A Day For Rejoicing
Copyright 1999 / Leslie A Turvey

  What a day it was, June 17, A.D. 31.
   Jesus had died. His disciples witnessed his crucifixion. They knew he was resurrected: he spoke with them on several occasions. And they had watched as he rose in a cloud of angels to heaven.
   Now, fifty days after his resurrection, on the first day of the week, the apostles were part of a group of believers who had gathered in a large home in Jerusalem.
   Perhaps it began as a whisper. But quickly the sound filled the entire house. It was like a hurricane, but there was no wind. They must have wondered what was happening.
   Then there were the flames. At least they looked like flames. They landed on each one of the people, yet caused no harm. Not a hair on their heads was singed.
What next? they must have wondered. They soon found out.
   They were all Galileans, but when they spoke their words were heard as Greek and Cretian and Arabic and Egyptian. Every bystander heard what was said in his own language. The word spread quickly, and soon a multitude had gathered, and was amazed to hear the disciples telling of God's marvellous works. No matter where they were born, they heard the message in their mother tongue.
   When someone suggested the disciples were drunk, Peter preached the first sermon of the Christian church, ending with the command, "Repent, and be baptized every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." The record shows about three thousand people were baptized that day. What a day for rejoicing.
  Today, Sunday May 23, 1999 is the anniversary of that remarkable pentecost day. But what is pentecost? Is it a powerful roaring sound? Or a flame-like something? Is it speaking in various languages? Or baptizing thousands of people?
   To understand pentecost, one must first understand God's holy days beginning with the passover. They're catalogued in Leviticus 23.
   To the Jews passover looks only back to the exodus. But in God's grand plan for mankind it also looked forward to the ultimate sacrifice of Jesus Christ (I Corinthians 5:7). Immediately following passover are the days of unleavened bread, which symbolize sin being put out of our lives (same
verse).
   Regardless of the date of passover, there's always a sabbath during the days of unleavened bread. On "the morrow after the sabbath" the priest waved a sheaf of the first-cut grain (Leviticus 23:10-11), looking forward to the morrow after the sabbath when Jesus Christ would be accepted by his
father as the firstfruits of those who have died (I Corinthians 15:20,23).
  The Israelites were then to count forward fifty days (Leviticus 23:15-16). On the fiftieth day the priest waved two loaves of leavened bread (verse 17,20), representative of the two segments of God's coming church: the Israelites and the gentiles.
   Coming forward two millennia, we arrive at that great day for rejoicing, the pentecost day when the church of God was born amid marvellous manifestations of the Holy Spirit.
   But all the amazing events of that day still don't answer the question, What is pentecost? It comes from the Greek meaning 'fiftieth': nothing more.


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