Christians celebrate the day of Pentecost on the fiftieth day after Easter each year to commemorate the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles and other followers of Jesus Christ. However, before it was followed by Christians, it was also one of the three major special of the Jews that include Passover, The Feast of Tabernacles and Pentecost. Pentecost, in Greek meaning 50th, was special to them because of the meaning of the number seven, which signifies the perfection, the fullness of God and divine completion. The number fifty is one more than seven times seven. The Jews strictly followed the order of God’s creation cycle, and even their land took rest every seventh year.
The year of jubilee is the time when the horn of the ram is blown to proclaim it as a special year, the 50th year. This is the holy year of liberty, emancipation. God’s salvation work perfectly laid out in the world complete. The slaves were liberated, debts were canceled. This freedom message is embedded in Pentecost.
This meaning of Pentecost, a liberation of all the bound and oppressed, fulfilled its full scale on this new day of Pentecost where disciples in the Early Church gathered and received the Holy Spirit. Since then, the Apostles have become bold, powerfully revealing the authority of the church to the world.
Another meaning of Pentecost was the gratefulness of the people towards the Lord for giving of the Law of Moses. Also, Israelites expressed gratitude and brought the first harvest to the Lord, celebrating the abundance with the Lord seen in Duet 16:9-12.
When the wonders of the power of the Spirit was poured on disciples, everybody outside was dismayed at this unusual scene. Peter the apostle boldly proclaimed, “In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams.” (Acts 2:17) It was the prophetic passage taken from the Book of Joel.
Pouring of the Spirit was given to people beyond boundaries of gender, rank, ethnicity and many other conditions in the human world. It was time that invisible work of the Spirit became visible by moving people to come out to testify and proclaim the truth. This exponential growth of the Early Church was initiated by this powerful intervention of the Holy Spirit on the Pentecost Day. May this power of the Holy Spirit also reveal his impact and transforming influence today in all believers.