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Pentecost: A Day of Thanks
By Jerry Burnhauser
What do two loaves of bread have to do with the coming of the Holy Spirit? This is not a connection we would normally think about, but remember that the Festival of Pentecost was celebrated by the nation of Israel for many generations prior to the Holy Spirit being given to the Church in the New Testament. The Festival of Pentecost, or the Feast of Weeks, as it was known to God’s people in the Old Testament, was primarily a harvest festival. It was the time when the wheat harvest was finished in the land of Israel and God instructed the Israelites to bring an offering to Him.
There were many different types of offerings that God directed Israel to offer at the various festivals throughout the year. Sometimes when we read about these offerings it seems like a very complex system. Still, God must have ordained all of these offerings for a reason. It seems one of the major reasons is to help illustrate or foreshadow the various aspects of Christ’s sacrifice for us. The Messiah’s sacrifice was so special and so complete that just using, for example, only a lamb would not really show all of the facets that Christ’s sacrifice would do for us. One of those facets revolves around a unique offering which was only offered at the Feast of Weeks and not required at any other festival. This offering consisted of two loaves of bread made with yeast.
For many years I wondered why God would require an offering that contains leaven or yeast. Often yeast is pictured as something undesirable in festival lessons. Apostle Paul, for example, pictures yeast as malice and wickedness in 1 Corinthians 5:8. Christ refers to the yeast of the Pharisees in a negative way in Matthew 16. However, Christ also uses yeast in Matthew 13:33 to represent the Kingdom of Heaven. So we can see that yeast does not always represent something negative.
The two loaves of bread belong to a certain class of offerings called fellowship offerings. We read about them in Leviticus 7:11-15. They are an expression of thankfulness to God. In the case of the Feast of Weeks they are an expression of thankfulness for the harvest that was just completed. In the liturgy of sacrifices when a sacrifice is doubled, as is the case here using two loaves of bread, it is intensified or emphasized. Here the lesson being that Israel should be extra thankful at this festival. Why? Because God not only gives life, He also sustains life by providing us with food. We who live today can look back and see that God’s blessings far exceed a harvest of physical food. They affect every aspect of our lives both physically and spiritually. They include the blessings we have here and now and our lives in the Kingdom of God forever.
In addition, the Feast of Weeks was more than just a harvest festival for the nation of Israel. Jewish tradition holds that the Law was given to them on this festival. That Law made them unique as a nation because God gave his teachings to Israel first, with the idea they would be an example for the other nations. God wasn’t under any obligation to do this for them, so the Israelites knew they had received a great blessing and they were very thankful to God for this as well.
When God delivered Israel out of Egypt at Passover He knew that giving them freedom would not necessarily keep them free. That is why giving them His teachings at Pentecost was just as important to insure that the nation of Israel would start out on the right path to remaining free. God’s teachings showed the Israelites how to behave in order to be part of a society free from the harmful effects of sin. In this way they had the potential to avoid so many of the problems that affected the nations around them. Unfortunately something was missing and the nation of Israel started behaving like their neighboring nations. God was not finished yet.
For Old Testament Israel, the two loaves of bread symbolized Israel’s blessings which they were thankful for on the Feast of Weeks. The ultimate thing, however, that mankind has to be thankful for is when Jesus Christ came and walked on this earth. When the Messiah Jesus came He taught us the finer points of the Law. More importantly He came to offer Himself as the perfect offering for our sins because no amount of doing what is right can put us in a right relationship with God. We need Jesus to accomplish that for us. In 1 Corinthians 5:7 Apostle Paul shows us that Jesus Christ is our Passover Lamb sacrificed for us. This is the sacrifice that truly makes us free. The coming of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost insures we will grow in this freedom and in our relationship with God that Christ initiated on Passover. The Festival of Pentecost shows us that God does more than just free us from sin. He is ever with us through the Holy Spirit guiding us along to make us sin-free for all time.
Whether it’s the physical blessings of a bountiful harvest, the giving of the Law to guide one’s life, or the ever presence of Christ through the Holy Spirit, there has been and always will be much to be thankful for on the Festival of Pentecost!
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