Shavuot Pentecost Celebration 2024

Automated transcript, lightly edited for readability. Scripture appears as spoken; the video is the authoritative teaching.

go shabbat shalom everybody thank you again for joining us on a very special service as we celebrate shavuot uh the festival of weeks in 2024 also known as yeah also known as pentecost a day that we're more than familiar with because of the book of acts and so on the special day again shavuot um it's a really special holiday in the bible biblical feast day or holiday if you will and It's actually one of the top three if you will see in the Bible we have biblical feast days that of course God gave to Israel and These festivals and holidays established the religious calendar for Israel and it was based around agriculture and We know in the spring, what's the big one in the spring, the one that kicks off everything? It's Passover, right? Passover and the week-long week of unleavened bread. And that's how we start the calendar. That's how we start again to remember the story of the Bible, the origin story of the people of God.

Slaves. They were in Egypt and they were slaves. They were oppressed. They were trapped. They couldn't get out. Children were being slaughtered and their cries were heard in the heavens. and god saw his people in agony and raised up moses to lead them out of egypt their redemption so we're first introduced to the character of this god in this capacity on such a personal level for his people in exodus and we learned something about him this is the god that frees slaves And that's how we start, the Bible starts the biblical calendar out every single year remembering that, that premise. This is the God that frees slaves.

This is the God that frees the oppressed. A God that hates when power is leveraged to proceed and produce a victim and an oppressor. And so at Passover, his wrath goes forth. Israel takes the lamb, they put the blood on the doorposts, and they go through the waters of rebirth into the wilderness to meet God. A few days after that, a festival of first fruits, Yom HaBikrim, occurs. And that is when also the barley is waved before the Lord. This is when all of the men of Israel and their families would bring the first of their barley harvest in the early spring before the Lord as a type of offering. And they would all travel up to Jerusalem for Passover and Unleavened Bread and bring forth their offerings.

And then 50 days after that, we have Shavuot. And then of course after that is the day of shouting or the day of trumpets, the festival of trumpets, if you will. And then the day of atonement, it's kind of a big one, where God's grace is manifested, providing a way for Israel to cleanse the footprint of their sins and transgressions from his sight and purge the temple. And then of course after that we have a little one. It's called the Feast of Tabernacles when Israel brought their third and final offering or tithe to God. And the top three are actually found in Deuteronomy 16. Deuteronomy says, "Three times a year all of your men must appear before the Lord your God at the place He will choose: at the festival of unleavened bread, the festival of weeks , and the festival of tabernacles ."

So these are pilgrimage feasts. These are three times a year where all the men of Israel, "Man, we gotta go to Jerusalem. Sorry." You know, you could take your family or not. You know, you gotta go. You gotta be there to represent, right? And bring your harvest in. Three times a year to Jerusalem. And you would bring a gift to the Lord. and they would bring in carts full of the harvest the produce the wealth the blessing that they had and they would bring it to the temple and they'd give it to the priests and the priests would wave an offering and the people of god would rejoice it says rejoice why do you rejoice because you're grateful because you're grateful there's an overlap there they tend to go hand in hand right typically we rejoice when we're thankful for something when we're grateful we have gratitude And from what we know, there was a tradition during Shavuot where people would make baskets.

And this is every harvest, but Shavuot seemed to be special. So you transport your offering in. And so you'd make baskets. And we have some Jewish writings and records that speak about how people just wouldn't just go to Hobby Lobby and get a basket that looks pretty, right? We can cheat today, right? Oh, 60% off every single week. That's awesome. No, people would make them and not simply make the basket, they would weave in ribbons and even gold if you were 1% or whatnot. Gold baskets, sparkly stuff. You wanted it to be special because the basket is an offering to the Lord. And I just can't imagine spending, for me it would take months to make a basket, but I'm sure they would probably do it in an hour.

But to spend the time making a basket with your kids Your family with the anticipation that we're gonna start a journey might be a small journey might be a big journey a couple days traveling around and once again, we're gonna go to The city of our king of our God Jerusalem and you have the floods of people just going down the highways over the hills and down in the valleys until finally You reach the peak of the Mount of Olives and you see the city of gold Jerusalem And then we would funnel between the gates and we'd go into the city and we would make our way up to the Temple Mount. And there, there this whole time, we're carrying our basket. And it's overwhelming just to think about that moment where it's your turn to hand your basket to the priest. And the priest takes your basket and he lifts it up. It's just a neat thing to imagine, to present it before the Lord.

Can you imagine? And you know what? I bet there were some laundry baskets sometimes. I'm just saying. There's baskets. I don't know. I thought about that earlier. Someone would bring a laundry basket because it just works. But when they would give their offering to the Lord, they would, in Deuteronomy 16, it actually tells us what every Israelite would say when they handed over whatever offering they brought. And would you guys like to read that? Like, would it be cool, I'm setting this up, like, would it be cool to pretend in your mind that you were in Jerusalem 2,000 years ago, hadn't been destroyed yet, 2,000 years ago, and you've come up with your basket, and you've made the journey, and your kids are excited, and then they look up to you because it's now time for you to say that thing.

And here we are in 2024 with the ability to say the thing. Right? And so if you would, join me. And it's in Deuteronomy 16, starting in verse 26, and we'll put the words up here. And the words in white, I'll read, right? That's the commentary. That's the context of what's being written. And when the words turn yellow, that's me and you and everybody, and we're going to say the thing. You ready? Okay. Some of you are like, this is kind of boring or dumb. No, this is neat. This is cool. All right. Starting in verse 26, wait for the yellow. This is verse 26. 1, starting in verse 1. Let me double check myself.

I don't think I got it mixed up with 26. I may have got it mixed up with Deuteronomy 26. Try Deuteronomy 26. We're going to edit this out. Deuteronomy 26, verse 1. We're on track. Thank you. I'm so thankful you're here today. When you have entered the land, the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance and have taken possession of it and settled in it. Take some of the first fruits of all that you produce from the soil of the land the Lord your God has given to you and put it in a basket. Then go to the place the Lord your God will choose as the dwelling for his name and say to the priests at that time, I declare today to the Lord your God that I have come to the land the Lord swore to our ancestors to give us." the priest shall take the basket from your hands and set it down in front of the altar of the lord your god then you shall declare before the lord your god my father was a wandering araman and he went down into egypt with a few people and lived there and became a great nation powerful and numerous but the Egyptians mistreated us and made us suffer, subjecting us to harsh labor.

Then we cried out to the Lord, the God of our ancestors, and the Lord heard her voice and saw our misery, toil, and oppression. So the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with great terror and with signs and wonders. And he brought us to this place and gave us this land, land flowing with milk and honey. And now I bring the first fruits of the soil that you, Lord, have given me. And it continues and it says, place the basket before the Lord your God and bow down before him. And then you and the Levites and the foreigners residing among you shall rejoice in all of the good things the Lord your God has given to you and your household.

That's really neat. That's so cool. Shavuot's neat for a lot of reasons. One is the name, right? Shavuot literally means weeks, plural weeks. Shavuot is the Hebrew word for week. On Shabbat sometimes we'll greet each other when we say goodbye. We'll say Shavuot Tov. It's like week good or have a good week, right? Week good, yeah, have a good week. Shavuot Tov, Shavuot. And it means, you know, And so why is it called weeks? Well, we know that in Deuteronomy 16:9 it speaks about counting off seven weeks after the day of first fruits. And then you shall hold the celebration. You shall rejoice before the Lord.

And once again, remember where you came from, but also where God has taken you to. See, according to the Torah, it tells us that Shavuot is 50 days after first fruits. 50 days. So if you count off in weeks, you count the weeks, you count seven weeks. And there's seven days in a week, so you have the whole 777 thing that's going on, which is 49, and then plus one on the 50th day, we have this grand celebration. And during this festival, they would make two very special loaves of bread to be waved as an offering. And this bread was intentionally leavened, which should kind of stick out a little bit. It's unique.

But not only that, the wheat was grinded into fine flour. This was an offering that was made that was very unique from all the other offerings. See, like when you brought in the barley offering, it's raw. It's not ground up. This is God gave it to us and God gets it back the way he kind of gave it to us, if you will, except for we cut it and give it back. But this is, you're making a loaf of bread. You're grinding flour. And why is that special? Why is that significant? well anyone can go to food line and pick up some good bread if you look in the right place but it's significant because of the story see remember i love to emphasize the bible is a story it was edited and put together and compiled to tell a story about a rescue mission of this great god that you're invited to participate in and sometimes we get accustomed to memorizing bible verses with the juanas and stuff like that you know memorize all these bible verses but we never actually read it in the context of a story and so why is it so significant that we now have leavened bread well because what kind of bread did israel have to eat when they left egypt unleavened bread why they didn't have time to let the dough rise before they headed out you know um And there's nuggets in there, which is really cool, because we're like, okay, well, they didn't have time to let the dough rise.

I mean, surely they could have let it rise the next 10, I mean, it doesn't take, I mean, it takes a little bit, it takes a while, you know, especially if you don't have that instant yeast. If they had some of that, it'd be good. But no, bread was something that was a cultural identity marker in the ancient world. Everybody made bread, but everybody made bread differently. And so when the Torah talks about getting the leavening out of your home, it's actually not like leaven per se. It's the Hebrew word sior, and it's essentially starter dough because that's the easiest way to make some bread, right?

You get some starter dough, or as the Amish call it, friendship dough. Anybody ever made bread before? Yes. It's fun. It's messy. Flour gets everywhere, and you got to clean it up before your spouse gets home. Everywhere. Everybody made bread. and the way it was made is from starter dough. You tear off a little piece and you give it to your friend. You keep it going, that way you can make the process go faster. And some cultures put dates and fruit in their bread as a customary staple of their culture. Some put nuts in their bread. Maybe some put peanut butter, I don't know. But every single, everyone had their own unique bread that they made.

And so it's significant when Israel's leaving Egypt, how they're not allowed to make the leavened bread they have to in fact leading up to that they got to make sure all of the starter dough that they have reused over and over and over again in their time of egypt is out of the house it's thrown away it's gone and so they leave egypt on a blank slate if you will they're leaving behind everything that was egypt everything everything that happens in egypt and 50 days later israel is now commanded to take wheat and grind it up into fine flour and get it nice and yeasty and bake it because this is a new bread for a new people. It's a new bread because the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and outstretched arm and we have received blessings now. Every Shavuot we remember once again who we are, who God is, and what God has done for us. This is the teaching of the Torah, right? This piece of the Old Testament that most of us grew up thinking was kind of boring. but it's kind of neat when you realize what the different things mean and why it's such a big deal but if you thought that was neat hang on to your seats um it gets it but wait there's more it gets really interesting this is whichever what's fun so the scripture tells us how much flour they used okay in the torah to make the bread that's it i love the way that the Bible was put together, inspired by the Holy Spirit, through men and women sharing their experiences, you'd think they could have been like, okay, you need to get the fire going at this temperature, make sure you get a little bit of oil, right, some salt, sugar, something.

You're going to make it with this much flour. Okay. How do we know how they actually did things, though? And so that is a great question.

And thankfully, because of the priestly families of the temple, their descendants from the time of Yeshua, we have a pretty good idea of how they did things in the temple. So during the time of Yeshua, the temple was still standing, right? And it was made to look beautiful by King Herod. He did a facelift on it. It was awesome. And in 70 AD, the Romans came to snuff out a rebellion that was going on, and they destroyed Jerusalem, and they razed the temple, leveled it. all gone, which put kind of a very critical-- it was a big deal for the Jewish people. This is the center of their faith, the center of their religion.

Everything in the Torah revolves around the temple in one way, shape, or form. And after about 100, 150 years, the descendants of the priestly families that worked in the temple realized, we're writing stuff down. We have writings from our great-great-great-great-grandparents. We have oral traditions of how everything was done in the temple meticulously. and we're starting to forget. So we need to compile something where we put everything together that we know now. And so they did. Over the course of 100, 200 years, they put together something called the Mishnah. And it is a record, and it's a record of how they say things happened in the temple.

And based on this and other writings we know, we have the measurements of the loaves of bread. And these are, I'm going to say exact, but roughly exactly the same measurements measurements of how the bread would have looked and the bread is described as having horns on the four corners of each of the loaves and we could there we go I guess we could do two and I could do the Moses thing but they had horns on it what other articles in the temple have horns on them altars do yeah that's right it's just neat it's neat how they incorporate incorporated that in Torah does not say how big it needs to be. Torah doesn't talk about. Torah just says how much flour. And so I love how at some point in Jewish history, they said, what do we do?

Well, we do our best. And this was it. And I found that awesome. I found that so cool. Let's see here. We have, let's see, we will go ahead to the next slide. I think he's holding the bread, right? Yeah, so here's an image. Don't go to the next one yet. Here we have an image of an illustration based on a commentary of a very famous rabbi named Rambam of the Mishnah Torah on what he believed they were describing. And this is a priest coming. There's the mixture at the bottom. But he's holding the two loaves of bread. I like the pointy horns, but they like them flattened. That's fine. Do we have a slide before this that's Deuteronomy ?

Yeah, let's do that. So Deuteronomy says this, it says, "The priest," and this is one of those interesting things, "The priest is to wave the two lambs before the Lord as a wave offering together with the bread of the first fruits," which are these, "They are a sacred offering to the Lord for the priest. On that same day you are to proclaim a sacred assembly and do no regular work." This is the Lasting Ordinance. We read that verse every year and we're like, "Oh yeah, that makes sense. You wave the bread." That's not what the verse says. The priest is to wave two lambs before the Lord together with the bread.

So good. So we also have an illustration from the colorful illustrations of the Bais HaMikdash illustrations from the Rambam. And we also have a picture of what they illustrated with this. And so can we go to that picture of where they're... Yeah, here we go. It's a double lamb sandwich. It's good. And that top lamb looks like he has a platypus. Look at that big old... Anyway. Yeah, so, and I love this so much because most of us are like, yeah, I mean, that's how they would have done it. And that's fine if you're content with that. If you're like, yeah, that's how they did it. Cool. I like to think they did it too, just like this.

I like to think they went up and over, you know. But I would have, if I could go back, this is the moment I would want to see because you know there were sound effects, right? Right? Both of these lambs stacked on top of each other. I mean, they got to call Jacob for this one. He trains all year for this. This is lifting weights. I love it. I love this so much. This is probably one of my favorite topics. The priest is to wave it. And this is a sacred, with the bread, this is a sacred offering to the Lord.And sometimes I read the commandments in the scriptures. And I'm in love with them. I'm in love with every single one of them.

Whether they are disturbing or not, I still appreciate what they're doing. And I do believe that God met Israel where they were at as far as the commandments, as far as the context of the Torah. Maturely met them where they were at when they're understanding and culturally. And the reason I say that is because Yeshua says that. People are asking, "Hey, what about divorce in the Torah?" And Yeshua says, "Yeah, that's not the perfect will of God." He put that in there because you suck. I mean, you guys, your heart is awful, right? That was put in there to meet you and your immature state where you were at.

That's not the will of God. You're supposed to launch out of that, move forward. But sometimes you read a commandment and you wonder, I wonder, if I was God, I would have this commandment there just to see if they would do it. And it's beautiful. And I say that as a form of it's beautiful and I love it. So now you know how they waved the two lambs and the two loaves of bread together. It's beautiful. It's beautiful. And this is a celebration of remembering not simply that God redeemed you from Egypt for ancient Israel and for us, but that God didn't stop there. See, redeeming us from Egypt, from the place of oppression, from the place of death, that's Passover.

Shavuot, he didn't stop there. he gave you a new identity he made you into a new people chosen by him he gave you bounty and abundance and blessing god does not stop there god kept going in the story of israel and he's still going today and he's not going to stop nor is he ever going to leave you or betray you he's never going to stop chasing you because our god is a god of love that's the core of everything god is and that's what first john 4 14 says It's who God is. This is a God you can trust. This is a God you can be vulnerable with, you can embrace, and you can lean on because this God does not stop, especially when it comes to the mission laid out in the Bible of rescuing all of humanity collectively as one people, one diverse people, a people that does not speak Hebrew but all languages, a people that does not dress one way or another A people that may not make the bread the same way depending on where they're from. No, all tribes, all languages and tongues, all nations have a seat at the table of God in Isaiah 25. Isaiah 19, especially the end, is a prophecy that speaks about Israel Do we have the verse?

Did I put that up there? Isaiah, no, that's fine. Israel 19.24, it says that in that day, Israel will be the third, along with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing on the earth. The Lord Almighty will bless them, saying, Blessed be Egypt, my people. Assyria, my handiwork. Israel, my inheritance. The enemies of Israel will become worshipers alongside Israel. Beautiful. I wonder why Yeshua hammers the whole thing. love your enemy thing. Because when it comes to it, if you're loving someone, they're not your enemy, they're your neighbor. That's the mission. And I want to compel you to have your shields up over the next few months.

We're in a time that is cyclical in the United States every four years. And every four years, we find it far too easy to turn our backs on the teachings of Yeshua. Temporarily, we just hit pause because we have to hate someone. Why? Because they hate us. Why? Because we're on two different teams and we want to vote for two or three or no, none of the people. And so therefore you're not with me and I'm not with you and we must be, you're the reason America's gonna die. And that's a fair script of every single side, right? And I wanna compel you and I wanna encourage you. Over the next few months, put your guard up against the voice of the enemy that says, It's okay to not follow Yeshua now.

It's okay to look at another person based on their opinion about something that you know nothing about what went into it and their life experiences. Don't use disagreements as an excuse to look at someone else as subhuman because that's what you do when you think you're better than someone else. They are lesser of a human than you. And once you strip someone of their identity that God gave them as a real human being, Or then it makes it far too easy to say things that you would never normally say to someone that you actually know. Or do things, or have bitterness. Because this is the mission that you're on.

And I have some news. Every empire in the world will be conquered by Yeshua. And they will yield to the foot of His throne, which is the cross. Philippians says we are citizens of the kingdom of heaven. And we do have opportunities to inflict mighty change in the world. But while you're doing it, don't forget the mission. Don't forget what you're called to do and be a part of. Don't let differences, backgrounds, stereotypes, nationalism keep you from supporting the mission of God. Shavuot reminds us of that because a new bread has been waved before the Lord. Not one that is remnant of leaving horrible places, but signifies arriving at a new place in the wilderness, trusting in our God.

And we move forward throughout the story, and we come through the gospel accounts, and we come to the book of Acts, in Acts chapter 2. And what takes place in Acts chapter 2 is an event that is 50 days after Yeshua resurrected from the grave. 50 days since death was defeated, since the disciples partook of the unleavened bread, signifying the flesh of the Lamb, and were freed from Egypt. And here, here in Acts chapter 2, the disciples... along with many of the female followers and including Mary, the mother of Yeshua, are gathered together, ready to worship God, ready to rejoice. They've come to Jerusalem.

They've come to celebrate. They've got their baskets ready, I'd assume. They're ready to see the loaves of a new kind of bread waved once again as a reminder. But if the bread represents a new type of life apart from Egypt, a place of slavery and death, and we know that Yeshua was that bread broken for us to be freed from sin and death, this is the Passover imagery that Yeshua spoke about, then this new bread that is about to be waved should signify not only a new life outside of Egypt, but a new life outside of sin. And we know the prophets speak about this type of arrival of a new humanity. And you know how they describe it?

So Ezekiel speaks about a time when God's kingdom is going to impact earth and crash into it, and a new humanity is going to blossom. Not only just a new humanity, but Isaiah says it's a new creation springing forth. And Ezekiel says, well, what's that look like for the people of God, the people of this new creation? He says, yeah, they're going to die, and they're going to have their crusty old hearts taken out of them, and God is going to put a fresh heart, a clean heart within them. But what else do you have to do? I mean, if you do, someone's dead, what else do you have to... Oh, he says, yeah, and a new spirit will be breathed into them.

It's new creation. It's new humanity being formed by God and the spirit being breathed into them. New life. And this is the account of what took place when the disciples and Mary and the others were in Jerusalem during this event, this Shavuot celebration. Acts chapter 2 verse 1 it says when the day of Pentecost arrived they were all gathered together in one place and suddenly there became there came from heaven a sound like a rushing mighty wind and it filled the entire house where they were sitting and divided tongues as a fire appeared to them and rested on each one of them and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance now they were dwelling in Jerusalem and Jews, devout men from every nation under heaven.

And at this sound, the multitude came together and they were bewildered because each one was hearing them speak his own language. And it goes on to list 15 different cultures and nations that the Jews that were in these areas had come to Jerusalem to worship and they heard in their own language. I think I have a picture of a map I kind of found and put on there. Yeah, this is what it looked like. the Parthians, the Medes, the Elamites, the residents of Mesopotamia, Babylon, Judea, Pontus, Asia, Cyrene, Libya, Egypt, Rome, Cretans, Arabians. We hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God.

It's beautiful. So these were Jews. These were Jews that had been scattered all over the world, and they had come back for the celebration, the pilgrimage feast of Shavuot. They'd come back with their baskets. And this is what they're experiencing. they see these disciples of Yeshua and they're saying the mighty works of God and they're hearing in their own language the mighty works of God being spoken to them. It's powerful, powerful. This new experience was given to the followers of Yeshua and the message went forth from them to the people that went there that are now going to go back home and talk about what they have seen and heard and what magnificent things are going on in Jerusalem. for out of Zion shall go forth the law and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

New life was given on Shavuot, a life that trusts in God, a life that is devoted to God's kingdom alone, a life that follows the Lamb. And so today, we celebrate that, and we rejoice, and we show gratitude for that, because I don't think you'd be here today if you didn't have a blessing or two that you could rejoice about that God has given to you. And it's so funny because we're always grateful, right? I mean... Well, you know, grateful for my car. You're grateful for your house, right? Thankful for that. Thankful for my job. Grateful for my money, right? But here's the thing, and this is something, someone told me this about 10 years ago, and it has messed me up ever since.

Are we sure that we're grateful or not just proud of it? Not just proud of it. See, because many times we see our job and our money as things that we produced, right? We did that. We did this. I got my car. I got my house. My stunning good looks. Got my wife. But here's the thing that we miss sometimes and we forget is you cannot be grateful for something that you feel entitled to. And that's what Shavuot is about. God gives blessings, but he invites our participation. And so I don't know where you're at today, but I find it really cool that even though we can't go to the temple and bring a basket on our shoulders and kneel down with our kids watching us and offer it unto the Lord, I think it's remarkable that that we can still participate in this commandment of Shavuot.

Because that's why we do the feast days, right? To memorialize and live out the commandments of God, but also to teach our children because they're watching us. And it's a really overwhelming feeling to be able to participate in the same gesture of gratitude that the ancient Israelites did. And so I know we don't have a temple that we can go to and worship God and give to today, but we do have a congregation that we can go to and worship God and give to today. And so join me and many others as we rejoice, as we take time to recognize the things that God has done for you, the blessings that he's continued to give to you, and the promises that God always keeps.

And so let us rejoice and be grateful and celebrate a new life in Yeshua today on Pentecost, or as we also call it shavuot please stand as we conclude services with worth with worship hey guys i hope you're excited i hope you're excited because we're gonna break bread together please stay we have a meal we're gonna have lunch together afterwards and celebrate and just celebrate the fellowship that god has brought together but also i also urge you worship reflect are you grateful if you need prayer today there's a prayer team on either side of the stage They want nothing more than to join you in lifting up your needs and requests before the Father today. Alvino Marqueno, our Father, our King, Father, we thank you for this opportunity to come together once again on this day that signifies your eternal rest that is only truly found in your Son, Yeshua. Father, I ask that your Word would continue to speak to us, but not only that, this new Spirit that your Word says is within us even now, that it is the same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead today that it would continue to work in every one of us so that we would maintain focus on the mission of the word and not be distracted by everything the enemy would want to distract us with during this season may we be ambassadors of the love of our god may we be ambassadors of grace and mercy may we be taught how to have empathy before reacting may we be a people of peace representing you in the name of yeshua we pray amen let'ssing shema together Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is one. Blessed is the name of his glorious kingdom for all eternity. And may the Lord bless you and keep you.

May the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. May the Lord lift up his countenance toward you and give you his peace. In the name of Yeshua HaMashiach, our Sar Shalom, our Prince of Peace, we pray. Amen.