7. Nissan – Month of Redemption

Spring is in the air. 😊Absolutely my favorite season of the year! Everything comes back to life; the new green leaves are a luminous color, and they allow the sunlight to shine on them making dappled shadows on the ground and blending beautifully with the sound of water babbling in the streams, Spring makes all my senses come alive again.

We have entered the month of Nisan, the seventh month in the Jewish civil calendar and the first month of the religious calendar. The month of First Fruits, Abundance and Redemption.

That is enough for us to jump up and down with excitement and dance through this month.
Let us now look more seriously at the month of Spring.

Click here or on the image for the video

The Name “Nisan” is of Babylonian-Persian origin, suggesting Springtime or blossoming, and a similar word, “nitzan,” in Hebrew, means a blossom.

According to Akkadian and Sumerian the same word is derived from “Nisag” meaning First Fruits.

It is also called the “First Month” because it is the Month of Redemption, the month of the Exodus of the Jewish People from slavery in Egypt, “the House of Bondage”.
No individual slave, or group of slaves, and certainly no enslaved nation had ever escaped from slavery in Egypt, proving God’s absolute Power of Redemption for His people in bringing them out of the “House of Bondage” into Freedom.

Your portion

You have been Redeemed by the Blood of Christ. Taken from your house of bondage into Freedom. We know from the story of the Israelites that even after being freed from slavery, they struggled with a slavery mentality.

So, they said to one another, “Let’s appoint a Leader and go back to Egypt.” Numbers 14:4

As the Spring season refreshes everything, bringing renewal and new growth to the earth, allow Holy Spirit in the same way to wash through your old ways of thinking and transform those old thoughts into Redeemed Christ-centered thoughts, you’re living from the Christ mind. What does that look like what does it feel like? How do you live as free person, liberated from your bondage? Renew your mind.

Barley was the first crop ready for the harvest by the time of the Passover, in the middle of April.

The LORD spoke to Moses: “Speak to the Israelites and tell them: When you enter the land I am giving you and reap its harvest, you are to bring the first sheaf of your harvest to the priest.” Leviticus 23:9-10

And in 1 Corinthians 15:23 the Apostle Paul applies this concept as first fruits to Jesus Christ.

“But each in his own order: Christ, the first fruits; afterward, at his coming, those who belong to Christ”. 1 Corinthians 15:23

First Fruit is a Kingdom principle that always results in a blessing. We bring our First Fruit to God as an act of thanksgiving, for the year of provision. But we see God always returning favor upon our thankfulness.

• Jeremiah 2:3 recorded God as saying that Israel was the first fruit of His harvest.
• 1 Corinthians 15:23 Christ rose from the dead and was identified as the first fruit of those who are asleep.
• Romans 8:23 Christians have the first fruit of Holy Spirit living in them. We also have the first fruit of eternal life.

Your Portion

Passover is always on the 14th of Nisan. Interestingly the number 14 represents completely completed. As we celebrate Passover this month know that Christ’s sacrifice for you was and is a completed work. His first fruit Gift of Holy Spirit inside of you is an abundantly fruitful gift. Holy Spirit is given as a fruit with many seeds, and many possibilities to you. It will always produce fruit if you plant from this seed and it will always release an abundant harvest. Come with a heart of thanksgiving, a posture of worship and feast at the table He has set before you.

Barley was viewed as an inferior grain to wheat and was known as the food of the poor and it was grown mainly for feeding animals. Yet throughout scripture we see God constantly use this grain to feed and to multiply.

We know that Boaz left some grain for the poor (Ruth 2:2 in accordance with Leviticus 23:22). In this way Ruth, a Gentile, came to know her “kinsman redeemer.”
Jesus Christ fed the five thousand with barley loaves (five barley loaves and two small fishes. John 6:9).

Your Portion

I believe that this miracle was a symbol of feeding the five thousand, not only physically but also spiritually. If Barley was meant for the poor, prophetically Jesus Christ took poverty in all forms, physical, mental, and spiritual poverty and he multiplied it into abundant overflow. He brought knowledge and revelation about the Kingdom to those who probably were never even considered worthy enough to be taught. Regardless of their social status He gave them what they needed on all levels: spirit, soul, and body.

When Jesus said: “I come to give Life in abundance” (John 10:10) it was on all levels of life. If we do not live in abundance on all levels, then we should allow God to show us the root of our unbelief, because the Cross redeemed every dead and unproductive area into life.

Here is a beautiful blessing the Jewish people say during the month of Nisan when they see a tree blossom for the first-time during spring.

“Blessed are You, L rd our G d, King of the Universe, who has made nothing lacking in His world, and created in its goodly creatures and goodly trees to give mankind pleasure”.

When you recognize an area in your life that once was dead but is now alive in Christ speak a blessing over it.

Glorious blessed life!
Have a blessed Passover Season.