Hebrew Month of Elul (Aug/Sept)

Aug/Sept

Theme:  Repentance, Intimacy, Visitation, Build

1. Repentance
   1. Moses ascended Mt. Sinai to receive the commandments the 2nd time – Exodus 33:12- 34: 1 – 35.  Jewish tradition places the timing of this in the month of Elul
   2. This is right after the Israelites worshiped the golden calf.  Moses is interceding on behalf of Israel and repenting for their idol worship (Exodus 32:7-35)
      1. Elul is a time to examine the things in our hearts that keep us from drawing closer to the Lord in an intimate relationship.  A time to repent and ask the Lord to cleanse us of sin and rebellion. Psalm 139:23-24 “Search me, God, and know my heart, test me and know my anxious thoughts.  See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” 
         1. When we repent and confess our sins, it removes the barriers that keep us from walking intimately with the Lord.  I John 1:19 “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
         2. We see how David responds to Nathan, the prophet, exposing the sin of adultery with Bathsheba.  Psalm 51:10 “Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.  Do not cast me from your Presence or take your Holy Spirit from me.  Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.”
   3. Ezekiel 8 – 11:  verse 1 “In the sixth year, in the sixth month on the fifth day, while I was sitting in my house and the elders of the Judah were sitting before me, the hand of the Sovereign Lord came upon me there.”
      1. Ezekiel has this profound vision where the Lord reveals to him the idol worship and detestable things the elders were doing. Ezekiel 8:12 “He said to me, ‘Son of man, have you seen what the elders of the house of Israel are doing in the darkness, each at the shrine of his own idol?  They say ‘The Lord does not see us; the Lord has forsaken the land.”
      2. He sees the response in heaven to the idolatry and in this vision, sees the cherubim, the four living creatures, the wheels.
2. Intimacy
   1. Moses wants to know the Lord more Exodus 33: 13, 18” If you are pleased with me, teach me your ways so I may know you and continue to find favor with you.  Then Moses said, “Now show me your glory.”
      1. Elul reminds us that we can dare to ask, “show me your glory”.  This level of intimacy is available to us all because of what Jesus did on the cross, Hebrews 4:16 says “So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God.  There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.”
      2. In 2017, there was a solar eclipse at the beginning of the month of Elul.  For many people who don’t know Elohim, the Creator, seeing the moon totally cover the sun and the corona suddenly become visible for those few minutes of totality was a “religious experience”.  People described being “one with the universe”.  What they are describing is the opportunity they had to see a glimpse of the glory of the Creator through His creation of the sun, stars, and planets.  The sun is a representation of the Glory of God.  Normally we can’t look at the sun because it damages our eyes but when the moon totally covers the sun, we can get a glimpse of the glory without damaging our eyes.  This is like what happened for Moses, he was hidden from the full glory of the Lord but caught a glimpse.  That glimpse changed his appearance.
      3. Coming into the Presence of God changes our very presence.  Moses’ face shown with the radiance of the glory of the Lord.  If we regularly come into the Presence, His glory will be evident on our faces; we will reflect His glory wherever we go.  We can change the atmosphere wherever we go by carrying the glory into the darkness.  
3. Visitation – Elul is a time of receiving visions and angelic visitations
   1. Ezekiel’s vision in chapter 10, v3-5”Now the cherubim were standing on the south side of the temple when the man went in, and a cloud filled the inner court.  Then the glory of the Lord rose from above the cherubim and moved to threshold of the temple.  The cloud filled the temple and the court was full of the radiance of the glory of the Lord.  The sound of the wings of the cherubim could be heard as far away as the outer court, like the voice of God Almighty when he speaks… v 9-10,14 “I looked, and I saw beside the cherubim four wheels, one beside each of the cherubim; the wheels sparkled like topaz.  As for their appearance, the four of them looked alike; each was like a wheel intersecting a wheel…Each of the cherubim had four faces:  One face was that of a cherub, the second the face of a human being, the third the face of a lion, and the fourth the face of an eagle.”
   2. Haggai 1:1 “In the second year of King Darius, on the first day of the sixth month, the word of the Lord came through the prophet Haggai to Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest
   3. Mary was visited by the angel Gabriel in the month of Elul. Luke 1:26 “In the sixth month, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David.  The virgin’s name was Mary.  The angel went to her and said “Greetings, you who are highly favored!  The Lord is with you.”
4. Build
   1. Haggai’s word was to build the house of the Lord. Read Haggai 1:3 – 11
   2. Nehemiah was rebuilding the wall in Elul and finished on the 25 day of Elul.  It took them 52 days which means they would have started on the 2nd of Av.  Nehemiah 6:15-16 "So the wall was completed on the twenty-fifth of Elul, in fifty two days."
      1.  The enemy started to resist them almost immediately.  Nehemiah 2: 19-21 But when Sanballat the Horonite, Tobiah the Ammonite official and Geshem the Arab heard about it, they mocked and ridiculed us. “What is this you are doing?” they asked. “Are you rebelling against the king?” I answered them by saying, “The God of heaven will give us success. We his servants will start rebuilding, but as for you, you have no share in Jerusalem or any claim or historic right to it.”
      2. If Nehemiah was not clear on his assignment in Kingdom Life he may have been dissuaded from moving forward when the enemy's attack came.  But he appeared confident in his identity and knew what he was called to do.  He knew it was the time to rebuild.
      3. When we have a solid understanding of our personal identity, it can help us stay focused on what we are to set our hands to do.  There are so many good causes to become involved in within the Kingdom, but we really need to be sensitive to the Holy Spirit to know what is it He is calling us to do.  We say yes to that and no to everything else.  I believe we learn this through seeking Him intimately.  When we know the Lord on an intimate level, we are confident in Him.
5. Application
   1. These things that we see in the month of Elul move us step by step toward an upgrade or enlargement.
   2. As we search our hearts, inviting the Lord to search us and point out the offensive ways so that we can repent, it prepares us to journey into more intimate places within his Presence.  This leads to visions, visitations, prophetic words.  We then are equipped to build the kingdom and step into the place of enlargement.