Pentecost: the Forgotten Celebration?

In a recent unscientific poll I conducted with a handful of American Christian college students (the majority of whom attend a Christian university and have been Christians the majority of their lives), none of them could tell me the significance of Pentecost. At least one had never heard of Pentecost, and all said they have never celebrated it in their home churches. How has one of the greatest Christian celebrations become so easily forgotten?

Perhaps it is because the church in America (and other parts of the world) tends to base its calendar around a secular/national calendar rather than on the centuries-old Christian calendar. Many American churches are much more likely to observe Memorial Day, July 4th, and Mother’s Day than Pentecost. (If you’re reading this and starting to get defensive, let me ask you which one of those is mentioned in the Bible. Let me give you a clue: the first 3 aren’t.) On the church calendar, every Sunday from this coming Sunday (Trinity Sunday) until Christ the King Sunday (the next-to-last Sunday of November) is numbered in relation to Pentecost Sunday. On the Christian calendar, Pentecost is important. But what exactly is Pentecost?

It all begins with a Jewish festival, the Feast of Weeks (known in Hebrew as Shavuot and in Greek as Pentecost). This was an ancient Jewish agricultural festival in which the community celebrated the gathering of the year’s first harvest and offered thanks to God for nature’s bounty. (You can read about this in Exodus 23:16, Exodus 34:22, and Leviticus 23:15-21.) By the first century, Jews also celebrated the giving of the Law on Mount Sinai at Pentecost.

In Acts 2, we read of the apostles of Jesus gathering together with others to celebrate this Jewish festival. At the Pentecost celebration recorded in Acts 2, there was a sound like rushing wind and what looked like tongues of fire on each person in the room as God’s Holy Spirit came upon those gathered. Each person was able to understand the others, even though they came from different regions and spoke in their native languages. The Apostle Peter addressed the crowd, proclaiming that it had been prophesied that God’s Spirit would be poured out on all people. This began on that Pentecost day. The rest of the book of Acts tells about the Holy Spirit being poured out on other groups of believers. (Acts 8:17, 9:17, and 10:44 are a few examples.)

In Acts 2, we read not only of the coming of the Holy Spirit, but also of what happens to people when they are filled with the Holy Spirit. With rushing of wind, tongues of fire, and speaking in different languages, sometimes we skip over the most important part – how the Holy Spirit changed their lives.

The people repent, or turn from their sin and turn toward God (Acts 2:38). They were baptized, which illustrates God’s ability to wash a person on the inside (Acts 2:38). They received forgiveness for their past sins (Acts 2:38). They were rescued (saved) from all that had kept them from God (Acts 2:40). They were taught by the apostles about Jesus – who He was, what He offered, and what He asked of them. They enjoyed fellowship with one another – giving of their time, possessions, and money to help one another (Acts 2:42, 44–47). They broke bread together, sharing food at daily meals while remembering Jesus’ death and resurrection (Acts 2:42, 46). They spent time in prayer for one another and for others. (Acts 2:42). They performed signs just as Jesus had done, empowered by the Spirit (Acts 2:43). They worshiped God together (Acts 2:47). They were witnesses of what they had experienced, and the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved (Acts 2:43, 47).

The Christian celebration of Pentecost brings us back to that day when God revealed himself to humankind in a new way, when He poured out His Holy Spirit. It is a call for us to live in the same power of the Holy Spirit which fills us today.

Bibliography:
Philip A. Bence, Acts: A Bible Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition (Indianapolis, IN: Wesleyan Publishing House, 1998).