Tawa Baptist

Pentecost

Scripture: Deuteronomy 16:9-12

Video Link: https://youtu.be/Ix2Ecqso8L8

Structure:

  • Introduction
  • Count – rhythm 
  • Give – gratitude
  • Include – communion
  • Conclusion – remember

Introduction:

Kia ora koutou and good morning everyone.

Today is Pentecost Sunday, a time in the church calendar when we remember and celebrate the gift of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit provides a connection between Jesus and his followers. The Holy Spirit makes Jesus close and real.

Although today is Pentecost, the Holy Spirit is not bound by the church calendar. He can move at any time. But having a special day to remember the gift of the Spirit helps us.

Pentecost gets its name from the Greek word for fiftieth, because Pentecost is celebrated on the fiftieth day after Easter.

Ten days after Jesus’ ascension to heaven, while the disciples were waiting in Jerusalem, the Holy Spirit descended on them, empowering the disciples to proclaim the good news about Jesus in a whole host of foreign languages. We read about this in chapter 2 of the book of Acts. 

Pentecost wasn’t always a Christian festival though. Pentecost was originally the Jewish Festival of Weeks. Sometimes called the harvest festival. As it happens we learn about the feast of weeks in the book of Deuteronomy. From chapter 16, verses 9-12, we read…    

9 Count off seven weeks from the time you begin to put the sickle to the standing grain. 10 Then celebrate the Festival of Weeks to the Lord your God by giving a freewill offering in proportion to the blessings the Lord your God has given you. 11 And rejoice before the Lord your God at the place he will choose as a dwelling for his Name—you, your sons and daughters, your male and female servants, the Levites in your towns, and the foreigners, the fatherless and the widows living among you. 12 Remember that you were slaves in Egypt, and follow carefully these decrees.

May the Spirit of Jesus illuminate God’s word for us.

In these verses Moses gives the Israelites a number of instructions. Moses tells the people to count the weeks, celebrate by giving and include the whole community in your celebration. Count, give and include.

Counting is about rhythm. Giving is about gratitude and including is about communion. First let’s consider the instruction to count.

Count – rhythm:

Have you ever noticed the rhythms that naturally occur in this world? The sun rises in the east and sets in the west and so we have the rhythm of night and day, sleeping and waking.

The ocean’s tide rises and falls with the gravitational pull of the moon. The moon itself goes through its own cycle from full moon to half-moon to new moon. The seasons have their rhythm too, of spring, summer, autumn and winter. Your heart also beats to a rhythm. We could go on but you get the point.

These rhythms support life and they become a measure for time. Without these natural rhythms the world would revert to chaos and life would not be functional or sustainable.

Deuteronomy places quite a bit of importance on the idea of time. We see this in the way Moses prescribed a rhythm of three main religious festivals each year. These holidays were pilgrimages in which the people of Israel travelled to one central place to participate in worship.

The three main festivals were Passover, which remembered God’s deliverance of Israel from slavery in Egypt. The festival of Weeks, which happened at the end of the grain harvest. And Tabernacles (also known as the festival of shelters) which remembered Israel’s 40 years in the wilderness when they lived in tents.

Christians don’t need to celebrate the Jewish festivals. The three main events for Christians are Easter, Pentecost and Christmas, each of which find their meaning in Jesus.

From verse 9 of Deuteronomy 16 we read…

9 Count off seven weeks from the time you begin to put the sickle to the standing grain. 10 Then celebrate the Festival of Weeks to the Lord your God

If you’ve ever done long distance running, then you will know the importance of keeping your rhythm. If you have to stop and start all the time it takes a lot more energy and the run is less enjoyable.

The Passover festival and the festival of Weeks book ended the barley and wheat harvests. This fifty-day harvest period was a busy time if you were a farmer. It was like running a marathon. When you are really busy and working hard you need a rhythm to sustain you and you need something to look forward to, a celebration or a holiday at the end of it.

Counting the days and the weeks gives you a lift, that motivation you need to get the job done. Only five more weeks till the school holidays. Only three more weeks to another long weekend. 

There is a thoughtfulness and a consideration for what people need in this command to count the weeks to the end of harvest. It provides a rhythm and something to look forward to. 

The last two or three years have been challenging, like a long distance run. Although we have much to be thankful for here in New Zealand, Covid has disrupted many of our natural rhythms. We’ve had to stop and start repeatedly and this has left us feeling more tired than we normally would.

The other thing about Covid and the various lockdowns we went through, is that we never really knew when it would all end. So counting off the weeks wasn’t possible. Hard to look forward to something when you can’t see the finish line.

What rhythms do you have to support your health & well-being? Perhaps eating meals and going to sleep at the same time every day. Maybe having a 30-minute walk in the morning. Or not bringing work home in the weekend, so you can look forward to a break.

What rhythms do you have to support your faith and hope? Perhaps starting and finishing the day with a dedicated prayer time. Perhaps stopping to be silent and still three or four times a week. Maybe meeting with your Bible study group once a fortnight. Hopefully Sunday worship features as well.  

Give – gratitude:

A few years ago now, when the kids were younger, Robyn’s parents gave our family a voucher to visit Hobbiton, near Matamata in the Waikato. At Hobbiton there is this amazing tree, known in Tolkien’s books as the party tree. It is where they filmed Bilbo Baggins’ birthday party for the movie. 

The tour guide asked the group what was different about the way Hobbits celebrate birthdays and no one knew, so I felt I had to answer. Hobbits don’t receive presents on their birthday, instead they give presents to all their guests. 

In verse 10 of Deuteronomy 16 Moses gives the instruction to celebrate the Festival of weeks to the Lord your God by giving a freewill offering in proportion to the blessings the Lord your God has given you.

The thing that strikes me here is that the people are to celebrate by giving. This is a bit like the way Hobbits celebrate their birthdays. Not by receiving presents but by giving gifts. Cool aye.

The other thing I find interesting here is that, in Deuteronomy, Moses places the emphasis on the freewill offering aspect of the festival.

The protocol for observing the Festival of Weeks is detailed in the book of Numbers and in Leviticus as well. But both those accounts focus on the mandatory aspects of the celebration. For example, the priests had to sacrifice two bulls, seven lambs, a ram and a goat, along with grain and drink offerings as well.[1]

In addition to this legal requirement, people could also make freewill offerings.    

In Deuteronomy, Moses shines a spotlight on the freewill aspect of the feast of Weeks. The technical details are not in view here, as much as one’s gratitude for the blessings the Lord your God has given you.

A freewill offering means exactly that. It is an offering you make to God of your own freewill. Not because you have to but because you want to. Not because you must but because you can.

In the gospels we hear of a woman of ill repute who anointed Jesus’ feet with expensive perfume. She did this of her own freewill, out of gratitude and love for what Jesus had done for her. Those who have been forgiven much, love much.

Likewise, in the book of Acts we read of Barnabas selling a field he owned and giving the proceeds to the apostles. No one was forcing Barnabas to do this. He was moved by the Spirit, in an act of gratitude and love.

Although there is a rhythm with Israel’s worship, Moses did not want this rhythm to become routine or like an empty ritual, where the people just tick a box. Nor did he want people to think that somehow their giving put God under obligation.

In giving to God we are not securing for ourselves some influence over God. We cannot keep God in our pocket. The Lord Almighty cannot be bought. To the contrary. All that we have is a gift from God. Our giving to God is meant to be a response of gratitude for his blessing in our lives.

Celebrating by giving provides an antidote to greed and avarice. What’s more, gratitude in worship keeps our feet on the ground, it keeps us humble. Gratitude saves us from the self-righteous contempt that often characterised the Pharisees. 

The point here is that giving is good for us. We don’t give because God is short of cash. God is not short on resources. Giving supports the life and well-being of the individual donor and the community.

Moses tells the people to count the weeks, celebrate by giving and include the whole community in your celebration. Count, give and include. Counting is about rhythm. Giving is about gratitude and including is about communion.

Include – communion:

In verse 11 Moses says…

11 And rejoice before the Lord your God at the place he will choose as a dwelling for his Name…

Moses is referring here to a central place of worship. This one place was to be the hub of Israel’s life in the land. It was to hold the wheel of Israel’s cultic worship together.

Having one central place of worship was also meant to provide coherence and integrity for Israel’s thinking about God. Without a central place of worship, the people would be inclined to conform to the influence of their pagan neighbours, with the result that Israel’s religion would become indistinguishable from pagan practices.  

One central place of worship reinforced the idea that there is one God and he is holy, set apart, different from the gods of the Canaanites and Philistines. 

During the time of Eli, Hannah and Samuel, that one central place of worship was Shiloh. But God’s name was brought into disrepute there, so the central place of worship became Jerusalem, during the time of David and Solomon.

In the gospel of John chapter 4, Jesus has a conversation with a Samaritan woman by a well. The Samaritans believed that their mountain, in Samaria, was the special place chosen by God, while the Jews maintained the temple in Jerusalem was the place.

Jesus said, “Believe me woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem… 23 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. 24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”

For Christians, worship of God is not centred around a geographical place. For us, worship is centred in the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus replaces the Jerusalem temple. In and through Jesus we are reconciled to God and we enjoy communion with God. In Jesus, God’s name, his character and reputation, dwells in fullness.

Returning to Deuteronomy 16. Verse 11 goes on to say that everyone is to be included in the celebration.

When we think of ancient Israel making sacrifices, we might imagine the slaughter and burning of whole animals. Livestock and grain going up in smoke. And while some sacrifices were treated in this way, other offerings and sacrifices took the form of a shared meal for the whole community, sort of like a Hobbit party.

The freewill offering attached to the Feast of Weeks was a party to which everyone was invited. Not just people in your own family but also your male and female servants. So women were included along with men.

The Levites were also to be included. It was the Levites’ job to look after the special tent of God’s presence and to assist with the ritual sacrifices and other religious duties. The Levites were set apart for God’s service and, as such, were not allocated any land. The Lord was their portion.

But wait there’s more. Moses says that foreigners, or resident aliens, living among you must be included in the feasting as well. And we cannot forget the orphans and widows. They were not to miss out either.  

What we notice here is that the Levites, the foreigners, the widows and the fatherless were in no position to contribute anything to the feast. Doesn’t matter though. Not being able to bring a plate should not exclude anyone.

What we have in this community meal, in which everyone is included, is a kind of communion. The food, the lamb, the bread, the grain, the wine was offered to God and belongs to him anyway because it came from him in the first place. So that makes God the host of the party and the host can invite anyone he wants.

And so, in the Festival of Weeks (and other religious practices of ancient Israel), we have a form of social welfare, where those who cannot provide for themselves are provided for.

Once again we see how the festivals and sacrifices Israel was instructed to make were beneficial for them. Israel’s rhythm of worship was not meant to be a heavy burden. It was meant to support the life and well-being of the individual and the whole community.

Deuteronomy’s instructions for the Feast of Weeks finishes with these words…

12 Remember that you were slaves in Egypt, and follow carefully these decrees.

We hear this phrase about Israel being slaves in Egypt a number of times in the Old Testament. Deuteronomy is peppered with it. In the context of chapter 16, the call to remember makes the Feast of Weeks a memorial meal.

But why frame the memory in this way? Why say, remember that you were slaves in Egypt, when you could just as easily say, remember God’s deliverance or remember your release or something more positive like that? After all, the Feast of Weeks is meant to be a party, a celebration, isn’t it?

Well, it is characteristic of Moses, and of ancient Israel generally, to make room for lament. Lament allows grief and sadness to be acknowledged and expressed. Something like 40% of the Psalms are laments, to say nothing of the prophetic writings like Jeremiah and Lamentations.

The longer you live the more you have to grieve. True rejoicing cannot really take place if grief and loss is ignored or swept under the carpet.

It is rude and insensitive to laugh and joke and drink too much, when there are children in the room who have lost their father or a woman who has just gone through a divorce or refugees who have been forced to leave their land.  

Remembering the pain of their slavery in Egypt goes hand in hand with including refugees, orphans and widows. It is a way of honouring those who have suffered loss and standing in solidarity with them. You’ve got scars? I’ve got scars from where I come from too?

The white middle class western culture I was born into is pretty buttoned down when it comes to lament. We are not very good at expressing our grief. But as repressed as we are, we still have the social sensibility to keep things real.

Where I come from it is not unusual for someone at a party to give a heartfelt speech and make a toast to absent friends. It might be a time to celebrate, like a birthday party or a wedding anniversary, but that doesn’t mean we have to pretend everything in our life is perfect or whole.

Conclusion:

This morning we celebrate communion. Communion is a memorial meal, bringing to mind Jesus’ suffering, death and resurrection.

As well as remembering Jesus’ scars, we also remember others in the room with us. Those who have suffered much to be here.

Communion isn’t just a personal thing, between you and God. Communion is something we share with each other as well. Communion transcends differences in gender and ethnicity and social status.  

Maybe your circumstances right now are a bit rubbish. Communion remembers forward as well as back. Communion looks forward to that time when God will wipe away every tear and heal every hurt. A time when we will participate in the Messianic banquet with Jesus in heaven.

Let us pray…

Eternal God, help us to find our rhythm as we walk humbly with you.    

Generous God, open our hands to pay forward what you have given us.

Compassionate God, open our hearts and minds to include others.

Suffering God, help us to remember where we come from and where we are headed. Through Jesus we pray. Amen. 

Questions for discussion or reflection:

What stands out for you in reading this Scripture and/or in listening to the sermon? Why do you think this stood out to you?

  • What rhythms do we observe in the natural world and in our own bodies? How do these rhythms create order and support life?
  • What rhythms do you have to support your health & well-being? What rhythms do you have to support your faith and hope? What are you looking forward to in the short to medium term?
  • Why do you think Moses highlights the freewill aspect of the Feast of Weeks in Deuteronomy? What are the benefits of giving, both for the donor and the community?
  • Why did Israel have one central place of worship? Discuss / reflect on the ways Jesus replaces the Jerusalem temple.
  • How did the Feast of Weeks (and other religious rituals) contribute to the social welfare system of ancient Israel? Who are the foreigners, fatherless and widows in our society today? How might we include them?
  • Why is it important to make room for lament even as we celebrate? How might we do this in our context today?
  • Take some time this week to reflect on the connections between the Jewish festival of Weeks and the Christian festival of Pentecost. What do these two festivals share in common? How are they different? 

[1] Numbers 28:26-31