Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

“ALL of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.” (Acts 2:4)

Christians all over the world is celebrating these days as Pentecost season. Pentecost is not particularly a Christian holiday. It is one of the most important Jewish holidays. Acts 2:1-13, we read the story of the Pentecost. There are three important Jewish festivals to which every male Jew within twenty miles of Jerusalem was bound to come to Jerusalem, the Passover, the Feast of Pentecost and the Feast of Tabernacles. Pentecost fell on the fiftieth day after the Passover. The feast itself had two main significances for Jewish people. One, it commemorates the giving of the Law to Moses on Mount Sinai.  (Leviticus 23:21) The other significance of this day is the offerings at the Festival of weeks. (Numbers 28:26) So many people come to Jerusalem on Pentecost festival than other feast days.

What happened at Pentecost we really do not know; certainly the disciples had an experience of the power of the Spirit. After the resurrection they gathered together ashamed and astonished more faithful and may be thinking about their safety and planning for the future may be waiting for the risen Lord; if so they did not disappointed on Pentecost festival. “ALL of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.”

Holy Spirit is a word misunderstood by many Christian denominations today. Some have taken monopoly on the God’s Spirit. Charismatic Movement talks about Holy Spirit as their monopoly. On the other hand organized Christian denominations gave little or no importance to the word Holy Spirit or the presence of God. Certainly Holy Spirit is the presence of the God Almighty. Holy Spirit is not only a power by which God once upon a time intervened in the world, God’s Sprit or Holy Spirit is also the power and the force by which God intervenes constantly in new ways in the present world and makes Godself knowable to us.

There are two important things we should know about this passage. After the resurrection, he appeared to them in Holy Spirit. Disciples returned to Jerusalem with great joy. Joy not because Jesus was gone from them but they knew that he was with them forever. As members of the Christian church we can also have a great joy that the ascended Jesus was not gone from the world, he was with the disciples, with us, with the church and with the world forever. We read that promise in Matthew 28:20 “And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Second important thing about this passage is that the ascension of Jesus together with the Pentecost day gave us hope of the Second Coming. There is no need to speculate about how and when it will happen because Jesus Himself said that not even He knew the day and the hour when the Son of Man would come. But we need to strive for the coming of that day and to make ourselves ready for it, knowing that God has a plan for the world, mankind and for each one of us even in our daily life. 

The risen God was no ghost or hallucination; the risen God is real. Christianity is a historical fact and we as Christian are waiting for that risen Christ. While we are waiting, it is also our duty to be His witness in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth. As Christians it is not only a time to wait for God but also a time to work for God because the most priceless thing is waiting for us in heaven. The book of Acts tells us that the Church carries on the life of Christ. So it is our duty as Christians, to carry out the message of Jesus Christ.

May God almighty help each one of us to attain that joy of hope for the world to come and to be His witness to the end of the earth. Amen.

Grace and Peace,