PT-3 "The Evidence of the Spirits Coming"

 

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 7/12/2017 7:27 AM

My Worship Time                                              Focus:  PT-3 The Evidence of the Spirits Coming

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                          Reference:  Acts 2:1-4

            Message of the verses:  “1 When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. 2 And suddenly there came from heaven a noise like a violent rushing wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3 And there appeared to them tongues as of fire distributing themselves, and they rested on each one of them. 4 And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit was giving them utterance.”

            We begin this section by looking at the difference between being filled with the Holy Spirit and the baptism of the Holy Spirit, for there is a difference.  MacArthur writes “The apostle Paul carefully defines the baptism with the Spirit as that act of Christ by which He places believers into His body (Rom. 6:4-6; 1 Cor. 12:13; Gal. 3:27).  In contrast to much errant teaching today, the New Testament nowhere commands believers to seek the baptism with the Spirit.  It is a sovereign, single, unrepeatable act on God’s part, and is no more an experience than are its companions justification and adoption.  Although some wrongly view the baptism with the Spirit as the initiation into the ranks of the spiritual elite, nothing could be further from the truth.  The purpose of the baptism with the Spirit is not to divide the body of Christ, but to unify it.  As Paul wrote to the Corinthians, through the baptism with the Spirit ‘we were all baptized into one body’ (1 Cor. 12:13; cf. Gal. 3:26-27; Eph. 4:4-6).”  If you are a true believer in Jesus Christ and someone asks you if you have been baptized with the Holy Spirit your answer should be yes it happened the moment I became a believer.

            Now as we move onto looking at the filling of the Spirit which is what we read in verse four, this is something that should be continuous.  Peter was filled initially on the Day of Pentecost, but we read that he was filled in Acts 4:8 “Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, "Rulers and elders of the people.”  We have mentioned that there is no such command in the Bible to be baptized with the Holy Spirit but there is a command to be filled with the Holy Spirit and when you look at the grammatical construction of that passage (Eph. 5:18) it indicates believers are to be continuously being filled with the Spirit.  MacArthur writes “Those who would be filled with the Spirit must first empty themselves.  That involves confession of sin and dying to selfishness and self-will.  To be filled with the Spirit is to be consciously practice the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ and to have a mind saturated with the Word of God.  Colossians 3:16-25 delineates the results of ‘letting the word of Christ richly dwell’ in us.  They are the same ones that result from the filling of the Spirit (Eph. 5:19-33).  As believers yield the moment by moment decisions of life to His control, they ‘walk by the Spirit’ (Gal. 5:16)…The baptism with the Spirit grants the power that the filling with the Spirit unleashes.”

            Now the next section we will be looking at is the section that speaks of “tongues” “And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit was giving them utterance.”  I do not want to get into this section now but will do it in our next SD as there is much to say about this as the speaking of tongues was a spiritual gift that was given to believers as the church began.  We call it a “sign gift.”  We will talk more about this in our next SD.

Answer to yesterday’s Bible question:  “The angel of the Lord” (Luke 1:13).

Today’s Bible question:  “Where did Job live?”

Answer in our next SD.

7/12/2017 7:52 AM