Aliyah and Harvest Time

Aliyah and Harvest Time

by Josie Silver

I wanted to share in this week’s update, a message I wrote for a Zoom teaching I did just before Shavuot. I felt it should go further than that platform, for the sake of prayer for Israel and Aliyah.

Jeremiah 32:41 “I will rejoice over them to do them good, and I will assuredly plant them in this land with all My heart and with all My soul.”

A few weeks ago, Israel and the Jewish people worldwide celebrated the Feast of Shavuot. There is, of course, much rich symbolism prophetically, agriculturally, and biblically connected with this Feast. The Feast days return year after year in their God-appointed sequence.

Because the Feast days are connected agriculturally, they naturally cause us to think of harvest, not only agriculturally, but spiritually as well. Yet the harvest is not limited to the Feast days themselves; it continues long afterward. The Feasts of God are, in essence, a springboard into a fuller and greater harvest.

At the same time, another dark and troubling reality continues to increase across the nations the rising tide of anti-Semitism.

This virulent hatred against the Jewish people and Israel has now gone wild. It will not decrease, only increase. It is reaching levels not seen since the Holocaust. It is a major alarm.

Yet anti-Semitism acts like a threshing fork in the midst of the harvest for Aliyah, forcefully separating many Jewish people from the nations and driving them home to Israel, just as a threshing tool separates valuable wheat from worthless chaff. The Jewish people are like wheat ready for gathering - an ingathering back to their ancient homeland, Israel.

There is a threshing taking place in the nations among the Jewish people, but it is a time of refining rather than destruction. The persecution of anti-Semitism is also forcing many Jewish people to stop trying to blend in and instead embrace their Jewish identity and live it out in Israel.

Water and oil do not blend.

All the Feasts of God are centered around the agricultural cycle. Looking at the harvest seasons in Israel during the Feast days causes us to view them through a seasonal, agricultural, biblical, and prophetic lens, which is always exciting.

Shavuot is the time when we remember the Torah being given on Mount Sinai, and also the prophetic fulfillment of God’s Word being written on our hearts by the fire of the Holy Spirit when it was poured out in Jerusalem. Shavuot is also the season of firstfruits, the end of the barley harvest and the beginning of the wheat harvest.

In ancient Israel, farmers gathered the first pickings of the wheat harvest to bring before the Lord as a firstfruits offering of gratitude and thanksgiving, believing God for a rich harvest during the year.

If we look at Shavuot through a prophetic and biblical lens, it is a time in God’s calendar when He is in the process of harvesting the Jewish people from the four corners of the earth and bringing them back to His land, Israel.

I would like to think that while we here in the land are harvesting our crops with our hands for us all to enjoy and send out to the world as prophesied through Isaiah:

Isaiah 27:6 “Israel shall blossom and bud, and fill the face of the world with fruit.”

that God is simultaneously harvesting His people for Aliyah. That is how it works in His economy: two dynamics working in synergy, the natural and the spiritual, always in perfect alignment with time and season. One cannot work effectively or successfully without the other.

Just as heaven and earth were fashioned to work together in synergy, and as it is ordained for Jew and Gentile to work together in oneness, bringing about the fulfillment of His Word.

A lot goes into harvesting, both agriculturally and spiritually.

Both require concentrated timing, planning, and preparation in order to succeed.

On the ground, farmers must prepare the soil for planting seed.

Spiritually, Aliyah involves plowing the heart - breaking through mindsets, complacent attitudes, lies, fear, a “good life” mentality, distractions, uncertainties, and financial concerns.

He has a pattern for everything - He had a pattern for the Temple, the instruments, the priestly garments, and the sacrifices. He also has a pattern for the salvation of the Jewish people.

Just as there are obstacles in the soil that compete against crops, so too there are obstacles in spiritual Aliyah: bureaucracy, documentation, paperwork, timing, emotions, and the willingness to leave behind what is familiar. None of this is easy, and these things can choke the new life that is to be planted in Israel.

On the ground, harvest requires watering, tending, and much attention before fruit appears. Spiritual Aliyah requires learning basic language, phrases, and words, along with research and much planning. These are necessary things to do months before arriving in Israel to ensure roots take hold.

Farmers need to recognize the right season when crops are ripe and know when they must act.

Jewish people still living in the nations today are a ripened harvest ready for the “picking” for Aliyah. Let us pray they recognize it - hearing and responding rather than waiting any longer. May they know the field is ripe and the time has come to make the transition.

God is harvesting His people for Aliyah in preparation for the harvest of their souls here in the land. Israel is a field preparing physically and spiritually for their return.

Ezekiel 36:24–26 

“I will take you from among the nations, gather you out of all countries, and bring you into your own land. Then, I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean. Then, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you.”

It is interesting to note God’s pattern. He has a pattern for everything - He had a pattern for the Temple, the instruments, the priestly garments, and the sacrifices. He also has a pattern for the salvation of the Jewish people. It is all perfectly laid out in Ezekiel 36:

Scattering - regathering - planting - harvesting - cleansing - salvation.

We are witnessing the fulfillment of this in our current days here in Israel.

Jewish people in the nations are like a ripened harvest for their Aliyah experience.

John 4:35 describes the diaspora as a plentiful harvest ready to be brought to the land of Israel:

“Lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest.”

Ezekiel 36:8–9 “But you, O mountains of Israel, you shall shoot forth your branches and yield your fruit to My people Israel, for they are about to come. For indeed I am for you, and you shall be tilled and sown.”

So much of Scripture is agricultural and farming language, and that makes sense because God is working both with the earth agriculturally and spiritually - “on earth as it is in heaven” - in perfect tandem.

There are so many incredible Scriptures about Aliyah, if only our people knew them. But it is our job to pray and declare them. One of the most profound verses is Psalm 126:6, which fits perfectly with Aliyah.

Psalm 126:1,6 “When the Lord brought back the captivity of Zion.” 

“He who continually goes forth weeping, bearing seed for sowing, shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him.”

This is a well-known and beautiful passage, often applied in many ways, but ultimately it refers to the movement of Jewish people returning to the land from captivity. They return with seed, sheaves, and joy.

I have personally heard many Jewish people express their great joy at being here in the land when they make Aliyah to begin their new chapter of life.

“They will come with sheaves in their hands.”

In ancient Israel, sheaves were bundles of barley and wheat presented as a firstfruits offering to the Lord.

Jewish people returning to Israel also come with “sheaves in their hands,” so to speak with incredible gifts, talents, professions, skills, knowledge, and education to contribute to the land. Each one will bear fruit here. Their return is almost like a firstfruits offering to the Lord.

The Jewish people went out of Zion with great weeping, but they are returning with joy - even in the midst of war. That does not mean life here is easy - everything takes time.

Bearing sheaves traditionally speaks of moving from exile into restoration and fruitfulness.

Those returning are bringing seed with them to plant in the land - seed that will produce more fruit and contribute to the growth, strength, expansion, success, survival, and future of this nation.

Many Holocaust survivors returned carrying generational seed. Many now have four generations living here in Israel today.

The fields in the nations are white for the harvest of Jewish people for spiritual Aliyah.

Open your eyes, and you will see.

Aliyah is a clarion call in this hour.

I want to give you a challenge if you are reading this article: Would you set aside just two minutes every day to pray for the Jewish people to return to Israel? Not hours of intercession - just a few minutes each day. If we each do this, it will significantly increase the global pillar of incense ascending before God. The impact will be mighty.

Aliyah — the return of the Jewish people from the nations back to their homeland, Israel - sits at the center of what we are ultimately waiting and laboring for - revival in Israel, the national salvation of the Jewish people, which will bring worldwide revival and ultimately the return of Yeshua, our Messiah, Son of David, the Lamb of God, to sit on His throne in Jerusalem.

We are calling all Jewish people to come home and be part of Israel - to return, be rooted in the land, and become part of the great harvest.

Let us pray they will not remain scattered in the corners and fields of the nations, but that they will hear the voice of the Master Harvester calling them home.

We are each called to be harvesters in the field - your nation - so that we too can play a part in the harvest of Jewish people returning to Israel.

Praying God’s Word back to Him is powerful. If you would like a book containing many Scriptures pertaining to Aliyah to make decreeing and proclaiming God’s Word easy and very accessible, you may enjoy:

Israel - God’s Heart Cry: Eternal Truths over the Most Hotly Contested Nation in History by Global Watch.  It is available on Amazon.

Jeremiah 30:10 “Therefore do not fear, O My servant Jacob, says the Lord, nor be dismayed, O Israel - for behold, I will save you from afar, and your seed from the land of their captivity. Jacob shall return and have rest.”

This sounds very much like a Scripture fitting for the Holocaust survivors.

Shabbat Shalom and blessings from Zion!