There is something deeply meaningful about the sukkah (tabernacle/booth). During Sukkot—the Feast of Tabernacles—Jewish families build these temporary shelters, cover them with branches, gather inside them for meals and prayer, and remember how our people lived in the wilderness after God brought them out of Egypt.
If you have never celebrated Sukkot, some of these traditions may seem unfamiliar. But the truth behind them is something every one of us needs.
In the video I am sharing with you, I take you inside our family sukkah in Israel and show you some of the traditions and symbols connected with this beautiful biblical Feast. Sukkot comes at the time of harvest, so you will see grapes, olives, pomegranates and other fruits that remind us of abundance and blessing. But they are more than decorations. They remind us that behind every harvest is the provision of God.
The rain had to come. The soil had to produce. The trees had to bear fruit. People worked with their hands, but ultimately there were things only God could provide.
And I believe we sometimes forget this.
We look at what we have built, what we have earned or what we have accomplished and slowly begin to think that we are the ones holding everything together. Of course, God wants us to work, plan, prepare and be responsible with what He has given us. But who gave us the strength to work? Who opened the door we could not open ourselves? Who carried us through the season when we thought we could not continue? Who placed the right person in our path at exactly the right moment? Who gave us another morning?
Sukkot brings us back to a truth we can easily lose sight of: everything comes from God.
Our people had to learn this in the wilderness. Israel had no fields to harvest, no permanent homes and no way of knowing what the next day would bring. Yet God provided. He gave them food. He gave them water. He led them through the wilderness, and His presence remained with them.
Thousands of years later, Jewish families still build these temporary shelters during Sukkot. We leave the security of our homes for a little while and sit beneath branches. I have often thought that there is something wonderfully humbling about this. We spend so much of our lives trying to make ourselves secure, and then God gives us a Feast that says, Come outside for a moment and remember where your security really comes from.
Perhaps you have never sat inside a sukkah, but I think the question it asks belongs to all of us: What am I depending on?
Is my security in what I have saved? In what I own? In my job? In my ability to control what happens next? In the plans I have made for tomorrow? There is nothing wrong with these things, but they were never meant to carry the weight of our trust. Only God can do that.
Sometimes we are also waiting for something extraordinary before we recognize His provision. We are waiting for the big miracle, the big answer or the big breakthrough. Yet when we stop and look carefully, so much of God’s goodness has already come to us in the things that have become part of everyday life.
Food on the table. Someone we love sitting beside us. Work for our hands. A friend who called when we needed encouragement. Strength to make it through another difficult day. An answered prayer that has become such a familiar part of our life that we have forgotten we once asked God for it.
How easily we become used to the blessings we once prayed for. This is why gratitude and joy are so closely connected with Sukkot. Deuteronomy 16:15 says:
“The Lord your God will bless you in all your produce and in all the work of your hands, so that you surely rejoice.”
First we recognize the blessing. Then we rejoice in the One who gave it.
But perhaps you are reading this and thinking, “Pastor Israel, right now I don’t feel that I have abundance.” Maybe you are wondering how God will provide for something you need. Perhaps there is a financial burden, a family situation, a health concern or simply a prayer you have carried for a long time without seeing the answer.
The sukkah does not promise that we will always know how tomorrow will work out. In fact, it reminds us of exactly the opposite. Israel walked through the wilderness one day at a time. They had to learn that the God who provided yesterday could be trusted again tomorrow.
And dear friends, the same God is still faithful.
There is also something even greater in Sukkot. This Feast does not only cause us to look backward at what God has done; it points us forward. Sukkot carries a prophetic message. Scripture points toward a coming Kingdom when the nations will worship the King.
Everything around us that feels permanent today is actually temporary, just like the sukkah. Our possessions are temporary. Our circumstances are temporary. Even the problems that sometimes seem so enormous to us are temporary. But God’s Kingdom is not temporary. His promises are not temporary.
And in Jesus we have the greatest assurance that God has not abandoned us and that everything He has promised will ultimately be fulfilled.
So wherever you are reading this, I want to encourage you to take a moment and look again at what God has placed around you. Remember the ways He has carried you. Thank Him for the blessings that have become so familiar that perhaps you hardly notice them anymore.
And then think about those things you still need, those situations you cannot control and those prayers still waiting for an answer. Place them back into His hands.
You may never have sat beneath the branches of a sukkah, but you can carry its lesson with you: What surrounds us is temporary. The faithfulness of God is not.
May the Lord open your eyes again to His goodness. May He remind you that He is your Provider, and may He give you peace for the things you cannot yet see. The God who was faithful yesterday and has carried you until today can still be trusted with tomorrow.
Chag Sukkot Sameach and blessings from Israel,
Pastor Israel Pochtar