this demonstration of divine grace: that fallen human beings, through faith in the merits of the Saviour's atoning blood, may be made partakers of the divine nature, transformed into the very image of the Creator.