Pentecost
commonly called Whitsunday
O GOD, who as at this time didst teach the hearts of thy faithful people, by sending to them the light of thy Holy Spirit; Grant us by the same Spirit to have a right judgment in all things, and evermore to rejoice in his holy comfort; through the merits of Christ Jesus our Saviour, who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the same Spirit, one God, world without end. Amen.
This Collect was said on Pentecost Sunday in the Confederate Camps
After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people. [Jeremiah xxxi]
And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions: And also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days will I pour out my spirit [Joel ii]
JESUS said unto his disciples, If ye love me, keep my commandments. And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you [John xiv]
These scriptures were read each Pentecost Sunday in the Camps
May the Spirit of God be with you.
Today the Church marks the coming of the Holy Ghost to the people whom God called out as his own. It is called the
Feast of Pentecost, as it was known in Greek, to the Jews and Early Christians. Pentecost means fifty; for it came
on the 50th day after the Passover. It, like the Passover, was one of the three main feasts of the Jewish people,
when all males were to present themselves at the Temple of the Lord with an offering. There were probably hundreds
of thousands of faithful pilgrims in Jerusalem that Pentecost Morning when the Holy Ghost descended upon the
Apostles and women with them in the upper room with a roaring wind and tongues of fire. Then, with the apostles
charged with the Spirit of God, and preaching the Gospel, upon the 3,000 whom the Spirit touched in a special way so
that they might hear the Gospel, as spoken in strange tongues by the Apostles, and believe, and love Jesus, and
follow him.
Pentecost was originally tied to the first grain harvest, but by the time our Lord walked with us, it had taken the
additional and perhaps primary meaning of remembering the giving of the Law to Moses. You see, it was reckoned to be
50 days from the deliverance of Israel out of bondage, beginning with the first Passover, until God came down on the
Mountain at Sinai to write his law in stone for the people. So in the time of the Apostles, in the time of our Lord,
the hearing and reciting of the commandments was very much a part of their devotion on this specific day.
What did our Lord say to his Apostles before his ascension concerning the Day of Pentecost? If ye love me, keep
my commandments. And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for
ever. We believe Jesus kept that promise on the Day of Pentecost. We believe that he has written his law on the
hearts of his chosen and given them his Spirit to abide with them. We believe he moves the people of the world
according to his sovereign purpose to hear and act on his word through the power of the Sprit. We remember stories
of the Great Awakening in the early 1800s, when many were brought to know Christ. We remember especially the great
revivals that occurred in the Camps of the armies during the War Between the States, and we look for God to move yet
today, according to his good purpose, in our midst, to awaken men to faith and salvation. In all cases the Spirit
proceeds such awakenings as occurred at Pentecost. He brings common men to accept Christ as Lord. He strengthens and
encourages them. He speaks as their Advocate. He prays for them in groanings that are known only to God for that
which he knows is best for his chosen. He guides and protects the elect. He disciplines the church, and brings
sinners to repentance. God, and God alone does all of this through Grace alone. Glory be to God!
In thanksgiving, let us committ ourselves to follow his commands, and close with the Ten Commandments and with the
Summary of the Law:
Thou shalt have none other gods but me.
Thou shalt not make to thyself any graven image, nor the likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down to them nor worship them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God and visit the sins of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; and show mercy unto thousands in them that love me and keep my commandments.
Thou shalt not take the Name of the Lord thy God in vain: for the Lord will not hold him guiltless, that taketh his Name in vain.
Remember that thou keep holy the Sabbath day Six days shalt thou labour, and do all that thou hast to do; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God. In it thou shalt do no manner of work; thou, and thy son, and thy daughter, thy man-servant, and thy maid-servant, thy cattle, and the stranger that is within thy gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven, and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the seventh day, and hallowed it.
Honour thy father and thy mother; that thy days may be long in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.
Thou shalt do no murder
Thou shalt not commit adultery
Thou shalt not steal
Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour
Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his servant, nor his maid, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is his.
and in Summary:
Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one
Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy
strength; and thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.
Preached at Saint John Baptist Anglican Church
The Reverend
Mark Carroll,
Colonel
Ben Caudill Camp -
Pentecost Sunday - the Year of Our Lord 2007