Pentecost 2014: Festival of Mystery
June 4, 2014
Chester FBC, Chester, IL Dr. Mike Fogerson, Speaker
Introduction:
A The Jewish Feast of Pentecost begins this evening.
1 It is the feast that falls in the middle of the seven “high holy days.”
a Passover, Unleavened Bread, First Fruits (50 days later) . . . Pentecost. (Which all have to do with blood sacrifice and resurrection)
aa The Fall feasts (Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Tabernacles) all have to do with Judgement & the coming Kingdom.
bb The Menorah gives a helpful reminder of these holy days.
cc In Scripture, Pentecost is represented by two loaves of Challuah bread held up by the High Priest.
dd Interestingly enough, Today’s Jews celebrate it in a ceremony called, “decorating the bride.” (This ceremony typifies the rapture of the Bride of Christ & the rapture of the Church.)
b It is called the “Festival of Weeks”, “The festival without a date” since the 2nd century AD.
aa Primarily, because when counted from the lunar cycle, it has no fixed dated.
bb It’s non-fixed date gives it an air of mystery.
c It is a harvest feast that marks the passage of seven weeks after the Feast of First Fruits.
aa Deuteronomy 16:9-10 (NASB) 9 "You shall count seven weeks for yourself; you shall begin to count seven weeks from the time you begin to put the sickle to the standing grain. 10 "Then you shall celebrate the Feast of Weeks to the LORD your God with a tribute of a freewill offering of your hand, which you shall give just as the LORD your God blesses you;
bb It is a festival of the early summer harvest, but it’s associated symbols/metaphors invoke meanings far beyon the mere harvesting of grain.
cc Being raised in a Southern Baptist church, I never knew the significance of Pentecost outside of Acts 2, but we as Christians should know a little bit about every festival because there is a blessing to be found in each one of them.
2 Pentecost embodies the elements that the church associates with the coming rapture, the nearness of the coming of our Lord, Jesus.
a We find ourselves at the middle of 2014, the year is half gone & the end of this year is quickly drawing nigh.
aa Prophetically speaking, we also see that end of time seems to be quickly approaching as well.
bb In my personal ministry, I have not seen prophesy being fulfilled as rapidly as I do now or the key end time players assembling like this since the early 70's.
cc With Russia on the move in the Ukraine, nuclear weapons being brandished by Iran & Saudi Arabia, the Middle-East war threat rises to the highest probability we’ve ever seen.
dd The Blood Moon tetrad . . . the church/Christian who are mindful of the signs are full of anticipation.
b Amongst the Jews, Pentecost is a festival that celebrates the giving of the Law to Moses as the 12 tribes gathered at the foot of Mt. Sinai, where they heard the actual voice of God.
aa At first glance, the Bible doesn’t seem to make a clear connection between Sinai & Pentecost, nevertheless, the connection is there if you take the time to look for it.
bb For Christians, the festival is a picture of the marriage between God and Israel.
cc In the context of God marrying Israel, the time in between Passover & Pentecost is God’s courtship of His wife.
B Pentecost from its earliest days, was known as a festival of harvest.
1 Long ago, the Omer was offered by the high priest as he stood before the Tabernacle (later the Temple.)
a The Omer was the token of the Festival of First Fruits (Resurrection Sunday).
aa In Lev. 23.11, it is called “the sheaf.”
Leviticus 23:11 (NASB) 11 ~'He shall wave the sheaf before the LORD for you to be accepted; on the day after the sabbath the priest shall wave it.
bb The Omer/sheaf was little over two quarts of flour that marked the first day of the fifty-day countdown to Pentecost.
b Leviticus 23:15-17 (NASB) 15 'You shall also count for yourselves from the day after the sabbath, from the day when you brought in the sheaf of the wave offering; there shall be seven complete sabbaths. 16 ~'You shall count fifty days to the day after the seventh sabbath; then you shall present a new grain offering to the LORD. 17 ~'You shall bring in from your dwelling places two loaves of bread for a wave offering, made of two-tenths of an ephah; they shall be of a fine flour, baked with leaven as first fruits to the LORD.
aa The counting of 50 days from Firstfruits to Pentecost is typical of redemption in general.
bb For the Jew, it has always represented the maturing relationship between God & Israel.
2 In Acts 2, when the Holy Spirit was poured out in Jerusalem (on Pentecost), the prophecy of the “early rain” was fulfilled.
a There is a day coming when the Holy Spirit will be poured out in Jerusalem once more. When?
b Peter’s second sermon spoke of the ultimate outworking of the festival cycle:
aa Acts 3:19-21 (NASB) 19 "Therefore repent and return, so that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord; 20 and that He may send Jesus, the Christ appointed for you, 21 whom heaven must receive until the period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time. (Emphasis Added)
bb The prophetic implication is that in the future God’s promise to restore the earth to the state of glory that He originally intended in the Garden.
C (Fresh Revelation) In Jewish belief, trees are of the utmost importance for it is the bond between man and his environment.
a Genesis 1:11 (NASB) 11 Then God said, "Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees on the earth bearing fruit after their kind with seed in them"; and it was so.
Genesis 2:9 (NASB) 9 Out of the ground the LORD God caused to grow every tree that is pleasing to the sight and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Genesis 2:16 (NASB) 16 The LORD God commanded the man, saying, "From any tree of the garden you may eat freely;
aa Jesus cursed the fig tree for not bearing fruit.
Mark 11:13-14, 21 (NASB) 13 Seeing at a distance a fig tree in leaf, He went to see if perhaps He would find anything on it; and when He came to it, He found nothing but leaves, for it was not the season for figs. 14 He said to it, "May no one ever eat fruit from you again!" And His disciples were listening.21 Being reminded, Peter said to Him, "Rabbi, look, the fig tree which You cursed has withered."
bb Jews believe that trees are judged by God on Pentecost for the fruit they produced.
b Through out the church age, we have believed that the fruit of one’s life will be judged following the Rapture.
aa Paul gives us this picture in 2 Cor. 5.10,
2 Corinthians 5:10 (NASB) 10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad.
bb There is coming a time when the good fruit of the saved will be reviewed, judged . . . & then the judgement will come to a depraved world.
c In Pentecost, there is a hidden theme of fruit bearing, which points to the Judgement Seat of Christ (not to be mistaken with the Great White Throne Judgement of God).
aa Mark 7:15-20 (NASB) 15 there is nothing outside the man which can defile him if it goes into him; but the things which proceed out of the man are what defile the man. 16 ["If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear."] 17 When he had left the crowd and entered the house, His disciples questioned Him about the parable. 18 And He said to them, "Are you so lacking in understanding also? Do you not understand that whatever goes into the man from outside cannot defile him, 19 because it does not go into his heart, but into his stomach, and is eliminated?" (Thus He declared all foods clean.) 20 And He was saying, "That which proceeds out of the man, that is what defiles the man.
bb As Christians, we are never judged on our salvation, but rather the fruit we’ve produced with our good works.
cc The feast that speaks to this most directly is Pentecost.
D This judgement is coming, but we don’t know exactly when it occurs (it’s not a fixed time . . . just like Pentecost.)
1 Symbolically, Pentecost becomes a perfect model for the rapture, since its date is also beyond reckoning.
a The Books of Moses do not state on which day of the month Pentecost is to be observed, it says only that it is to be celebrated fifty days after the offering of the Omer (first fruits), they offer the first sheaf of the summer grain harvest, which is to be offered “the day after the Sabbath,”
b After 70 A.D., it became physically impossible to commemorate either the Festival of Firstfruits or the waving of the loaves at Pentecost.
aa After 70 A.D., the sixth of Sivan is a fixed date upon which it is remembered, but the ancients didn’t have a fixed date.
bb They simply knew it was fifty days after firstfruits (with leap months, it was impossible to fix it)
2 The 19th Chapter of Exodus relates that the giving of the Law at Sinai came in the third month on the third day of the month. (This places the giving of the Law at the time of Pentecost.)
a As I told you earlier, Jews see that first Pentecost as the anniversary date of God marrying Israel. (And the giving of the Law.)
aa The catching away of the bride, the Law is the marriage contract.
bb Exodus 19:19 (NASB) 19 When the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses spoke and God answered him with thunder.
cc
b When we think of trumpets we think of Rosh Hashanah, feast of trumpets. (Many believe that the Rapture will occur on some future Rosh Hashanah. . . but will it?)
aa Leviticus 23:24 (NKJV) 24 "Speak to the children of Israel, saying: 'In the seventh month, on the first day of the month, you shall have a sabbath-rest, a memorial of blowing of trumpets, a holy convocation.
bb A memorial . . . of what? The trumpets heard at Sinai, marriage of God & Israel.
c Many Jews say that the Ex. 19.19 passage is the first mention of a trumpet blast in Scripture . . . the voice of God.
aa The trumpet wasn’t blown by man, but by God’s own voice!
bb When God came down, after the people 3 days preparing themselves, the trumpet blew long & loud, filling the people with awe & terror. (BTW, this is the ONLY reference in the OT of a heavenly trumpet coming from Heaven. The next mention of a trumpet from heaven . . . is Rapture!)
cc The fire of God’s glory descended and God gave the 10 Commandments, marriage happened!
dd Pentecost is an interesting possibility for Rapture.
1 Thessalonians 4:16 (NASB) 16 For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first.
E When Jesus rose from the dead, He represented the firstfruit offering that looked forward to all the faithful being resurrected. God has an order!
1 1 Corinthians 15:20-24 (NASB) 20 But now Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who are asleep. 21 For since by a man came death, by a man also came the resurrection of the dead. 22 For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive. 23 But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, after that those who are Christ's at His coming, 24 then comes the end, when He hands over the kingdom to the God and Father, when He has abolished all rule and all authority and power.
a According to Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia, the early church fathers had a high regard to Pentecost.
aa Easter was always on Sunday . . . and so was Pentecost.
bb In the 50 days between Easter/Passover, they would pray standing up, wouldn’t fast, new converts were baptized.
cc It was a time of expectation in the early church.
b Many expected because Jesus ascended near Pentecost, He’d return in the same season.
2 Biblically, the harvest of early summer is often seen to typify the “harvest” or catching-away of church.
a It was (and is the season) grain is gathered/fruit is picked.
aa The challuah bread represented the two bodies of the redeemed at the end of the age: Israel & the Church.
bb Bread & fruit are the perfect picture of redemption, blessing, & bounty.
b But to Israel, in the time of Jacob’s Trouble in the Great Tribulation, the harvest will not bring satisfaction (church is gone.)
aa Instead, there will be a realization that something very drastic has happened.
bb Micah 7:1-2 (KJV) 1 Woe is me! for I am as when they have gathered the summer fruits, as the grapegleanings of the vintage: there is no cluster to eat: my soul desired the firstripe fruit. 2 The good man is perished out of the earth: and there is none upright among men: they all lie in wait for blood; they hunt every man his brother with a net.
c There are some very great clues here if your looking . . .
aa The time is set at the end of the fruit harvest (late April to early June) . . . the season between firstfruits & Pentecost.
bb The Hebrew word for “gathered” means “to remove, or take away.” . . .major understanding is “to be gathered to one’s fathers at death.”
cc The good fruit (church) of the righteous has been harvested and taken for inspection and storage (Judgement of the fruits of trees: Berma Seat)
dd From Micah’s point-of-view, the friends of Israel have gone away.
3 Micah’s also distressed because he wants the fruit to return.
a You don’t know what you have until it’s gone.
b “Perish” is from a verb meaning “to cause to vanish.”
aa The picture becomes clearer if we see inbetween the lines.
bb Micah is describing the conditions that will prevail when righteous mankind is instantly transported from the earth at the catching-away of the church.
F My last thought on Pentecost is a tradition that the Jews observe.
1 The Jews stay awake all night in their synagogue’s house of study, pouring over little sections of the Torah called, “tikkun.”
a Each little section covers the most important texts of Judaism.
aa The “tikkun” is a set order of study.
bb They study all night long and expect God do something new the following morning. (A Fresh Revelation)
b This tradition is very different than the first Pentecost at Sinai.
aa Bible says they slept in and Moses had to awaken them for God to speak to them.
bb In atonement for this, Jews nowadays stay awake all night.
cc They believe that for a brief instant that the skies open during the night and God will favorably answer any prayer.
2 What a picture of Rapture!!!
a The opening of the heavens for “a brief moment” corresponds with the message in 1 Cor. 15.51,
1 Corinthians 15:51-52 (NASB) 51 Behold, I tell you a mystery; we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, 52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.
b Here is the perfect picture of Christ coming to get His bride!
aa Where does He take her? Marriage supper of the Lamb!
bb This corresponds with Pentecost, when the Jews”stay up all night to decorate the bride,” then feast the next day.
cc All of this, on a feast without a date!
3 No one knows when the rapture of the church will be . . . but it could be soon so keep looking up this season.
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