The Feast of the LORD #4 - Pentecost

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If you've been reading this blog from the beginning, you know we started with a 40-day countdown during Lent which begins on Ash Wednesday. Actually, we started the blog with an introduction to the blog on March 2, 2014, and article introducing our countdown to Easter, and then an article on Shrove Tuesday, which precedes Ash Wednesday.

Leading up to Easter, we talked about the prophetic significance of the seven Feasts of the LORD. 

The first three Feasts are:

• Passover 
• The Feast of Unleavened Bread 
• The Feast of Firstfruits 

You may have forgotten, but we're in another countdown right now to Feast #4, which is Pentecost. (Tweet that!) So in these posts this week and next during these days leading up to its observance on Sunday June 9, we're going to talk about what Pentecost is historically.

Actually it would be more accurate to say we're on a count up, but let's get to that in a moment. First, some background information.

On the Jewish calendar, we are currently "Counting the Omer." The omer is the Hebrew word for "sheaf." (Tweet that!) We're talking about sheaves of grains, of course, but sheaves can also be personified as people.

Back during the three feasts we observed near the Christian celebration of Easter and the Jewish Passover, the third Feast was the Feast of Firstfruits. This celebrated the early harvest, when the barley is harvested. (Tweet that!) We are now counting up to another harvest: the wheat harvest. (Tweet that!)

From the Feast of Firstfruits, God instructed the Jewish people to count seven weeks (of seven days), which is of course 49 days. The following day, which is the 50^th, is the Feast of Pentecost.

Of course we know penta means five, as in the Pentagon has five sides and a pentagram is a five-pointed star.

It is interesting to note that in the Counting of the Omer, the Jewish people count up, not down. (Tweet that!)

We usually count down to important events. As children we know it's twenty-four days to Christmas. Or ten days to our birthday. We count down to the event as we did in our 40-day countdown through Lent to Easter in March and April on this blog.

But those who observe the "Counting of the Omer" count up to Pentecost. So we started counting the omer on the Feast of Firstfruits, which this year was Sunday, April 20^th. And while you may not have known it, we've been counting up all this time. (Tweet that!) Today is the 35^th day of the omer.

On my Jewish calendar. which I got from El Shaddai Ministries, it is noted that today is "35 Omer."

There is a lot more for us to learn about the fourth Feast of the LORD, Pentecost. So through the next two weeks we'll explore the Jewish roots and insights of this Feast. In my next post we'll look at Pentecost before the events of the Pentecost Christians usually think of when the Holy Spirit was poured out in Acts 2.