context - Pentecost (hê pentêkostê, "fiftieth") was a holiday with a history. In late Judaism Pentecost was to be celebrated on the "day after the seventh Sabbath," or on the fiftieth day after Passover. Originally this was the Festival of the Firstfruits of the Grain Harvest (Ex. 23:16; Lev. 23:17-22); it was also called The Feast of Weeks because it came after a period of seven weeks of harvesting that began with the offering of first barley sheaves during Passover and ended with the wheat harvest. By the time of the first Christian century, the day/season had come to refer to The Giving of the Law at Mount Sinai (deduced from the chronological note in Ex. 19:1), and included an annual renewal of the Mosaic covenant. Thus, it would have included a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. [1]

non privatized religion - They were all together in one place (2:1 nrsv); God’s Spirit is poured out upon a community of believers. The Holy Spirit is not a ‘personal’ gift from God that each believer privatizes . . . This same Spirit of one God ‘appeared among them-on each of them’ as the distinguishing mark of a people belonging to God. The restoration of Israel is the work of this Spirit sent by God as promised, which is why the first auditors of the miracle of tongues were ‘devout Jews from every nation’ (2:5)."

Describe your favorite holiday parade and celebration. Why is this one your favorite?

Name some of the cultural languages spoken by a variety of generations, ethnic groups, unions, societies/ institutions that are heard through words, clothing, body language, and music, etc.

Why do you think Luke includes the many dialects and "mother tongues" that fill up this narrative-perhaps seventeen language groups?

While we do have a number of fine homilies in our DPS archives on this important and annual text, you could enter the text from the pew, noting the strangeness and perplexities of Acts 2.

Recover some of the meaning of fire, wind, tongues, Luke’s use of numbers, and "the Spirit" through Luke’s theology of Israel vis-à-vis the birth of a New Israel.

Suggest ways in which Pentecost is not / is replicable today-God’s activity coming to us through celebration, outreach, proclamation, mission, etc. Other tongues can be spoken by the church in more ways than just glossolalia! Name some of those ways we can speak boldly in new languages about "God’s deeds of power."

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