Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
What is the baptism of the Holy Spirit?
Do you know?
Have you been baptized with the Holy Spirit?
Can you be baptized with the Holy Spirit today?
Welcome to the Final Word where we study God's Word
to find the final answer
to some of the religious world's most difficult questions.
We have been studying for the past few weeks,
things concerning the Holy Spirit of God.
We've talked about the Personality of the Holy Spirit,
and last time Gary Colley led our lesson as he taught us
the Spirit's role in the Inspiration of the Word of God,
the Holy Bible.
Today we have a wonderful treat for you.
BJ Clarke has agreed to teach a very difficult Bible subject.
His topic is the Baptism of the Holy Spirit.
Now, I don't have to tell you, that the religious world
seems to be completely confused on this specific subject.
I am glad today that BJ Clarke is here to guide us
through this lesson.
Please give your attention to him as he teaches us about
the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
I want to take you on a journey today with me,
and I want to begin with three individuals
- all of them beginning their names with the letter "J."
And they saw something coming, and told that it was coming,
and as we see it coming to view through their words,
I believe it will help us to appreciate it more
when it gets here in our study of the scriptures.
We start with Joel, and I would like to invite your attention
to Joel 2, because the prophet Joel saw this
hundreds of years in advance-the inspiration of the Holy Spirit
which was spoken of so eloquently last hour -
was given to Joel, and Joel was able to write down exactly
what God wanted him to record.
And in chapter 2 and verse 28, this is what Joel said:
"And it shall come to pass afterward that I will pour out
"my spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters
"shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams,
"your young men shall see visions,
"and also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days
"will I pour out my spirit.
"And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth,
"blood and fire and pillars of smoke.
"The sun shall be turned into darkness, the moon into blood,
"before the great and terrible day of the Lord come.
"And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call
"on the name of the Lord shall be delivered.
"For in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance,
"as the Lord has said, and in the remnant
whom the Lord shall call."
I would like to zoom in on the first part of this passage,
verse 28.
The prophecy is made that God would pour out His Spirit
upon all flesh and that the subsequent result of that
would be that young men and women would prophesy
in their particular fields and realms of authority,
and as you and I think about what Joel said,
we start asking the question, "Did God ever do what He said
He was going to do in the book of Joel 2:28?
Did He ever pour out His Spirit?"
Let's go now to the book of Matthew and notice John.
Here is John the Baptizer,
and John is the harbinger for the Lord.
He's preparing the way for Jesus,
and you'll recall that several came to his baptism
from around the area surrounding the Jordan.
They were baptized of him in water, confessing their sins.
And then in verse 11, John makes this statement.
He says, "I baptize you with water unto repentance,
"but [notice the contrasting word] He that cometh after me
"is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear.
He shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire."
And so many individuals over the years have come to this passage
of scripture and have suggested that this is what
you and I ought to desire.
How many of us have seen individuals on television
or at these tent meetings crying out to the Lord to baptize them
in the Holy Spirit and in fire?
And you remember on one occasion Jesus said,
"Ye know not what you ask"?
That's certainly the case with individuals who are begging
for the Lord to baptize them in fire,
because the baptism of fire that is under consideration here
in this passage is not a pleasant thing.
It is eternal punishment.
Jesus would be the administrator of this baptism of fire,
but he would also be the administrator
of Holy Spirit baptism, so we get a little
more information with each passing passage.
Joel says it's coming. It's going to come.
The time will come afterward.
"I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh."
And now here's John saying, "There's one coming after me
"who is going to overwhelm you or immerse you
or baptize you with the Holy Spirit."
And we now go to Jesus.
We've seen Joel, John. And what about Jesus?
Turn to Acts 1, and notice that in Acts 1,
Jesus Christ has risen from the dead.
He has spent some time on the earth,
about 40 days with individuals, speaking about things
pertaining to the kingdom of God.
And I want you to please pick up the reading with me in verse 2,
because this will become significant later on.
He says in verse 2 of Acts 1,
"...until the day in which He was taken up,
"after that He through the Holy Spirit had given commandments
"unto the apostles whom He had chosen. To whom,"
Vs. 3. Now who are we talking about? The apostles.
"He also showed Himself alive after His passion
by many infallible proofs, being seen of them."
That would include the apostles, and in this particular context,
it's talking about the apostles.
Vs 4, "Being assembled together with them commanded them
(that's the apostles) "that they should not depart
"from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father which,
saith He, ye have heard of Me."
There was a time they had heard Jesus say
a promise is coming to you.
And then, look at verse 5, please.
"For John truly baptized with water
(notice the element---water), "but ye"
(Who? You apostles.) "ye, shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit
not many days hence."
Now the apostles have a question,
but Jesus goes on to elaborate more about this time
of the Holy Spirit's outpouring.
Look at verse 8.
"You shall receive power, after the Holy Spirit is come
upon you, and then you'll be my witnesses."
And so we start asking the question.
Joel said the time was coming when God would pour His Spirit
out upon all flesh.
John the Baptizer said Jesus will be the one
who will administrate this outpouring.
And then we see Jesus Himself telling the apostles,
"I'm going to baptize you in the Holy Spirit."
It's you.
And in Acts 2, we read of these events
beginning to transpire, but wait just a minute.
Before we get there, go back to Luke 24 and notice that
in Luke 24, Jesus is getting ready to ascend into heaven.
He tells His apostles in Luke's account, verse 49:
"Behold, I send the promise of My Father upon you,
"but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem until ye be endued
"with" (notice) "with power"
(Where's this power going to come from?)
"from on high."
There would be a divine outpouring from on high.
It would be a powerful outpouring.
It would come upon the apostles in the city of Jerusalem,
and let's see if we can find out whether this transpired or not.
In Acts 2:1, we find that "when the day of Pentecost was come,
"they..." And that raises a question-Who?
And we go back, and we say, "All right,
who are we talking about here?"
And you know, there are some people who would tell you that
the "they" under consideration in Acts 2:1 refers
to the 120 who are mentioned in Acts 1:15.
But you know as well as I do from your English classes that,
when you find a pronoun, you want to connect it
to its nearest antecedent.
And the 120 in Acts 1:15 are not the nearest antecedent
of "they" in Acts 2:1.
The "they" of Acts 2:1 points us back somewhere,
and we don't have to go far.
And remember-when Luke wrote this document, he did not say,
"All right, I'm going to call this verse 1, verse 2,
verse 3, verse 4."
He wrote it as one, continuous, flowing document.
Later, for our convenience, some individuals divided it up
into chapters and verses.
Sometimes they did a good job, and other times they didn't.
But Luke wrote it down.
Picture this---here you are, and you're reading this epistle
and this book of Acts, and-look at verse 26 of Acts 1.
"They gave for their lots, and the lot fell upon Matthias,
"and he was numbered with the eleven apostles.
And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they..."
They who? The eleven apostles.
"were all with one accord in one place.
"And suddenly there came a sound from heaven
"as of a rushing, mighty wind.
"It filled all the house where they were sitting.
And there appeared unto them..."
That's the apostles.
There's been no change of transition here
to refer to anyone else.
"There appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire..."
Notice-"like" as of fire.
Some people confuse Matthew 3:11 -
"I will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire."
And because they see the word "fire" here in Acts 2, they say,
"Well that must be what Matthew 3:11 is talking about."
It is not.
These cloven tongues were "like" as of fire,
and you will observe that "they," that's the apostles,
"were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with
other languages or tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance."
Do you remember what Jesus said in Mark 9:1?
He said, "Some of you standing here will not taste of death
till you've seen the kingdom of God come with power."
What did He tell them in Luke 24:49?
"You go into the city of Jerusalem.
"You stay put, because there you're going to be endued
"with power from on high.
"And you shall receive power
after the Holy Spirit has come upon you."
You apostles.
And in Acts 2:5, they are in Jerusalem.
The apostles are there, and Joel saw it coming.
John saw it coming.
Jesus saw it was coming, said it was coming.
And in Acts 2, they saw it come.
The baptism of the Holy Spirit fell upon these apostles.
They were overwhelmed by the power of the Holy Spirit,
so much so that they could speak in languages
they had not formally studied.
And they were able to get the attention of the crowd,
and the crowd said, "These men are-what's going on here?"
Some of them said, "Well, they're just drunk."
Look in verse 14, please, of Acts 2.
"But Peter, standing up with the 120?" No.
"But Peter standing up with the 100?" No.
"But Peter, standing up with the 11 lifted up his voice,
"and he said unto them, 'You men of Judaea, all ye that dwell..."
Where? "at Jerusalem."
We're at the right place.
"be this known unto you and hearken to my words.
"These are not drunken as you suppose.
"It's 9:00 in the morning, as if someone would get drunk
"at that time, anyway.
"It's not right to get drunk any time of the day,
"but it's ludicrous for you to suggest that these people
"are drunk this early in the morning.
"That's not even logically possible,
much less scripturally relevant."
He says in verse 16, "But this is that which was
spoken by the prophet Joel."
And then Peter quotes what Joel had predicted in Joel 2:28-32.
And I would like to find the brother who said for
the first time what we preachers have repeated so many times.
It just works when an inspired writer says,
"'This is that' - that's that!'" Right?
You just can't improve upon the accuracy of understanding
when an inspired man says,
"This is that which Joel was talking about."
Then you know that Joel 2:28 is being fulfilled here in Acts 2.
The apostles are receiving this outpouring of the Holy Spirit,
and it is enabling them to verify to this crowd that
these Galileans must be representatives of God,
because they couldn't speak like this
if they were not God-given this ability.
If they didn't get this ability from God, they couldn't speak,
so we'd better listen to them.
And some heard and were convicted of the truth that
they were guilty of slaying the very Son of God,
so they said, "What shall we do?"
Peter said, "Repent and be baptized every one of you
in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins."
He told those 1st-century believers they would receive
the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Now I want you to consider with me, please,
a couple of items here.
In Acts chapter 2, and this has already been alluded to
by brother Colley last hour.
When someone received the baptism of the Holy Spirit,
when the apostles received it in Acts 2, what did it do to them?
They did not begin barking like dogs,
and I'm not trying to be blasphemous.
I'm just telling you-you may have even heard of some
of these individuals down in Florida who started saying
some years ago that when the Holy Spirit came over them,
they just couldn't help themselves.
They started barking like dogs and crawling around
on the floor like dogs.
And they started laughing uncontrollably.
Holy laughter given them by the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
They just started laughing, and they couldn't stop.
My friends, it's blasphemous to suggest that that lack
of dignity is anything like the dignified thing
we are reading about here.
Years ago, when I lived in Etowah, Tennessee,
I went to a tent meeting.
I was single, and had a lot of time on my hands,
more so, it seems like, than I do now
(and that's not just because I'm married.
My wife---I don't want to blame her for all of that.)
But, I was single, and I had an opportunity on a Tuesday night
to go to this tent meeting.
I thought, "I'm just going to observe.
I'm certainly not going to worship."
So I sat there, and I watched this man come out,
and he claimed that God had baptized him in the Holy Spirit
and that he had been given so many miraculous revelations
and this, that and the other.
He held up a bucket, and he said,
"Now, one of the revelations I've received as a result
"of the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
"God told me to make a "bucket," make a bucket
and to bring it here tonight."
And while he's saying this and music's playing
in the background, and it's playing in an up tempo.
I mean they're really getting into it.
And this man's over the microphone saying,
"God told me to tell you tonight when I got here
"that I am to pass this bucket around, and you are to throw
"your wallets and your purses into this bucket,
and it's for the ministry of the Lord."
I stood in amazement and watched as people did that very thing.
And then I stood and watched as a little four-year-old girl
(she couldn't have been any older than that)-she came up
and got in line with the others who were having the preacher
smack them in the forehead.
And there was one lady prior to this four-year-old girl,
after the preacher smacked her in the forehead,
she started twirling her arms around like an airplane getting
ready to take off and fell backwards and hit her mouth
on the corner of a wooden folding chair and was bleeding
into the sawdust and was not moving.
And I was a little concerned about her,
and I started trying to really pay attention to her.
And there was this guy next to me, and he says,
"Oh, don't worry about her. She's just slain in the spirit."
I was thinking, "I think she's just knocked cold, Buddy.
"I don't think she's slain in the spirit at all.
I don't think that has anything to do with it."
And then this four-year-old girl comes up,
just imitating Mommy and Daddy and others.
The preacher smacks her on the forehead,
and she starts shaking violently,
rolling around in the sawdust.
I couldn't take it anymore. I looked at this guy next to me.
He's clapping to the music while all of this is going on.
And I said, "Where do you get the authority for this?"
And he said, "Acts 2-haven't you read it?"
And I said, "Sir, I have read Acts 2 hundreds of times,
"and I have never read of anything in Acts 2
that even remotely resembles what I'm seeing here tonight."
And at this point, apparently the preacher observed that
one of his members was having a conversation with someone
that he didn't recognize.
And so the music came to a grinding halt,
and the preacher took the microphone
and put it very close to his mouth.
And he said, "Ladies and Gentlemen,
we have a seducing demon in our presence tonight."
I started looking around for where he might be,
suddenly realizing that he was talking about me!
And the music's now stopped.
And I said to him the same thing that I'd said to this gentleman.
I said, "Sir, where do you get the authority for this?"
And I quoted some verses of Scripture-and I kid you not.
The first words out of his mouth after I quoted
a few verses of Scripture.
He said, "Are you a member of the church of Christ?"
I had not even said that I was, but the passages that I had
mentioned, I guess, and the way in which I had preached them
or taught them convinced him that I was a member
of the Lord's church.
And I said, "Well, yes sir, I am a member
"of the church of Christ,
the one you read about in the New Testament."
And I used that old thing I'd heard since I was young,
growing up, that if he'd just follow me out to the cemetery,
he could try to raise a man from the dead,
and I'd tell him to stay put, and we'd see who won.
And I don't know if it was Brother G. K. Wallace
as to which one said that,
but I remember hearing it as a boy, and I thought,
"I'll use that on this occasion."
Well, this same man, this same man, when I said those things,
people started jeering.
And he said, basically, he said, "Don't, don't jeer this man.
Feel sorry for him."
He said, "The problem with you members of the church of Christ.
You've got the Bible, but you ain't got no Holy Spirit."
And last time I checked, the Bible is the sword
of the Spirit, right? (Ephesians 6:17).
And as long as I have this word dwelling in me richly,
I am filled with the Spirit
(Colossians 3:16; Ephesians 5:18, combined).
And I do not believe in any way, shape or form that
what I saw that night was anything like what happened on
the day of Pentecost. I know it wasn't.
One more thing the man said that just absolutely shows you
the ludicrous nature of these individuals.
He said during his sermon - if you want to call it a sermon -
he said, "Now we know from the Scriptures that
"John the Baptist was cross-eyed."
And he cocked his head, and he looked at those people,
and he said, 'You bunch of vipers,'
and this, that and the other.
And so afterwards I couldn't resist.
I said, "Sir, I would just like to ask you - you said we know
"from the Scriptures that John the Baptist was cross-eyed.
Would you show me that text? I've never seen that."
He says, "You just have to read more carefully."
Would you all do me a favor and go home
and read the New Testament as carefully as you can
and let me know if you run across that?
Brother Taylor reads the New Testament once a month,
and has for years.
Have you ever seen anything like that in the New Testament,
brother Taylor?
When a man departs from the word of God,
he can believe anything and claim that it is the Holy Spirit
revealing it to him, which, by the way, is one of the reasons
why it is deadly serious for brethren to come along
and suggest the Holy Spirit's nudging them to do
or believe certain things.
That gets into a realm, opens up a door,
of subjectivity you don't want to open up.
We want to thank B.J. Clarke for another wonderful lesson.
There has been a great deal of error taught
in the religious world about this topic.
The Baptism of the Holy Spirit as it is talked about
in the New Testament is not the same
as what the religious world claims it is.
Today, for some reason this baptism appeals
to people's fleshly desires, their fleshly selves,
they think it causes them to go in convulsions,
or make them shout out, or as BJ said,
to send out buckets into the audience
of well-intentioned but misguided people,
in order to pad these false teachers' pockets.
Folks, is that what the Holy Spirit intended when
he talks about the baptism of the Holy Spirit?
Brother Clarke has done a wonderful job
of setting the stage for us.
He has taught us about the many things that people claim
this "baptism" talks about.
He has shown us from his own life,
that the people in the denominational world,
truly have a misconception of what the Holy Spirit's Work is,
and indeed who the Holy Spirit is all-together.
What exactly did the Holy Spirit do?
Is not the Bible the word of God?
Isn't that what we learn?
Is it not the Sword of the Spirit?
Yes, Brother Clarke is right!
The Bible is the sword of the Spirit,
according to Ephesians 6:17.
And when we have this word dwelling in us richly,
we are filled with the Spirit - you learn that by reading
Colossians 3:16; and Ephesians 5:18.
What a wonderful lesson from God's Word.
What a powerful reminder it is to us,
that the Holy Spirit still directs us today,
by his Holy Word.
We've really only heard half of what BJ Clarke has to say
on this subject, and already we can put to rest
some of these false concepts about what the Holy Spirit's
job is and the ideas that the religious world
has been trying to teach us throughout the years.
If you come back next time, we will be sure that you that
you learn the truth as it is found in God's Word,
about this wonderful Bible subject -
the Baptism of the Holy Spirit.
Now I want to tell you which baptism will save you.
I want to walk you down the path,
that the Holy Spirit has laid out in His Word to show us all
how we are supposed to get to heaven.
The Scriptures are clear.
You remember, God is not the author of confusion.
He tells us what we should do to be saved and it's very simple.
A person, if he is to be saved, he must do these simple steps.
First, a person must believe that Jesus is the Son of God.
And Jesus says in John 3:16, "For God so loved the world,
"that he gave his only begotten Son,
"that whosoever believeth in him should not perish,
but have everlasting life."
And so we must believe that Jesus is the Son of God.
Secondly, the Holy Spirit wrote for us in Acts 2:37-38
that we need to repent of our sins.
You remember Peter stood before them that day.
He preached a long sermon, and they heard the sermon
and here was their reaction.
"Now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart,
"and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles,
"Men and brethren, what shall we do?
"Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized
"every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ
"for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive
the gift of the Holy Ghost."
So we need to then repent.
Thirdly, Romans 10:10 - Paul writes
by inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
"For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness;
and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation."
And so we must confess that Jesus is the son of God.
Then upon that confession, the Spirit teaches us that we are
to be baptized for the forgiveness of sins.
That is, in order to have our sins completely washed away.
Notice these words:
"And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world,"
(this is Jesus speaking) "Go ye into all the world,
"and preach the gospel to every creature.
"He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved;
but he that believeth not shall be damned." Mark 16:15-16
And that friend, is how you become a Member of the Church
for which Christ died.
The Holy Spirit has helped us,
has made it absolutely clear for us, and in his word,
if you expect to go to heaven, simply do these things.
Folks, we invite you to come back again
and join us next time as we continue to study
about God, specifically about the Holy Spirit of God.