Scripture Readings
Newsletter – 16/05/2016 Pentecost
The Jewish feast of Pentecost, 50 days after Passover, was less well known than the other two pilgrimage feasts. Nomadic Hebrews sacrificed lambs in the spring to ensure adequate water through the dry season. After they settled into agriculture the barley harvest was celebrated a few days later. These two feasts became linked and associated with Passover. Tabernacles occurs in autumn when everyone slept in tents on the hillsides to protect and harvest the grapes. It was associated with temporary shelters used while wandering in the wilderness. Pentecost was associated with God giving the Covenant on Sinai. So the coming of the Holy Spirit on the Apostles at Pentecost fits neatly with this Covenant feast: the birth of the Church. Acts lists the regions where the Church was to grow.
Paul urges the Romans to live by the Spirit who, with Christ, has made his home in us. We are now Sons of God. If we are led by the Spirit within us to follow God’s laws, we will have confidence that the Father will “give life to our mortal bodies”, just as Jesus was raised.
In John’s Gospel Jesus repeats his promise that his Father would send another Advocate, through whom he and the Father would be with his church for all time.
Psalm Response: Send forth your Spirit, O Lord, and renew the face of the earth.
(Acts 2: 1-11; Psalm 103(104); Romans 8: 8-17; John 14: 15-16, 23-26)
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