Thanks for joining us tonight as we continue to discuss the subject of living life under the New Covenant. There are many things about the New Covenant that we take for granted even though they're a big deal to God. They're a big deal because BEFORE Jesus came to earth in a physical body and lived among us for thirty-three years, mankind was estranged from God and had NO idea of how to come back into fellowship with Him. Indeed, the Bible says that before Jesus, we were the ENEMIES of God because of sin (Romans 5:9). But God LOVED us anyway and implemented a way for us to come back into fellowship with Him simply by FAITH. As a part of that, a new COVENANT was implemented between the Father and Jesus so that it could NEVER be broken and with a new way of living, a momentous change that we have been slow to adapt to.
And so, the purpose of this series has been to focus on what to do to accelerate our adaptation into the fullness of the New Covenant lifestyle. It's fine that believers can be saved simply by believing and that through believing we can have eternal life with Jesus. But so many of us are simply waiting passively for this life to be over so we can get to eternity. I will like eternity with Christ as much as anybody but in the meantime while we're here in this life, it's not God's intention that so many believers live in defeat and despair and fear and insufficiency and sickness and doubt and tribulation and hardship. Those things are NOT necessary ways of life. Why then do so many Christians settle for so little POWER and AUTHORITY and VICTORY when according to the Bible, God ALWAYS leads us to triumph in Christ (2 Corinthians 2:14)? Are we going to BELIEVE Scripture or give in to our circumstances as an unchangeable presence in our lives that God refuses to deal with until we've begged Him enough times to finally deserve His favor?
One of the reasons the Body of Christ lacks power and effectiveness and relevancy is that we've failed to pay enough attention to the person and the role of the Holy Spirit. That's why we've been discussing Him for the past six weeks. This is a really important part of New Testament life because unlike the Old Covenant, He now lives INSIDE every true believer (1 Corinthians 3:16) and is SPEAKING 24/7 directly to the part of us that's SPIRIT as He leads us to VICTORY in Christ. Some of us take longer than others because we don't hear as well as they do, but the Holy Spirit is patient and He never gives up on us. What we haven't fully realized about Him though is that He makes available to us a lot of POWER that's unique to the New Covenant and is readily available.
Examining the Scriptures
Now once again I'm about to lead our discussion into one of those areas where believers are heavily "invested" into their beliefs to such an extent that they refuse to consider other points of view even if they're grounded in the Scripture. It IS possible for intelligent, studious Christians to examine the same Scripture and come to entirely different points of view. Yes, there's only one version of the Truth but nobody including you and me knows all of what it is yet (1 Corinthians 13:9) and we need to RESPECT differing points of view. Our job is to study Scripture and try our best to strip away manmade tradition and religion from what we believe so we can come to the truth as closely as possible. And in that spirit I have done my best in this particular article to just present the Word objectively to encourage us all to continue seeking the Truth even when we think we already know everything about a subject.
To start with, Jesus appeared to His disciples after the Resurrection and told them to wait in Jerusalem until they were baptized WITH the Holy Spirit because they needed to receive additional POWER (Acts 1:5-8). They had already been born again when as believers they RECEIVED the Holy Spirit (John 20:22) but they still needed to be baptized WITH the Holy Spirit to receive POWER. And as we discussed last week, the power arrived on the Day of Pentecost fifty days after the Passover (and the Last Supper) when the Holy Spirit was poured out on ALL mankind thus fulfilling an 850 year old prophecy made by the prophet Joel (Joel 2:28 confirmed by Acts 2:17-21).
One of the unique New Covenant things that happened that day was that the Apostles began to speak with other tongues as the Holy Spirit gave them gave them the utterance (enabled) (Acts 2:4) and that speaking was heard by the crowd of people who had gathered there from every nation under heaven in their own individual languages (Acts 2:5-6). Speaking in other tongues is a unique New Covenant manifestation of the Holy Spirit that was connected to the POWER that Jesus had instructed the Apostles to wait for. Soon after receiving that POWER, the man who had denied Jesus three times just 50 days before preached a sermon that resulted in the salvation of three thousand souls from among those who had just witnessed the great pouring out of the Holy Spirit.
As we proceed through the Book of Acts there are some particular highlights to point out. For one thing you'll note that the Bible usually uses the words WITH or IN instead of the word OF when it's talking about Baptism WITH the Holy Spirit. Jesus used WITH when He spoke to the Apostles in Acts 1:5-8. But most of the time we say today "Baptism OF the Holy Spirit" which needs to be clarified. After the Pentecost pouring out, it wasn't the Holy Spirit performing the baptizing, it was the Apostles laying hands on new converts (Acts 8:17 for example) who did the baptizing. Think about it as a comparison to water baptism: it isn't the water that performs the baptism, it is people facilitating the immersion of a believer into the water. In the same way believers in the Book of Acts facilitated the immersing (or enveloping) of new converts into the Holy Spirit by the laying on of hands.
Another thing to point out is that there are a number of scriptures that talk about being FILLED with the Holy Spirit. One school of thought in the Body of Christ says that when someone is born again they are simultaneously FILLED with the Holy Spirit. But there's another School that thinks that baptism in the Holy Spirit is a separate event from being born again and from water baptism as well. They would also say that when they were baptized in the Holy Spirit they were FILLED on a one-occasion basis with the Holy Spirit. A third group would also say that after Baptism in the Holy Spirit as a separate one-time event, a person can be FILLED with the Holy Spirit on many occasions in the context of supernatural empowerment.
And there are other variations of interpretation so you can appreciate why there is so much contention within the Church about this subject. But what does the Bible and in particular the Book of Acts actually say about all these things? Here's a summary of key points:
1. There is an event called the Baptism with the Holy Spirit and it is empowers believers.
2. The Baptisms with the Holy Spirit were usually described as separate events that followed both being born again and baptism in water.
3. The Baptisms with the Holy Spirit following the OUTPOURING were conferred by the laying on of the hands of informed believing clergy.
4. There are many examples when believers who'd ALREADY been baptized with the Holy Spirit were described on subsequent occasions as being newly "filled with" or "full of" the Holy Spirit on special occasions when the Holy Spirit was more fully manifesting power than on other occasions. There was an original Baptism followed by subsequent distinctive occasions of being filled.
5. The Bible DOES say that when people were baptized with the Holy Spirit they were being FILLED with the Holy Spirit but it does NOT say that when they were born again they were simultaneously FILLED with the Holy Spirit. It DOES say that when we're born again, the Holy Spirit comes immediately to reside within the new believer. So according to Scripture there is a difference between residing and in-filling.
6. The Bible DOES say that the OUTPOURING was/is available to ALL believers during the last days and not to just the Apostles. Logically we're all still involved in the LAST days because Jesus hasn't come back yet.
7. The Bible also says that the POWER of the Holy Spirit was released as a part of the OUTPOURING, that the POWER is particularly characterized by prophecy, dreams, visions and signs on the earth and that the POWER is for believers.
8. The Bible does NOT say that the procedure for Baptism with the Holy Spirit by the laying on of hands was temporary or that it should be changed or discontinued.
9. The Bible does NOT say that the need for EMPOWERMENT additional to the act of becoming born again would come to an end.
10. The Bible does NOT say that we have to be baptized with the Holy Spirit in order to be saved.
11. The Bible does not say that when a written New Testament becomes available, the ministry of the Holy Spirit would cease or the need to be baptized in the Holy Spirit would no longer exist.
12. The Bible does NOT say that people who're born again have to speak in diverse tongues or that they're not saved unless they speak in tongues or that they have to speak in tongues in order to be saved. Speaking in tongues is a voluntary action to connect to an additional POWER source that's available only under the New Covenant.
Conclusions
It seems to me that there's more to learn about this subject than any natural person will ever be able to master and call "Truth-for-Everybody." So why can't we stop fighting about it and embrace the parts we understand and let everybody else embrace what they can understand. Nevertheless, if you're INVESTED in a belief structure that's significantly in conflict with any of the above realities of actual scripture, then I would recommend going back to the Word to review why you believe something that's different from what the Word actually says or doesn't say about this subject.
Over the centuries the Church has been guilty of inventing additions to the Word, twisting interpretations of the Word and relying on out-of-context verses to make them be consistent with an overriding theology. Please get this: NO INDIVIDUAL OR CHURCH GROUP TEACHES A THEOLOGY THAT EMBRACES ALL THE TRUTH. That's because none of us are smart enough to figure out what all truth is. If you don't agree with me on something, I am open to hear your point of view and evaluate it in the light of Scripture to find out if there's something from your point of view that I should consider. And I'm pretty sure that's the attitude God wants all of us to have.
In this article I've not shared my points of view on this subject, and I do have some. I am only telling you what Scripture actually says and then challenging you to match your belief structure to what the Word says. You want to do that because the source of power in the life of the New Testament believer isn't just the written Word. No, the written Word is a part, a vital part to be sure, of the total package of special POWER that has been made available to the New Testament believer. That package of POWER though also includes the Holy Spirit and we're only just discovering the extent of His POWER that's been made available. Come back next week and we'll take a look at speaking in diverse tongues in the current day Church, which should be another fun article.
Thanks for joining our discussion tonight. We'll be looking for you again NEXT Sunday night on March 6. In the meantime may the Lord bless you with every spiritual blessing (Ephesians 1:3), pushing you to VICTORY in every area of life!
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Sinners' Prayer
If you've never invited Jesus to be your Lord, you can do so today by believing and saying out loud the following simple prayer:
Jesus, I declare today with all my heart that I believe in you and I believe that God raised you from the dead. I acknowledge that my sins have been forgiven for all time and I ask you to come into my life today and be my Lord and Savior. Thank you for salvation and eternal life.
If you were sincere as you prayed, God has already come into your life and you're a new creation, a totally new species recreated in His image. Now ask the Lord to lead you to a good faith-based, bible-teaching church where you can be equipped to fulfill your potential in the Kingdom of God.
When you get a moment have someone help you look up the following scriptures because they confirm what you've done by saying this prayer and believing what you said:
Romans 10:9
2 Corinthians 5:17
Ephesians 2:8
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