What is Pentecost Sunday?
Pentecost Sunday takes its name from an Old Testament harvest festival that fell fifty days after the sheaf of firstfruits was waved, and in Acts 2 that same day became the moment the Holy Spirit came down from heaven. The date, the name, and the events all belong together — and commentators draw from them a picture of grace, of the church's beginning, and a caution about turning the day into a religious season.
The name and the count
The word itself is simply a number, and the day it marks was already fixed in Israel's calendar long before Acts.
Arend RemmersFifty days after the resurrection day, after the waving of the firstfruits, the wave-sheaf, was another feast of which we find the fulfilment also in the New Testament. If we take the Greek exactly, Acts 2:1 says "And when the feast of the fiftieth was fulfilled" — the fifty days mentioned here, seven weeks plus one day, the day of Pentecost. Pentecost is simply the Greek word for "fifty."
Why it falls on a Sunday
The counting rule in Leviticus decides the weekday, which is why the feast can only land on the first day of the week.
The Bible TreasuryThe people were instructed to count from the morrow after the sabbath, from the day that "you brought the sheaf of the wave offering" (beyond doubt fulfilled by the Lord's resurrection on the first of the week), "seven full weeks shall elapse... you shall count fifty days to the day after the seventh Sabbath; then you shall present a grain offering of new grain to the LORD" (Lev. 23:15-16). This makes it clear that the day of Pentecost (Acts 2) was the morrow after the seventh sabbath, or, in other words, the first of the week.
What happened that day
The events came with visible and audible signs, and the languages spoken carried an echo of an older judgment at Babel, where God scattered mankind by confusing their speech.
William KellyOn the day of Pentecost, as they were all together, the Father's promise was fulfilled with twofold outward signs: a blowing sound out of heaven that filled all the house; and parted tongues as of fire that sat on each, so that all were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages as He gave them utterance — the answer of grace to the judgment of Babel.
The birthday of the church
The Spirit's coming worked at two levels at once, and the second level is what makes the day more than a personal experience.
Arno Clemens GaebeleinHe came upon the assembled believers individually, and also did a work in a corporate way. Each believer on that day was filled with the Holy Spirit... But He also was present as the mighty rushing wind which filled all the house. He did not only come upon each, but all were baptized with the Holy Spirit, and united into a body... Since then, whenever and wherever a sinner believes in the finished work of Christ, he shares in that baptism and is joined by the same Spirit to that one body... It was the birthday of the church.
The two loaves
The offering commanded for the feast was not one loaf but two, and they were baked with leaven — details commentators read as a picture of who the church is made of.
C E StuartIt was composed of two wave loaves, as they are called, baked with leaven; these two loaves typifying those from Jews and those from Gentiles, who as Christians are together presented to God... Baked with leaven, we learn that they represent saints still in their bodies on earth, and in whom the flesh exists.
Three thousand
Set beside the day the law came down at Sinai, the number saved at Pentecost tells its own story.
W. T. P. WolstonThe day that Moses brought down the law, engraved on tablets of stone — only to find it broken already — three thousand men died by Levi's sword; three thousand law-breakers were hurled into eternity unblessed (Ex. 32:28). The day the Holy Spirit came down to witness to an ascended Saviour, three thousand souls were brought to that Saviour, and were blessed and saved by Him.
Keeping the day as a holy season
On observing such days as fixed religious seasons, writers point back to Paul's alarm over the Galatians.
Leslie M. Grant"You observe days and months and seasons and years" (v.10), the formalism calculated to draw attention to themselves, and involving the assumption that more righteousness was required of them at some times than at others. Such actions subtly sanction unrighteousness on "ordinary" days. What witness of this pervades Christendom today! There are holy days, holy seasons, attended by great pretensions of spirituality, which is thrown to the winds in ordinary life.
Summary
- Count. Pentecost means "fifty" — fifty days counted from the waving of the sheaf, which is why the day always falls on the first day of the week.
- Gift. On that fiftieth day the promised Spirit came with wind and tongues of fire, and men from every nation heard the wonderful works of God in their own language.
- Body. The Spirit filled each believer and joined them all into one body; every later believer is added to the same body by the same Spirit.
- Reach. The feast's two loaves, baked with leaven, picture Jew and Gentile brought to God together — real people still living on earth.
- Result. Where the law's day at Sinai left three thousand dead, the Spirit's day left three thousand saved — but writers warn against turning that grace back into a calendar of holy seasons.