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Pentecost Season · Day of Pentecost · Year A

Acts 2:1-21 or Numbers 11:24-30

The Coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost

Pentecost, Jean II Restout
Pentecost, Jean II Restout, 1732Musée du Louvre, Paris
Restout paints the upper room as a vast architectural space with the flames small and the wind doing most of the work, the figures blown rather than posed.This is the day the church is given what it has been waiting for, and the painting keeps the room bigger than the people in it.Jean II RestoutA French painter (1692-1768) from a long dynasty of painters, who kept a serious religious practice going through a century that mostly wanted something lighter.Musée du Louvre, ParisA royal palace turned public museum by the Revolution in 1793, on the principle that what the king had owned now belonged to everyone.Musée du Louvre, Paris

Overview & Insights

"All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them ability." (Acts 2:4)

On the day of Pentecost the Holy Spirit descends on the gathered disciples with wind and fire, and they proclaim God's works in many languages. Peter interprets the event by Joel's prophecy that God will pour out the Spirit on all people.

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Take it further: Acts 2:1-21 or Numbers 11:24-30

Commentary

Background & Word Study

The Church Fathers

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