Feast of Pentecost Study
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Pentecost, is not a particular day that originated in the New Testament when the Holy Ghost was sent down from God. Pentecost or the Feast of Pentecost has its roots in the Old Testament. Tonight, we are going to examine those roots and compare the roots of the Old Testament to the roots of the New Testament.
So what is Pentecost exactly? Pentecost or Shavouth is a festival celebrated on the 50th day after Passover or 7 weeks after Passover. Many of us who know a little-bit of something about geometry should know that the word “penta” means 5. It was one of three feast that God required all males to attend representing their families (Holy Convocation).
In order to understand Pentecost, it is also equally important to understand several of the synonymous names associated with the festival. Reason being, is that you won’t find the word “pentecost” in the Old Testament because the word “pentecost” is a taken from the greek word “pentekoste”.
Names synonymous with Pentecost - 4 names:
Names synonymous with Pentecost - 4 names:
Shavuoth
Feast of Weeks
Feast of Harvest
Day of First Fruits
First scriptures:
22 And thou shalt observe the feast of weeks, of the firstfruits of wheat harvest, and the feast of ingathering at the year’s end.
15 “From the day after the Sabbath—the day you bring the bundle of grain to be lifted up as a special offering—count off seven full weeks. 16 Keep counting until the day after the seventh Sabbath, fifty days later. Then present an offering of new grain to the Lord. 17 From wherever you live, bring two loaves of bread to be lifted up before the Lord as a special offering. Make these loaves from four quarts of choice flour, and bake them with yeast. They will be an offering to the Lord from the first of your crops. 18 Along with the bread, present seven one-year-old male lambs with no defects, one young bull, and two rams as burnt offerings to the Lord. These burnt offerings, together with the grain offerings and liquid offerings, will be a special gift, a pleasing aroma to the Lord. 19 Then you must offer one male goat as a sin offering and two one-year-old male lambs as a peace offering.
20 “The priest will lift up the two lambs as a special offering to the Lord, together with the loaves representing the first of your crops. These offerings, which are holy to the Lord, belong to the priests. 21 That same day will be proclaimed an official day for holy assembly, a day on which you do no ordinary work. This is a permanent law for you, and it must be observed from generation to generation wherever you live.
10 Then celebrate the Festival of Harvest to honor the Lord your God. Bring him a voluntary offering in proportion to the blessings you have received from him.
Now the first question we may ask is “why is harvest, feast, or first fruits” contained in the names of Pentecost? Because the priest presented grain offering to the LORD on behalf of the people of God.
26 The first of the firstfruits of thy land thou shalt bring unto the house of the LORD thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother’s milk.
Notice here in scripture, God says that the people are to bring their very best. Don’t choose out the very best for yourself, don’t keep it to yourself, bring the finest of what you have and offer it to God. When we present anything to God we need to present our finest to God, this is why it is called a “sacrifice”. I believe that is one reason why the writer of Hebrews says in Hebrews 13:15 that there is a “sacrifice of praise” that we can offer through Jesus or what Jesus has done for us. Most of the time your flesh doesn’t want you to praise God. We begin to think of excuses to not give God glory, we begin to think that the circumstances that we are currently end is not conducive to us to praise God. But when you praise God and you live for God anyhow....this is a sacrifice of praise! Why, because Jesus sacrificed himself for us and because he sacrificed himself for us we ought to sacrifice ourselves for Him, we should have a continual praise upon our lips.
Again lets examine what God says:
10 And thou shalt keep the feast of weeks unto the LORD thy God with a tribute of a freewill offering of thine hand, which thou shalt give unto the LORD thy God, according as the LORD thy God hath blessed thee:
Celebrate the Festival of Harvest with a tribute or honor to God. Why are we honoring God, for the blessings He has bestowed upon us. They are honoring God here because God is providing them with provision of food to eat. God sent them rain while they were in the promise-land
We find later on in scripture around Jeremiah 5:24 that the people of God became unthankful for the blessings that God bestowed upon them.
24 Neither say they in their heart, Let us now fear the LORD our God, that giveth rain, both the former and the latter, in his season: he reserveth unto us the appointed weeks of the harvest.
We must strive to ensure that we never become like the Israelites who failed to thank God for the blessings that He bestows upon us.
When we examine the scriptures there are several themes that we must take note of: “new/first”, harvest, and “thanksgiving”.
Dealing with the themes:
Dealing with the themes:
New- God first of all was doing a new thing with the Israelites.
1 And the LORD said unto Moses, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first: and I will write upon these tables the words that were in the first tables, which thou brakest. 2 And be ready in the morning, and come up in the morning unto mount Sinai, and present thyself there to me in the top of the mount. 3 And no man shall come up with thee, neither let any man be seen throughout all the mount; neither let the flocks nor herds feed before that mount. 4 And he hewed two tables of stone like unto the first; and Moses rose up early in the morning, and went up unto mount Sinai, as the LORD had commanded him, and took in his hand the two tables of stone.
5 And the LORD descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the LORD. 6 And the LORD passed by before him, and proclaimed, The LORD, The LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, 7 Keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, unto the third and to the fourth generation. 8 And Moses made haste, and bowed his head toward the earth, and worshipped. 9 And he said, If now I have found grace in thy sight, O Lord, let my Lord, I pray thee, go among us; for it is a stiffnecked people; and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for thine inheritance.
10 And he said, Behold, I make a covenant: before all thy people I will do marvels, such as have not been done in all the earth, nor in any nation: and all the people among which thou art shall see the work of the LORD: for it is a terrible thing that I will do with thee. 11 Observe thou that which I command thee this day: behold, I drive out before thee the Amorite, and the Canaanite, and the Hittite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite. 12 Take heed to thyself, lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land whither thou goest, lest it be for a snare in the midst of thee: 13 But ye shall destroy their altars, break their images, and cut down their groves: 14 For thou shalt worship no other god: for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God: 15 Lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and they go a whoring after their gods, and do sacrifice unto their gods, and one call thee, and thou eat of his sacrifice; 16 And thou take of their daughters unto thy sons, and their daughters go a whoring after their gods, and make thy sons go a whoring after their gods. 17 Thou shalt make thee no molten gods.
So we see here that God is doing a new thing with the Israelites. Not so much in that we are identifying this particular time in scripture, nonetheless we consider the whole of Exodus in which God redeems a nation out of slavery, gives them laws in which to govern themselves, makes a covenant with them, and calls this nation His holy people. Nowhere in human according to scripture do we find that God does such a thing. God calls them out of Egypt, delivers them, cleans them up, gives them His word, makes a covenant with them, and calls them His people!
Considering this, we must know that when the Israelites celebrated Shavuot that they celebrated the giving of the law (tables of stone) the covenant that was made between God and Israel, and the birth of a (NEW) godly nation.
How does this parallel with “The Day of Pentecost” in Acts 2?
God called the saints out of the world (Egypt). The ekklesia which is the greek word for church means the called out ones.
9 But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light:
2. God gave them the word (gospel) by the preaching of Peter (Acts 2:14-36).
3. God made a New Covenant with the church.
33 But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.
4. God established the church as His Holy People.
14 He gave his life to free us from every kind of sin, to cleanse us, and to make us his very own people, totally committed to doing good deeds.
18 to open their eyes, so they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God. Then they will receive forgiveness for their sins and be given a place among God’s people, who are set apart by faith in me.’
Acts 26:18 is one of the reasons why we call the people of God “saints” because we received forgiveness of sins and sanctification by the blood or sacrifice of Jesus Christ! I know that we as pentecostal/apostolics believe heavily in the importance of water baptism for the remission of sins, but we must NEVER forget that the forgiveness of sins is all made possible by the blood of Jesus Christ! Water in and of itself cannot wash you of your sins, it is the blood of Jesus Christ, his sacrifice in which we received atonement of our sins. We just believe that the act of baptism signifies not only the washing away of sins but also the burying of sins and if God gives a commandment we ought to do it. Contrary to those who believe that Peter went rogue on the day of Pentecost, we believe that when Peter exhorted the Jews to be baptized in the “name of Jesus Christ” that Peter was fulfilling the great commission that Jesus gave the Apostles in Matthew 28:19. We further conclude that baptism in the name of Jesus was further implemented in scripture in Acts 8th, 10th, and 19th chapters.
So lets review shall we:
The Israelites celebrated Pentecost which is also called “Feast of Weeks, Feast of Harvest, Day of First Fruits, or Hag Shavuot.”
They celebrated this day because of 4 things; to give praise to God for providing them with the first fruits of the harvest, to commemorate the giving of the law on Mount Sinai, to celebrate the creation of a new nation (remember that they were slaves prior to becoming a nation, and to celebrate the establishment of the Israelite nation in the promised land.
Retuning back to the themes: New, First, Harvest, and Thanksgiving. It should be clearly evident that all 4 themes are represented in the Old Testament.
Again:
God created a new nation, gave them new laws.
They celebrated the first-fruits of the harvest.
Pentecost was a joyful time and it was considered to be a celebration.
How does this parallel with the New Testament?
5 Parallels of Scripture from Old to New Testament:
5 Parallels of Scripture from Old to New Testament:
God established a new covenant with the church.
Those whom were empowered by the Spirit of God had a newfound boldness to proclaim the word of God (specifically Acts 2-8).
The disciples of Jesus received what is considered to be the first-fruit (figuratively) of the Spirit of God (Romans 8:23).
Upon the inception of the Holy Spirit, those whom were in the upper-room experienced a great sense of joy that was produced by the the Holy Spirit. They rejoiced, they gave God praise, they testified about the LORD (Acts 2:5-12).
If we would remember that when God revealed himself to the children of Israel (theophany) at Mt. Sinai that fire and smoke accompanied the reveal of God to the Israelites. Likewise, God again choses fire to reveal himself not only to the disciples in the upper-room, but to thousands of Jews who had traveled from distant countries to Jerusalem to celebrate the feast of Pentecost. God choose, people to speak through (through the enablement of the Holy Ghost or as the scripture says “as the Spirit gave utterance” (Acts 2:3).
End Biblestudy:
Join us this Sunday as we celebrate the birth of the church (body of Christ) and its 1,987 year anniversary (if you do the math and subtract 33 A.D. from 2020 A.D. will give you 1,987.
What is the church?
13 For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit.
2 Unto the church of God which is at Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours: