You may come across people who have had erroneous teaching concerning the baptism of the Holy Spirit. You must first show them the scriptural meaning of the term.
It is first mentioned by John the Baptist:
I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance. But he that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire. (Matthew 3:11)
This statement is also recorded in Mark 1:8, Luke 3:16, and John 1:26–27.
After His resurrection, Christ refers to this promise made by John, commanding His apostles “that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which, saith he, ye have heard of me. For John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence” (Acts 1:4–5).
Then the term “baptize” is also used by Peter in Acts 11:16 when he is speaking of the fact that the Holy Spirit came upon the gentiles in exactly the same manner that He did upon the Jews on the day of Pentecost.
The word “baptize” is an untranslated Greek word meaning to immerse.
Paul speaks of the baptism of the Holy Spirit in 1 Corinthians 12:13.
Let us examine these Scriptures in order to learn the scriptural meaning of the term.
When John the Baptist said, “He shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit,” he was referring to being immersed in God, spirit, soul and body. John is comparing his ministry to that of Christ’s.
The baptism that he himself brings is physical. It does not touch the spirit, the real man. It is a type of the work that Jesus is to do within the spirit of man.
John is saying, “I baptize the physical body with water, but He shall immerse the spirit with the Holy Spirit and out of that immersion shall come the Power, to live the New Creation life.”
It was for this infilling of the Spirit that Christ was to bring that the disciples were told to tarry in Jerusalem. The Holy Spirit could not come to interpenetrate man until Christ had been glorified, or until redemption had been completed.
It is largely due to the fact that the church has not understood that the disciples were not filled with the Spirit until the day of Pentecost that has led to the erroneous teaching concerning the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
Let us now examine 1 Corinthians 12:13 to see what refers to the new birth. “For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body.” When does a man become a member of the body of Christ? When he is born again. The baptism into the body of Christ is the birth into that body.
For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. (Galatians 3:27)
This refers to the new birth, for we are told in Romans 8:9, “If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.”
Let us see what actually took place on the day of Pentecost. The disciples were gathered in the upper room in which they were sitting. They were filled with the Holy Spirit, they were immersed with the Holy Spirit.
The baptism in the Holy Spirit is reversed in a certain sense from baptism in water. In water baptism, there is a plunging down into the water. In the Spirit baptism, there is a coming down upon of the Holy Spirit. However, the result is the same: immersion.
The disciples were immersed in the Holy Spirit, and out of that immersion, they were interpenetrated by God.
There is a vast difference between being baptized, immersed in the Holy Spirit, and being filled with the Holy Spirit. When we were baptized with the Holy Spirit, we were filled with the Holy Spirit but then we were commanded in Ephesians to be continually filled with the Spirit which requires action on our part.
The disciples could not be filled or indwelt by the Holy Spirit until they had been born again.
HOW DOES ONE RECEIVE THE HOLY SPIRIT?
The Holy Spirit is received by faith. This is taught very definitely in Galatians:
This only would I learn of you, Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? (Galatians 3:2)
That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith. (Galatians 3:14)
What is faith? Faith is an impartation to our spirit, through revelation. It comes through hearing the Word of God.
Acting upon the Word of God is taking the Word of God as sufficient evidence above all other evidence.
The Word declares that the heavenly Father will give the Holy Spirit to His children who ask Him. If we ask in faith that is acting upon His Word, we shall receive the Holy Spirit.
We ask the Holy Spirit to come into our lives to fill us, then we act upon the Word that says that we shall receive Him when we ask, thanking Him for coming into our lives; and God must make that Word good. (See Luke 11:13.)
Nowhere are we taught that we should look upon tongues as the evidence of the fact that we are filled with the Holy Spirit. Tongues is the initial evidence of being baptized with the Spirit, but the evidence of being filled with the Spirit is fullness. The Spirit is filling our thoughts, our feelings, our attitudes and empowering our actions.
The book of Acts is not doctrinal. It is historical. It relates that upon several occasions during a period of thirty-five years, certain ones spoke in tongues when they were filled with the Holy Spirit: Acts 2:4, the day of Pentecost; Acts 10:46, the day the gentiles received Christ; and in Acts 19:6, at Ephesus.
Speaking in tongues is only mentioned in several other places in Scripture.
In 1 Corinthians 14, Paul writes to the Corinthians to reprove them for their abuse of tongues.
1 Corinthians 12:30 shows clearly that all do not speak in tongues as a gift of the spirit for the church assembled.
1 Corinthians 14:22 shows that tongues are not a sign for the believer, but for the unbeliever, in a church service when a member is led by the Spirit to speak in tongues, in the unbeliever’s cultural language as a sign.
Not only does Scripture fail to teach that tongues is the evidence of the filling of the Holy Spirit, but to make tongues the evidence of the Holy Spirit’s filling would be contrary to God’s dealing with the new creation.
The speaking in tongues in a church service is a physical manifestation and evidence to the physical senses of man.
God is a faith God and everything we receive from Him we receive on the grounds of faith.
So, in dealing with a person who desires to be filled with the Holy Spirit, show him that he shall receive the Holy Spirit when he acts upon Matthew 7:11 as he acted upon the Word for salvation.
A man is born again when he says, “I have eternal life because I have met the conditions of the Word and the Word declares it.”
A man is healed when he says, “I am healed because the Word declares, ‘By His stripes, I am healed.’”
Prayer is answered when we thank Him for the answer because the Word declares that what we ask, we shall receive.
So also, the Holy Spirit comes upon our lives when we say, “I have the Holy Spirit because the Father has promised to give the Holy Spirit to them who ask Him.”
QUESTION
- What is the difference between the baptism of the Spirit and the filling of the Spirit?