[00:00:00] Speaker A: The Bible does not say, take a tithe check and write it to the little red brick church house on the corner and give them a tenth of your money. It does say, take a tenth of your money and spend it on your family, celebrating God's festivals that does exist.
Run your home and your dough like a biblical boss.
Mark. We're entering the fall, and as we enter fall and we maybe depending on where you are, maybe you're in the beautiful northeast of the country and the leaves are turning or whatever one's mind goes to, as it would the biblical feasts. So we're going to talk about biblical feasts today, but before we do, couple thoughts from you. Anything you want to bring up? I have some things I like to bring up.
[00:00:56] Speaker B: Oh, we. We hosted a large dinner last night at the house and got to. I. I've been excited lately about how much traction the Abrahamic tent tours have been getting. Oh. On YouTube, where people have actually emailed us and said they found our podcast because of a tent tour and they liked it. But yeah, if you've seen my Abrahamic tent, not the literal tent, we'll be talking about that today. But if you've seen my home on the tour video we made, you know, we have a table that seats, I think, 26 people when it's fully unfurled.
And last night it was. We had all of the pro lifers from the Salt Lake area for a big dinner and kind of hang out and strategize time. So that was super fun.
[00:01:46] Speaker A: So this was an adult meeting, not. Not a family with kids kind of scenario.
[00:01:51] Speaker B: Right. My daughters were the only youths at the table, and boy, did they come through with dinner preparation, baking. It was.
They.
Very few things. Very few things make me feel the joy of being a proud dad. Like when my daughters make an amazing meal that everybody goes, wow, did you hire somebody to do this? And I go, no, these are my children.
I love it. That was fun.
[00:02:18] Speaker A: That's great. And did we strategize how to save babies in Utah? We figure that out.
[00:02:24] Speaker B: I mean, we're. We're making progress. We're looking at real estate. We're opening new clinics. We're basically stepping into the gap left by the evil folks over at Planned Parenthood and saying, let's take away all the excuses. Let's provide all of the health care stuff that they claim to provide. But we know that as soon as they're not allowed to do abortions, they stop operating in cities. So let's, let's go do, like, Women's health stuff and all that. So it's pretty exciting.
[00:02:54] Speaker A: Save the young girls who feel. Who feel trapped and save their babies.
Okay, so what if we got a couple of millionaires listening who are like, I give really significant checks to Abraham's wallet, but, gosh, if I could save some babies in Utah, I'd love to do that, too. How. How could people do that?
[00:03:14] Speaker B: So there's the. The place that my wife is the medical director is called the Pregnancy Resource center of Salt Lake. Actually, they just changed the name to Karis Pregnancy Clinics because they wanted to be more of a holistic, like I just said, clinic that provides all sorts of services to women who need it.
So their. Their website is Charis, which is C H a r I s-community.org and you could go there and you could see on a dashboard at their homepage, how many people did they get to pray with so far this year? How many people.
How many babies were literally being walked into Planned Parenthood that decided not to and now are with us? We've got that number up on the dashboard. Fun fact, this year, year to date, it's 199 so far. So that feels like a good, good place to invest.
[00:04:10] Speaker A: That's awesome.
[00:04:11] Speaker B: So it's a cool, cool website, even if you don't have money to give, but if you do, you'll just see a big button that says give. And you could do that.
[00:04:17] Speaker A: Great.
Well, this past weekend, I had mentioned in previous episodes that my wife and I had been counseling a couple that were going to be married. We married them off this past weekend and. And with sex on the brain and how to talk to him about his upcoming sex life.
A friend of mine mentioned to me, this is a very strange plug, but I'm gonna. I'm gonna do it. He said, when's the last time you. You listened to the Abe's Wallet sex episode? I said, I don't even know what you're talking about. He said, well, it was like six sex truths that your pastor won't tell you or something like that titled like that. So I went and found it. It was maybe six months ago or something.
I just want to say good job by us. If I can. If I can do a. If I can do a. Just thinking. I was really encouraged and edified by. By listening to that stuff because it's really good. So I would just like to recommend that episode to people. There it is.
[00:05:23] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:05:24] Speaker A: I just want to throw this in. You mentioned tent tours. I don't know. Tell me you can shut me down if you want. Mark, do you think that people.
Do you think that is discouraging or encouraging to. For people to hear the goings on in Cincinnati? If I tell all these people came in town and they are looking around or this fun thing is happening, I want it to be aspirational to kind of think of, oh, that that kind of thing could happen in my town. But I also hear from people at er, like, it makes them feel like, lonely and sad, like, well, nothing like that ever happens in Long Island.
What do you think?
[00:06:03] Speaker B: Well, first of all, I want to tell the ur guys, maybe tone it down a little bit.
Let's just be encouraged.
[00:06:13] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:06:14] Speaker B: I have not noticed any statements like that, so I guess you have. But I think even as a segue into what we're going to talk about today.
[00:06:24] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:06:24] Speaker B: If it wasn't for what's happening in Cincinnati, for sure my family would never have built Asuka.
For sure my family would never have had any idea what you were talking about when you said, what if you got like four other families to do it and you all sort of shared a party, like those types of things. You guys have such a rich community that I think that's part of your job is to be an example to us.
[00:06:50] Speaker A: Okay, that's good.
[00:06:52] Speaker B: I don't want to know so much like, you know what the fourth match that David Neubauer played on the pickleball court.
[00:07:00] Speaker A: No, no, no.
[00:07:01] Speaker B: Outcome was today. But, but I would like to know if there's something that you're like, hey, here's a mature community that has developed something and you should try it in your town. And that's. That's even what we're going to try to do today a little bit.
[00:07:14] Speaker A: Yeah. Okay. I'll throw this out there again. People have come through town, spent a couple of days kind of looking around, seeing what things happen. Going to a men's mid rash go to a. A Sabbath gathering at somebody's house and kind of getting a feel for. Okay, what, what of this could I pull off at home?
And we've got a guy coming in. He's a unique guy. One, he's an Australian. So he is coming halfway around the world to come to Cincinnati. But he's also the first disciple I ever made. Did I tell you that he. That my. That my friend Phil is coming to town?
[00:07:49] Speaker B: Mark, I don't think you told me that. But we've heard of. We've heard stories of Phil in the past.
[00:07:54] Speaker A: Yes, yes. Well, if you didn't know Australia has become, it was this rowdy place of freedom, freedom, freedom, Yosemite Sam. And it's turned into like lockdown central, where there's big government squashing everything, including the church.
And Phil's family is asking the Lord, is this the time to make a move?
So he's not just coming for a two day visit, he's coming for a three week visit to Cincinnati where he's doing all the Tory things.
He's interviewing, he has interviews lined up at about five places. And he's going to be, I think he's going to be with our, the friend of the pod, Eric Stano, doing some real estate looking around. So they're taking the trip very seriously. And I'm just excited because he's going to be here right at the end of September. He's going to be here for Yom Kippur into Sukkot. So I'm very excited about all this. So that, that leads us to a primer of Sukkot or, or the biblical feast. Your pastor never talks about Sukkot.
So, yeah, no, I'm excited to talk.
[00:09:15] Speaker B: About this because I, I don't know you and I talked a little bit about it, but recently I sat with my good friend Rabbi Jared Grover in my kitchen. He happened to be in town. It was actually a crazy story. I could tell that some other time. But he was in town and he, Jewish rabbi listens to Abraham's Wallet podcast and so shout out to Rabbi Grover.
But he actually had some questions for me about our Passover episode and well, I love that you guys are doing this. I've run into people who are Jewish who are a little offended when we do these things. He wasn't, he was not offended. But he also said, you're really not doing the things we do on some of this stuff. So it'll be interesting to kind of hear your take, Stephen, on how you started doing Sukkot. Get the, the Christ following perspective on some of these, these feasts and festivals. And then also ask like, what would it have looked like to do this a couple thousand years ago? Because I think that's a fun thing to add in. Actually, I thought Jared had a really good point. Like you just did Passover, without a doubt, deep storytelling of the Exodus. What are you doing?
And so I thought that was, that was a very interesting point to consider, but I'm looking forward to it. So let's jump into festivals.
[00:10:39] Speaker A: Okay, well, let me ask this question mark, why.
Let's think about why we do the podcast. Let's Ask this vision statement, what's the whole point of this podcast? And for the listener who flicks it on, he touches the screen. And here it comes.
What, what are we, what are we doing this for? What are we hoping to offer these guys?
[00:11:02] Speaker B: Oh, I feel like I'm failing the, the pop quiz, but I think we just want to grab a quote, anything. We want to grab a young bye bye guy by the shoulders who maybe has had limited to zero guidance on how to run a household and say, here's some tools. And the, you know, they all come from one place.
Spoiler alert. But here's what the Bible says when it comes to what fatherhood looks like. And there's a path that you can walk from the time you're 15 until the day you die that kind of is laid out. And, and it's not just ideas. There's also some specific tools, whether those be investments or biblical feasts that will actually make your, your household scene run in the way that God designed it.
[00:11:49] Speaker A: That's right. We are, to quote our little mission statement, we are trying to inspire and equip Abrahamic leaders to make their homes outposts of the kingdom.
So we're trying to give you these tools. You hear me rant about culture all the time and that I believe that a father's job is to curate a culture.
So part of a culture, any culture, is, is traditions in that culture.
What, what happens at high school football games when somebody starts playing the opening strains of the national anthem? Mark.
[00:12:30] Speaker B: Everybody stands up and puts their hand on their heart.
[00:12:32] Speaker A: There you go. That's an American tradition. That's part of being an American.
And if you just arrive from Australia, you might be going, well, what's, what's going on here? Well, there's a culture here and there are traditions around that culture.
So as you're trying to create a kingdom family, we want to build cultures. And I have to start with saying this without trying to come down too hard on any of us who just kind of rolled over and do this thing without much intention. But I have to say that the state of the holidays with, with regards to religious holidays in the west is pretty rough. So let me describe our two big religious holidays.
I have in my basement a plastic tree which I reassemble every year. When it gets cold, I put it in a prominent place in my home. We decorate this plastic fake tree with tinsel and glass and tiny electric lights.
And we say at the end of it, that was for God. I hope God loved that thing.
Or the number Two thing that we do is we tell kids the Easter bunny is coming, we give them chocolate eggs on cellophane grass, and then we serve up a big plate of swine in front of everybody and we go, this was for the Messiah. This is why we did this.
I just want to say that he doesn't command any of that, but he does command seven appointed times is what they're referred to in the Scriptures that his followers have to observe.
And it's been happening for thousands of years. And even if Gentiles piggybacked into the Messianic way of life, they practiced these things, it's represented over and over and over.
Yes. In the New Testament, including by the Messiah and the church he established. So I. Right up front, I would like to clear your mind if there's any of the. If there's any thought, is this right for us to do?
Argument. Not only is it right, it's commanded that his followers do this thing. I do have to say right up front before I get too excited about giving you instructions on how to do this, this. This festival called Sukkot, that we're not talking about a salvation issue.
So Protestants get real nervous anytime that you tell you use the word should. Well, we, as followers of Christ, we should be doing this thing. Oh, are you saying I'm not going to heaven if I don't? Nobody ever said that. I'm just saying there. There's something that you should do. And so that's. That's my opening salvo. Is that what we are doing currently when it comes to. I want traditions of religious holidays where I express my faith.
None of the things that we do as Americans are commanded by God, but there is a whole category of things commanded by God which we do not do.
Thoughts?
[00:15:50] Speaker B: Yeah, I think the word that's gonna trip people is the one command.
Because I think that we. We tend to bounce back to, well, if it's a command, then I have to do it, or I'm not cool with God.
Is that. Is that what you're saying, that, like, these are requirements for us to be good with the Creator, or are you just saying if we don't do it, we better have a good reason?
I don't know.
[00:16:20] Speaker A: You're putting. It's a weird phrase, good being good with God. I'd say we're good with God based on the completed work of Christ. However, there's a command in Ephesians 5 that says, Find out what pleases God. I think it's a totally great question, and I think it's how. And I think you perfectly represent how a lot of people feel anytime you introduce did you know the Bible says we're supposed to do this? They totally suddenly feel attacked and they think that you're trying to question their salvation. So I think, yeah, you're very helpful. I think those kind of questions, which I don't always think about when I'm preparing for this kind of thing.
[00:16:55] Speaker B: My tithe is 2% mark, and I feel great about it.
[00:16:59] Speaker A: There you go.
[00:16:59] Speaker B: Well, God has given you some instructions here.
[00:17:01] Speaker A: Okay, that's right. That's right.
[00:17:03] Speaker B: Onward. Let's talk about the Sukkot.
[00:17:07] Speaker A: Okay, so I want to talk about why. Why observe Sukkot?
So I'll just say really quick, we're not going to go through all of these. There are seven festivals described over the calendar year. There's a spring set of three.
We would say that Passover is kind of the king of those three. They all happen in a compressed eight day span. Then there's a festival that happens in the summertime. I'll give you a hint. It's 50 days. And after the end of the spring festivals, that is Pentecost or Shavuot. And then there are three that happen in the fall.
The kind of centerpiece of the three that happen the fall, those are kind of collectively referred to as High and Holy days. You might have heard that mentioned. But the one taken up the lion's share of that space and it's the.
Because it's more involved and bigger, it's. It kind of captures our imagination more. And for reasons that we'll describe, we recommend. That's Sue Coat. Okay, so let me say, I'm going to say this one more time. And I'm not trying to be. I'm not trying to beat a dead horse. I'm trying to illuminate your thought.
When I say what do you do to express your faith in Christ? What do you do?
You are going to say things like daily Bible reading. You might get up in the morning, do daily Bible. You might say weekly church gathering.
You might say membership in said church. You might say volunteering at said church. You might be part of a prayer group.
You might read Christian books on the topic.
Hooray. That's all great stuff. I just want to say none of that is commanded in Scripture. You're just not told to do any of those things. They're all good ideas.
Join the local church, give money, all that stuff. You're just not commanded explicitly to do those things.
What we're Describing. I'm going to read it to you. It's commanded for the people of God.
I lead worship sometimes. I always like to say, we're not here to come up with how do I like to express myself.
And then I'll express myself and hope that God likes it.
God tells us how he wants us to worship Him. So if we just do the things that he. He says. I think it's in Psalm 148. He really likes loud singing.
So make some noise in front of him. That's what he likes. And you don't have to. Well, I hope he liked it. We know he liked it. That's what he told us to do. So similarly, this stuff I like. I like you getting up early in the morning to read the Bible. I think that's great. But this stuff is what he tells us to do. So I would challenge any. Any would be disciple out there. Again, that verse says, find out what pleases God. Okay, why do it? Well, it's commanded. And so I would just. Our encouragement or challenge is to wade into those waters somewhat. So I would say, one, it's commanded, as we'll see. Number two, I think I would say my why would be. It's very effective that walking your family through Sukkot is effective for making disciples and creating this culture.
One thing that God did very well, as opposed to, you know, He. He gave us devotionals and said, be sure to have a quiet moment of reflection every day. He didn't say that. He told us to do these festivals which are very immersive. They're multi sensory.
The whole family is involved. They create identity. When you do them over and over and over again, a story starts forming in your mind. This is what we do. This is who we are. So I would say we do it because it's commanded, because I think it's very effective.
There can be a steep learning curve. We're hoping to flatten that somewhat by talking about it today. But it's really fun.
You're going to see that in the passages. I'm not going to slam everybody with passages. Sukkot is mentioned all over the Bible. But I'm going to read a couple of key passages that describe without question that it is fun. It's supposed to be fun and it shapes who we are. I think it's a great place to start if you are. I don't. By the way, we don't call these Jewish feasts.
[00:21:42] Speaker B: We.
[00:21:42] Speaker A: We call them biblical feasts because the worship of Yehovah would mean doing these things. Do. What are your thoughts, Mark, on the immersive or effective discipling quality of Sukkot?
[00:21:58] Speaker B: You, you kind of touched on this. But I think that the, if you just think back to like the early years that you had as a child or a young person with the Lord, probably one of the only things that stuck to you early on was stories. Like, that's why when we teach kids we use stories.
And the, the scriptures are full of stories. And I have found that it's great to do a felt board, you know, Baptist version of a story.
[00:22:33] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:22:34] Speaker B: Nothing wrong with that.
[00:22:35] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:22:35] Speaker B: But God made us this way.
He knew that we would learn through story. And he said, I don't just want you to tell it, I want you to experience it with your bodies. And that's one thing that I think is so cool about.
Like, yes, there's the should we do it? I think we should because of what you said. But there's also just the tell me a better way to sink some of these truths into our bones than to like experience tastes and sounds. And you know, this year we have an early Sukkot, but some years bone chilling cold as we sit out in the suka and shiver a little bit and go, huh, the house is certainly nice at this, this hour of the day.
[00:23:20] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:23:21] Speaker B: So that's probably my number one is like taking storytelling from just an intellectual thought exercise to much more of a physical thing.
[00:23:30] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:23:30] Speaker B: It's unique. And we get to do it in Passover. We do it in Sukkot. Every single one of these festivals actually involves more than just talking.
[00:23:38] Speaker A: That's right, yeah. And we're going to encourage people that if you'll just start moving, just do something active and physical, start moving in this direction. I don't think you have to have all your T's crossed the first time you try this.
We're going to try to give you very simple to do's to take the next step towards having your family live into this story. As Mark says, it's so effective. So that's, that's our why.
I'll tell you again, it's because it's commanded. We think it's effective and it's really fun.
So the second thing I want to talk about is how the descript, how did the scriptures describe that we're to do this thing and then we're definitely going to end up with, well, what do you actually do? And I want you to kind of lead that out, Mark, in describing what you actually do. But the how of scripture, I have to say Sukkot, which has several names that you might have heard. It's referred to as the feast of Ingathering, because it's the time of the fall harvest. The feast of ingathering, the feast of Booths. You might have heard of that.
And another translation for that booth is the feast of Tabernacles.
And the Hebrew word for tabernacle, what the Greeks called tabernacle is sukkot. It just means tent.
So when we say the feast of Sukkot, we mean the feast of tents, booths, tabernacles, all the same thing. That festival is mentioned in Exodus 23, Exodus 34, Numbers 29, Deuteronomy 16, Deuteronomy 31, 1 Kings 8, 2 Chronicles 5, and 7, Ezra, Nehemiah, Hosea, and John 7, among a couple of other places. I'm going to read from. It's all over the place. It is, it is a repeated thing which, spoiler alert is going to last a very, very, very long time. This, this thing. Here's the instructions.
I think the, the two best sections of description. I'm going to read from Leviticus 23. And it says, on exactly the 15th day of the seventh month, when you've gathered in the crops of the land, you shall celebrate the feast of the Lord for seven days, with a Sabbath rest on the first day and a Sabbath rest on the eighth day. That doesn't mean that they fall on Saturdays. It means that there are extra Sabbaths beside the regular weekly Shabbat. Now, on the first day, you shall take for yourselves the choice fruit of beautiful trees, branches of palm trees, and boughs of thick trees, and willows of the brook, and make booths of them or tents. And you shall rejoice before the Lord your God. For seven days.
You shall celebrate it as a feast to the Lord for seven days in the year. It shall be a permanent statute throughout your generations. You shall celebrate it. In the seventh month.
You shall live in booths, these temporary shelters for seven days. All native born in Israel shall live in booths. So that your generations may know that I had the sons of Israel live in booths when I brought them out of the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God.
One more descriptive passage. Deuteronomy 16.
Celebrate this feast of tabernacles for seven days after you have gathered the produce of your threshing for floor and your winepress, be. This is a command. Be joyful at your feast. You, your sons and daughters, your men, servants and maidservants, and the Levites, the aliens, the fatherless and the widows who live in your towns for seven days celebrate the feast to the Lord your God, at the place the Lord will choose. For the Lord your God will bless you in all your harvest and. And in all the work of your hands, and your joy will be complete. Mark what seems to be the tone of Sukkot.
[00:27:43] Speaker B: I think it's like joy and merriment. We almost need a Sukkot Santa Claus.
[00:27:49] Speaker A: You're right. You're right, we do. We need a little Sukkot. Abraham, who comes and throws delicious treats at the children.
Yeah, he needs to throw, like, pieces of brisket treat trip to the kids.
[00:28:01] Speaker B: Yeah, they know he's really here because he just got told to circumcise everybody in the village.
[00:28:09] Speaker A: It's a ruse, kid. Stay away.
So let me. I, I'm. I don't have much more to say in this whole section. What does Scripture say? It says that you take seven days, you put them aside, you build something outside that. That's up for debate, by the way. How do you, how do you build it? What is it? I don't know. It's up for debate. Where, where does it go? Is it a city park or is it in front yard? I don't know.
So some of these things, the, these, this is why, if I can speak to your rabbi for a second, this is why we kind of piggyback on Jewish tradition a lot of times, because the dumb, dumb Christians have punted on all of this stuff and they went to a Constantinian kind of deal where we piggyback on pagan traditions that, that, that don't have anything to do with God. And we punted on all of these biblical traditions because they were anti Semitic, they hated Jews.
So we don't hate Jews. We think they have these traditions that we can learn a lot from because they've been practicing these things for a very long time. So you build something outside.
There is. I want to underline that there's inclusive rejoicing.
So the Jews say that it's a mitzvah, it's a blessing to have a stranger under your sukkah, and that whenever you eat there, you want to have neighbors, you want to have people outside the family. And it's an inclusive celebration and it's bookended by Sabbaths. So that's about.
Doesn't tell us much more of what we're supposed to do. Besides, you build this thing and then there's sort of traditions that develop about how, how to do this thing before we get into the practicalities of what we do and what we recommend people to do as first steps. Do you have any thoughts on those scriptures or other scriptures about Sukkot?
[00:30:06] Speaker B: No. I mean, I thought you captured it. It's easy for us to maybe look at Jewish tradition and go, well, we don't see all those things in the Bible so that it's all evil and wrong. And I think that's a mistake.
Maybe I don't have to say this, but we're not saying that. Whatever we're about to tell you on how we do it is how you have to do it.
[00:30:26] Speaker A: Right.
[00:30:27] Speaker B: And we're also open to the idea that we're missing it on a few of these things. We might be like, getting to heaven someday. And the Lord goes, what were you doing with that? That is not a problem.
[00:30:38] Speaker A: That wasn't the way to do that. Oh, okay.
[00:30:41] Speaker B: So I don't know. This is where I'm thankful that we don't live under the law. And our perfect obedience to a sort of code of actions and things like that is what determines our righteousness. We live under Christ and the freedom that we have to fully engage in the word of God, but also maybe not get like full on struck down if we accidentally trip and, you know, try to stop the ark from touching the ground or something.
[00:31:13] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. I mean, we can look at God's instructions for the building of the temple.
They were so specific how he wanted things hung on this kind of ring, on that kind of pole, that high off the ground for that length. He was so specific. Did you hear specifics here?
It's like, build a booth.
Well, my booth's going to be kind of puny and runty. Okay. Did you build one? Yeah. Okay, cool. It just seems like there's a lot open here to the way that you do it. So just for the sake of giving you a starting point, we're going to tell you how we do it. And I didn't make this up either.
In preparing for this, one of the things that I opened up was a deck from a training that I went to in Northern Kentucky, I don't know, 10 years ago, 15 years ago.
And Justin Wolfenberger, one of those people, was just doing a. Let's just do a training on how do you do Sukkot. So I pulled up that deck and it's just a way. It's a way of, of. Of approaching this thing. Let me just say this about. In practicality, I'm gonna throw it to you, Mark.
Sukkot starts in 2015, sundown of October the sixth. And it goes through the 13th sundown in Cincinnati. I looked it up. Is going to be at 7:13pm on October 6th. So that's when Sukot will begin.
It's not amazing.
[00:32:47] Speaker B: That would be the dates and times in the year 2025.
You said 2015. I don't want people to think this is.
[00:32:54] Speaker A: That's so weird. Yeah, that's so weird. Yeah, it's 2025.
Sorry for, sorry for missing the decade on that one. Yeah. So what are you going to do, Mark?
[00:33:07] Speaker B: So there's a few things we do I would say to get ready for this holiday.
We have our own take on the booth and I think you could, if you, if you want to see some booths, there's always a big booth show off. That happens at ur, our little online community where people will film videos of their, their booth.
And we have gotten everything from what I would call truly pitiful efforts where I would go now, you don't have to do this to be a, you know, follower of Christ, but if you're going to do it, a little more effort, please.
Like, hey, we noticed that there's an overhang on our house and so we just decided that's our sukit. And yeah, big thumbs down.
But that being said, I am very open to the idea of people who are trying this out for the first time, like you said, wading into it. You don't have to go totally hog wild. You might have a bunch of tiny children and you're thinking, I don't know, that we could even get through an outdoor meal. We live in South Dakota and it's going to already be, you know, 30 degrees by then. So whatever it is, there's a lot of ways to do this. I think for us, probably the two most exciting kickoff events of, of Sukkot are the building of the suka and the shopping trip that we make to equip our, our week.
[00:34:39] Speaker A: Hallelujah.
[00:34:41] Speaker B: And I, I don't think you're going to get into great detail on this, but just to start with, both of those things involve financial investment because there's a whole tithe in the scriptures that was meant to be given to basically consumption and feasting for your family.
[00:35:03] Speaker A: Thank you, Mark. Well done.
[00:35:06] Speaker B: I hate to say it if you're offended by the fact that tithe doesn't mean cutting 10% of your pre or post tax income and giving it to your local church, but that's not what the Bible talks about when it talks about a tithe.
And so we have allocated money now, thankfully Actually, I'm going to reach behind me.
[00:35:28] Speaker A: Oh, here he goes.
[00:35:31] Speaker B: Every year I try to upgrade a little bit.
And so there. Our first attempt, I used two by fours that somebody had left in a shed when I bought my house. And we just built a little booth, and it was big enough for like a four folding plastic table, which we ate around for our meals.
Then I ca. My booth a couple times, it fell on my head and I. I got very angry. And like, Emilia was like, I hate when you're building the suka because it's.
[00:36:00] Speaker A: Not safe, because you lose your religion.
[00:36:01] Speaker B: It's not safe for the kids to be in the backyard.
You know, you're dropping it. It's. And so I said, okay, we're gonna level up. And I built. Last.
Two years ago, I built a new suka that actually is large. We can fit 15 or 20 people inside of it, and it fits our big outdoor dining table. And I built it with hinges, so my, my setup time went from several hours to like 20 minutes. Genius. And so I have a whole system of. Of how it goes up, and it's. It's way easier to do now, and it's nicer. But that first year, we still had tarps going around it, and I thought, upgrade. Now we have the outdoor weatherproof curtains that are so much nicer. Every year we've. We've put some money into this.
It takes some space. I have a shed that's like 30% full of suka for most of the year. So it is not a zero investment thing. But we put that. We put that booth up together. We'll probably do that on October 4th or 5th. I don't know if that's allowed, but we usually don't do it on the day that it starts.
[00:37:09] Speaker A: Right.
[00:37:11] Speaker B: And then the other prep thing we do is we go to the grocery store and we. It's the only time of year where we say to our kids, it's a yes today on. On Food. Now, they did find my breaking point at that last year.
But in. In the past, we've gone to Costco, which is where we do most of our grocery shopping, and we've said, it's a yes. If you see something that delights your eye, you may put it in the cart and we can enjoy that as a part of this feast week.
We invite lots of people that week. So we're gonna. We're gonna cook a brisket. That's gonna happen. We're going to.
Basically, there's going to be a steak night. There's Going to be whatever we like is going into that night. One year I had friends and they're like, we really like fancy tequilas, like trying them. And they, I was like, well I'm gonna go buy like three that they've never tried and like learn about em and do a little like this would be a fun thing to do. So whatever it is, it's basically some, something special. Kind of what we Americans tend to do at like Thanksgiving or Christmas. You don't eat those things or make that big of a deal of your meals.
Normally we try to do that for a full week. In Sukkot last year we went to the kind of bougie grocery store. It's, it's not quite Whole foods level, but it's, it's getting there.
[00:38:38] Speaker A: Sprouts. Sprouts.
[00:38:40] Speaker B: Think sprouts. But classier. Not, not as many like blue haired weirdos.
[00:38:47] Speaker A: Okay, okay.
[00:38:48] Speaker B: What is it there? Harmon's. Harmon's.
[00:38:51] Speaker A: Oh, okay. Harmon's.
[00:38:52] Speaker B: But we did that and we did our Everything's a yes trip there. I don't recommend that because. No, it was, we had to go, we had to revise at the register when I said we're not spending a thousand dollars on a week of groceries, so be a little bit thoughtful about that. But for the most part I say put some money towards making this thing awesome. And if you have younger kids, that might mean, hey, we don't ever buy Oreos. But this week if they are delighted by Oreos, they're going in the shopping cart and we're going to use again, physical senses to kind of build the sense that this is special and we're celebrating something. So I'll pause there, but that's what we do to prep.
[00:39:36] Speaker A: That's so good. I, I, I'm just gonna, I'm gonna double down on what you said. I just want to make this statement. The Bible does not say take a tithe check and write it to the little red brick church house on the corner and give them a tenth of your money. It doesn't say that anywhere.
It does say take a tenth of your money and spend it on your family celebrating God's festivals.
That does exist. I think it's Leviticus 14.
So yeah, good point.
It seems like you have to build something and our way of doing it is much like Mark's.
Our suit coat sits on our back deck. It is 16 by 8. Do you know why?
That's the size of lumber that they sell.
So I put it together that way we hang tarps on the Sides, I'm challenged. I'm challenged by Mark's level of discipleship. Maybe I need to have some weatherproof curtains on the side. That white is definitely beautiful than our ugly tarps.
And I throw this out to everybody.
The. The Jews will tell us that it's a mitzvah to beautify the Sukkot.
Beautify the Sukkot. So little candles here and there, a little throw pillow here and there.
[00:41:02] Speaker B: Don't underestimate the value of some string lights on the course.
[00:41:07] Speaker A: Of course, there's a warming glow that happens in the suka.
Texas Aggie football does get watched in my suka. I cannot find the biblical command not to bring technology into the suka. It just says. It just says, be out there.
[00:41:22] Speaker B: So, yeah, that's important because it's. It's.
I think, as a buddy, you and RC Slocum, former coach of Texas A and M, are pretty close friends these days.
[00:41:35] Speaker A: Yeah. Good.
[00:41:36] Speaker B: So, of course, you're watching as much Texas A and M football as you can so that when you play golf with rc, you've got something to talk about.
[00:41:42] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. Right.
So I'm again, I was looking back at that deck that was presented to me years ago, and it said plan an aggressive rhythm of suka sitting. I remember hearing that phrase a lot in the early years. Suka sitting.
Like, just be out there.
Why? What's the value?
Well, there's many values. The Bible doesn't necessarily describe them all in detail. Just says, do it. So go out there, be. Spend time there, beautify it, keep it upbeat.
Like, this isn't like Bible study all day.
That. That's not the goal. We. We do board games out there.
It's supposed to be fun.
When the friends come over, a lot of times we will open up the fridge and we'll go, here's everything that we've got for suko. What. What strikes your fancy? I hope it involves me firing up the smoker, which is right there beside my suka. I would love for us to enjoy stuff together. We. We want it to be fun. We like the idea of friends dropping by. There was a year, one of my early years of doing this in Cincinnati, that Jeremy Pryor and the gang had put together what they called a suka hop.
So it was like a progressive dinner that happened over seven nights. And we're going to visit as many sukas. Even if all we're going to do when we get to your place is we're going to have smoked weenies out of the crock pot. Great. That's what we're doing at your place. And just went and just visited many people and it really helped to bind us together as a community. Go, hey, yeah, I see what you. Your family's doing great. It's just, it's just a festival.
So give your permission to be laid back and to enjoy the feast, eat and talk every day, be with friends. Nehemiah 8 the describes assemblies happening every single day during Sukkot. You might not be in a place where you can have assemblies with other families every day. We're putting our schedule together right now. We hope to do that very thing. We hope to have. We're going to host. When we host, it's not going to be 10 people at our house. We'll probably have 50 people at our house. And we will be moving around and, and enjoying that. And if you make this thing an annual tradition in your home and in your community of believers, you'll just find that people start innovating. And that has happened around us and it's been so great. Our friend Tate Paul has this interesting property, has this house on a cul de sac. But then you go into his backyard and it's like five acres large.
And every year they build this great suka out there that we have this huge gathering.
And he takes some fallen limb off of one of these trees, makes a gigantic kerosene soaked torch out of this and leads a parade of children through trails they have built in the forest. And he tells the story of God leading his people through the wilderness. And he's saying that, you know, God has prepared a place for us. The end of the story of Sukkot is the wedding feast that we're all going to end up at. And when he, when he leads everyone through the forest, we come back and the sukkah has been beautified and the lights are on and the moms have like chocolate fountains out and it's this wonderful. Kids look forward to that every year.
That's not in the scriptures anywhere. But the Pauls decided to do that and now we all demand it every year. That's a must. We love it. So I think those kind of things will happen can happen organically as you kind of plus up every year. If you.
[00:45:36] Speaker B: I kind of imagine Tate Paul wearing like a, like a Christmas pageant style Abraham with a fake beard. Does he do. Does he get biblical for this role or.
[00:45:48] Speaker A: No, he doesn't wear a costume. But I could provide him with. I have a Moses costume that would be very appropriate for that evening.
Yeah, with his big old bald head shining gloriously in the night.
[00:46:01] Speaker B: Can I share one thing? That if you. If you were just wading into this and you said, okay, I built something.
I did a grocery store trip, and I'm on a budget, So I had $50, and I said, go spend the $50 on treats, kids.
Whatever you did. Or you went whole hog if you were only going to have a couple other guidelines.
Probably you. You mentioned it, Steve, but sitting in the Suka, my job is, like, largely happens on Zoom, and I get a lot of questions. Wait, where are you right now? You're not in your normal background with a curated sort of geometric painting, left shoulder. But, you know, if I have coffee with a guy, I'll say, we're doing it at my house. We're not going to the coffee shop.
[00:46:52] Speaker A: Same.
[00:46:53] Speaker B: And it's just a good opportunity to share with people, some of whom don't know the Lord at all, and go, well, this is like a way for me to actually experience the story that God told about us humans and his plan for everything.
So it's a huge opportunity there.
Your neighbors might think you're crazy. I think our neighbors thought we were nuts for a couple years. Just like they're doing the lumber thing again. Oh, no.
[00:47:24] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:47:25] Speaker B: The tarps. They make us think something terrible is going on in that little booth.
[00:47:29] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:47:30] Speaker B: The curtains, I think, lessened that impact. But I also think that my number one kind of starting off every meal we do in the Suka thing that I just love is I ask, kind of like we do at Passover, I ask questions to my kids, and the questions that we ask are, what are we in?
We're in a booth.
Okay. Why? And we. We occasionally will revisit the section of scripture you just read. But we'll. We'll tell stories from the Exodus. We'll look at kind of the. The history that led up to this holiday.
But then I say, why? Why would God ever want us to remember a time when his people were wandering around with flimsy booths as their protection? I said, everybody look at that big, giant brick house that we're right next to right now.
And they look at it, and I go, does that thing look pretty sturdy? Yes. Yeah, it looks pretty. Is that what we rely on for our protection?
No.
And one of the cool things about.
I think this is just tradition, Steve, but maybe it's in the. In the text. I know you're supposed to. When you look up in your Sukkah, you're supposed to see more sky than roof. Meaning you've covered the top with some branches, but if it rains and you're in the suka, you're getting wet.
[00:48:56] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:48:58] Speaker B: And part of the reason there is because we're not trying to build a bomb shelter out there. That would just be super comfortable.
We're trying to say the Lord protected his people and was their provision and protection through a very challenging time.
And similarly, it's very easy for us in our comfortable American lives to go, well, we have financial resources, we have strong homes, we have emergency funds, whatever. We've got all this stuff. We don't really think too often about the Lord being our protector and provider.
This holiday, one of the primary reasons we sit out in a flimsy booth is because we. We want to remind ourselves that's not our source of provision, that's not our source of protection. And I love the visual of doing it right next to my house.
[00:49:48] Speaker A: Amen.
[00:49:49] Speaker B: Because, I don't know, my house feels pretty. Pretty sturdy to me. And if there's a big storm, I go, well, I can just go in the house and I don't have to worry about it.
[00:49:57] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:49:58] Speaker B: So it's a great, great way for us to start every meal. Is that house. What protects us? No, what protects us? The Lord does. And so that's so good.
That'll be basically a feature of every meal we do in the sukkah.
[00:50:12] Speaker A: That's great.
Yeah. Our. Our referring, our refrain is, that big white building behind us is not our home.
We're headed to our home. It's this land that we haven't seen yet. That's where we're going. Because we are a people on pilgrimage. There's a psalm that describes pilgrimage. We read that psalm. We see the sojourner Abraham in Hebrews 11. And there's a story about it in Genesis 18, him being a sojourner. And we go, he's the father of how we practice this faith.
So we're on sojourn as well.
I love all that stuff. What we're going to do for people is in our monthly email that comes out, which you should be subscribed to. If you're not, you should get on the subscription
[email protected] but with that, you might wonder, okay, so I'm going to make an effort. We build it. What are we going to do out there every day besides hang out in it? How? What do I teach?
We're going to furnish you with topics that you could cover during your seven days. You don't have to cover these topics. Bible doesn't say you have to cover these topics.
We just know that, for instance, again, Nehemiah says that you're going to have a daily gathering there.
So you might want to cover one topic. I mean, the kids are going to know, why are we, why are we doing this again?
So the questions Mark that you mentioned, I do those questions too. We're going to put those questions in our monthly email. We're also going to put these seven topics for the seven days. You don't have to do it this way. It's just a suggestion, just a starting place.
We'll put that in the monthly email as well.
And you could just print that out and use that as your starting point.
Here's my concluding remarks. Ready?
God is also building a family.
God also has a vision in his mind of mature children, same as you do, same as you're doing.
And he has traditions and cultural, a culture that he's working on, building out.
And these are his inventions. These, these festivals, they're his inventions for how do I create mature children in my family?
He wants to shape you the same way you want to shape your kids. And I have a sneaking suspicion that no matter how WASPy, Luther Loving, Protestant, evil, evangelical you are, if you're going to follow him, if you're going to follow the King of the universe in the name of Yeshua, the Messiah, you're going to be doing this eventually. Why? Why do I think that? I'll tell you. This is my. This is the last passage I'm going to read for the day. It's Zechariah 14 and it describes an end times war that's going to come to Jerusalem. It says in that day a great panic and dismay from the Lord will fall on them. And meaning the attackers of Jerusalem and they will seize one another's hand and the hand of the one will be raised against the hand of the other. Judah also will fight at Jerusalem and the wealth of all the surrounding nations will be gathered together, gold and silver and garments in great abundance.
So like this plague on men. There will be plague on the horses, mules, camels, donkeys, and all the livestock in those camps. It's going to be horrible.
Then everyone who is left of all the nations that went against Jerusalem will go up year to year to worship the King, the Lord of Hosts, and celebrate. DRUMROLL Guess what?
The Feast of Booths, Sukkot.
And it will be that whichever of the families of the earth does not go, go up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of Hosts There will be no rain on them.
If the family of Egypt does not go up to Jerusalem and present themselves, then no rain will fall on them. It will be the plague to which, with which the Lord will strike the nations who do not go up to celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles or Booths, or Sukkot. This will be the consequent punishment for the. The sin of Egypt and the consequent punishment for the sin of all the nations that do not go up to celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles. Sukkot.
This one's not going away, folks.
We're going to be doing this one forever. If you're God's people, I want you to at least know about Sukkot. I would like for there to be a dream in your heart that says, someday we're going to start celebrating this in my family because I'm curating a culture of God followers with traditions and celebrations that fit that goal. In our home, if you want to pull out the plastic tree and decorate it with tinsel, I do that. I personally do that.
It's not in the Bible.
I can't say that I do that because it's what the Lord commands. I say that I do it because it's. That's the way that we Americans celebrate the season and we put on Bing Crosby songs and we hang a garland over the mantle.
I can't say that God commands us to do any of those, but we want our families to be shaped not just as Americans. I guess I do want to raise Americans in my home. I want to raise Kingdom God followers in my home and people who honor his word. So as you take baby steps, baby steps towards these things, we bless you. If there's anything that we can do to help you, please come over to see us on ur. I know we make reference to ir. Some people don't even know. How do I. How do I join up?
Is a place for anybody that supports and partners with the podcast. You do that by going to abrahamswallet.com and. And joining our team with any amount of donation, any kind of support at all, and you can join the conversation. We just. Forgive us. It's not because we don't think of it as you pay to get to part of ur. It's that we want to have some kind of gate into. Well, who believes in that? Who's serious about this? And that's the gate. So we'd love to see you over at ur.
Bless you. As you. You create cultures and traditions in your home that honor God whatever those traditions are, however you figure out to do it. And, oh, we recommend, for the sake of pleasing the King, that you would consider Sukkot coming up in just a couple of weeks. Bless you. As you consider these things.
