Pentecost: Why God Chose That Exact Day to Pour Out His Spirit

"When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place." — Acts 2:1

I wonder if you remember the British Gas 'Talking Flames' advert from the 2000s in which lots of little living flames were seen floating down from the sky bringing power to our homes? Maybe the unprecedented experience of the followers of Jesus in Jerusalem, described in Acts 2, felt a bit like being in that advert, as flames of fire appeared and rested on the head of each of them.

Luke tells us that these early Jewish followers of Jesus were gathered together in Jerusalem, waiting for the fulfilment of Jesus' promise, given just ten days earlier at his ascension. He had told them that the Holy Spirit would come on them and they would receive power to be his witnesses to the ends of the earth. He didn't specify exactly when this would happen, but I wouldn't be surprised if at least a few of those disciples had a hunch that Pentecost would be the day of fulfilment.

God Always Acts with Purpose and Precision

God never does things randomly. He always acts with purpose and precision. Jesus was born at just the right time; died at just the right time; and was raised at just the right time. It is no surprise then that the outpouring of the Holy Spirit happened at Pentecost, because this was the perfect day for this glorious promise to become reality.

Pentecost is one of the major Jewish annual festivals prescribed in the Torah, the Law of Moses. Known in Hebrew as Shavuot, it carries two names in English – the Feast of Weeks or Pentecost. The significance of this festival was twofold:

Pentecost as a Harvest Festival — and Its Stunning Fulfilment

First, it was a harvest festival. On the day after the Sabbath that followed Passover, a sheaf of wheat or barley was waved before the Lord in the temple as the first fruits of the harvest to follow. Then seven weeks or fifty days later the full harvest was gathered in and this would be celebrated in the Feast of Shavuot. Jews and converts to Judaism would flock from far and wide to Jerusalem to join in the joyous festival.

So, it was on this special day, Shavuot/Pentecost, as the disciples gathered to celebrate the harvest, that God chose to pour out the Holy Spirit on them. As a result, each disciple was filled with the Spirit and supernaturally enabled to proclaim the wonders of God in the native languages of the ethnically diverse crowd thronging the Jerusalem streets that day. Three thousand souls were wonderfully saved and baptised after Peter explained the spiritual significance of what was going on. This was a harvest of lives reaped for Jesus – people gathered into his kingdom from across the known world – the first fruits of what would become the global mission described in the rest of Acts and still taking place today.

The gift of languages experienced at Pentecost was a great reversal of what happened at the Tower of Babel (Genesis 11). In his judgement on human arrogance, God introduced a diversity of languages at Babel which brought confusion and scattered people across the world. But at Pentecost, in his mercy, God enabled a diversity of languages to bring understanding of the Gospel and to unite the scattered peoples of the earth in Christ. What a turnaround!

Pentecost and the Law of Moses — Three Thousand Die, Three Thousand Live

Second, Shavuot was a day to recall the giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai, the Law of Moses, thought to have been given by God fifty days after the exodus from Egypt. Tragically, even as Moses was up the mountain receiving the Law from God, the Israelites were down below indulging in sinful idolatry. They created and worshipped a golden calf and credited it with their deliverance from slavery in Egypt. On reaching the foot of Sinai, Moses smashed the two stone tablets when he saw what was going on, symbolic of the fact that the people had smashed God's commands with their idolatry.

Interestingly, we read in Exodus 32:28 that because of this sin, God brought judgement on the people and three thousand died as a consequence. How glorious then, that years later, God poured out the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, on the very day the people were recalling the giving of the Law, with the result that three thousand souls were saved, baptised and filled with the Spirit (Acts 2:41).

The Spirit Written on Our Hearts — Not on Tablets of Stone

The apostle Paul tells us that God's Law was good and holy, but it was ultimately unable to make people righteous because of the innate sinfulness of the human heart. All it could do was show us just how sinful we are! So, in his great mercy and by his extraordinary grace, God poured out the precious gift of his Spirit, so that God's commands would be written internally on our hearts rather than externally on tablets of stone.

As Christians we now have the power within us to live faithfully for God, not yet perfectly but progressively, becoming more like Jesus day by day. We are no longer under God's judgement, because of what Jesus accomplished in his death, resurrection and ascension, all of which is made real for us by the indwelling gift of the Spirit – Christ in us, the hope of glory!

If you'd like to explore what it means to be filled with the Spirit in your daily life, we'd love to welcome you at one of our Sunday services. You're also warmly invited to join us in prayer as we seek to walk in step with the Spirit together.

Living as People of the Pentecost Spirit

So, as those filled with the Pentecost Spirit, let us rejoice in the steady supernatural transformation of our lives into the glorious image of Jesus, and let us take every opportunity to gossip the Gospel to everyone we meet as God's global harvest gathers pace in preparation for Jesus' return.

Blessings, Rev Rob

For more reflections like this,