I'd like to discuss and answer a question I've received recently regarding the counting to the Feast of Pentecost this year. And here's the question. Why is Pentecost this year on June 1st instead of June 8th? It seems—and the question goes on—is it May, right? No, it is June. It is June 1st. Yeah, I have it right. Somebody else is waving me off like I might have had the dates wrong. It's on June 1st instead of June 8th. And the question goes on. It seems the latter date is seven weeks from the Days of Unleavened Bread, but the June 1st date seems to be a week early.
And so, usually the task accounting is pretty straightforward. However, when the Days of Unleavened Bread begins on a Sunday and ends on the weekly Sabbath, it can create some confusion about when we start the count to Pentecost. And let me just start off and be clear that nothing has changed, and nothing is changing in how we count on our teaching on how we count to Pentecost. This is nothing new, but rather a reminder because of how the Holy Days fall this year can cause some to be unsure when the count towards Pentecost should begin. And so, during the Sermonette time today, I wanted to review with everyone how we count to the Feast of Pentecost when the first day of Unleavened Bread falls on a Sunday. So, let's start off by looking at the Holy Day instructions, recording Leviticus 23 and verse 4.
This, as we know, is where we see outlined in Scripture the Holy Days and where God instructed which days they were to be observed, and the different aspects that would be associated with each of these feast days. And here, beginning in verse 4, we see where God is given the instructions for the Days of Unleavened Bread. And it says, these are the feasts of the Lord, holy convocations, which you shall proclaim at their appointed times. On the fourteenth day of the first month at twilight is the Lord's Passover. And on the fifteenth day of the same month is the Feast of Unleavened Bread to the Lord. Seven days you must eat unleavened bread. On the first day you shall have a holy convocation. You shall do no customary work on it. But you shall offer an offering made to the Lord for seven days. The seventh day shall be a holy convocation. You shall do no customary work on it. And so, on our calendar this year, this year's Passover is on April 12th, which is a Saturday. So we will observe the Passover service the evening before, on Friday, April 11th, beginning right after sunset as we normally do, and as we see Jesus did with his disciples on the last Passover, he observed with them. So the Passover service falls on Friday evening. Saturday is the Sabbath, with that evening also being the night to be much observed. And then on Sunday, April 13th, we will celebrate the first day of Unleavened Bread. This honors the specific instructions we see outlined in Scripture on the correct days to observe on our calendar.
So now regarding Pentecost, the Feast of Pentecost is the only holy day not established on a specific day of the month by God. We saw where Passover is to be on the 14th. First day of Unleavened Bread is to be on the 15th. This is the only holy day where God instructs us to count forward from a specific occurrence to know where we observed Pentecost. Let's continue in Leviticus 23 in verse 10. God again instructs us, speak to the children of Israel and say to them, When you come into the land which I will give you and reap its harvest, then you shall bring a sheaf of the firstfruits of your harvest to the priest. He shall wave the sheaf before the Lord to be accepted on your behalf. On the day after the Sabbath, the priest shall wave it. And you shall offer on that day, when you wave the sheaf a male lamb of the first year without blemish as a burnt offering to the Lord. Its grain offering shall be two tenths of anifa, a fine flour mixed with oil, an offering made by fire to the Lord for a sweet aroma. And its drink offering shall be of wine, one-fourth of a hen. And notice verse 14 through 16. He says, You shall eat neither bread, nor parched grain, nor fresh grain, until the same day that you have brought an offering to your God. You shall be a statute forever throughout your generations and all your dwellings. And you shall count for yourselves from the day after the Sabbath, from the day that you brought the sheaf of the wave, offering seven Sabbaths shall be counted. And it says, Count fifty days to the day after the seventh Sabbath, and you shall offer a new grain offering to the Lord.
And so while this year's timing, the timing of this year's holy days, may seem a little bit strange with having Passover on a Friday evening and then the Sabbath, which is also the night to be much observed, and then going straight into the first day of Unleavened Bread on a Sunday. It's going to be a busy weekend, as you guys all know. But while it may seem strange as timing, this timing has occurred most recently in the past in 2021. Now I'll give everybody a break if you don't remember that year, because there's a lot of other crazy things that were going on that year as well. But it also occurred this way in 2008, 2005, and 2001. So right at the beginning of 2001, just to name a few years. But the next time that this occurrence will be in this manner will be for another 20 years after this Passover. So it won't fall in this way for another 20 years, which means I'll probably have to give this sermon at again in 20 years to remind everybody that this sometimes happens and how we count towards Pentecost when this occurs. So with how the days of Unleavened Bread falls, there are conceivable two ways to count to Pentecost. Either begin counting from the Sunday on the first day of Unleavened Bread, or the Sunday after the last day of Unleavened Bread. So with the Holy Days how they fall this year, the first day of Unleavened Bread will be on a Sunday, which means the seventh day, which is also a Holy Day. The last day of Unleavened Bread will be on the following Sabbath, counting seven days. So you can either start counting on the Sunday that occurs during Unleavened Bread on that first Holy Day, or you'd have to count on the Sunday that occurs immediately after the last day of Unleavened Bread.
We should begin by reviewing also a very basic principle regarding sacrifices as they relate to the Sabbath and to the Holy Days. We know from biblical and historical records that whenever Passover fell on the Sabbath, there was no provision against offering the required Passover sacrifices on that day. Under the Old Covenant, sacrifices were offered every Sabbath. There was also special sacrifices offered on each of the Holy Days. So considering these facts, there are no biblical or practical provisions against the waving of the wave sheaf on an annual Holy Day.
And also with this in mind, we have a scriptural example that helps shine a light on the proper way to count to the first day of Unleavened Bread falling on a Sunday. Turn with me to Joshua 5.
Joshua 5, and we'll start reading in verse 10. And kind of to catch you up on the context of what we see here in Scripture, Joshua and the Israelites have now approached the Promised Land. They were on the one side of the Jordan River, and then God gave instructions for them to cross over, and they did. And so we find them now in the Promised Land, a little bit outside, and they call it the Plains of Jericho, a little bit outside the city of Jericho. But they have entered into the Promised Land, and we find what occurs next, tying into this first day of Unleavened Bread and also the wave sheaf offering in Joshua 5 and verse 10. It says, Now the children of Israel camped in Gilgal and kept the Passover on the fourth,teenth day of the month at twilight on the plains of Jericho. So note that they observed Passover just as the instructions that we read in Leviticus instructed them to. And it's the same that we continue to observe today on the fourth,teenth. And verse 11, And they ate, and notice, and they ate of the produce of the land on the day after the Passover, on leavened bread and parched grain on that same on that very same day. And so this is the key to this understanding. They ate the produce of the land, which meant they harvested in the first fruits. They brought it in. They ate on that day. And they were not to do that until that wave sheaf offering was waved to God. And it says they did this after the Passover. So the fourteenth would have been Passover. The fifteenth would have been the first day of on leavened bread. And note, they ate on leavened bread, just as we do today, still in that time period and parched grain on the very same day. Then the manna ceased on the day after they had eaten the produce of the land. And the children of Israel no longer had manna, but they ate the food of the land of Canaan that year. Again, remembering back till Leviticus 23 verse 14, you shall eat neither bread nor parched grain nor fresh grain until the same day that you have brought an offering to your God shall be a statute forever throughout your generations and all your dwellings. That's what we read earlier. So no produce was to be eaten until after the wave sheaf. And the wave sheaf is offered on the morrow after the Sabbath, which would make it a Sunday, as it says in the New King James or in the King James Version. And so we can see that the Passover in Joshua chapter 5 was also on the weekly Sabbath, just as it's occurring this year again. So again, from the context of Joshua chapter 5, we can clearly see the Israelites were eating of the current harvest of the land on the day after Passover, which would have been the first day of Unleavened Bread. Accepting this understanding, we see that the wave sheaf and the first day of the count for Pentecost would have taken place on that same day, Sunday, the first day of Unleavened Bread. But then some might say, well, that's nice and all, but isn't that the Old Testament? Is there anything in the New Testament that would support this conclusion of it being on a Sunday? Actually, there is. Scripture shows that Jesus died on the cross or a stake on Wednesday just before sunset. They hurried to get him into the grave because the first day of Unleavened Bread was about to begin at sunset, which on that day in that year would have been on a Thursday. And so as we have considered the wave sheaf offering was harvested during the days of Unleavened Bread, in Old Testament times the priest would have taken a sheaf of the early barley harvest, cut it, and waved it before God for his acceptance.
And only then could the harvest season begin. And in like manner, Jesus Christ had to be harvested first by God the Father before the rest of mankind could be harvested, which symbolized the Feast of Pentecost. And as regarding Jesus's death and resurrection, you can put in your notes John 20 verse 17, where Jesus, after he was resurrected, said to her, Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to my Father, but go to my brethren and say to them, I am ascending to my Father and your Father and to my God and your God, symbolizing that offering that the high priest and the priest would have raised that wave sheaf and Jesus Christ sending to heaven, in that same example being the type of what not the anti-type, but the type. Jesus died just before the days of Unleavened Bread began, and after three days and three nights in the grave, which again was the sign of Jonah, he was resurrected right before when the priest would have offered the wave sheaf offering before God. Thus, we have clear example of the wave sheaf offering, ultimately symbolizing Jesus Christ, occurring during the days of Unleavened Bread, not after the conclusion of the feast, not after the last day of Unleavened Bread. So not only did do we have the example from Joshua when it should have when it did occur, we see that it fell also on a Sunday during the middle of the days of Unleavened Bread. And so God's acceptance of the wave sheaf offering in type, as we see outlined in the Old Testament, and in reality we see in the Gospel accounts, allows Israel's harvest to begin, and more importantly, depicted God's spiritual harvesting of all of mankind. Therefore, we see from Scripture the wave sheaf offering occurred during the days of Unleavened Bread on the Sunday during these days, and thus begins to count towards the Feast of Pentecost. So as we conclude, I wanted to just remind and share everyone how we do count to Pentecost when this unique situation occurs. It's not a new teaching of the church, but rather continues the teaching of the church in the last three decades. It was reconfirmed by a thorough study commissioned by the Council of Elders that resulted in the study paper entitled, Pentecost and its Observance. This paper was published in 1997, and is still available on our website. We know that the feasts of Passover and Unleavened Bread are intimately connected to the spring harvest, both physically and spiritually. Thus, the church teaches that we begin counting to Pentecost on the Sunday that falls during the days of Unleavened Bread, which this year also happens to be the first day of Unleavened Bread. So again, I just wanted to take a brief amount of time to review with you how we count to Pentecost when the first day of Unleavened Bread falls on a Sunday. And again, if you have any questions, as always, you know where I'm at. I'd be happy to answer this. But I wanted just to take a few minutes. I'm going to do this in each of the congregations. It's not a concern or a problem that we have, but I know several of us in the ministry have had this question asked of us, which why are we off? Is this which week? Should we really be observing this upcoming feast of Pentecost? And so I just thought it would be good, just since this is kind of a rare occasion, to review with you our teaching on it and where we pull from Scripture and the examples that we have.
