August 2, 2025: Tisha B'Av - Time Of Teshuvah (REPENTANCE)

This year Tishah B'Av begins Saturday, August 2nd at sundown and runs 25 hours until Sunday, August 3rd, one hour after sundown. The customs for observing this day are similar to those of Yom Kippur. It's an annual fast day in Judaism, on which a number of disasters in Jewish history occurred, primarily the destruction of both Solomon's Temple by the Neo-Babylonian Empire and the Second Temple by the Roman Empire in Jerusalem.

The 9th of Av, Tisha B'Av, commemorates a list of catastrophes so severe it's clearly a day set aside by God to bring us back to Him in repentance.

Because of the gravity of this day, Tishah B'Av is generally regarded as the saddest day of the Jewish year (even sadder than Yom Kippur) since it was on this date that both the First and the Second Temples were destroyed and the Jewish people were forced into exile. The root of these tragedies is said to go back to the Exodus from Egypt, when the LORD decreed a 40 year exile from the Promised Land because of the Sin of the Spies, on the ninth of Av.

The ninth of Av is the lowest point of a three week period of mourning that began with the fast of the 17th day of the fourth month (undertaken to recall the first breach in the walls of Jerusalem by the Babylonians before the First Temple was destroyed). The "Three Weeks of Sorrow" is intended to instill a sense of teshuvah (repentance).

"The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, A broken and a contrite heart— These, O God, You will not despise." Psalm 51:17

Tishah B'Av allows us to express heartfelt grief over the loss of Zion and therefore over the frailty of our human condition. During this time it is appropriate to grieve over our sins and to shed tears that attest to a "broken and a contrite heart".

Indeed, during the entire "Three Weeks of Sorrow" we read selections from the prophets that forewarn of the coming destruction of the Temple and the subsequent exile of the Jewish people (galut). During this time of the year, we listen to the lamentations of the prophet Jeremiah crying out for our repentance...

Here are a few historical events that took place on Tisha B'Av, the Jewish day of mourning:

1) The spies return on the eighth day of Av and report that the land is unconquerable. That night, the 9th of Av, the people cry. They insist that they'd rather go back to Egypt than be slaughtered by the Canaanites. The LORD is highly displeased by this public demonstration of distrust in His power, and consequently that generation of Israelites never enters the Holy Land. Only their children have that privilege, after wandering in the desert for another 38 years.

2) The First Temple was also destroyed on the 9th of Av (423 BCE). Five centuries later (in 69 CE), as the Romans drew closer to the Second Temple, ready to torch it, the Jews were shocked to realize that their Second Temple was destroyed the same day as the first.

3) When the Jews rebelled against Roman rule, they believed that their leader, Simon bar Kochba, would fulfill their messianic longings. But their hopes were cruelly dashed in 133 CE as the Jewish rebels were brutally butchered in the final battle at Betar. The date of the massacre? The 9th of Av.

4) In 1492, the Golden Age of Spain came to a close when Queen Isabella and her husband Ferdinand ordered that the Jews be banished from Spain. The edict of expulsion was signed on March 31, 1492, and the Jews were given exactly four months to put their affairs in order and leave the country.

What was the Hebrew date on which no Jew was allowed to remain any longer in Spain, where they had enjoyed welcome and prosperity? The 9th of Av.

5) World War II and the Holocaust, historians conclude, was actually the long drawn-out conclusion of World War I that began in 1914. And yes, amazingly enough, Germany declared war on Russia, effectively catapulting the First World War into motion, on the 9th of Av, Tisha b'Av.

And today, we are still at war with Hamas, and against the infiltration of RADICAL ISLAMIC JIHAD on all sides surrounding Israel, financed by Iran.

We continue to stand as watchmen and women on the walls, PRAYING for the protection of our SOLDIERS and the return of our HOSTAGES! Today is day #666 of their captivity in Gaza. We call forth their deliverance right now, in YESHUA'S MIGHTY NAME!!

Tisha B'Av is a time for reflection and mourning. It constitutes a time of corporate reflection intended to lead ISRAEL to TESHUVAH (REPENTANCE).

🔥THIS IS OUR CALL TO PRAYER: That Israel may realize that our VICTORY comes only from our REDEEMER, YESHUA HA'MASHIACH!

🔥YESHUA’S PROPHETIC CRY OVER JERUSALEM:

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem,

you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing.

Look, your house is left to you desolate. For I tell you, you will not see Me again until you say, ‘Baruch Haba B’Shem ADONAI' (Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the LORD)." Matthew 23:37–39

Yeshua wept over Jerusalem because He foresaw the destruction, the exile, and the spiritual blindness that would follow:

“When He approached Jerusalem, He saw the city and wept over it, saying,

‘If you had known on this day, even you, the conditions for peace! But now they have been hidden from your eyes.’” Luke 19:41–42

🕯NO TEMPLE, NO KORBAN:

Since the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 AD (as prophesied by YESHUA), there has been:

• ❌ No altar

• ❌ No blood sacrifices

• ❌ No high priest functioning

• ❌ No atonement by Levitical means

“Not one stone will be left upon another; every one will be thrown down.”

Matthew 24:2

Yet, the Torah demands a blood atonement:

“For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you on the altar to make atonement for your souls…” Leviticus 17:11

So where is the blood atonement today?

In MESSIAH YESHUA, who gave Himself as the final Korban!

“Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” John 1:29

🕊THE TEMPLE NOT BUILT BY MAN:

And so we wait for another Temple — not the Third Temple built by human hands, but the one YESHUA will inhabit, built by the Father, filled with glory and righteousness:

"2 My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. 4You know the way to the place where I am going.”

5 Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”

6 YESHUA answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me. 7 If you really know Me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know Him and have seen Him.” John 14:2-7

“Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up…But He was speaking about the temple of His body.” John 2:19, 21

For now, we also have become temples of the RUACH HA'KODESH (Holy Spirit):

“Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?”

1 Corinthians 3:16

“Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God?” 1 Corinthians 6:19

✨ A PROPHETIC SUMMARY FOR TISHA B’AV:

Though we mourn:

• The destruction of the Temple

• The loss of sacrifices

• The suffering of our people through generations

We rejoice:

• That the true Korban has come

• That the veil was torn

• That atonement has been made

• That we have become the dwelling place of His Spirit

• That the heavenly Temple awaits His return

And we wait with awe and longing for the fulfillment of this promise:

“And I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying,

‘Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be His people.’” Revelation 21:3

So, let's PRAY for the final reconciliation of ALL peoples to YESHUA!! Pray for the Arab nations, the scattered lost tribes of Israel, and the remnant, to be awakened at this time. The LORD will redeem the suffering, and use it to draw us unto Himself, through YESHUA HA'MASHIACH! Amen