Omer Counting Should Not Be a Foreign Concept to the Church!

Christine Darg discusses a topic that the early Church understood--counting the Omer between Passover and Pentecost. The present-day Church must catch up!

"You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” (Acts 1:8)

Yesterday in many churches around the world Pentecost was celebrated.

Our calendars are so mixed up that only God truly knows what time it really is.

Pentecost is actually derived from the festival of the LORD called Shavu’ot.

Shavu’ot in Hebrew means weeks, plural, the Festival of Weeks. According to instructions in Leviticus 23, every day in the 50 days from Passover to Shavu’ot the days are counted—it’s called the counting of the Omer, the sheaf of the First Fruits harvest.

The counting ends at Shavu’ot, 7 weeks later.

In Hebrew the Counting of the Omer is called ספירת העומר Sefirat Ha’omer, or The Day of Waving, or Waving the Omer sheaf. The first day of counting is called the Early Firstfruits when sheaves of grain are lifted and waved before the LORD.

The counting began in Bible days when a measure of barley called an Omer was offered in the Holy Temple in Jerusalem.

On a spiritual level, the counting mirrors the journey of the Jews’ ancestors in the desert who spent these 49 days in spiritual preparation and anticipation…between the Exodus (on Passover) and the Giving of the Torah (on Shavu’ot) The final day is called the Later Firstfruits.

Shavu’ot is called Pentecost by Christians. Pentecost is derived from the Greek word pente meaning 50. When composing the Book of Acts, the fact that Luke, the author of the Book of Acts, in Acts 2: 1 described the arrival of Pentecost as fully come, indicates that the early disciples were counting the days of the Omer, as all observant Jews would have been doing.

Presently on the Hebraic calendar, today Monday 20 May 2024 is only the 27th day of the Omer, that’s just a little over halfway toward Shavu’ot. That means Shavu’ot be celebrated from sunset 11 June until nightfall 13 June 2024.

Unfortunately the Church world has not taught on this fascinating window of time between Passover and Shavu’ot. Presently we are in a 7-week time tunnel connecting Passover and Shavu’ot, and seven is the Torah’s holy number.

One of my Israeli friends named his son Omer because he was born during the days of counting of the Omer. Today Omer is an Israeli Army officer but he was just a boy when I first met him, and so hearing his name explained was the very first time I had ever heard about the concept of counting the Omer, although I have been a Bible believer all my life. I certainly never heard anything about counting the Omer in church. Today Omer counting is an unknown I daresay to 99.9 per cent of the churches who do not yet have a solid foundation in the Hebraic roots of Scripture. It's not a easy to grasp concept.

It’s fascinating that Yeshua did not complete the full Omer count in his post-Resurrection appearances but rather He ascended to the Father on 40th day of counting the Omer. Bible scholars often speak on the meaning of 40 in the Bible. In eternity we will contemplate these deep things. So Jesus ascended to Heaven on the 40th day of the Omer, and He sent the Holy Spirit at the end of the Omer count. This is the day when the Holy Spirit was sent to the believers waiting in the Upper Room and when the Apostle Peter spoke in Acts Chapter 2 to the pilgrims who came to the Temple in Jerusalem. 

“And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. 3And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. 4And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.” (Acts 2: 2-4)

Since the window between Passover and Shavu’ot is a time set apart in Holy Scripture, surely it is a concept to study! During this time the Omer is counted daily, and for the Jewish people there are scripture readings. There is a great count-down, or count up?, to Pentecost! To many of us, it is a totally foreign concept, yet the counting of the Omer has always been here in the Bible.  It was a practice which Jesus and his disciples certainly knew.

From the second night of Passover, every night to the night before Shavu’ot, the Jewish people recite a blessing and state the count of the Omer in both weeks and days. So, for example, on the 27th day, (which it is today 20 May 2024), they will say, “Today is 27 days, which is 3 weeks and 6 days of the Omer.” The counting is intended as a reminder of the link between Passover, which commemorates the Exodus, and Shavu’ot, which commemorates the giving of the Torah. The counting of the Omer reminds the Jewish people that their redemption from slavery was not complete until they received the Torah.

Over the past decades, followers of Yeshua have been discovering that all of the Levitical Feasts of the Lord have deep meanings concerning Messiah.  The New Testament is concealed in the Hebrew Bible and the Hebrew Scriptures are revealed in the New Testament.

The seven weeks to Pentecost were, of course, the harvest season.

Rabbi Shaul, the Apostle Paul, a Pharisee of Pharisees, participated year by year in the Levitical feasts, including the Feast of Firstfruits during Passover.  That is why, in a very Hebraic way, Paul declared in 1 Corinthians 15: 20, “Now is Messiah risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept.”

The seven weeks to Pentecost begins with “a sheaf of the firstfruit” and end with the loaves of “bread of the firstfruits” being “waved,” that is, ascending upwards, to the Lord.  Jesus died and fell into the ground as the grain of wheat. He prophesied in John 12: 24, “Truly,  truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”  In resurrection, Jesus the Bread of Life “bore much fruit.” The Church, which is the Body of Christ–sprung forth from that one “grain of wheat” which fell into the ground and died– Jesus himself.  

Now let’s go back to the early Resurrection morning of the “first day of the week” that leads up to Pentecost, to examine the account as recorded in John Chapter 20. 

As soon as Mary Magdalene recognized the Lord and heard Him call her by name, her first instinct was to do what the other women did an hour or so later — they held him by the feet and worshiped him.

But at that point in time, Jesus could not allow Mary Magdalene to touch him, and He tells her why it was impossible at that particular moment. In John 20: 17 and 18, he said to her, “Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say to them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.” According to Leviticus 23: 14, it was forbidden for anyone to touch the new harvest until the first sheaf had been offered to God. Furthermore, this holy offering was to be presented in the morning, and without a doubt, Jesus the Bread of Life, ascended to His Father at the hour of the morning sacrifice.  This hour was the “third hour of the day”–that is, from 8 to 9 o’clock in the morning.

It was from this hour of the firstfuits presentation to God that the seven weeks to Pentecost began to be counted, and we know that it was at this same hour—9 o’clock in the morning!—that the day of Pentecost in Acts Chapter 2 was also marked by the descent of the Holy Spirit.

Now, going back to resurrection morning, Jesus ascended to His Father, as the “firstfruits” of a mighty harvest throughout history that will soon be completed. Multitudes of souls are being gathered from every nation on earth.  After being presented to the Father, Jesus returned to the Resurrection garden, in time to greet the other women who came to visit the now empty tomb.  This time He did not forbid the women to touch Him, because “the weeks” of harvest had begun after the firstfruits had been presented to the Father.

For 40 days after his resurrection, Jesus at certain times appeared to his disciples—behind closed doors, and in the open air, and in encounters such as his conversation with two disciples on the road to Emmaus, or on the shores of the Sea of Galilee where he cooked breakfast and ate with his disciples.  On one occasion more than 500 of his followers saw Him simultaneously, many of whom were probably interviewed by the apostle Paul, because Paul recorded some of the post-resurrection appearances of Jesus in 1 Corinthians Chapter 15.

One of the most exciting concepts to contemplate is that nearly 2,000 years ago the Holy Spirit was outpoured on the early Church on the day of Pentecost. Now in these Last Days, Scripture predicts that the Holy Spirit will be outpoured once again upon Jerusalem and the House of David. HalleluYah!

 Zechariah 12: 8,  In that day shall the Lord defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem; and he that is feeble among them at that day shall be as David; and the house of David shall be as God, as the angel of the Lord before them.

⁹ And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.

¹⁰ And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn.Pentecost is described as the Church's birthday in the Upper Room, with the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and some eschatologists believe for various reasons that the Rapture of the Church could also happen at Pentecost.

But when really is Pentecost this year? Only God knows the day and the hour!

Interestingly Psalm 67 is traditionally read every day during the count up (or count down) period of 49 days from the Sheaf (omer) of First Fruits (the day on which Yeshua was resurrected) to Shavu’ot (Weeks, Pentecost, the day on which the Holy Spirit was outpoured).

May God Cause His Face to Shine on Us

1{To the chief Musician on Neginoth, A Psalm or Song.} God be merciful unto us, and bless us; and cause his face to shine upon us; Selah.

2That thy way may be known upon earth, thy saving health among all nations.

3Let the people praise thee, O God; let all the people praise thee.

4O let the nations be glad and sing for joy: for thou shalt judge the people righteously, and govern the nations upon earth. Selah.

5Let the people praise thee, O God; let all the people praise thee.

6Then shall the earth yield her increase; and God, even our own God, shall bless us.

7God shall bless us; and all the ends of the earth shall fear him.

This beautiful psalm, one of my very favorites, praises Elohim for the blessing of the abundant agricultural harvest, “the earth has yielded its increase.”

Psalm 67 beautifully echoes the Aaronic blessing and refers to the covenant promise of being blessed in order to be a blessing to the nations.

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Now the following thought are only my musings on the counting of the Omer and nothing is shared to be dogmatic:

“It is the glory of God to conceal things, but the glory of kings is to search things out.” (Proverbs 25: 2)

As I’ve already noted, in the Jewish world, this is the time of “Sefirat Ha’omer,” the Counting or Waving of the Omer, which is all about counting days.

Unfortunately the Church world has not taught on this fascinating interval between Passover and Pentecost = Shavu’ot, meaning weeks.

Presently we are in a window of seven weeks between the Passover and Shavu’ot festivals, and seven is the Torah’s holy number.

It’s fascinating that Yeshua (Jesus) did not finish the Omer count in his post-Resurrection appearances but rather He ascended to the Father on day 40 of counting the Omer. There are no coincidences in God! This must have a deep meaning. Scholars speak often on the meaning of 40 in the Bible, but basically the use of 40 seems to emphasize a spiritual truth. In eternity we will contemplate these deep things. “Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” (Psalm 90: 12)

Are you interested in the Rapture of the Church, the catching away of believers to be with the Lord Jesus forever?  This subject has captivated me because I have experienced many dreams about the Rapture and the Second Coming of Jesus.  These dreams have generally depicted the “snatching away” Rapture, when Jesus comes for us suddenly in the atmosphere.  Let’s look at one of the concealed types and patterns found in the Levitical Feasts of the Lord concerning End Time events and the Rapture of the Church… concealed but quite possibly unsealed in this hour…

When I speak of the Rapture, I am referring to the event described in the New Testament as the coming of the Lord in the atmosphere to catch away believers who are looking and waiting for Him to appear.  

Another word for Rapture is “translation” ….the church will be translated to heaven in the same way that Elijah was translated out of here…. alive in a fiery chariot….or like Enoch in the Old Testament who was also translated without dying. 

The Bible says Enoch walked with God, and one day he vanished alive, because God just took him home with him due to the fact that they were such close friends. Some people mock the Rapture as a preposterous idea to believe that millions of persons will disappear, whereas Enoch and Elijah were just single individuals. However, the Rapture will be the Body (singular) of Messiah!

Let’s explore some interesting Scripture-based ideas. After all, we are living in a time of unprecedented revelation, a time when the prophet Daniel said many Scriptures would be unsealed.  In the last chapter of the Book of Daniel, Chapter 12, Daniel wrote about the End Times,

“And I heard revelations but I did not understand; then I said, O my Lord, what shall be the end of these things?  And he said, Go thy way, Daniel: for the words are closed up and sealed til the time of the end.  Many shall be purified and made white and tried, but the wicked shall do wickedly: and none of the wicked shall understand but the wise shall understand.”

Are you among “the wise who shall understand?”  If you have received the Lord, you are already wise. Clearly in the above passage of Scripture, we are promised that the wise will understand many revelations that have been heretofore sealed in the Bible. So why not have faith to believe that we WILL understand?

A friend sent me a book that is full of revelation about chronology in the Bible available on the Internet:

In “Miracle of Time” author Frank L. Paine mentioned something that I have often mused upon but I had never seen nor heard anybody else articulate. That is…… by the spirit of revelation, I have been expecting that near the event known as the Rapture, what Paul referred to as the catching away, there will be a period of time in which those who have died in Christ will be resurrected FIRST according to 1 Thessalonians 4: 16, and therefore it is conceivable that they may appear and walk beside those of us who are still alive and remaining on the earth just prior to the Rapture. So I’m musing about the possibility of a short time span similar to the time in the New Testament when the saints came out of their tombs after the resurrection of Jesus and appeared to many.

When Jesus ascended to heaven on the 40th day, He broke the pattern of the counting of the Omer.  He, in fact, left 9 days uncounted……Could it be that he left those days for later ….for similar conditions on earth?

Now let’s look further into this fascinating matter.  In First Thessalonians Chapter 3: 13, the Apostle Paul refers to the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ with all of his saints. The word “coming” in New Testament Greek is “The ‘Par-ou-sia'” which  literally means “presence, being alongside of.”

Paine’s book, Miracle of Time, poses this interesting question….If we are at the culmination of church history, surely we should ask whether the Bible holds any clear information concerning the order of events when the Rapture takes place.  First of all, the New Testament speaks of resurrections “each in his order.” Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15: 23, “But there is an order to this resurrection: Christ was raised as the first of the harvest; then all who belong to Christ will be raised when he comes back.”

Secondly,  let’s look at the fact that Paul was given the word of the Lord concerning the translation of believers in First Thessalonians 4: 15-16. I want to undercore something that perhaps you have never noticed before.  Paul expressed an undefined space of time  between the descent of our Lord and the catching up. He said Jesus comes “from heaven with a shout…and then….with the trump of God,” at which moment “the dead in Christ” would “rise first.”  I checked all of this and Weymouth’s New Testament  is a translation that uses the word “afterwards.” The King James says the dead in Christ will be raised first, then we who are alive and remain will be caught up.  But now let’s read Weymouth’s translation, “the dead in Christ will arise first…..Afterwards we who are alive and are still on earth will be caught up in their company amid clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we shall be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage one another with these words.”

So here’s a question to examine— How much time can elapse between the dead in Christ shall arise “first” and “afterwards” we who are alive and still on the earth will be caught up?  Most Bible scholars and believers have assumed ALL of these events will happen in the twinkling of an eye—in a nano second–simultaneously.  But if there is a pause in that verse, we know that some pauses in Bible chronology have been quite lengthy!  Therefore we may consider the blessed possibility that for a period of time, however short, possibly, possibly, POSSIBLY, for Yeshua’s uncompleted days of the counting of the Omer, we who are alive and part of the Bride of Messiah may see resurrected saints and the Lord in the same manner that He appeared to His disciples at various times.  After His Resurrection, during the first 40 days of counting the Omer, Jesus walked through walls, vanished and appeared. Could this pattern be repeated for the yet incomplete nine days to be potentially fulfilled?

Turn with me to a totally fascinating passage, one that I have frequently pondered, and hardly anyone ever preaches on,  Matthew 27: 52-53.  Here we read,

“. . . many bodies of the saints which slept arose, and came out of the graves after His resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.”

Imagine what it was like in Jerusalem at the resurrection of Jesus! There was darkness, the renting of the thick temple veil, an earthquake and saints rising from their graves as firstfruits from the dead and appearing to many, startling them!  Wow, that must have been more than  awesome….

From the perspective of counting the Omer, the coming of the Lord in the Rapture is the second and still unfulfilled part of Messiah’s Resurrection.  The first part of his Resurrection was perfectly fulfilled when He, the head of the Church, was raised up at the beginning of the seven weeks leading up to the Pentecost festival.  

Upon rising from the dead, one of the first things Jesus did was to wrap up “the napkin, that was about His head” and neatly put it aside “in a place by itself.” Frank Paine in “Miracle of  Time” makes a fascinating suggestion that Yeshua’s action of folding away the napkin that had been on his head in death was a prophetic act to signify that He, the Head of the Church, had finished with death, and the Church, “which is His body,” was figured in the shroud and would come later! Selah!

It was from this hour of the firstfuits presentation to God that the seven weeks to Pentecost began to be counted, according to the divine instruction in Leviticus 23:  “begin to number the seven weeks from such time as you begin to put the sickle to the corn.”

And we know that it was at this same hour—9 o’clock in the morning!—that the day of Pentecost in Acts Chapter 2 was also marked at its opening by the descent of the Holy Spirit.

Let me remind you that by ascending back to heaven after 40 days, Jesus broke the type of counting the Omer, that is, after 40 days He ascended to Heaven, leaving His disciples, but they were  promised that He would return “in like manner” as they had seen Him depart. The “type” of the full Omer count has been on hold while Jesus has been absent from the earth.  Here’s my question:  Will the remaining 9-10 days up to the full 50 days be completed?  

Earlier I quoted 1 Thessalonians 3: 13 and Paul’s words: “the coming, the parousia of our Lord Jesus Christ with all His saints.”  This word parousia simply means “being present” or “being alongside.”  Is it possible that Jesus, and all His saints who have been in the graves for the past nearly 2,000 years will soon be alongside us in their resurrected immortal bodies, while we are still in our mortal bodies, immediately prior to our translation to His Father’s House?

If the “type” (picture) of the harvest is to be fulfilled, ten more days must elapse, when the same conditions of the first 40 post-resurrection days are restored, suggests Frank Paine in his book “The Miracle of Time.”  I find this to be not only fascinating but plausible because our God is accurate in his types and shadows and meanings of numbers. No number is casually in the Bible by accident. That could possibily mean that the graves of believers who died in Christ would first be emptied and then afterwards we who are alive and who still remain would be rejoicing over our soon departure home without ever having to die.

Possibly. . . .“Afterwards,” during the relatively short space of time while Jesus is with the resurrected saints and the living believers on earth, “at the last trump… we shall be changed incorruptible,” in order to journey  into the heavens; and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”

At the time when the Bride of Messiah is removed from the earth by translation, chronology of redemption on earth will continue but it will be centered again around the nation of Israel. God will officially return to the nation of Israel for the very last of the Last Days before the Lord’s Millennial reign on earth from  Jerusalem.

I know this is much to take in, but it is my ardent hope that the reader is ready for the coming of the Lord. We must repent of any known sins and live a righteous and holy life in the reverential fear of the Lord.  If you are not sure if you are ready or if you are not sure that you know Him, call upon the Lord Jesus (Yeshua).  All who call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved!

Additionally, my Rapture-ready friend Dr. John David Pitcher made an insightful point that could transcend the typology of the Fall Festivals, of  which many believe are the true types and shadows of the Rapture: “How I love a good mystery! God has certainly left us one! Could the final countdown of the Omer transcend the ages? Could it transcend the calendar? Could the final 9 days be in fact transcended to the Days of Awe between a future Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur (in the fall instead of the spring)? Both have a 9-day period. Both have a similar focus. Oh how much there is left a pondering within my heart!”

Finally, a number of years ago, our ministry produced a video based upon the mystery of the Omer. Here is a link to that video on YouTube:

To contact Christine Darg, please visit her website at www.JerusalemChannel.tv