Brent Thompson
02/15/18
The phrase “baptism of the Holy Spirit” has caused some confusion for many believers, especially depending on who is defining it. The involvement of the Holy Spirit is evident throughout the corpus of Scripture. God’s Spirit hovered over the waters of the deep at creation (Gen 1:2). The Holy Spirit descended and lit like a dove on Jesus following his water baptism in the Jordan river (Matt 3:16; Mark 1:10; Luke 3:22). Christ promised He would send the Holy Spirit, whom He called the Helper or Advocate, once he was no longer in the world (John 14:26). That promise was fulfilled on the day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit was poured out onto the apostles (Acts 1:1-8). This last scene is where confusion surfaces and questions abound such as: What is baptism of the Holy Spirit? Is Spirit baptism an internal, one-time event that occurs at the moment of salvation, or is it a post-conversion experience that is manifest through ecstatic expressions of tongues, signs, and special revelation? Is a person truly saved if there has not been an experience of the above listed manifestations?
In order to unpack these questions and work toward a biblical understanding of Spirit baptism there must first be an understanding of the work of the Holy Spirit in the early church as detailed in the book of Acts. Jesus told the disciples that they would receive power from the Holy Spirit to take the gospel from “Jerusalem to Judea, to Samaria to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8). Interestingly, the progression of post-conversion baptisms of the Holy Spirit in the book of Acts, took place exactly in this geographical sequence (Acts 2; 8:14-17; 19:1-7).
One of the main purposes of these post-conversion Spirit baptisms was to provide evidence to the church in the first century that Jesus’ words were true and that the gospel was to go forth to all nations. Additionally, that all people, Jew or Gentile, would be part of the body of Christ (Rom 10:12). There is no indication in Scripture that a post-conversion spirit baptism was meant to be the normal Christian experience for all time. The apostles and disciples who experienced post-conversion spirit baptism were given unique gifts through the enabling of the Holy Spirit for their special assignments. Christ told them they would “receive power when the Holy Spirit came upon them” (Acts 1:8). The Greek word for “power” is the word dunamis which is where the English word “dynamite” is derived. The apostles would need to be filled with the dynamic power of the Holy Spirit to fulfill their mission.
What is true for the apostles and disciples is true for believers today. All believers since the church began are commanded to be filled with the Spirit and to walk in the Spirit (Eph 5:18; Gal 5:25). Yet the fact remains, which certain denominations capitalize on, that these early apostles and believers were told to wait (and they did wait—ten days). Why? To indicate the transitional period between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant, between the prophetic age and the church age.
Today, baptism by Christ through the Holy Spirit takes place for all believers at conversion. At that moment, every believer is placed into the body of Christ (1 Cor 12:13). At that point the Spirit takes up His permanent residence in that believer’s soul. No group or sect of believers exist that have not been filled with the Holy Spirit (Rom 8:9; cf. 1 Cor 6:19-20). The baptism of the Holy Spirit is not a special privilege that is designated for some believers. Nowhere in Scripture are believers given responsibility to prepare for it through prayer, pleading, or any other means. It comes, like salvation itself, through grace, not human effort (Eph 2:8-9). Paul writes in his letter to Titus that God “saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior” (Titus 3:5-6). God sovereignly pours out the Holy Spirit on those He saves. It is a one-time event that occurs at the moment of conversion. The greatest danger of assuming a second blessing of the Holy Spirit is the creation of two classes of Christians—the Spirit-haves and the Spirit-have-nots—which divides the church. The inevitable results are feelings of superiority or inferiority, (depending on which group one falls into), judgement, jealousy, animosity, and pride which is the exact opposite to how we are to regard ourselves and others (Phil 2:5-11). If we are in Christ, we have His Spirit, and we do not need a special experience by which He is conveyed to people nor to validate our faith.
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