From “Feast of Tabernacles,” Chapter 5- Feast of Pentecost
The Feast of Pentecost was the second of Israel’s three annual Feasts. As the Scriptures reveal, the Feast is also called the Feast of Harvest, of Firstfruits, or of Weeks. Pentecost is the New Testament name, and is so called because Pentecost means “fiftieth.” An examination of Lev. 23:15, 16 will reveal why the Feast is called Fiftieth. It was because the Feast began on the fiftieth day after the Passover sabbath, or “the morrow after the seventh sabbath.” This, of course, parallels exactly with the fulfillment of the type in the New Testament. When Christ arose from the dead, He continued with the disciples for the space of forty days, “speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God.” (Acts 1:3). Then He departed into Heaven, and after ten days (at the time of Israel’s Feast of Pentecost), He sent forth the Holy Ghost upon the waiting disciples.
THIS IS THE AGE OF PENTECOST
Pentecost! What a vast subject looms before us as we contemplate the tremendous implications of the word! Many books have been written on the power and glory of this Feast, and men who have appropriated in some measure the experience of Pentecost have proved by the Word and by experience its reality, and the Word has been confirmed with signs following. We could not begin to adequately explain the meaning of the Feast in this study, nor is it our intention to do so. Our prime concern is to prepare the ground for truth concerning the Feast of Tabernacles, which surpasses the glory of Pentecost even as the noon-day surpasses the glory of early dawn. How strange, it seems, that good men of God who have discerned by the Spirit the fulfillment of Passover and Pentecost in the Church, should now close the door to further revelation and deny that the last Feast has any application to our day and age! At the turn of this century, when God began to restore pentecost–and right up to the present time, many evangelical circles have gone to considerable trouble in an attempt to prove that Pentecost was an event of ancient history, and that its power and glory were not for present-day experience. But a large group of hungry souls have proved by the Word and by experience that Pentecost was and is for personal appropriation by faith, just as the Passover was. Therefore let us not stop at the Passover; but let us go on to enjoy the fruits for which Christ died, even the glories of Pentecost. And let us not stop at this partial restoration of Pentecost, but let us go on to enjoy the fullness of the Pentecostal experience as recorded in the Book of Acts. And even then, let us not stop at the fullness of Pentecost, but let us go on to appropriate and experience the glories of the Feast of Tabernacles–for which Pentecost has paved the way. GHW
Notice that last sentence. It says it all. Even those who have embraced the fullness of Pentecost have been taught that they have arrived. The truth is we have arrived at Pentecost but were never meant to camp there! In many segments of the Pentecostal/Charismatic church, the experience of Pentecost has become an idol. But who is the Holy Spirit to point to? Jesus, and His fulness, which is expressed in our lives in the Feast of Tabernacles. So, let us rejoice in the gift of Pentecost to the Church. Open the gift, enjoy the gift, and use the gift. But know there is a greater gift to come.
Late Harvest Wesleyan Ministries 