It is almost time for Pentecost!
PENTECOST IS SUNDAY, May 23, 2021
(Another 2 Timothy 4:2 Lifestyle article from a collection of our SEASONS topics.)
If you have been counting the Omer with me, you are realizing that the 49th day arrives on a Saturday evening at sunset and the 50th day occurred on Sunday after sunset this year on May 16th of the secular calendar. The 50 days are up – but Pentecost isn’t on our calendars until Sunday, May 23; so what gives?
You have to follow the scriptures found in Leviticus 23:15 which says: And ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the Sabbath, from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave offering; seven sabbaths shall be complete.
The 7th Sabbath after Passover was the 15th; but the 50 days of counting didn’t end until sunset on the 16th. So we celebrate on “the morrow after the Sabbath” next; which would be Sunday, May 23rd.
Therefore; Pentecost happens on Sunday, May 23rd, 50 days after Passover. https://theinseasonlifestyle.com/counting-the-days-explained/
Consequently, many different homes and churches will be celebrating Pentecost on this Sunday. So, we often call the day “Pentecost Sunday.”
A TIME OF SEASONAL FULLNESS
All of this “fullness” of life happening between Mother’s Day and Father’s Day and right before Memorial Day is certainly going to create an extra lot of festivities during the months of May.
However, it is such a blessing to be celebrating so many special seasons of life all through the spring and summer months.
God is outside of time. For us inside of time, He keeps the clock ticking. His way of keeping time is always perfect. When we reach the Day of Pentecost, we have had several months to ponder the wonder of how God sends His Holy Spirit to us. https://theinseasonlifestyle.com/gods-calendar/
NO GIFT COULD BE GREATER THAN PENTECOST
What greater gift has ever been given to equal the blessings of God’s People receiving God’s Holy Spirit?
The only thing comparable or greater would be the gift of salvation given by Yeshua Messiah who sacrificed His life for us in order to make this very special day called “Pentecost” possible.
Hence, this Day of Pentecost arrives as our Groom’s special wedding gift to His Bride. He sends this gift ahead with His love.
THERE IS SO MUCH ANCIENT HISTORY HIDING WITHIN PENTECOST
Certainly, God’s faithful have celebrated Pentecost since ancient times.
The very first generations of all of the faithful did not even understand or comprehend the full meaning of the day. That is because it had not been fulfilled in their time. Most importantly, they had hope. They had faith while they waited patiently on God to bring His will about. Further, they were obedient without question. These people were part of the first part of the story, the beginning part.
Today, we can celebrate with the fullness of the whole story. Looking back, our generation now knows the rest of the story. We gladly celebrate the happy ending.
Though ancient people and present day people may have celebrated Pentecost from different views and perspectives. one concept runs the same through The Day of Pentecost for all generations. It is the concept of God’s provision. We celebrate the fact that we are thankful. It is a time to offer praise to God for the abundance of life.
LOOKING BACK AND LOOKING FORWARD
Therefore, when the Day of Pentecost arrives today, we will offer up our thanks for the gift of God’s Holy Spirit living within us. We will thank YHVH for making our lives rich and full.
In ancient times they offered thanks for God’s provision of the bountiful wheat harvest which made their lives rich and full. The wheat harvest was the BEST harvest of the year. That harvest was the one they looked forward to the most.
During the Day of Pentecost in ancient times people would bring their first-fruits offerings up to God’s altar. For instance, for seven weeks, starting after Passover and the barley harvest, continuing right up to the season of Pentecost, they were always waiting patiently and counting their days.
On the Day of Pentecost they were ready to move on from the giving of the earlier barley harvest offerings. It was time for them to begin bringing the best and the first of the wheat harvest offerings up to God. As a result, this time was known as the times of the latter first-fruits. Then the day eventually came to be called Pentecost.
The later first-fruits harvest was the time for the most cherished crops of the wheat harvest to be offered up to God in Thanksgiving.
After that offering, the rest of the wheat could be happily consumed by the people in their meals at their tables.
A PATTERN SIMILAR TO THE DAYS OF NOAH
The pattern of these rituals actually go back to the days of Noah. Noah was very familiar with the first-fruit offerings of Pentecost. At the end of the flood, God caused a great wind to blow over the earth and the waters receded. Does that sound familiar? “It was like the sound of “a mighty rushing wind.”
In the meantime, Noah sent out three separate doves to see if the waters were low enough for his family to leave the ark.
THE FIRST DOVE
However, that first dove returned to Noah, without finding a safe place to rest it’s head. Consequently, Noah took the dove back into the boat.
This dove is symbolic of people living without the indwelling of God’s Holy Spirit. For example, all things seem unsettled, unsafe, uncomfortable.
A SECOND DOVE
Next came the second dove. Noah released it and it returned in the evening with an olive branch held within its beak.
This dove is symbolic of today’s Christians, living with a portion of God’s Holy Spirit residing within their hearts.
Subsequently, the olive leaf represented food and nourishment for the spirit. It spoke of peace.
THE THIRD DOVE
So, Noah waited seven days after the return of the second dove. He sent out the third dove. The third dove never returned.
This is symbolic of the day God will give man immortality. It is a time when God will breathe the breath of eternal life into all of mankind who have followed Yeshua Messiah. Therefore, they will live forever inside God’s Kingdom in a place of peace comfort, and plenty.
This flood of YHVH’s Holy Spirit will be the last flood that covers the earth. It is a complete pouring out (flooding) of God’s Spirit to mankind. This will be a life-giving flood as opposed to a life-taking flood.
On that day, those who already contain a portion of God’s Holy Spirit will be completely filled up. They will live forever in a world made completely new by Yahweh.
YESHUA’S CONCERN FOR HIS FOLLOWERS
Yeshua knew we would all feel lost without him after His Resurrection and Ascension. As a result, The Holy Spirit was a gift to comfort us until his return.
God’s Holy Spirit connected heaven and earth, similar to Jacob’s ladder in the story of Jacob when he dreamed in a place called Bethel. In a similar fashion, The Holy Spirit connects Messiah and His Bride (The Church) even when they are separated by time and space.
LEARNING AND WAITING ON THE DAY OF PENTECOST
For the last fifty days (in the time that has passed between Passover and Pentecost) God has been teaching us much like He taught our ancestors as they were wandering in the wilderness. We have been learning how to come out of Egypt and become God’s people. 
The ancient harvest offerings were only physical in nature. Today those who are faithful will observe the custom by bringing and offering the first and the best from all of their spiritual gifts as well as material and physical offerings.
PASSING THROUGH SEVEN WEEKS
Further; from the day of our early first-fruits offerings and the beginning of this latter-first-fruits offering, we have been counting through seven weeks. The church has been passing through seven holy Sabbaths together. All the while we have been trying to open our eyes wider to the will of God within our daily lives.
We’ve spent seven times seven days (7 weeks) of counting while waiting for God’s appointed sacred time called Pentecost. This is the day our Jewish brothers call “Shavuot.”
Each day during our counting we studied the attributes of God. We attempted to apply what we know of His loving kindness and goodness to our own lives.
In short, we sought after His holy traits and His holy character and imitated them as best we could. It was our own version of a type of the journey that our ancestors took through the wilderness. Only for us it was a spiritual journey instead of a physical journey.
THE WILDERNESS OF THE WORLD
During the whole time of waiting (for seven sevens – seven weeks of seven days,) we were listening for God’s voice. We were very carefully remembering that HE IS GOD.
Each day we pondered the fact that we came from the dust of the ground. With every reminder in our devotions we realized we must depend solely on God for our sustenance and life. Nothing comes to us unless He allows it.
Meanwhile; our souls, similar to the ancients, celebrated the giving of Torah. We wrote more of its words inside our hearts as we waited on the day of God’s fulfillment and the giving of His Holy Spirit.
We pondered the fact that while living in the wilderness God’s people received the best ways to live directly from God the Father. It was considered that our daily lives in this world are all about learning to be obedient to YHVH and trying to follow His ways.
RECEIVING THE WAY TO MAKE TORAH WORK
In the Holy City of Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost in the time after Jesus had ascended into the heavens, God’s people received the way to make Torah work inside their hearts. This happened through God’s Holy Spirit living within them.
These two precious wedding gifts of The Bride of Yeshua (salvation and the sending and giving of God’s Holy Spirit) have been received and opened by The Bride of Yeshua with great thanksgiving.
With the progression of God’s appointed Holy Days from Passover to Pentecost,the Bride (God’s Church filled with God’s Spirit) has now received salvation and a whole new supply of all she needs for sanctification. It is God’s Holy Spirit that sanctifies us.
WITNESSING THE REVERSAL OF BABEL
Now an amazing thing has happened. The gift of God’s Holy Spirit at Pentecost has reversed the damage that was done at the Tower of Babel.
With the gift of tongues, people who have always spoken different languages and never understood each other at all, are now able to fully communicate. Their tongues, minds and hearts are now able to share a full capacity for understanding YHVH’s love and share it with others. Hence, the language of love sent down from the very heart of God is allowing God’s people to communicate like they have never communicated before.
This beautiful gift of God’s Holy Spirit will break down the divisions of the cold, hard hearts which Babel put up. Because of this new language of love, the knowledge of The LORD will one day again fill the earth.
TRADITIONS
In modern times some people choose to wear red. This is to remember the appearance of the flames of fire above the heads of the disciples of Yeshua Messiah. It happened to them on the first day that this amazing blessing which occurred among The People of God.
Many also use the symbol of the dove for Pentecost. This is because God’s people know (just like Noah knew) that doves mate for life. They realize a dove always returns for its mate, and it takes its mate back to their first home together. When Noah released his dove from the ark, he knew it would be searching for their original home, The dove searched for the place and the state of where they lived together in peace before the flood. The instincts of this dove werethe only way Noah had of ever finding such a place again.
THE HEART OF MANKIND IS ALWAYS DESIRING TO BACK TO THE GARDEN
When God gave His Holy Spirit to mankind on the Day of Pentecost, God knew mankind would always be searching in his heart for his first home. He would be yearning for the time in the garden when man lived with God in peace and abundance. Man would want to return to the time before evil and sin covered the earth.
Like Noah’s dove searching for home and a place to land, God’s Holy Spirit is always searching for a place to land within our hearts. He will search and search until we find Him.
NEW LIFE AFTER BAPTISM
When God’s Holy Spirit takes residence inside our hearts, we are cleansed and refreshed. We are renewed just as the earth after the flood in the days of Noah. Then, after baptism, we step out into a whole new way of life.
After the flood the earth had to start anew. It had to begin again with producing green growing things. For the first time ever, the earth did not have an immediate offering to offer up to God for that year at the appointed time of the early first-fruits.
We are like that new earth after we receive salvation and are baptized. There is a time of starting the whole new process of becoming fruitful. Good fruit takes time to grow. This “growing” time is the time of sanctification one goes through in the wilderness of this life.
FAITHFUL PATIENT GROWING
The fifty days we count every year from Passover till Pentecost remind us to stay faithful. They remind us to be patient and keep growing. Also, they remind us to prepare and to keep pursuing the One we love with all our heart.
We should never give up!
The end of the time of counting will come. There will be gifts from God to receive.
YESHUA WILL COME AGAIN
One day, just like the dove’s mate waiting patiently in the ark of Noah, we will look up and see our Beloved coming in the clouds of glory. He will be coming to tell us our heavenly home has been prepared and is now ready.
Our Beloved will take us away with him to The Marriage Supper of The Lamb.
There will be a great wedding in Heaven.
We will have a set aside time with our Groom before we return again with Him in order to rule and reign with Him on the earth. This will be a great time for the restoration of all things.
There will be 1000 years of peace with a short time of war afterwards when Satan and His demons will be defeated and destroyed forever.
We will see The New Jerusalem coming down from the Heavens and God will dwell in the midst of us forever and ever.
LIKE A BRIDE WAITING
The fourth, fifth and sixth weeks of the counting of the omer are huge growing times. Our learning escalates as we are approaching the end of the waiting on the Day of Pentecost.
At that time, our focus becomes even more clear. We begin to feel a sense of urgency. The realities of our meditations begin to sink in. We begin to act and think like a bride who is seeing the calendar days tick off just before her wedding. Everything we have hoped for is beginning to unfold.
Now the Bride gets to put more and more of the things she has learned and planned for her Groom into practice. She knows in her heart that the time for thinking and planning are drawing to a close. Now she is much closer to reaching the time for DOING.
Her clothing is a pure white gown. She has oil in her lamp. Her attendants are watching and ready. By the end of the seventh week of the waiting, it is time to be responding to the One she loves.
COMING OUT OF THE ARK
And so it happened in the second month and the twenty-seventh day that God spoke to Noah and said “Go out of the ark, you and your wife and your sons and your son’s wives with you.”
God was giving them the gift of a clean, new world.
In our present age, Yeshua Messiah has given us a portion of a gift called The Holy Spirit. During the age to come there will be a New Jerusalem coming down from Heaven. The Holy Spirit is an engagement present from Yeshua. It is a present that says to the Church, “Keep this until I come for you. It is to remind you that I am close; and I am coming again! It is to help you to know that you have my heart at all times.”
A SPECIAL DELIVERY PACKAGE FOR THE BRIDE
So at the end of the counting of the days Pentecost arrives. It appears like a special delivery wedding gift from our Groom in Heaven.
This day from God, one that He appointed and planned so long ago, is like an official invitation for mankind to leave the world and come inside the ark of Heaven. This is where we will find rest with God forever.
One day the earth will be made new again. We will reign with Yeshua Messiah forever.
The Messiah will be waiting (like Noah at the bow of the great ship.) He will be looking for and seeking His Bride (The Church.)
KEEPING OUR TEMPORARY SHELTERS
When God’s Holy Spirit comes to live within us, our bodies become temporary shelters. They function like little temples or tabernacles designed to house The Holy Spirit of God. A small portion of God comes to live within us. We can now take a portion of Him with us wherever we go.
NEW BEGINNING FOR GOD’S CHURCH
With Pentecost accomplished, just like that brand new world Noah’s family experienced, a clean, whole, new-beginning comes to God’s Church.
My favorite quote from the lips of Jesus can be applied here:
“I MAKE ALL THINGS NEW.”
Praise to Almighty God for The Sacred Appointed Day of Pentecost that draws us ever closer to our Father in Heaven.