WhitSunday, more commonly recognized as Pentecost Sunday, was celebrated as the second-most important Christian holiday from around medieval times all the way until 1972. Christmas was celebrated as the birthday of Jesus; Pentecost Sunday was celebrated as the birthday of the church. What has happened to all of the joy and festivity surrounding this second most joyful day of the year in the Christian life? Since WhitSunday was a moveable holiday, you didn’t know when it would come each year. By 1972, people had grown tired of the uncertainty and unpredictability of when their day of rest would come each year. So in 1972, after 600 years of celebration, WhitSunday was renamed the Spring Bank Holiday and placed on the last Monday of May. And to this day it has been largely forgotten. Ironically, no one forgets the birthday of Jesus. But no one remembers the birthday of the church. No one forgets the resurrection of Jesus. But no one remembers the resurrection of each and every follower of Jesus into new life that the Holy Spirit brings. As we are in a series on the ministry of the Holy Spirit, we come to Pentecost, the day the Holy Spirit was poured out in a new way on a small band of disciples, huddled upstairs in a home 50 days after Jesus rose from the grave. What happened on that first WhitSunday, the first Pentecost? Join us this morning in Acts 2.
