'Appointed' in the Bible

Adam knew [Eve as] his wife again; and she gave birth to a son, and named him Seth, for [she said], “God has granted another child for me in place of Abel, because Cain killed him.”

Is anything too difficult or too wonderful for the Lord? At the appointed time, when the season [for her delivery] comes, I will return to you and Sarah will have a son.”

now let it be that the girl to whom I say, ‘Please, let down your jar so that I may [have a] drink,’ and she replies, ‘Drink, and I will also give your camels water to drink’—may she be the one whom You have selected [as a wife] for Your servant Isaac; and by this I will know that You have shown lovingkindness (faithfulness) to my master.”

You shall observe the Feast of Unleavened Bread; for seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, as I commanded you, at the appointed time in the month of Abib, for in it you came out of Egypt. No one shall appear before Me empty-handed [but you shall bring sacrificial offerings].

You are to make sacred garments [official clothing reserved for holy services] for Aaron your brother, for honor and for beauty (ornamentation).

And behold, I Myself have appointed with him Oholiab, son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan; to all who are wise-hearted I have given the skill and ability to make everything that I have commanded you:

“Speak to the children of Israel and say to them, ‘The appointed times (established feasts) of the Lord which you shall proclaim as holy convocations—My appointed times are these:

‘These are the appointed times of the Lord, holy convocations which you shall proclaim at their appointed times:

‘These are the appointed times (established feasts) of the Lord, which you shall proclaim to be holy convocations, to present an offering by fire to the Lord, a burnt offering and a grain offering, sacrifices and drink offerings, each on its own day.

So Moses declared to the Israelites the appointed feasts of the Lord.

Now the appointed responsibilities of the sons of Merari involved the frames of the tabernacle, its bars, its pillars, its sockets or bases, and all the equipment, and all the service concerning them,

“The sons of Israel are to keep the Passover at its appointed time.

On the fourteenth day of this month at twilight, you shall keep it at its appointed time; according to all its statutes and ordinances you shall keep it.”

Those men said to Moses, “We are [ceremonially] unclean because of [touching] a dead body. Why are we being restrained from presenting the Lord’s offering at its appointed time among the Israelites?”

But the man who is [ceremonially] clean and is not on a journey, and yet does not observe the Passover, that person shall be cut off from among his people [excluding him from the atonement made for them] because he did not bring the Lord’s offering at its appointed time; that man will bear [the penalty of] his sin.

‘You shall present these to the Lord at your appointed times, in addition the offerings you have vowed and your freewill offerings, as your burnt offerings, grain offerings, drink offerings, and as your peace offerings.’”

Then Joshua called the twelve men whom he had appointed from the sons of Israel, one man from each tribe;

Now when the king [and the people] of Ai saw it, the men of the city hurried and got up early and went out to meet Israel in battle, the king and all his people at the appointed [time and] place before the desert plain (the Arabah). But he did not know that there was an ambush against him [waiting] behind the city [on the west side].

Beyond the Jordan east of Jericho, they designated Bezer in the wilderness on the plain from the tribe of Reuben, and Ramoth in Gilead from the tribe of Gad, and Golan in Bashan from the tribe of Manasseh.

Now the appointed signal between the men of Israel and the men in ambush was that they would make a great cloud of smoke rise from the city.

Then the cook lifted up the leg (thigh) with the meat that was on it [indicating that it was the priest’s honored portion] and placed it before Saul. Samuel said, “Here is what has been reserved [for you]. Set it before you and eat, because it has been kept for you until the appointed time, ever since I invited the people.” So Saul ate with Samuel that day.

Then Samuel said to the people, “It is the Lord who appointed Moses and Aaron and brought your fathers (ancestors) up from the land of Egypt.

Now Saul waited seven days, according to the appointed time which Samuel had set, but Samuel had not come to Gilgal; and the people were scattering away from Saul.

But Samuel said, “What have you done?” Saul said, “Since I saw that the people were scattering away from me, and that you did not come within the appointed time, and that the Philistines were assembling at Michmash,

Then Saul sent messengers to take David; but when they saw the group of prophets prophesying, and Samuel standing and presiding over them, the Spirit of God came on the messengers of Saul; and they also prophesied.

In the morning Jonathan went out to the field for the meeting with David, and a young boy was with him.

David said to Ahimelech the priest, “The king has commissioned me with a matter and has told me, ‘Let no one know anything about the matter for which I am sending you and with which I have commissioned you. I have directed the young men to a certain place.’

even from the day that I appointed judges over My people Israel; and I will give you rest from all your enemies. The Lord also declares to you that He will make a house (royal dynasty) for you.

Then Absalom would say to him, “See, your claims are good and right, but there is no man appointed as the king’s agent to listen to you.”

So Amasa went to summon [the fighting men of] Judah, but he delayed longer than the time which David had set for him.

So the Lord sent a pestilence (plague) [lasting three days] upon Israel from the morning until the appointed time, and seventy thousand men of the people from Dan to Beersheba died.

Then you shall come up [to Jerusalem] after him, and he shall come and sit on my throne and he shall reign as king in my place; for I have appointed him to be ruler over Israel and Judah.”

Jeroboam and all the people came back to Rehoboam on the third day, just as the king had instructed, saying, “Return to me on the third day.”

Jeroboam held a feast on the fifteenth day of the eighth month, like the feast which is kept in Judah, and he went up to the altar; he did this in Bethel, sacrificing to the calves which he had made. And he stationed in Bethel the priests of the high places which he had made.

So he went up to the altar which he had made in Bethel on the fifteenth day of the eighth month, in the month which he had devised in his own heart [in defiance of God’s commandments]; and he held a feast for the Israelites and he went up to the altar to burn incense [in defiance of God’s law.]

Now the king had appointed the royal officer on whose arm he leaned to be in charge of the [city] gate; and the [starving] people trampled him at the gate [as they struggled to get through for food], and he died, just as the man of God had foretold when the king came down to him.

When the king asked the woman, she told him [everything]. So the king appointed for her a certain high official, saying, “Restore everything that was hers, including all the produce of the field since the day that she left the land until now.”

Then they went in to offer sacrifices and burnt offerings.Now Jehu had stationed eighty men outside for himself and said, “If any of the men whom I have brought into your hands escape, the one who lets him go shall forfeit his own life for that man’s life.”

Then all the people of the land went to the house of Baal and tore it down. They utterly smashed his altar and his images to pieces, and they put Mattan the priest of Baal to death in front of the altars. And [Jehoiada] the priest appointed officers over the house of the Lord.

They also feared the Lord and appointed from among themselves priests of the high places, who sacrificed for them in the houses of the high places.

Now over the people whom Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon had left in the land of Judah, he appointed [as governor] Gedaliah the son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan.

Their relatives the Levites [who were not descended from Aaron] were appointed for all the other kinds of service of the tabernacle of the house of God.

Some of them also were appointed over the furniture and over all the [sacred] utensils of the sanctuary, as well as over the fine flour and the wine and the [olive] oil and the frankincense and the spices.

So the Levites appointed Heman the son of Joel, and from his relatives, Asaph the son of Berechiah; and from the sons of Merari their relatives, Ethan the son of Kushaiah,

So the singers, Heman, Asaph, and Ethan were appointed to sound aloud the bronze cymbals;

He appointed some of the Levites to minister before the ark of the Lord and to profess [God’s name] and to thank and praise the Lord, the God of Israel:

Of the Izharites: Chenaniah and his sons were appointed to outside duties for Israel, as administrators and judges.

Then Solomon began to build the house of the Lord in Jerusalem on Mount Moriah, where the Lord appeared to his father David, in the place that David had prepared, on the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

Now in accordance with the ordinance of his father David, he appointed the divisions of the priests for their service, and the Levites for their duties of praise and ministering and serving before the priests as every day required, and the gatekeepers by their divisions at every gate; for David the man of God had so commanded.

Jeroboam appointed his own priests for the high places, for the satyrs (goat demons) and calves (idols) which he had made.

He appointed judges in the land in all the fortified cities of Judah, city by city,

When he had consulted with the people, he appointed those who sang to the Lord and those who praised Him in their holy (priestly) attire, as they went out before the army and said, “Praise and give thanks to the Lord, for His mercy and lovingkindness endure forever.”

Also Jehoiada placed the offices and officers of the house of the Lord under the authority of the Levitical priests, whom David had [previously] assigned over the house of the Lord, to offer the burnt offerings of the Lord, as it is written in the Law of Moses, with rejoicing and singing in accordance with the order of David.

Hezekiah spoke encouragingly to all the Levites who showed good understanding in the things of the Lord. So the people ate for the appointed seven days, sacrificing peace offerings and giving thanks to the Lord God of their fathers.

And Hezekiah appointed the divisions of the priests, and the Levites by their divisions, each in accordance with his service, both the priests and Levites, for burnt offerings and for peace offerings, to minister and to give thanks and to praise in the gates of the camp of the Lord.

Hezekiah also appointed the king’s [personal] portion of his goods: for the morning and evening burnt offerings, and the burnt offerings for the Sabbaths and for the New Moons and for the appointed feasts, as it is written in the Law of the Lord.

and I will not again remove Israel from the land which I appointed for your fathers, if they will only be careful to do everything that I have commanded them in regard to all the law, the statutes, and the ordinances given through Moses.”

So Hilkiah and those whom the king had told went to Huldah the prophetess, the wife of Shallum the son of Tokhath, the son of Hasrah, keeper of the wardrobe (now she lived in Jerusalem, in the Second Quarter); and they spoke to her about this.

He appointed the priests to their positions and encouraged them in the service of the house of the Lord.

and afterward, there was the continual burnt offering, the offering at the New Moons, and at all the appointed festivals of the Lord that were consecrated, and the offerings of everyone who made a voluntary offering to the Lord.

In the second year of their coming to God’s house at Jerusalem, in the second month, Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel and Jeshua the son of Jozadak began [the work], with the rest of their brothers—the priests and Levites and all who came to Jerusalem from the captivity. They appointed the Levites, from twenty years old and upward, to oversee the work of the house of the Lord.

Moreover, from the day that I was appointed to be their governor in the land of Judah, from the twentieth year to the thirty-second year of King Artaxerxes, for twelve years, neither I nor my relatives have eaten the governor’s food allowance.

Now when the wall had been rebuilt and I had set up the doors, and the gatekeepers, singers, and Levites had been appointed,

“They refused to listen and obey,And did not remember Your wondrous acts which You had performed among them;So they stiffened their necks and [in their rebellion] appointed a leader in order to return them to slavery in Egypt.But You are a God of forgiveness,Gracious and merciful and compassionate,Slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness;And You did not abandon them.

We have also cast lots—the priests, the Levites, and the people—for [contributing] the supply of wood, to bring it to the house of our God, according to our fathers’ households, at set times annually, to burn on the altar of the Lord our God, as it is written in the Law;

Then I had the leaders of Judah come up on the wall, and I appointed two large thanksgiving choirs, the first one proceeding to the right on top of the wall toward the Refuse Gate.

On that day men were appointed over the chambers for the stores, the contributions, the first fruits, and the tithes, to gather into them from the fields of the cities the portions required by the law for the priests and the Levites; for Judah rejoiced over the priests and Levites who served.

Now prior to this, Eliashib the priest, who was appointed over the chambers of the house of our God, and was related to Tobiah [our adversary],

and I provided for the wood offering at appointed times and for the first fruits. O my God, [please] remember me for good [and imprint me on Your heart].

Then Esther summoned Hathach, one of the king’s eunuchs, whom the king had appointed to attend her, and ordered him to go to Mordecai to find out what this issue was and why it had come about.

the Jews established and made it a custom for themselves and for their descendants and for all who joined them, so that they would not fail to celebrate these two days as it was written and at the appointed time annually.

to establish these days of Purim [to be observed] at their appointed times, just as Mordecai the Jew and Queen Esther had established for them, and as they had established for themselves and for their descendants with instructions regarding their times of fasting and their lamentations (expressions of needing help).

“Is not man forced to labor on earth?And are not his days like the days of a hired man?

So am I allotted months of futility and suffering,And [long] nights of trouble and misery are appointed to me.

“[O God] turn your gaze from him so that he may rest,Until he fulfills his day [on earth] like a hired man.

“This is the wicked man’s portion from God,And the heritage decreed and appointed to him by God.”

“For I know that You will bring me to deathAnd to the house of meeting [appointed] for all the living.

“For He sets no appointed time for a man,That he should appear before Him in judgment.

“Who has appointed God His way,And who can say [to Him], ‘You have done wrong’?

And marked for it My [appointed] boundaryAnd set bars and doors [defining the shorelines],

Like sheep they are appointed for Sheol (the nether world, the place of the dead);Death will be their shepherd;And the upright shall rule over them in the morning,And their form and beauty shall be for Sheol to consume,So that they have no dwelling [on earth].

Be to me a rock of refuge and a sheltering stronghold to which I may continually come;You have given the commandment to save me,For You are my rock and my fortress.

And I said, “This is my grief,That the right hand of the Most High has changed [and His lovingkindness is withheld].”

For He established a testimony (a specific precept) in JacobAnd appointed a law in Israel,Which He commanded our fathersThat they should teach to their children [the great facts of God’s transactions with Israel],

Let the groaning and sighing of the prisoner come before You;According to the greatness of Your power keep safe those who are doomed to die.

To hear the sighing of the prisoner,To set free those who were doomed to death,

The mountains rose, the valleys sank downTo the place which You established for them.

He made the moon for the seasons;The sun knows the [exact] place of its setting.

You have commanded Your testimonies in righteousnessAnd in great faithfulness.

He has taken a bag of money with him,And he will come home on the appointed day.”

When He set for the sea its boundarySo that the waters would not transgress [the boundaries set by] His command,When He marked out the foundations of the earth—

I said to myself, “God will judge both the righteous and the wicked,” for there is a time [appointed] for every matter and for every deed.

Also, every man to whom God has given riches and possessions, He has also given the power and ability to enjoy them and to receive [this as] his [allotted] portion and to rejoice in his labor—this is the gift of God [to him].

“I hate [the hypocrisy of] your New Moon festivals and your appointed feasts.They have become a burden to Me;I am weary of bearing them.

“Listen carefully, I have appointed him [David, representing the Messiah] to be a witness to the nations [regarding salvation],A leader and commander to the peoples.

“The smallest one will become a thousand (a clan),And the least one a mighty nation.I, the Lord, will quicken it in its [appointed] time.”

“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you [and approved of you as My chosen instrument],And before you were born I consecrated you [to Myself as My own];I have appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”

“See, I have appointed you this day over the nations and over the kingdoms,To uproot and break down,To destroy and to overthrow,To build and to plant.”

‘They do not say in their heart,“Let us now fear and worship the Lord our God [with profound awe and reverence],Who gives rain in its season,Both the autumn and the spring rain,Who keeps for usThe appointed weeks of the harvest.”

“Even the stork in the skyKnows her seasons [of migration],And the turtledove, the swallow and the craneObserve the time of their return.But My people do not knowThe law of the Lord.