4th feast : the feast of weeks (Pentecost) 5

Wednesday 4 August 2021

4th feast : the feast of weeks (Pentecost) 5

From the day after the Sabbath, the day you bring the sheaf to be waved from side to side, you will count seven full weeks. Until the day after the seventh Sabbath you shall count fifty days, and you shall make a new offering to the Lord. You will bring two loaves of bread from your dwellings to be waved aside and others; they shall be made with two tenths of the flowers of flour, and baked with leaven, these are the firstfruits to the Lord. Leviticus 23:15-17

The feast of the weeks or harvest feast is celebrated 50 days after that of the waving sheaf, which is why it is called Pentecost. The feast of the sheaf is at the beginning of the barley harvest and Pentecost at the end of the wheat harvest. Both of these feasts begin the day after a Sabbath, the first day of the week, a Sunday.

At Pentecost, all who make up the people, including the poor and foreigners, rejoice. The more fortunate willingly share their possessions and thus remember that they were servants in Egypt (Deuteronomy 16:9-12). Many sacrifices are offered : burnt offerings with their cake offering and their libation, sin sacrifices and prosperity sacrifices. A part of these is shared between those who offer them, their family and their neighbors : a happy communion reigns thus among all.

Jesus was resurrected on the feast of the wreath. What happened during the fifty days after his resurrection ? For forty days, Jesus instructs his disciples, enjoins them to wait in Jerusalem for the coming of the Comforter, and ascends to heaven. On the fiftieth day, the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit descends on the disciples (Acts 2). This is the beginning of the Church of God, made up of all who believe, regardless of race or origin (1 Corinthians 12:13). It is also the beginning of the action of the Spirit in the believer : he dwells in him (1 Corinthians 6:9) ; he leads him into all truth (John 16:13) ; it characterizes its walk (Galatians 5).

The Church remembers Jesus Christ and his work on the cross, of which the sacrifices mentioned above are images. Believers, united by the Holy Spirit, share with their brothers and sisters in Christ their fellowship with a dead and risen Lord. The sacrifice of prosperity is a symbol of that joy and of this communion of saints which is a blessing of great value to the whole Church on earth.

Source (Pleasing the Lord)