The day of Pentecost in the Book of Acts is when the disciples had their coming-out party. They were telling their faith stories in someone’s house, and the ruckus got so loud that people outside began to gather in the street to listen. The crowd grew, and people from all over the known world began to hear the story in their own language, kind of like sitting at the UN and hearing the speaker’s words in a way you could understand them. Growing up, I had no idea that Pentecost was actually a Jewish holiday – Shavuot. Shavuot has two significant meanings: it marks the wheat harvest in the Land of Israel and also commemorates the anniversary of the giving of the Torah by God to the Israelites at Mount Sinai. The Feast of Weeks is important for both religious and agricultural reasons (www.theisrael.blog).
Like so many aspects of Christianity, I was taught an incomplete understanding of a really significant event. The mention of Pentecost in Acts 2 was not meant to name the spiritual event taking place, but rather, it was meant to point to the when of it. It was meant to place this outpouring of the Spirit in a context that people in that part of the world would understand, since the Book of Acts itself was written at least 55-60 years after the event happened. The early church struggled with its identity, and the issue over forcing men to be circumcised was what finally led the Apostle Paul to move the fellowship away from being a sect of Judaism to being its own thing. The church struggled with its Jewish roots and still struggles with it today.
This also means that Pentecostals have actually been defining their speaking in tongues by the wrong thing. The Christian experience of Pentecost was about translating the words of the disciples into other known languages, while the speaking in the tongues of angels comes from an ecstatic experience of the Spirit whose origin is murky. All of this is meant to point out that we Christians need to do a better job at learning about our own faith, as well as the faiths of others. We make assumptions that are often not true, and this practice can lead us to judgments that are false. When we learn, we grow in understanding, and when that happens, the world opens up and becomes richer. Knowledge frees us to understand and speak up. Lack of knowledge leads us towards ignorance.
Prayer – Holy God, there is so much we do not know. Free us from self-centeredness so that we can know You and each other better. Amen.
Today’s art is from a set of eight windows from Cardiff United Synagogue in Cyncoed, Wales which was moved from Brandreth Road Synagogue, now demolished.