Yahweh Is Our God; Yahweh Is One [Thanksgiving]

This passage deals with the meaning of two of Israel's feasts, the Feast of Firstfruits and the Feast of Weeks (Pentecost). Behind the command to count the days, eagerly waiting forty-nine days from Firstfruits, when the barley is harvested, to the Feast of Weeks, when the wheat is harvested, lies the fact that the success or failure of the crops depended on the northwest and southeast winds, which God governs. The people of Israel had to depend on God alone for the weather and for the whole process of the harvest, and to offer thanks and prayers with earnest hearts.

But the people forgot God's grace, trying to set up a human king more powerful than God. The event in which God sent thunder and rain at Pentecost, when the wheat should have been harvested, to punish their pride is a warning that makes them realize they cannot live without God. We must guard against the foolishness of forgetting God and following the world's standards precisely when we enjoy abundant harvests and peace, and remember that everything is under God's sovereignty.

Do we acknowledge that everything we now enjoy is not chance but God's grace? Rather than living a life of bringing offerings freely with thankful hearts, are we not taking it all for granted and trying to leave God?