Pentecost 2.0

Feasts of Israel Series: Part 13

There are two important Pentecost celebrations described in Scripture—one when Moses went up Mount Sinai, beginning in Exodus 19, and the other with Jesus’ disciples, in Acts 2.

During the first, God scrawled His Law onto two stone tablets—an event marked by a wondering crowd gathered at the base of the hill to hear the thundering voice of God and watch fire flashing from the mountaintop. (See Pentecost 1.0 to understand what that was all about.)

As perfect as the gift of the Law was, its immediate result was the death of three thousand people (Exodus 32:27). They recognized the will of God. They heard it. But they crumbled under the weight of its judgment. The fiery presentation undoubtedly struck them with awe, but the fear of the Lord was insufficient to transform them into a holy people.

How Can We Bear the Weight of the Law?

Fortunately, God wasn’t done giving. At the same time He delivered the Ten Commandments, He also downloaded His plans for building the tabernacle, instituting the priesthood, and beginning the sacrificial system (Exodus 24-31). The Law had presented a heavy burden, but God made sure they would know how to secure forgiveness (for more on this part of His gift, see A Place for Me in God’s Tent).

While Israel was learning about giving and receiving forgiveness, God sent prophets to assure them another Pentecost was on its way. He was going to stretch out His finger to write again, but this time He’d drive the words deep. “I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people” (Jeremiah 31:33, NKJV). The Law was about transform from a stony set of rules to soft, internal guidance.

More prophecies followed, adding that God would even put “a new spirit within them.” He would give them “a heart of flesh” in place of stony ones. In this way, they’d be empowered to “walk in My statutes and keep My judgments and do them” (Ezekiel 11:19–20).

His Promise Fulfilled

Centuries later, fulfillment day arrived. Fifty days after Jesus died as the Lamb of God on Passover and rose on the Feast of the Sheaf of Firstfruits, Pentecost burst on them again with a rush of noise and fire.

Voices thundered from an upper room on Mount Zion and crowds from every corner of Jerusalem gathered to see what was going on. They saw fire shooting from the heads of Jesus’ followers like lightning as praise and prophecy erupted from their lips.

God was giving again. What would be the result of this gift? Instead of three thousand dying, three thousand came into new life (Acts 2:41).

The Source of the Power

What had happened? Where did this power to not only know God’s will but to accomplished it come from?

God could not write on human hearts without stepping inside people to do it. That new spirit He promised through Ezekiel to give them was His own. When God comes inside our hearts, everything He is enters with Him. The power of His love and compassion, the endurance of His longsuffering and understanding, the guidance of His knowledge and wisdom—all this and more comes into our hearts as He writes and writes and writes upon it.

God gave the gift of a knowledge His will in the first Pentecost. He added the gift of grace at Pentecost 2.0. Motivated by the love of God now dwelling within us, filled with His power to carry it out, the presence of His own Spirit empowers us to testify and believe. Now that’s what you call fulfilling the Law.