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26 “When you come into the land that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance and have taken possession of it and live in it, you shall take some of the first of all the fruit of the ground, which you harvest from your land that the LORD your God is giving you, and you shall put it in a basket, and you shall go to the place that the LORD your God will choose, to make his name to dwell there. And you shall go to the priest who is in office at that time and say to him, ‘I declare today to the LORD your God that I have come into the land that the LORD swore to our fathers to give us.’ Then the priest shall take the basket from your hand and set it down before the altar of the LORD your God.
“And you shall make response before the LORD your God, ‘A wandering Aramean was my father. And he went down into Egypt and sojourned there, few in number, and there he became a nation, great, mighty, and populous. And the Egyptians treated us harshly and humiliated us and laid on us hard labor. Then we cried to the LORD, the God of our fathers, and the LORD heard our voice and saw our affliction, our toil, and our oppression. And the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with great deeds of terror, with signs and wonders. And he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. And behold, now I bring the first of the fruit of the ground, which you, O LORD, have given me.’ And you shall set it down before the LORD your God and worship before the LORD your God. And you shall rejoice in all the good that the LORD your God has given to you and to your house, you, and the Levite, and the sojourner who is among you.
“When you have finished paying all the tithe of your produce in the third year, which is the year of tithing, giving it to the Levite, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, so that they may eat within your towns and be filled, then you shall say before the LORD your God, ‘I have removed the sacred portion out of my house, and moreover, I have given it to the Levite, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, according to all your commandment that you have commanded me. I have not transgressed any of your commandments, nor have I forgotten them. I have not eaten of the tithe while I was mourning, or removed any of it while I was unclean, or offered any of it to the dead. I have obeyed the voice of the LORD my God. I have done according to all that you have commanded me. Look down from your holy habitation, from heaven, and bless your people Israel and the ground that you have given us, as you swore to our fathers, a land flowing with milk and honey.’
“This day the LORD your God commands you to do these statutes and rules. You shall therefore be careful to do them with all your heart and with all your soul. You have declared today that the LORD is your God, and that you will walk in his ways, and keep his statutes and his commandments and his rules, and will obey his voice. And the LORD has declared today that you are a people for his treasured possession, as he has promised you, and that you are to keep all his commandments, and that he will set you in praise and in fame and in honor high above all nations that he has made, and that you shall be a people holy to the LORD your God, as he promised.”
(ESV)
Once again we enter into an Old Testament story which has significant implications for how we understand events documented in the New Testament.
“Then it shall be, when you enter the land which the LORD your God gives you as an inheritance, and you possess it and live in it, 2 that you shall take some of the first of all the produce of the ground which you bring in from your land that the LORD your God gives you, and you shall put it in a basket and go to the place where the LORD your God chooses to establish His name.
Deuteronomy 26:1-2 NASB
The first fruits would have been the very first gathered grains, fruits, and vegetables from the people’s harvest. Following the Passover feast, the people were to offer these to the Lord in order to recognize His faithfulness. Just as they had offered praise to God on the heels of their deliverance from Egypt, they were to offer this harvest as a celebration of that freedom. In fact, it included a verbal confirmation of their deliverance from Egypt during the ritual. In the New Testament, Paul wrote of how Christ became the first fruits of those who are asleep.
If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied. 20 But now Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who are asleep. 21 For since by a man came death, by a man also came the resurrection of the dead. 22 For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive.
1 Corinthians 15:19-22 NASB
How does Jesus relate to the first fruits?
Just as God was faithful to giving freedom at the Red Sea and providing the first fruits of the people’s harvest, He was also faithful in resurrecting Jesus from the grave. In this way, Jesus was given as the first fruits of the resurrection. Just as the Israelites were set free from bondage in Egypt, and gave the first fruits as a sacrifice, Jesus brought freedom from sin and death as a sacrifice given to God. Interestingly, the first fruits were then given to the Levite, to the stranger, to the orphan, and to the widow, that they may eat in your towns and be satisfied (v. 12). This is another fascinating layer which speaks to how Jesus was given for those who were orphaned and estranged from God the Father!
How should we respond to this? The idea verifies that through Christ, all will be made alive. Just as the first fruits were given immediately before the rest of the harvest would come in, Jesus was given by God and resurrected before the harvest (humanity) will be gathered. At that time, the wheat will be resurrected with Christ and the tares will be separated and thrown away (Matt 13). We could go on and on with these layers as they run so deep in helping us to understand God’s heart from the very beginning, but the point being, God is practical. He uses routine functions of everyday life to lure us deep into His eternal truth and prove to us that only He could be the master architect to construct such deep, elaborate ideas.
I want to leave you with one final image. One of our pastors, Alex Carlin, preached a great sermon on how the first fruits relate to the hope of Jesus. In it, he used this graphic which is incredibly helpful in understanding the pattern that God has followed throughout history.
