Baptism in the Spirit
Just before Jesus started his public ministry, His cousin John was preaching a message of repentance and baptising people in the river Jordan. He’s frustrated because although people are getting right with God and sorting out their past, they aren’t bearing fruit – there’s no evidence of life change.
John tells the people someone is coming who will baptise them in the Holy Spirit and with fire. Up to that point the main way the Holy Spirit is described is as the Spirit. Only 3 times in the Old Testament is He described as the Holy Spirit. Old Testament believers saw the Spirit as the power of God to get a particular job done – and actually only 150 people had been filled with that power. Now someone is coming, Jesus, who will baptise or drench everyone with the power of God who is holy! That’s baptism in the Holy Spirit.
- He gives us power to be holy
- He gives us power to be witnesses wherever we are (Acts 1:8)
- He gives us different gifts – supernatural power to do what Jesus is calling us to do
- He gives a prayer language that is like a hotline to God, for when we run out of words to say – we call that the gift of tongues.
When you meet up with your discipler, get them to explain more and to pray for you to be baptised in the Spirit.
Matthew 7:7-8 tells us to ask, seek and knock. Why not pray that Scripture turning it into your own words…
“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.”
Recommended extra reading
Receiving the Holy Spirit and His Gifts (Terry Virgo)
