Real People of Pentecost

We can easily forget that the Bible’s stories involve real people in real places at a real
time in history.

On Sunday, we celebrate yet another one of those: Pentecost.

As the BibleProject helpfully explains, Pentecost was a long-standing Jewish festival that took place in the early summer. Pilgrims from far and wide would return to Jerusalem. It was an ancient tradition, but the story in Acts 2 inaugurated a new world.

But why did the Spirit descend on Pentecost? How did we get there?

We start in Exodus, where God’s presence is seen through the fire of the burning bush. Then, at Mount Sinai, God revealed Himself and His presence—as fire—to Moses. When the Tabernacle is built, His presence is again revealed through fire, with “the glory of the Lord” filling the space. God gave the law to His people—for their good—and His presence dwelled in the temple.

What makes the Pentecost we’re celebrating on Sunday different from this?

Before His death, Jesus promised his disciples that He would not leave them as orphans. “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever; that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you” (John 14:16-17).

With rushing wind and tongues of fire, Jesus’s disciples were filled with the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost.

In Exodus, the law was delivered to Moses. Jesus is the fulfillment of the law. His Spirit is delivered to all who follow Him.

In Exodus, God’s presence was found in the tabernacle. After Pentecost, the Body of Christ is God’s temple. His presence is found in us.

In Exodus, Israel was God’s people. After Pentecost, a new people was created in Christ—neither Jew nor Greek, neither slave nor free, neither male nor female (Galatians 3:28).

Today, we are a part of that new people, filled with the Spirit of truth. We are very real people in a real place at a real moment in history—as confusing a moment as it may feel and as broken as our lives may sometimes seem. 

As the pastor and apologist Sam Allberry writes, “[The Bible] promises us something in the midst of this loss—something more precious than anything else in the world, and which itself can never be lost—the presence and love of God within us, by the Holy Spirit. The coming of the Holy Spirit stands between us and spiritual orphanhood. We have not been abandoned.”

And we never will be.