The Baptism In The Holy Spirit

THE BAPTISM IN THE HOLY SPIRIT

THIS MORNING I WANT TO TALK WITH YOU ABOUT GOD’S EMPOWERING PRESENCE Some of the thoughts I will Share were inspired by Dr. George Wood

AS a Pentecostal… I believe that the Holy Spirit Empowers US

1. deepening our worship to the lord by giving us a language of praise which we have not learned

2. Power in our Christian Witness –

Personally – As A Pentecostal Christian I did not have that knowledge in my Brain before I had that experience in my SOUL

What I’m telling you is that The Baptism in the HS is a crisis event

Like Salvation the Baptism does not comes by osmoses or by degrees.

It comes as an event.

It comes as an experience.

And I had this experience nearly simultaneously to my conversion

And I had no Idea what was going on doctrinally

As I have studied I have discovered that we as Pentecostals are sometimes judged for our experiences

We are accused of having an experience and then running to the Bible to validate our experience.

They are suggesting that "if we were a biblical person we would get the scripture first and then have the experience"

But we are actually in good company.

Peter did exactly that same thing in Acts 10

Peter was on his house top praying when he had an experience – a vision of a sheet being lowered with unclean animals. – he was told to take and eat. Peter so no lord I can’t eat they are unclean..

The experience was so overwhelming that he agreed – and the Spirit used that as a bridge to send Peter to Cornelius’s house.

Whats amazing about that experience is that Jesus had explicitly tought that it is not the things that go in a man that make him unclean, but what comes out of Him.

- Mark 7:19

For it doesn’t go into his heart but into his stomach, and then out of his body." (In saying this, Jesus declared all foods "clean.")

Jesus had established the doctrine, but PETER had not yet had the experience

It was not till he had an experience that he was able to go back and find that it was backed up by the Word

It’s ok to have an experience that you don’t understand

As long as it is ultimately backed up by God’s word

If it is not backed up by God’s word we need to be willing to re-define our experience or reject our experience

For example

I absolutely have no time for the propagate a doctrine that would suggest a Christian can be possessed by an evil Spirit

There is not a SHRED of scriptural evidence for the experience.

My heart cannot go where the scripture don’t go

because God’s Spirit and God’s word always agree

In spite of someone experience I have to redefine their experience before I will redefine the scripture.

BUT WHEN THERE IS EVIDENCE WE NEED TO TAKE THAT AND DEAL WITH IT SERIOUSLY

As in the case of the Baptism in the Holy Spirit.

There are many who have had the experience and there is solid foundational doctrine to base the experience on…

This morning I want to look at 4 biblical terms that describe the Pentecostal Experience.

They are synonymous…

1. THE BAPTISM IN THE SPIRIT

Acts 1:5

For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit."

Acts 11:16

Then I remembered what the Lord had said: ’John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’

With, in , by means of….

Both these statements by Jesus take place sequentially after

John 20:22

And with that he breathed on them and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit.

When they received the Holy Spirit they received NEW LIFE

So, Jesus is telling the disciples who have already received the Spirit that they would be Baptized in the Spirit

So, there is a distinction between the presence of the Spirit in our lives in Regeneration and the Presence of the spirit in our lives for empowerment.

There is often a confusion between what Jesus says in the book of acts and what Paul says in 1 Cor. 12:13

1 Cor. 12:13

For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body--whether Jews or Greeks, slave or free--and we were all given the one Spirit to drink.

Many will take this verse and say this is the Baptism in the Spirit

That the Baptism in the Spirit is the same as regeneration

That there is no other blessing

No other empowerment

No other work necessary

The problem with that view is that it ignores John 20:22 and Acts 1:5

Which teaches the following pattern for our spiritual WALK