This We Believe: Baptism of the Holy Spirit

Thanks, Pastor T.

I don't know about you guys, but I'm fired up.

I thought I was gonna lose my mind in worship.

Like, that was powerful.

The Lord has been moving all morning.

Like what Taryn said wasn't an exaggeration.

Like, he is here, he's present.

My husband Anthony and I have had a chance to be a part of Zan since the very beginning.

And we have seen Sunday after Sunday the Lord show up in power and in love and mercy and encounter people.

So I just want you to know that he's close to you, that he's here, he's in this place.

So let's just level up our expectations this morning for what the Lord is gonna do.

Regardless of what you've come in with, regardless of what you're facing, like it is the belief of not just myself, but our whole church.

The Lord wants to work, he has things to say.

Um, and so you're exactly where you need to be.

You're in just the right place.

Um this morning we're continuing in our uh This We Believe series, where we've been unpacking just like core essential values and beliefs here at Zion.

And today we're focusing on the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

Um, yeah, come on, it's good, it's exciting, and the Lord's been pouring out his spirit this morning.

So, like I said, get your expectations up because he's gonna touch you and he's gonna mark you.

Um, he's here, he's ready, he's eager to do it.

Um, and in light of talking about the baptism of the Holy Spirit, I've titled my message this morning, um, You Will Receive Power.

And this is taken directly from the words of Jesus in Acts 1, that he speaks to his disciples before he ascends to heaven.

But he is in turn not just speaking these words over the people in the room, he's speaking it to every believer and follower that has come after them, which means he's speaking it to us too.

And he says, The baptism, the Holy Spirit, will come upon you and you will receive power.

And you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and all the way to the ends of the earth.

Power to be fully freed, power to be transformed, power to be um set free from addiction and pain and brokenness, the power to see the kingdom come in our lives and through the works that we're doing, the power to fulfill Jesus' mandate in Matthew 10, where he says that I've called you.

This is what I want you to do, and it is to heal the sick, to raise the dead and cast out demons in my name.

And that's a mandate that we cannot do unless we are empowered, activated, and have the Spirit of God poured out on us.

All throughout Scripture, the Old Testament through the New Testament, God has been baptizing people with his spirit.

It's not something that was just reserved for the early church or the early disciples.

Um, it the Lord baptized like prophets of old, Samuel and Deborah and Anna and Elijah.

And in both testaments, um, when the baptism of the Holy Spirit is talked about, it's described as the Spirit of God coming upon a person.

And we see this in two images.

The first comes from the New Testament, and it's the image of the dove.

So after Jesus has been baptized with water, he comes up out of the water and he's baptized then in the Holy Spirit, as signified by a dove coming and resting on his shoulders.

In the Old Testament, the image more frequently used was that of a mantle.

And a mantle was sort of just like a cloak that someone would wear, it would cover their shoulders.

Um, and in 1 Kings, we are we're introduced to a prophet named Elijah, who I mentioned earlier, and he is a man of great power, and he did fabulous and wonderful things for God.

And he decides to pick a successor, and he picks Elisha, and he demonstrates, he indicates that Elisha is going to be a successor, not just in his position, but in his anointing, by taking off his cloak, taking off his mantle, and throwing it over Elisha's shoulders.

Years later in 2 King, when it's time for that succession to actually take place, Elisha is taken up into heaven in a chariot of fire, and he leaves his mantle behind.

And Elisha picks it up, he smacks the Jordan River with it, the waters part, and he crosses on dry land, signifying that he had taken upon not just Elijah's responsibility as a prophet in Israel, but that that same baptism of the Holy Spirit that rested on Elijah's shoulders is now going to rest on Elisha.

And when the Spirit of the Lord comes upon a person, there's usually some sort of discernible evidence.

Pretty much always, there's like a physical manifestation of God having touched a person.

Oftentimes it's it's heat or it's just feeling like the heaviness of his glory.

Um people cry, they break out into spontaneous laughter.

Um, some people feel like they've been electrocuted and they're literally shaking under the power of God.

Um, sometimes people just spontaneously start speaking in tongues.

But when God's spirit comes upon person, like it's gonna do something to you.

But I think most importantly, what we want to see happen, the greatest to me indicator that someone's been baptized in the Holy Spirit is the fruit of their lives.

Are you living with more boldness?

Do you have more confidence?

Do you have more power?

Do you pray for the sick and see them get well?

Are you living in freedom?

Are you living in victory?

All those fruits of the Spirit listed in Scripture: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control, um, are they being amplified in your life?

Because this is what the Holy Spirit does.

The Holy Spirit comes upon a person and then amplifies what's happening inside of them.

It sometimes even deposits things that are entirely new, that you never had something before, but the Spirit of God hit you and now you're completely different.

And so to be baptized in the Spirit is not just to have God's presence take up residence inside of us, but to take up residence upon us.

To live in us and to live on us.

To live in us, to seal us for salvation, to be our comforter, to be to be the one that gives us wisdom and discernment, and to be on top of us so that we can operate with power and authority for the sake of other people and to see God's kingdom come.

And the good news is this is for everybody.

And I love um Pastor Terrence's been just sharing this word that she's had on her heart all morning, and it's that nobody misses out.

And this is true for the baptism of the Holy Spirit, and it's true for everybody in this room.

Nobody misses out.

In the Old Testament, um the Lord would baptize people in the Spirit, but it was often particular people in particular times and places for particular purposes.

And if you confessed Yahweh as Lord, if you were um part of the Israelites, like you were God's chosen people, you were his family.

But not everybody received this supernatural radical empowerment of his spirit resting upon them.

However, when we move into the New Testament, we see a change in covenant take place.

And in this covenant, as demonstrated by Pentecost in Acts 2, God is pouring out his spirit and he's fulfilling his promise to pour out his spirit on all flesh.

Everybody gets to play, everybody gets to participate.

Pentecost inaugurated a new era where perhaps the Spirit of God rested on particular people in the past, but now God is pouring out his spirit on everybody who says, Lord, I want it.

God, I accept you as Jesus Christ, and I want to be fully alive.

I want to be fully activated in your kingdom.

And the Lord says, Done.

He's pouring out his spirit.

Initially, the the early disciples were kind of resistant to like this new revelation simply because it was not the status quo.

It was just different from what had been.

I mean, they had they had grown up with this understanding that it was their people that were the chosen people of God.

Um and everybody else was outside of that circle.

And now God's saying, actually, I've expanded the circle, and everybody is welcome.

But the question they were asking themselves was, who is qualified?

Who is qualified to receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit?

And the Lord said, Everybody.

In Acts 10, Peter receives a vision from God, and God commissions him to go to the household of a Roman centurion named Cornelius and to preach the gospel to him and his family, which would have been um which would have been a big, it would have been a big deal, would have been a big assignment, um, because kind of the like dynamic in scripture was that um the Romans were the antithesis of the Jewish people and what the Jewish people were trying to accomplish as the holy people of God.

But remember, God's changing the status quo.

Doesn't matter what we were used to, he's doing something different.

So he sends Peter to go and witness um to this Roman household.

And as, hold on, let me just find it real quick.

And as Peter was speaking to them, the text says, while Peter was speaking these words, the Holy Spirit came upon all who heard the message of Jesus.

And the Jewish believers who had come with Peter were astonished that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on the Gentiles, for they heard them speaking in tongues and praising God.

This was a revelatory moment for the disciples.

It opened their eyes to the fact that God is not saying, I'm I'm for everybody.

I've always been for everybody, but now I'm instituting it and I'm demonstrating it by pouring out my spirit on anybody who says that they accept me as Lord.

And so it changed the way that the disciples ministered the gospel.

Now, when they would go on their missionary journeys, they wouldn't just bring people into an experience of salvation, they would release the baptism of the Holy Spirit upon them, believing that that was how God wanted to mark everybody.

As time passed, and as the church's direct connection to the ancient church, to the early church and the original disciples, as that connection grew more distant, the early church's emphasis on the baptism of the Holy Spirit began to fade in mainstream Christianity.

While water baptism continued to be a central part of a Christian's conversion experience, it's still central to this day.

We get water baptized all the time.

And then eventually the distinction between water baptism and baptism of the Holy Spirit was lost.

Like these practices were kind of like intertwined, and what became heavily focused was to be baptized in water, was to be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.

And there were pockets of time throughout history where there were still people who recognized the need and the importance of the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

You have the monastic movement, you have the Great Awakening in the 1700s and in the 1800s, but it wasn't until 1901 in Azusa Street in Los Angeles that the Lord split the heavens and poured his spirit out on people, and it sparked a movement that is continuing to this day of God's spirit being poured out for every people and every tribe and every tongue across the world.

Because it didn't matter that people gotten their theology a little wonky, God was going to fulfill his promise to pour out his spirit on anybody who is open to it and desiring of it.

And so we are living in an inheritance as the people of God where it's like the time for miracles, signs, and wonders that look like what we read in the Bible, like the time for that is now.

And it's coming and it's continuing.

Like this isn't just something of the past.

This is going to be the experience of our present and of the future.

And despite kind of the narrative throughout different denominations and different periods of time in church history, there is a distinction between water baptism and baptism of the Holy Spirit.

They are not the same thing, they're onto two different purposes, and neither practice is replaceable.

We need both of them.

Water baptism is unto repentance.

Okay?

And the baptism of the Holy Spirit is unto fire.

And in Matthew 3, John the Baptist, who prepared the way for Jesus, he's standing before his disciples for people that are like interested in hearing his message as he like proclaims Jesus in advance.

And he says, I baptize you with water for repentance.

But there is one who is coming after me, who's more powerful than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry, and he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.

Yeah, let's go.

Water baptism is the public proclamation declaring a person has received salvation and is going to spend eternity with God, has received eternal life.

But it is the baptism of the Holy Spirit that enables a believer to live fully and completely and wholly into everything that God has planned and prepared and equipped them to do.

It's an activation where we're not just saved, we're empowered.

And the witness of Scripture emphasizes not just the distinction between the two, but also the need for both of these practices.

In Acts 8, Philip goes on a missionary journey to Samaria and he witnesses to the people there.

I mean, they received Jesus.

And the the text says that he baptized them in the name of the Lord Jesus, which is synonymous for water baptism.

But then later in verse 14, the text says, When the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God, they sent Peter and John to Samaria.

And when they arrived, they prayed for the new believers there that they might receive the Holy Spirit, because the Holy Spirit had not yet come upon any of them.

They had simply been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.

Then Peter and John placed their hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit.

It was so important to the Christian life and Christian experience that Peter and John left and traveled to Samaria in order just to like release it.

Like everybody had already become a believer in Jesus, but they realized that they had not received the baptism of the Holy Spirit, and they're like, oh, this needs to be remedied.

And so they went and they tracked these people down and they released the baptism of the Holy Spirit because they knew that in order to be fully activated and fully alive, they needed to be empowered by, they needed to be covered by not just water, but the spirit.

And so we have to be covered with the anointing, with the oil in the presence of God.

We need to be saturated in it in order to experience and be everything that the Lord has.

And this isn't saying that there are like different levels or classes of Christians, like people who've been baptized with the Spirit and people who haven't.

Like, that's a false dichotomy.

Like we are all equal before God.

We're all his children.

We're dearly beloved.

We are accepted.

We have eternity with Christ.

We have salvation.

So if you haven't experienced the baptism of the Holy Spirit, yeah, like that's okay.

Like today's, we believe today's your day.

So like receive his spirit.

Like it's okay.

But the fullness of a person of a person's life with God is twofold.

It is the forgiveness of sins and it is empowerment.

It's eternity with God and it's salvation, and it is victory.

It's freedom.

It's power to reveal to people not just that you're saved, but that like that they can be saved too.

Baptism with water is a proclamation that a person has been saved, and baptism of the Holy Spirit is unto power.

A power that is not ultimately for us, so that we can feel good about ourselves or do impressive things.

It's gifted to us as the church so that we can proclaim but also demonstrate the kingdom of God.

So that we can talk about who Jesus is and what the kingdom's like, and then we can turn around and say, and here it is.

It's so that we can say that Jesus is the healer, and we can talk about it with our words, and then we can turn around and say, and I release healing over this person, and they receive healing, or freedom, or whatever it is.

It's it's a both ant.

And in this we look to Jesus, who was water baptized, then baptized in the Holy Spirit, and then proceeded to do his ministry, where he taught about the kingdom, and then he showed what the kingdom looked like.

And in doing that, he set himself up as an example of what we are supposed to do and what is possible.

Jesus was not just doing what he was doing as God.

Like for us just to be impressive, like, oh, look what God can do.

It's Jesus was functioning as a human being, saturated with the power of God, which means that we can do the same thing because we are also human beings who can be saturated with the power of God so that we can proclaim the gospel with boldness and then we can demonstrate it with power.

Jesus wants us to be like him in holiness and righteousness and peace and compassion.

But he also wants us to be like him in impact.

He wants us to do things, he wants us to be on mission, and he's promised to empower us for it.

He's promised to give us his spirit.

He doesn't just give us these calls and these commissions that feel massive and overwhelming and then step back in hopes that we figure out how to do it.

He infuses us with his grace.

Every time God asks us to do something, his grace is right there to fill us with everything that we need in order to do it and in order to be obedient.

So he is inviting us to receive an empowering experience like the disciples experienced in Acts.

These stories that we read about.

Peter raising the dead, Paul raising the dead, Paul being like bitten by some very poisonous snake, and he like shakes it off and then proceeds to keep eating dinner.

Like what?

Like these are not just supposed to be entertaining.

Like they are a blueprint for how we are supposed to be living and what is available to us.

Like the word promises us that God is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

And so if God is doing something yesterday, if his power is enough yesterday, then it's definitely still possible today, and it's definitely still possible tomorrow.

In these times, right, in this age, that often feels like very dark and confusing, and I feel like there's so much uncertainty, and we don't know what's gonna happen next.

And there's like like the scripture says, there's like war and threats and rumors of war, like it's heavy.

We cannot afford to be a church without power.

And there are communities of believers around the world who are in even more like currently dire circumstances, and they especially can't afford to be a church without power.

And yet, so often as a church, we turn to compromise or distraction because it's like, well, what can I actually do about it?

It feels paralyzing and it feels overwhelming, or we seek to fix things.

By exchanging like the potency of the Holy Spirit for political power and the sense of security and confidence that we can get through that.

And it's not saying that doing things for the kingdom in politics is like not important.

Of course, it's very important.

It's simply saying that like at the end of the day, the transformation of us as people, the transformation of the church, the transformation of the whole world is only going to come through Jesus Christ and a church that is on fire.

Like that's the solution to everything is Jesus Christ and a church that is on fire.

And we can't simply just sit back and trust that somebody else is going to take care of it.

Like if you are a member of the church, then your responsibility is to let yourself be set on fire.

Because there's a purpose for you, because you've been activated and called into mission into the work of the kingdom.

And this is the cry of Jesus.

And Luke 12, he says, I came to cast fire on the earth, and I wish it were already burning.

He wants us to be burning and burning and burning and burning and burning.

So how do we receive it?

How do we receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit?

In a practical sense, very often in scripture it comes with the laying on of hands, like an impartation where somebody has received an anointing from the Lord and releases it onto somebody else.

And the Holy Spirit can baptize people sovereignly whenever, wherever.

But there is something to be said about being in an environment that's saturated with his presence and where the expectation is that God is going to come.

It unlocks something, it reveals something, it provides additional access to experiencing the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

And we know that the presence of the Lord is everywhere and dwells within us, but there is still something significant about particular places, and the altar space is one of them.

But beyond that, in terms of our heart posture and what it looks like in here to receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit, first we have to hunger.

We have to be hungry.

Very rarely are we able to feast on or experience the fruit of the kingdom without determination and perseverance.

Because when we demonstrate determination, when we demonstrate perseverance, it's an act of faith.

And I'm going to overcome disappointment and frustration or my past history with certain things in order to get to you.

I'm going to overcome my discomfort and the fact that I don't, you know, I'm going to I don't really know what's going to happen when you encounter me, but like I trust you with it because I'm I'm so hungry.

I love what the psalmist says.

As a deer pants for water, so pants my heart for you, oh God.

Like, would that be our hearts this morning?

Like, God, I'm thirsty for you.

And you promised me living water.

I'm hungry for you.

And you promised me bread that would always satisfy me.

And perhaps you're listening to me speak it and you're thinking, um, I've already asked for the baptism of the Holy Spirit, and I didn't really feel like I received it, or it wasn't really what I was expecting or hoping for.

Ask again.

And if you've asked a lot of times, ask again.

And again, and again.

Because the other option is to stop asking.

And that's just that's never going to get us where we want to be with the Lord.

And in that, when the Lord touches you, don't delegitimize your experience with God because it might be different than somebody else's.

Just because God touched you one way and somebody else another way, doesn't mean that what you experienced wasn't very real and very powerful.

And the second thing, the second hard posture, is that we surrender.

Once again, a kingdom principle.

Surrender always comes before power.

Because life with God is designed to cost us something.

It's designed not to be easy.

And if you're new here and you're just kind of learning about Jesus for the first time, like don't let that scare you away.

Like it's really great, but it's not easy.

It's the best thing ever, and it's also incredibly difficult.

But it's so worth it.

It's so worth it.

I love how A.

W.

Tozer puts it.

He says, God is looking for yielded vessels before he's looking for powerful vessels.

He wants us to succumb to him as children and say, Lord, you can have this and you can have this and you can have this and you can have this.

I just give me more of you in exchange.

And the more we surrender, the more room that we make in our hearts to be filled with God's Spirit.

So if you're like, I want a lot of God's spirit, that's first a lot of surrender.

And then He comes and He fills you and He changes things, and you're like, why did I ever want those first things to begin with?

This is so much better.

It's so much better.

The gospel is not just about forgiveness from sins and a chance to have eternal life with God.

If it was, that'd be awesome.

That's amazing.

It's more than enough.

But it's more than that.

It's also freedom.

It's also intimacy with Him.

It's deep connection to Him.

We are freed into something.

We are saved into something, and that something is not just eternal life.

It's a mission for the kingdom of God to proclaim and to demonstrate.

This is the gospel.

What if we approached like the darkest situations in life, sickness, cancer, addiction, just the things that feel like really hopeless, financial loss, and we were unafraid and we were confident because we know that Jesus has given us the authority to wield his power, because we know that we are so covered and baptized and anointed with his spirit that if God is for us, then nothing can be against us.

And if God says that he's a healer, then we know that we can see that take place because we're filled with his spirit to release it.

Or if we know that God is the one who breaks chains, then we're not concerned when we find people who are chained up because we know who we are and we know what's possible for people, and we release that with power and with faith and with expectation.

And so the invitation today is to be marked by the Spirit of God, not just for yourself, but for other people.

Like this is not just about us, this is about everybody.

Everybody who's gonna know Jesus and experience freedom and healing because you became fully alive.

Like we have that's that perspective this morning.

So the invitation should be marked by his power and by his presence, whether it's for the first time or the 50th.

Like there's always a refilling.

The disciples were initially baptized in the spirit in Acts 2, and they were rebaptized in the spirit in Acts 4.

Like there's always more, so it doesn't matter if you've already encountered God.

Like, come jump in again.

Like the water's warm.

The water's warm.

Would you guys go ahead and stand?

We're gonna worship.

But like I said, the invitation today is to be marked by the Spirit of God.

And all morning I've been hearing the Lord say the Spirit and the bride say, Come.

So if you are hungry and you wanna be baptized in the Holy Spirit, come.

The altar is open.

There are people here that want to lay hands on you and impart it.

Can you be baptized by the Holy Spirit in your seat?

Of course you can.

But there's something about getting our bodies in alignment with what we want to experience and see from God.

It's one thing to say, I want it with our mouths, I want it with our hearts.

It's another thing to say, I want it with my body, and I'm gonna move my body and I'm gonna be a little bit uncomfortable in order to say, Lord, I surrender to you and I want a fresh feeling.

Yeah.

So the altar's open, and we invite you to come.

We invite you to come and experience this presence.

Yeah.

Holy Spirit, would you fall on this place right now?

Yeah, as people come for us, come to the altar, Jesus.

Would you rest on them?

People in their seats, God.

Would you rest on them?

Yeah, come, come, come.

Yeah, we thank you, Jesus, that you're here.

Overflow us, overflow us with your presence.

The spirit and the bridesday come.

Everybody gets to play.

Everybody gets to play.

The spirit and the bridesday come.

Jesus, would you baptize people?

Baptize people on the altar and the aisles and their seats.

Would you pour your spirit out of this place, God?

We asked for more Jesus.

We asked for more Jesus.

We don't just want to be satisfied with yesterday's bread.

We want more of you, Jesus.

We want a fresh revelation of who you are.

Would you fill these people here, God, with your spirit, with power, with both, with confidence?