That all hear the word in their own tongue

Grace and peace in our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Today is the day that our Lord promised His disciples before His Ascension. He told them in the book of the Acts of the Apostles, chapter 1, “Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which, He said, you heard from Me. For John indeed baptized in water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days after these. ” After these words, as we confess in the creed, He ascended into heaven to be seated at the right hand of God Almighty Father, and from there He is to come to judge the living and the dead.

So, today we end with the second article of the Creed, which deals with the second person of the Holy Trinity, the Son, and we begin with the third article, which deals with the Holy Spirit. We celebrate the day of Pentecost 10 days after the Ascension, which was 40 days after the Resurrection. The feast of Pentecost already existed at that time. That is why there were men from all parts of the Roman Empire in Jerusalem. The word, Pentecost, derived from the Greek, means fifty. For the Jews, it meant 50 days, according to their tradition, after the day when God gave Moses the two tablets of the Law on Mount Sinai. It was also the feast of the first crops of spring, wheat and barley, so, people took their harvest sacrifices to the Temple of Jerusalem to thank God. For us, on this same day we celebrate the delivery of the Holy Spirit to the church to proclaim the Gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ.

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