And ye shall count from the morning after the sabbath, from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave-offering, seven weeks; they shall be complete;
This feast has no fixed date on the calendar. It has a count: seven full weeks, starting from the day Israel waved the first sheaf of the harvest before God. Why tie one feast to another like this, and what was the fifty-day count pointing to?
The count does not start at a new year or a new month. It starts on the day Israel presented the sheaf, and the writers read that sheaf as Christ.
This day, the day after the Sabbath, becomes the starting point for the count... And then comes another picture of great significance. It is a beautiful picture — not of Christ, but of those who are Christ's. They are called by the name given to Him, the true sheaf of firstfruits.
Because the count starts there, the order of events is fixed.
This is the feast of Pentecost. It pictures God's people, gathered by the Holy Spirit and presented before Him, in connection with all the preciousness of Christ. In the Passover, we have the death of Christ. In the sheaf of firstfruits, we have the resurrection of Christ. In the feast of Pentecost, we have the coming of the Holy Spirit to form the Church. All this is perfect, God's own work. Christ had to die and rise before the Church could be formed. First came the offering of the sheaf, then the baking of the loaves.
The verse counts seven complete weeks; the next verse adds a day, bringing the total to fifty. That extra day is not a rounding error.
Verse 15 names a period of seven weeks (or sabbaths) in plain terms. Yet the text now speaks of fifty days. The reason the people had to wait one more day before bringing the wave loaves is very clear. They had to bring the offering on "the day after the Sabbath," the first day of the week. Again, this marks out the sphere of resurrection.
The name of the feast is a number, and the day it fell on carries the meaning.
Pentecost is the Greek word for "fiftieth." Strikingly, Israel held this feast on "the day after the seventh Sabbath." That is, they held it on the first day of a new week. It tells of a new order of things coming in, based on resurrection.
In Israel's calendar the stretch between the two feasts was empty. In the year Christ died and rose, it was not.
Israel had to count seven weeks from the day after the Passover Sabbath. Then came the feast of Weeks, or Pentecost, as the New Testament calls it. Nothing of any great importance in the Jewish religious year happened in between. In the year of the crucifixion and the resurrection, however, an important event fell between these feasts. It divided the seven weeks into two unequal periods: forty days and ten days.
God did not shorten the count by a single day.
But seven sabbaths had to be complete before this next feast could take place. Our God's timing was exact, just as He sent forth His Son when the fullness of time had come. So here too: when the fiftieth day arrived, the Holy Spirit came to make good the new grain offering of two wave-loaves.
The sheaf and the loaves belong to one harvest at two stages.
The loaves came out of human homes, so they spoke of humanity, and the leaven in them pictured sin in man. Still, they too were "firstfruits." The sheaf is the result of life out of death. The loaves are the result of that same life, drawn from the sheaf. Bread is the finished outcome of the harvest.
God still accepted these leavened loaves — but not without a sin offering.
The priest waved these two loaves, baked with leaven, before the Lord — presented to Him and accepted by Him... The sin offering made it possible for God to accept loaves that were baked with leaven. That sin offering spoke of atonement for the sin the leaven pictured. There was no leaven in the wave sheaf, so no sin offering was needed there. But notice: the leaven in the wave loaves was baked, and so had lost its power.
- Count from — the fifty days start at the wave sheaf, not at a set date. Resurrection is where every measurement begins.
- Count through — the seven weeks had to be complete. In the year of the crucifixion they held forty days of the risen Christ and ten days of waiting.
- Count to — the seventh sabbath passes and a new week opens. The offering falls on the first day, resurrection ground.
- Count for — at the end of the count the Holy Spirit comes and gathers God's people, presented in all the preciousness of Christ.
- Counted in — the loaves come from human homes and carry leaven, so a sin offering goes with them. The harvest is real people, accepted through atonement.
even unto the morning after the seventh sabbath shall ye count fifty days; and ye shall present a new oblation to Jehovah.
This verse sets Israel a count: seven full weeks from the waving of the sheaf, then one more day — day fifty. Commentators ask two things of it: why the count runs past the seven weeks, and what makes the offering brought that day "new".
Seven weeks is already a full period. One writer asks why the people had to wait one day more.
Verse 15 names the period of seven weeks (or Sabbaths) plainly, yet here it speaks of fifty days. The reason why the people had to wait one extra day before bringing the wave loaves is very clear. The offering had to come on "the day after the Sabbath," the first day of the week. Again, this points to the sphere of resurrection.
In the New Testament the fifty days fall into two parts.
Turning on to Acts 2:1-4, we come to the day of Pentecost, a word which means fifty days. We read that the Lord walked with them forty days after His resurrection, Acts 1:3. Then, ten days after He was taken up to heaven, we have the day of Pentecost, fifty days, a reference to Lev. 23:16. On this day, as we read, the Holy Spirit came down with force and filled each one gathered in that upper room. This great event marked the beginning of Christianity in this world.
The word "new" does not mean the rules had changed. One writer traces it to the crop itself.
Further, it had to be a "new" grain offering (or meal offering). It was new, not because the people could change the rules laid down for the meal offering in Leviticus 2, but because the harvest was new. If the wave sheaf was the "firstling" or first fruit of the barley harvest, the "new" meal offering was "the firstfruits of wheat harvest" (Ex. 34:22). The first harvest speaks of the Lord's resurrection. The wheat harvest is the new harvest that marks out these wave loaves.
Leviticus 2 gives a grain offering that pictures Christ. One writer says this one pictures other people, and he names what the oil stands for.
Exactly fifty days after the waving of the firstfruits, on the day after the Sabbath, when Christ rose, the Holy Spirit came down out of heaven to form the church on earth. Here is a new meal offering. It does not picture Christ, but those who are one with Him, His believing people. The oil, the Holy Spirit, came on the day of Pentecost upon them, as the oil was poured upon the meal offering.
Another writer sets the two offerings side by side, down to the ingredient that separates them.
The meal offering of Leviticus 2 is a picture of Christ in His perfect life down here, brought to its end in His death and so pleasing to God. The new meal offering of Leviticus 23 is a picture of the church of God, the fruit of the death of Christ, being presented to God. The meal offering was to be baked WITHOUT leaven. The new meal offering was to be baked WITH leaven. The meal offering pictured Christ, and had to be without leaven, for leaven is always a symbol of evil, and there could be no thought of evil in connection with Him. The new meal offering pictured the Church presented to God. It was baked with leaven, an admission that sin attaches to the believer.
Seven Sabbaths close one thing. The fiftieth day opens another.
Seven Sabbaths are now complete. Perfect rest as to all the past is found, and the first day has come again. It is the start of a new condition, the unveiling of a new creation — a fiftieth day (5 x 10), in which man begins with Almighty God indeed. The "new meal offering" speaks of a new measure of capacity in devotion to the Lord.
Both ends of the count fall on the first day of the week. One writer says two events give that day its character.
Two great facts stamp their character on the first day of the week. One is the resurrection of the Lord from the dead (John 20). The other is the founding of the Church at Pentecost (Lev. 23:16, with Acts 2). So "the Lord's day" is no ordinary day, and "the Lord's supper" is no ordinary meal. Both the "day" and the "supper" belong to Him in a special way.
- Count — The fifty days run from the waving of the sheaf, so the feast is dated by Christ's resurrection, not by a month.
- Christ — The one extra day lands the offering on the first day of the week, the sphere of resurrection.
- Coming — Forty days with the risen Lord, then ten days of waiting. On day fifty the Spirit came, and Christianity began.
- New — "New" means a new harvest, not new rules: barley first, speaking of the Lord's resurrection, then wheat for the loaves.
- Company — Leviticus 2 pictures Christ, sinless and free of leaven. This offering pictures His people: leaven admits their sin, oil marks the Spirit.
Out of your dwellings shall ye bring two wave-loaves, of two tenths of fine flour; with leaven shall they be baken; [as] first-fruits to Jehovah.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
And ye shall present with the bread seven he-lambs without blemish, yearlings, and one young bullock, and two rams they shall be a burnt-offering to Jehovah with their oblation, and their drink-offerings, an offering by fire of a sweet odour to Jehovah.
At this feast the priest brought God two loaves baked with leaven — yeast — and with them ten animals without blemish for a burnt offering. The loaves picture God's people rather than Christ, which raises a sharp question: how can anything with leaven in it come before God at all?
The feast of weeks pointed forward to a day the New Testament records, and the offerings listed here belong to that picture. One writer ties the loaves and the animals together in a single thought:
In the two loaves waved before the Lord, baked with leaven, we have a clear picture of the Church presented to God. It is made up of Jew and Gentile, and in both of them the leaven of the old nature is there. Yet they are presented to God not in themselves, but in connection with that perfect sacrifice pictured by the seven lambs, one bull, and two rams offered to God as a burnt offering.
The wording matters. Earlier in the chapter the priest waved the sheaf of firstfruits on its own. Here he never waves the loaves alone, and one writer weighs that difference:
The priest waved these sacrifices with the loaves, but he waved the sheaf by itself. The Lord Jesus was acceptable to God in Himself, apart from any question of sacrifice… With the wave loaves it was completely different. The appointed sacrifices were waved with them. The loaves could not be waved without them… There are saints whose standing before God is in resurrection, for the loaves were the firstfruits of the new harvest. God can receive them, and they are to be for God — but only in the closest connection with the sacrificial death of the Holy Son of God. Apart from Him and His death they would not be presented to God.
The loaves had leaven. The lambs had no blemish. Both stood before God at the same moment. One writer draws the lesson from that contrast:
So here, right alongside the leavened loaves, stands an unblemished sacrifice. It pictures the great and all-important truth that it is Christ's perfectness, and not our sinfulness, that is always before the view of God. Notice the words, "you shall present with the bread seven lambs… without blemish." Precious truth!… May the reader enter into it, make it his own, rest his conscience on it, feed and refresh his heart with it, and delight his whole soul in it. Not I, but Christ.
At the earlier feast a single lamb was enough. Here the list grows to ten animals, and that increase is read as meaning:
In the feast of firstfruits the focus is on Christ alone, so only one lamb was sacrificed (v. 12). But Pentecost involves the large number who are identified with Christ. So seven lambs — the complete number — were offered, besides a bull and two rams. The bull speaks of the strength of the offering and its power to atone for large numbers. The two rams stand for the witness that redemption is accomplished.
The verse ends by calling the whole thing a food offering with a pleasing aroma — and adds the grain and drink offerings that go with each animal. Each element is given a distinct sense:
All the offerings in this verse are said to be "of a pleasing aroma." This sets before our hearts what Christ always was in His pathway of obedience to death, in submission to His Father's will. The bull speaks of His patient endurance. He never once turned aside, but went on till the will of God was done at the cross… The two rams speak of His devotion to the will of God. The bull sets out His power to do that will, and the ram His desire to do it. "With their grain offering" speaks again of His perfect Manhood, which made everything He did effective… The drink offering again shows the joy God has received as the fruit of what Christ has done. We, dear friends, stand linked with all of this, for they were presented "with the bread."
Verse 18 gives acceptance; the sin offering of the next verse deals with the leaven. Writers hold the two side by side without letting one cancel the other:
Perfect acceptance is emphasized very strongly here, but so is the presence of sin in the accepted ones. That sin does not touch their acceptance, since God's grace puts it away according to perfect righteousness.
- With — the loaves never go up alone. The sacrifices rise with them, and apart from that death the loaves could not be presented at all.
- Without blemish — at the moment of presentation God looks at Christ's perfectness, not at our sinfulness.
- More — one lamb was enough where Christ alone was in view. Here the number rises to cover the many who are identified with Him.
- Each animal — the bull speaks of strength and patient endurance. The rams speak of devotion and of redemption accomplished. The seven lambs speak of completeness.
- Joy — the grain and drink offerings close the picture. They speak of Christ's perfect Manhood and of God's joy in what He has done. All who are presented "with the bread" share in it.
And ye shall sacrifice one buck of the goats for a sin-offering, and two he-lambs, yearlings, for a sacrifice of peace-offering.
Leviticus 23:19 belongs to the feast of weeks. At that feast Israel brought two loaves baked with leaven and waved them before God. Why does this feast need a sin offering, when the wave sheaf fifty days earlier needed none? And what do the two lambs for peace offerings add?
The offerings of this feast stand in contrast with those of the wave sheaf, which pictured Christ raised. One writer follows the sequence from resurrection to Pentecost and shows where the difference falls.
So Jesus rose, and He was waved before the Lord. Then, fifty days later, matching Pentecost, the two wave-loaves, baked with leaven, were brought to God as the firstfruits. Notice this. A burnt offering and a meal offering went with the wave-sheaf, but no sin offering. In verse 19, though, you will find a sin offering going with the wave-loaves, to meet the leaven in them. The sin offering is what counteracts the evil of the church, or it could not be accepted.
Verse 18 has already piled up burnt offerings of sweet aroma. A reader might ask whether that alone could cover what the leaven stands for. The answer comes in verse 19 itself.
It is quite true that a burnt offering would not have been enough where "leaven" was in question. And so we read, "And you shall offer one male goat for a sin offering, and two male lambs a year old as a sacrifice of peace offerings." (Verse 19) The "sin offering" was the answer to the "leaven" in the loaves. "Peace" was made, so that communion could be enjoyed. And everything went up to the Lord in immediate connection with the "sweet savour" of the "burnt offering".
The loaves picture God's people, and the leaven in them is the evil God sees. The one goat does not leave His people's standing in doubt.
God recognises that evil is in the believer. But it is not supposed to be at work, and the blood of the sin offering meets its presence. No sin at all is charged against you. You stand before God in all the value of the work of Christ.
The way the loaves were made matters too. They were not raw dough when the priest waved them.
The sin offering was there to speak of atonement for the sin that the leaven pictured. But notice: the leaven in the Wave Loaves was baked, and so had lost its power.
The verse does not stop at the sin offering. Two lambs follow it, and one writer ties them to what came at Pentecost.
The sin-offering fully met the baked leaven. The peace-offering laid the basis for the blessed privilege of communion. Acceptance, the joy of communion, and divine testimony too — all of them waited for the Holy Spirit to come down, to be made good in the reality that the wave-loaves pictured. Acts 2 displayed this on a wide scale, in both communion and testimony, when the bonds of unity and oneness gave witness to its precious fruit.
The animals of this verse were not waved on their own. The sheaf had been, and one writer draws a lesson from the difference.
At the offering of the wave sheaf, as we said, no sin offering was required. The wave loaves could not be presented to God without one. The wave sheaf was also waved alone, without the sacrifices that went with it. The wave loaves were waved together with the sacrifices. The Lord Jesus needed no sacrifice beside Him to make Him acceptable to God. We could not be presented to God, or be owned as devoted to His service, apart from the sacrifice of His well-beloved Son on the cross. Saints now are to be for God as those risen with Christ.
- Leaven — The loaves of this feast were baked with leaven. That one fact calls for everything in the verse. The sheaf had no leaven, so it needed no sin offering.
- Goat — The one goat is the direct answer to the leaven. A burnt offering on its own could not deal with what the leaven stands for.
- Baked — The leaven had already been through the fire and lost its power. God owns that sin is there, but He does not charge it to the worshipper.
- Lambs — The two lambs for peace offerings lay the ground for communion and joy. The verse gives fellowship, not just forgiveness.
- Waved together — The sheaf was waved alone; the loaves never could be. Christ is acceptable in Himself. His people come to God only through the sacrifice of God's Son.
And the priest shall wave them with the bread of the first-fruits as a wave-offering before Jehovah, with the two he-lambs; they shall be holy to Jehovah, for the priest.
34-word opener, heavy passive
The earlier wave sheaf went up before God on its own. The loaves are different, and one writer makes that contrast the key to the verse.
The priest waved these sacrifices with the loaves, but he waved the sheaf by itself. The Lord Jesus was in Himself acceptable to God, apart from any question of sacrifice. So the priest waved the sheaf before he dealt at all with the sacrifices appointed to go with it. With the wave loaves it was completely different. He waved the appointed sacrifices with them. He could not wave the loaves without them.
Why wave the offering at all? One writer gives the plain sense of the gesture.
The act of waving shows that the offering is given to the Lord. Some also see in it a sign of ascension (compare v.11). Christ risen ascended to heaven, and the church is a heavenly people that also has a heavenly destination.
Another writer reads the gesture as setting apart for God. He notes a detail that is easy to miss: the priest killed the animals first, then waved them whole.
Remember what these two loaves pictured: the Jew and Gentile offered together to God as the firstfruits of the harvest (James 1:18). Then we can see the reason for this unusual feature of that day's ritual. The whole animals were waved, but waved after death. Those who compose the church are in this way set apart to God as a whole. The church came into being only after the resurrection of the Lord, and its standing is in resurrection. So the animals were first killed and then waved.
The loaves stand for people, not produce. Notice what makes them acceptable.
The priest waved the two loaves before the Lord, and they were baked with leaven. In them we have a marked suggestion of the presentation of the Church to God, made up of Jew and Gentile. They are presented to God not in themselves, but in connection with that perfect sacrifice pictured in the seven lambs, one bullock, and two rams offered as a burnt offering to God, and in the sin offering of the goat, together with the peace offering.
So does the number two point to two groups kept apart? One writer answers with a flat no.
The two wave-loaves certainly do not mean two churches, one Jewish and one Gentile. One may add that this is the very worst idea possible, since it keeps up the old distinction. The very heart of the gospel, and of the one body too, is to break all this down — to unite as well as to save, in Christ.
The two lambs waved with the loaves were peace offerings, and a peace offering was eaten.
The "two male lambs a year old as a sacrifice of peace offerings" give us God's testimony of the place of communion into which He has now brought us through Christ's death and resurrection. How great is the grace that has brought us before God, where we have fellowship with the Father and the Son… The priests fed on these peace offerings. In the same way, we have the privilege of feeding on Christ, the Lamb of God, who gave Himself to bring us into this favoured place.
The verse ends by handing the waved offering to the priest.
Once the priest had waved these gifts, we are told they were "holy to the LORD for the priest." These are the things which sustain priesthood — Christ and all that He is in association with His people. He could not take up His priesthood apart from His people. There would be no point in this… With the wave sheaf it is Christ, the One who has gone in and opened the way of access into the presence of God. But this feast shows us that priesthood is active in relation to the Christian company.
- Sacrifice first. The priest could not wave the loaves without the offerings. He waved the sheaf alone, because Christ needed no sacrifice to make Him acceptable.
- Death first, then waving. The priest killed the animals before waving them whole. The company set apart to God stands in resurrection.
- Given, and upward. Waving hands the offering over to the Lord. It also points to ascension — a heavenly people with a heavenly destination.
- Leaven met, fellowship opened. Leaven is still in the loaves, but it is no hindrance. The peace offering brings us into communion and gives us Christ to feed on.
- Held by the priest. Once waved, the offering is holy to the LORD for the priest. Christ with His people sustains priesthood, and He will not take it up apart from them.
And ye shall make proclamation on that same day -- a holy convocation shall it be unto you no manner of servile work shall ye do [it is] an everlasting statute in all your dwellings throughout your generations.
The feast of weeks fell on the fiftieth day, counted from the waving of the first sheaf. This verse closes its rules with three commands: announce the day, gather the people, and do no ordinary work.
This feast had a date in history waiting for it. One writer asks what happened when that day came:
Only this feast is marked out by seven sabbaths in between. It is the feast of weeks. But among the Greek-speaking Jews the number fifty, as is well known, has given this feast its name, so it is called "Pentecost." What then was fulfilled when the day of Pentecost arrived? The Father made good His promise — that unmatched promise about which the Lord Himself had said, "It is to your advantage that I go away." What could outweigh the blessing of His presence with His disciples on earth? The gift of another Advocate — not gifts only, but He Himself baptising them. This was no longer a hope, but a fact.
The command to call the people together is new at this point in the chapter. The earlier waving of the sheaf pictured Christ risen, and it had no such assembly. One writer follows that difference into the New Testament:
There was no convocation on the day of waving the sheaf of firstfruits. That waited for the offering of the wave-loaves. When these types were fulfilled, no public gathering announced the resurrection, though there was a private one: "On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews." The day of Pentecost was very different. The disciples "were all together in one place," and when the news of what the Holy Spirit's presence had done spread, "the multitude came together." On that historic day the gathering of the disciples was indeed a holy convocation.
The ban covers the customary work of daily life. One writer links it to what the day pictures:
Again, verse 21 forbids customary (or servile) work. Pentecost speaks of another great work of God, in which people are blessed by God's grace without any work on their part.
The free day is not for idleness. One writer describes the pleasure God takes in the gathering, and the spirit we should bring to it:
In this feast we come to "a holy convocation." Whatever we go through in our own life in this world, we must never forget the pleasure God has in gathering His people together. If we walk before Him and please Him, we will truly value "the holy convocation" and be a help to it. What a privilege it is to be free from lawful things — servile work — and to come together to enjoy the circle of blessing which is ours in Christ. We are not to take up service for Christ as servile work, and not to worship God in a servile way. Instead, in the liberty of sonship by the Spirit, we praise and worship the Father in spirit and in truth.
The verse ends by fixing this rule in place, for every home and every generation. One writer sees a guard here against treating what God set up at the start as out of date:
"A statute forever." This would warn us against modern innovations in the things of God. In picture form, this feast has opened up the grand answer to all that Christ has done. All of it is made good in the Christian company today. The whole truth of it came out at the beginning of this age, and we are wise if we hold to it to the end. The statute is not only "in all your dwelling places" but also "throughout your generations." In later generations some might have thought the feast was out of date. Who knows — perhaps this very evil is what in the end reduced them to "feasts of the Jews."
- Fifty days — Seven sabbaths counted from the wave sheaf land on the day called Pentecost. There "the Father made good His promise" and sent another Advocate — not gifts only, but Himself.
- Proclaim — The day calls for a public announcement. The sheaf had no convocation, but this feast gathers a crowd. At Pentecost "the multitude came together."
- Convene — God takes pleasure in gathering His people. The free day is cleared for that privilege.
- No work — Ordinary work is shut out, because the day speaks of "another great work of God in which people are blessed by God's grace without any work on their part." So worship itself must never be servile. It belongs to the liberty of sonship.
- Forever — The statute holds "in all your dwelling places throughout your generations." No later age may treat what God set up at the beginning as out of date.