What is a convocation?

'A calling together,' and always called 'holy.' The occasions called 'holy convocations' are specially given in Lev. 23 when the Feasts are recorded; they included the Sabbath, and ended with the Feast of Tabernacles. "These are the feasts of the Lord, which ye shall proclaim to be holy convocations, to offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord." Lev. 23:37. It occurs also in Ex. 12:16; Num. 28:18, 25, 26; Num. 29:1, 7, 12. The same Hebrew word is translated 'assemblies' in Isa. 1:13; Isa. 4:5.

We have ka-hal (congregation), Mo-ed (assembly), and E-dah (appointed gathering). The first called together ekklesia; the next, meeting with God in an appointed place, see the first mention of it in this verse - hence a feast. The last more an appointed assembly of the people. The two last are from ya-ad (to appoint).

"Holy Convocations." These suggest collective gatherings. It seems that our God delights to have His people together with a single thought in their minds — to collectively minister to Him. He would guard them from any intrusion of the fleshly mind of man by reminding us that they are "HOLY"! We have to remember this, wonderful as the privilege may be, in our gatherings together to be ever conscious that He is there; that we come together for His pleasure, subdued, dependent, with holy reverence in our souls. This is the state that will lead to a spiritual production of that which will indeed be to God a feast. This would produce quality, even if it reduced quantity and all would be the better for it and God would be more rightly praised. These then are the instructive communications to our souls as preparing us for the unfolding of His mind in this wonderful chapter.

"Set times" are times of His appointment, to whom as the Eternal all times belong, and who is able to adjust them to His purpose. They speak of almighty power, and determinate counsel vindicating thus their place here. But they are "holy convocations" also, gathering times, when the voice of God arouses and assembles His people. His voice unites those who listen to it in obedience, and calls also to Himself.

Now rest is the great thought here, and while the rest of God is future, He brings out certain details here which He desires His people to observe, and take up as a feast for Him. What a holy Sabbath it will be when at last His people gather around Him in a Holy Convocation! If we turn over to Lev. 25, we see something of the breadth of it. Even the brute creation is going to share that rest when it comes. vs. 6, 7. This is taught in Rom. 8:21. When man is brought into it at last, so will the creation over which he is Lord. In this feast, "no work" is to be done. In other feasts we will read "no servile work" is to be done, v. 7. But in this feast it is no work at all. "Servile work" is right in its place, for we judge it to mean work in the sphere of responsibility as distinct from work in the Divine circle, the daily round as we speak. But no work of any description is to be done on the Sabbath. It is complete rest. Rest, we believe when, free from all that would rightly engage us here, we sit in the presence of God, at liberty to contemplate what He is to us, and what He has done, for His own pleasure and glory. This we are enabled to do in "Holy convocation." But it is also to mark us in our dwellings. This is better translated "to Jehovah in all your dwellings." Now while the rest of God is future, we can, as brought near to Him, enjoy the elements of that rest through Christ. "I will give you rest." Matt. 11:28. This then is to fill our souls whether in our circle of responsibility — the dwelling — or, gathered together in Christian privilege — the holy convocation. "Your dwellings" would be our side of things but the holy convocation would be God's side, as His people met together at the Divine centre. Then, keeping "to Jehovah" before us, would lead to an answer directly Godward as ministering pleasure to Him in it. If we miss this point in our comings together, we too will get where the Jews got — reducing the feasts of Jehovah to the feasts of the Jews.

We come now in this feast to "a holy convocation." Whatever exercise we have in our individual life in this world, we must never forget the pleasure God has in gathering His people together. If we walk before Him, well-pleasing in His sight, we will indeed value and be a help to "the holy convocation." What a privilege, as free from legitimate things — servile work — to come together to enjoy the circle of blessing which is ours in Christ. Not to take up that service for Christ as servile work, nor to seek to worship God in a servile way, but in the liberty of Sonship by the Spirit, praise and worship the Father in Spirit and in truth. This would produce the elements of a feast to God when in "holy convocation."

"And the Lord spake to Moses, saying, Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them, concerning the feasts of the Lord, which ye shall proclaim to be holy convocations, even these are my feasts. Six days shall work be done; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of rest, an holy convocation; ye shall do no work therein: it is the Sabbath of the Lord in all your dwellings." The place which the Sabbath here gets is full of interest. The Lord is about to furnish a type of all His dealings in grace with His people; and, ere He does so, He sets forth the Sabbath as the significant expression of that rest which remains for the people of God. It was an actual solemnity, to be observed by Israel; but it was also a type of what is yet to be, when all that great and glorious work which this chapter foreshadows shall have been accomplished. It is God's rest, into which all who believe can enter now in spirit; but which, as to its full and actual accomplishment, yet remains. (Heb. 4) We work now. We shall rest by and by. In one sense, the believer enters into rest; in another sense, he labours to enter into it. He has found his rest in Christ; he labours to enter into his rest in glory. He has found his full mental repose in what Christ has wrought for him, and his eye rests on that everlasting Sabbath upon which he shall enter when all his desert toils and conflicts are over. He cannot rest in the midst of a scene of sin and wretchedness. "He rests in Christ, the Son of God, who took the servant's form." And, while thus resting, he is called to labour as a worker together with God, in the full assurance that, when all his toil is over, he shall enjoy unbroken, eternal repose in those mansions of unfading light and unalloyed blessedness where labour and sorrow can never enter. Blessed prospect! May it brighten more and more each hour in the vision of faith! May we labour all the more earnestly and faithfully, as being sure of this most precious rest at the end! True, there are foretastes of the eternal Sabbath; but these foretastes only cause us to long more ardently for the blessed reality — that Sabbath which shall never be broken — that "holy convocation" which shall never be dissolved.

When the LORD spoke to Moses concerning this feast, He said, "In the first day of the month, shall ye have a sabbath, a memorial of blowing of trumpets, an holy convocation." These three things are connected in the words of the LORD, first, a sabbath; secondly, a blowing of trumpets; thirdly, a holy convocation. We have seen, when contemplating the sabbath, that God's rest was in view: so here, God is teaching us that His rest is in view; it is just about to be introduced, and He is recalling His scattered earthly people that they might enter into that rest, and surround His dwelling place in the Millennium. How blessed for Israel to be gathered together in a holy convocation in the promised land, after the long centuries of scattering among the Gentiles!

Pentecostal work being ended, another series of events begins (ver. 23) with the words referred to, "And Jehovah spake unto Moses." They blow up the trumpet in the new moon (compare Ps. 81; Num. 10:3, 10). It was the renewal of the blessing and the splendour of the people — Israel gathered as an assembly before Jehovah. It is not yet the restoration of joy and gladness, but at least the renewal of the light and reflected glory which had disappeared takes place, and enlightens their expectant eyes; and they gather the assembly to re-establish the glory.

Chapter 10 speaks of the silver trumpets which served for calling the assembly of the people, and for the journeying of the camps, but which serve also for other purposes. It was the testimony of God, rendered publicly, with two chief ends in view; to gather the people, and to make them journey. It is so indeed, practically; the testimony of God gathers His people around Him, and makes them go forward. The testimony of God was the sign of His intervention, whilst, at the same time, its result was to produce it. The priests who, in communion with their head, were to be in the intimacy of the thoughts of God, sounded the trumpets when needed.